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| A confused person. |
Since getting back from my mission and especially since coming back to BYU and studying engineering, I've tried to consider myself a science-oriented, rationally thinking human being. As a result I've become a bit more skeptical. This is also somewhat left over from my mission, during which I had many, many heated conversations with non-members about religious things, where all my beliefs were closely examined and called into question. I have questions about lots of different things, like evolution, homosexuality, feminism, polygamy, faith and reason, and so forth. Since none of these are typical sacrament meeting or Sunday school topics, I've tried to do some investigating on my own. For example, I read most of a book called Evolution vs. Creationism: an Introduction over the summer. That helped broaden my perspective quite a bit, and I feel more comfortable with the idea of God using the process of evolution to effect what may have been described figuratively to Moses as the Creation. However, none of the ideas I encountered in the book or in subsequent searching are definitely or obviously the correct, final answer to this or any other of my questions.
Since I don’t have a ton of time to investigate all these questions I have, and I’m also not quite sure where to start, I started feeling a bit frustrated when I heard several times in the space of a couple weeks (in sacrament meeting and then in general conference) Church leaders saying things along the lines of: “There are some people that doubt and question their faith and fall off the boat of faith and spiritually drown. This is sad. If only they were more righteous. But we welcome honest questioning, as in, when people listen to us and stop asking ‘why’.” Okay, I exaggerated that a bit, but only to demonstrate that I was feeling a bit bitter. I felt bitter because I kept hearing Church leaders say “please! Ask us honest questions!” but not seeing them actually provide any opportunities to do so.
I’m in an elders quorum presidency, and sometimes in our meetings, our elders quorum president asks how we can help people that were mentioned in the ward council as having special concerns like feeling lonely or having doubts about the Church. I remember thinking that if they knew that I was feeling lonely (this was a couple weeks ago, that is, a couple weeks closer in time to when I broke up with my now ex-girlfriend) and that I had questions and doubts about the Church, they would focus on me in ward council and then I would finally get the help I needed. (The bitterness just goes on and on.) In other words, I wondered why I wasn't receiving active help from the Church organization. I felt like people just assumed that since I am an RM, and have a calling, and come to Church and to ward activities, that I am doing completely peachy and the biggest problems I have are choosing which of my many adoring female fans to marry, which of the adoring law schools to attend, and which of my adoring non-member friends to baptize.
While I was wallowing in self-pity and thinking about how awful my life is, I started writing down my thoughts into a furious rant. I complained that the Church leaders say they want to answer questions, but never give us any chances to do so. I was even going through all the existing venues where a member could possibly ask a question (such as in sacrament meeting or Sunday school) and systematically tearing to shreds the possibility of anyone hypothetically getting a personal, satisfying answer to their question. And I was really doing a great job at it too, until I got hung up trying to prove that home teaching was a terrible place to ask personal questions.
I tried to prove that because I felt, as of then, uncomfortable when I thought about asking my questions to my home teachers. I suppose that was because as of then we had only had superficial conversations since they had only visited me once and just given the standard home teachers' 5-minute vague summary of that month's Ensign's 1st Presidency message and left. But then I was thinking of how nice it would be to have my own little highly dedicated missionaries to research my questions for me, and I remembered that quote in PMG which says “Home teaching is just missionary work to the members of the Church!” So I realized I was wrong, and after that, the only way I could think of proving that I couldn’t ask questions in home teaching was that my home teachers are just stupid. Unfortunately, they’re not. So after seething a bit more because my frustration and feelings of being the victim weren't completely justified, I was convicted by my conscience, and by the lack of initiative I had taken in actually asking my questions in Church or making it known to anyone other than my journal readers (who are, as far as I’m aware, nonexistent) that I had questions and doubts about the Church, so I decided to ask one of my questions to my home teachers.
It turned out pretty well. Today was the last Sunday of the month, so everyone did their home teaching (myself included) and when my home teachers came over, right at the end of the visit, when they asked me if they could do anything to help me out, I surprised them with a doctrinal question. I said something like this: in science, critical thinking is king. Scientists value questioning the prevailing theories, running experiments, and then adjusting the theories to match the truth that they see in nature. However, in the Church it seems like the opposite. We are taught the truth and told to accept it, and then leaders and missionaries are trained to help people kind of “get over” their critical thinking and logical concerns with the Church, by focusing on growing their faith instead. So how come we focus on faith in the church instead of on critical thinking?
Before I write a bit about their responses, let me just say that if any of you have thoughts about how to answer this question, and time to tell me about it, I’d be happy to hear it in the comments below.
My first home teacher responded by talking about how faith is necessary because we can’t truly know or prove doctrinal things. He shared an experience from when he was at the Conference Center and he felt the Spirit strongly right at the moment when President Monson walked through the door, and how this was such a strong confirmation for him that he hasn’t really had reason to doubt his testimony of the Prophet since then. He also talked about small little experiences he’s had, which are hard to remember the details of, but this resonated with me because I can think of lots of times when a good thing has happened and I have felt like maybe that was arranged by God to help me out, because it sure did make my life easier. My second home teacher responded by talking about repentance and his experience with feeling his sins wiped away, and how this is hard to explain psychologically. (He’s a psychology major.) This also resonated with me because I also remember having good, clean feelings when I’ve repented in the past.
