Falling Into Life: A Gay Exmormon’s Journey

Chapter Five – Here’s the box, now get in!

I think the best analogy to use in describing what is was like being a Mormon is that of a pre-natal child attached to a life-long umbilical cord. Being born and raised a Mormon is much like never being born at all…

Spencer Kimball, a Mormon prophet stated that faithful Mormons should be, “In the world, but not of the world.” But the older I got, it was more like The Killers’ lyric, “And the sky is full of dreams, but you don’t know how to fly”. In their attempt to scare me about the terrors of this world and make sure I lived with my Heavenly Father again, they made me want to see what was really so scary in the first place. I began to see that I was being held back, not from evils that might impede me, but from living a genuine life, a truly human experience.

The Mormon Church is comprised of a set of very stringent rules that must be complied with if you are to reach the goal Heavenly Father has set for you. And that goal is given for everyone to follow, and it is an understanding that everyone has the potential to reach it. The goal is called Exaltation_© (think of it as “Personal Planet Ownership”), and reaching the goal of Exaltation is the highest glory a spirit born of Heavenly Father can achieve, because it will provide you with the highest level of love attainable.

Or maybe it just provides you with the highest level of crazy? For some, like me, all the stringent rules created an enclosure rather than freedom. It’s billed as a wonderful, loving belief that frees you from Satan’s snares. After 38 years I would have taken on Satan mano-a-mano, I’d have signed up for a wrestling match with the devil himself than have to try and live that structure another day of my life. It became a box that I couldn’t stay in any longer. I felt like a caged bird, staring through the bars at a big blue sky.

It’s difficult to live your life if you’re a Mormon, but the hard work will guarantee you happiness. They will convince you that those containments, that the box is good for you. The structure will guarantee your return to live with your Heavenly Father, and *that* is the highest goal anyone could ever want. Even if you don’t think it is. You have lost your true goal if you don’t understand that. Giving everything to the building up of the Kingdom of God_© is mandatory. You feel happy when you are engaged in the Lord’s Work_©. You cannot feel truly happy if you do anything else. And *no* deathbed repentance!

God or the Heavenly Father (HF) of this world reached that goal the same way we are striving for it now: God was a regular guy on a planet exactly like this one, with the same choices we have, and he succeeded in reaching the goal of Exaltation which allowed him to become a God and create the same scenario. It is the same plan having been rendered innumerable times previously, and will continue innumerous times after this plan is finished. Exaltation = Becoming a God.

It is important to understand that in Mormonism you can have direct communication with HF at all times, he hears you, and you are unique to him. Every spirit born to HF (also known as Elohim) via a Heavenly Mother (HM) is tasked with following Jesus Christ’s Plan of Salvation_© so that we can all attain Exaltation, or at least return to live with Him again.

Heavenly Father’s Plan_© is known by all Mormon leadership consisting of Twelve Apostles housed in Salt Lake City who commune with Jesus (also known as Jehova) frequently, and from there an intricate network of leaders all chosen and set aside to do God’s Will_© on earth. God’s Will is to make everyone Mormon, or to at least give everyone the chance to be Mormon.

The General Authorities or the “GA’s” are the reigning group of men who give all the dictates, revelations and requirements for your personal goal of exaltation. The GA’s are personally tasked with the spiritual well-being of all humans on the planet, regardless of what church you may subscribe or belong to, due to the fact that none of them are right and Mormonism is.

This is why Mormon missionaries never follow local customs or requirements, acting as if they are above the local societal regulations: no matter what you *think* is best, they have the truth and you better pay attention to them. No matter how *right* you *think* you are, you are wrong, period. They have a much softer way of convincing you of this, but if you ask them this, they must respond in accordance.

HF’s Plan is perfect, and therefore there’s no need to look any further, you have your path, it is sure, now all you have to do is complete it. The Gospel_©, which encompasses all Latter-day Saint beliefs and restored knowledge, is never-changing, always welcoming and always correct. All answers are known to all religious questions. If you have a question, and it doesn’t matter what the question is or how complicated it is, you *can* receive an answer either through your personal LDS leaders, or through prayer to HF.

In Mormonism, our Spirits were born in a place called the Pre-Existence, a heaven-like state where we lived in happiness with HF. We only had spirit bodies, but HF (and you find out the Heavenly Mothers) had perfected physical bodies as they had already lived a life like ours previously and reached the exaltation goal. So HF and the Heavenly Harem of HM’s produced a *lot* of spirit children, producing them much in the same fashion women have children here on earth. Adam and Eve were created in HF and HM’s images and child-baring abilities, so our functionality mirrors theirs exactly, whether it be spirit or physical children.

Upon examination then, there was not an “immaculate” birth of the baby Jesus in Mormonism. They believe that God the Father did indeed have sexual intercourse with Mary to produce the baby Jesus, with the Holy Ghost serving as Holy Lubricant to protect Mary from God’s fatal intensity. Therefore, God the Father passed on his deital DNA immortal blessing to Jesus by being both his spiritual *and* physical father. The only way for Jesus to die was to be sacrificed as Savior of the world.

In this Pre-Existence there was a *war*, yes, you heard right, A War in Heaven_©. Only Mormons could confuse and taint the concept of heaven with violence. Think about that for a minute: One of Mormonism’s key doctrines is called The War in Heaven. It boggles the mind entirely when you actually examine it! In a nutshell, here’s how we all ended up here on earth: HF wanted a plan on how we could have a physical body like his, so he asked for volunteers. Satan, Son of the Morning, HF’s 2^nd born son was a power hungry bad guy and came up with Plan #1 (Communism…bad). Jesus Christ, HF’s 1^st born son came up with Plan #2 (Democracy…good).

Everyone had to vote for one or the other. Those who voted Plan #1 chose correctly, those who voted for Plan #2 chose incorrectly. Strangely, of all those voting, 2/3 of “the hosts of heaven”, meaning all of God’s spirit children chose Plan #2, supposedly because Satan’s a smooth talker. So, the 1/3 who voted Plan #1 went about ridding the place of those who voted Plan #2. But where to put ‘em, those pesky Satan followers? Why cast them out to the earth, silly! They can get all pissed off because they chose Plan #2, and be forever angry and try to destroy all those who voted correctly.

Queue Amityville Horror soundtrack.

In the mean time, God created the earth, somewhere in that timeframe, in seven days, and away they were cast, Satan and all his Commie spirit children buddies. God then created Adam and Eve, Eve eats the “fruit of that tree”, and they start screwing like rabbits and voila! A planet relocation from Kolob to this solar system (there was a *physical* and a spiritual “fall”, the earth itself has a spirit and is a living being), and here we are, happy but continually plagued by pissed off never-born God-kids.

Now on to death. If you’re Mormon when you die you go to Spirit Paradise, if you’re not you go to Spirit Prison. Yeah, feel the love. You wait there for one of two things, more Mormon missionaries (they can give you a Get Out of Jail Free card if you accept the Gospel), or the Final Judgement. Then, depending on how we lived, we will be given a choice of three places to reside after we are judged, known as the Three Degrees of Glory, unless you “deny” the Holy Ghost (which I have done) and you end up in Outer Darkness_© with Charles Manson, Hitler, and myself.

Each of the three degrees (stolen from doctrine created by Emanuel Swedenborg) is considered a heaven-like state of blissful living. The Celestial Kingdom is the highest, The Terrestrial Kingdom is the middle one, and the Telestial Kingdom is the lowest. But the lowest is nothing to balk at, even the glory of the Telestial Kingdom is so great that we would be tempted to commit suicide to get there, as they say.

The “Deseret” is the symbol of Mormonism. It still emblazons all the freeway signs throughout the state and can be found all throughout Mormon lore. Brigham Young created the icon to represent our roles in the gospel: worker bees. That is your calling, to be a *drone*. You work your whole life for that end goal, your reward awaits you after you die. You dedicate your life to this gospel, you promise everything to this church, you are expected to work. They don’t hide that fact, it is clear in the promises you make, and you promise to give all your time.

That’s the box. All of the doctrine creates a box, and you need to get in it! You know all the rules, the *entire* deal, there are no unanswered steps to your entire existence, from spirit child inception to final glory. You are lost if you don’t do as you’re told. If you make a mistake and get disfellowshipped or excommunicated, you must try to get back into their graces and get back *in* the box. It is the one and only true religion on this planet, get in the box! They have all the answers, get in the box! The box is not wrong, the structure is perfect and never-changing, get in the box! The box will make you happy.