I felt quite a bit more satisfied after asking my question and having a decent discussion about it. And it’s not even that my home teachers had extraordinary or mind-blowingly enlightening answers, but the fact that I just got the question off my chest and that they had any answer to it at all.
A couple hours later, my home teaching companion and I went to visit our home teachee who I respect a lot. He’s a super smart Physics major and I've always assumed that he was the perfect Church member with 100% enthusiasm and no questions. For some crazy coincidence, he took the chance today during our home teaching visit with him to candidly express a concern about not receiving revelation as strongly as he did on his mission. It kind of morphed into a discussion about knowing the Church is true in general, and we had a good talk, about doubts and questions and faith. I felt like we could relate really well and I was super happy to be talking to another person that also loves science and critical thinking, and is strong in the Church, yet has similar doubts and concerns to mine.
Anyways. Today I had a great experience, and the moral of the story is, when active members of the Church have serious doubts or questions about the Church, home teaching is actually a good place to start asking these questions.
Questions for you:
1. Have you expressed personal concerns in an official Church situation? If so, how did it go?
2. How do you think the Church could help active members discuss legitimate questions?
I had a really articulate response written out, but then, as web pages are wont to do, it was deleted as I hit submit. I'm just going to sum up what I think was a really important part of it: you should take an institute class from Brother Bartholomew at the Orem/UVU institute. It is an ideal place for asking these questions.
ReplyDeleteHey Jan! First of all, I want to say that I think you're a cool dude and it's pretty cool that you're openly asking for people's thoughts on this. My suggestions on this post are so cliche that I almost left this page without commenting or giving it a second thought. Actually I did, but then I came back. It would be selfish of me not to share what has worked so well for me just because I thought the methods were "cliche" or "cop-outs." My first suggestion for finding answers is to open the scriptures. I know, I know. There have been three different instances during the past two years where I've had big questions. They weren't doctrinal questions so much as "what should I do with my life" questions, but I think the principle works for any type of question. In any event, regardless of whether or not I had been regularly studying my scriptures at each period when I had these questions, if I said a sincere prayer asking to be guided to the answers and kept a notebook nearby to write them down, then without fail, the first page I would open up to would answer my question. And these weren't questions like, "How can I be happy?" And the answer was, "Keep the commandments." They were specific questions and the answers I got were extremely specific and personal, so much so that each only appears at one place in the scriptures. So basically, definitely not coincidences. So try that one out! I'm not the type of person who likes to ask questions to other people, so it's nice to know that if I just want to hash a question out with myself (and the Lord), I can still get the answers I'm looking for. The other option I would suggest would be to go to the temple. Whether in the celestial room or sitting on the grounds outside, my mind's always a lot clearer to receive answers at the temple. I hope these suggestions help and don't just make me sound like your mom or something! Haha. Who am I kidding. Moms are great anyway :)
ReplyDeleteThe title of your blog post caught my attention, as recently I’ve had a number of conversations about this very subject with a woman that I (unsurprisingly) visit teach. She has a PhD in Mechanical Engineering and is a lifelong member with a lot of questions. Given that everyone she has talked to about her concerns has been either a home teacher or a visiting teacher, I think your observation that the home (and visiting) teaching “infrastructure” facilitates these sorts of honest discussions is a good one. In fact, I’d even venture to say it’s part of the reason such an infrastructure is in place.
ReplyDeleteI have a great many thoughts on this subject and not enough time to write them all down. But ask me some time about things I’ve learned in regards to “knowers” and “seekers”. It’s one of the ways I’ve been able to reconcile a rational but faith-based approach to asking questions, and touches on why some people are disinclined to ask, answer, or even hear those questions. I also have a lot of thoughts on the emphasis we place on faith, how exercising our faith simultaneously requires that we exercise our agency, and how both are fundamental to our mortal existence. Sometimes (read: rarely) I even write blog posts. That one includes a shout out to your dad.
Jan, I was thinking of something somewhat similar just this last week.
ReplyDeleteI was thinking about how popular culture views "science" compared to how I view it and how and why our views differ.
Here is my theory:
The set of all scientifically provable hypotheses is a strict subset of all truth. I posit that there are truths, some of which may be very fundamental, which are not discernible by the scientific method. That is, of all the infinite un-falsifiable ideas, surely some of them are true, and even though science can't tell us which are and which aren't. Probably, most people agree with this, and it naturally leads one to question: what should be done about truths that can't be proven by science?
It's my answer to this question that I think makes my views different and that makes the church stress faith on matters that critical thinking may fail. Kind of like your first home teacher said, the answer I give is that the Holy Spirit that can testify of the truth of all things.
Also, how in the world do you have a post from 1992??
Also, I am jealous of your self-discipline in keeping a blog.
I appreciate this post, and in my experience with questions like yours I find myself talking to my dad, and at the time when I had a lot of questions that confused me he was my bishop, and I think it's safe to say that you can can talk to your bishop having an open discussion about your concerns and that will help, but having said that and having the experience of my dad specifically as my bishop, I feel it's important that in asking yourself questions about what you believe and finding the answers to those questions, like Laura said, through the scriptures and prayer. And having someone there with you who is able to help you in a revelatory capacity can help guide your conversation and scripture search to a place of understanding.
ReplyDelete