When you put your heart and soul into practicing Mormonsism, you are completely contained. Your diet is contained, your dress is contained (down to your underwear), your speech is contained, your reading materials are contained, your exposure to media is contained, your body is contained, your self expression is contained, and your thoughts are contained. Every single aspect of your life is contained.

You know what punishments await you if you get out of the box.

I remember when I was a kid, my oldest brother has a poster he had bought at BYU bookstore (mecca for my parents) or from the Deseret Bookstore. It had the Plan of Salvation in illustrated form. The “soups to nuts” plan in seventies style drawing. It started with the pre-existence, then to earth life, then to spirit paradise and on to the degrees of glory. On a poster. Around that same time that famous poster with Farah Faucet on it appeared in their room, too. Sex and salvation, baby.

Farah hung over my brother’s bed, she got pole position, if you will. The Plan over my brother’s desk. Farah didn’t last very long, she had a stacked bikini and she looked chilly. Around that time The Osmond’s album called The Plan showed up, too. The Osmond’s decided that they would write an entire album based on the Plan of Salvation. It had the picture of a ball of clay being shaped by a hand, no doubt God’s.

Then came Saturday’s Warrrior, a musical of gigantic popularity in Mormondom. Anytime I drove around my strange set of Mormon friends, they’d force me to abandon my music and play the Saturday’s Warrior Soundtrack, gawd I hated that thing. Nothing said “total loser” faster than that soundtrack. The phrase, “with glory trailing from their heels…” makes me want to vomit to this day. It references spirit children flying through the ether headed towards an awaiting physical body here on earth.

But that Plan of Salvation poster was really disturbing to me. Even at the young age of eight. It offended me! What I found almost frightening was the man on the poster having a severe lack of any meaningful life. It gave a drawing for each step of this poor sap’s life. But what was missing, what scared me was noticing that from age twenty to age seventy, he had nothing going on, literally. His “earthly life” flew by as if nothing of note even occurred. I translated that to mean that the bulk of our lives have no meaning whatsoever. You are simply a drone. You work away your life until the good stuff comes.

This couldn’t be more apparently true than attending a Mormon funeral. Mormons dedicate fifteen minutes or less to the dead person before they *launch* into a rousing church service with assigned talks and testimonies aplenty. If it wasn’t the casket at the front of the chapel, you might suddenly forget it was a funeral at all and assume it was just a typical boring Mormon meeting. No one gets up to “celebrate” the deceased and to say kind things about them. No heartfelt poems, no music besides hymns. No participation in the life of a person who may have had tremendous value to you. Nothing personal.

As a matter of fact, you wonder quickly what even happened to the life of the dead person because they’re so quick to forget he/she even existed before they bludgeon you over the head with doctrinal speeches dedicated to the saving of those still living. It’s also apropos for Mormon’s to use that moment to *guilt* the hell out of you depending on your state of belief in the box. The brother of a close friend of mine died in a tragic pool accident. By the time I got him on the phone to give him my condolences the entire family was fine with it, after all, they’d all see him soon enough, what was there to grieve?

My mom’s funeral occurred after I had left the church, she died at a time when we were not speaking. She had made it clear before she died that God did not “approve of my lifestyle”. Her funeral was just the same as all of them. Her life story was told in 15 minutes, and then on to the church service where I would be addressed several times in an effort to either guilt or welcome. After my younger brother told the audience that while he was preparing for his talk he had received much inspiration while “in the shower”, as he often did. I looked over at my cousin and made a quick hand movement that indicated the kind of “inspiration” most men typically receive whilst in the shower.

A few days before the funeral, while she was being “prepared” for burial, she was dressed in her temple clothing and placed for a family viewing in her casket. It was made of metal, and looked particularly cold to me. As I approached her, my sister and my sisters-in-law were crowded around the casket. They were all quietly saying how beautiful she looked. I saw my mom wrapped from head to toe in temple clothing, which is odd and only reminded me that her whole life, from birth to death, was framed in a religion that made her crazy. I didn’t think it was beautiful at all, it made me sick. There she was, my mom, in a box.

She did as she was told in life and in death: She got in the box.

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