About - wasmormon.org

Mission

Destigmatize those who leave the mormon church by providing a platform for anyone to tell their own story. Promote post-mormons as “normal” as well as provide a collection of honest answers to some tough mormon questions and de-demonize doubt. Foster healthy (and respectful) conversations about hard things within communities and families.

Wait, what is this site?

Remember the old mormon.org website? Before we were told that the term mormon was a victory for satan, there was a website about what it was to be a mormon. It allowed verified members to add a profile that basically bore their testimony of the church. It had a catalog of questions to answer and I thought it was pretty interesting to have a website set up to let people share their beliefs and faith. I even set up a profile. The church showcased and presented member stories, even if they were the sanitized faith-promoting versions. Fast-forward to today, when the website is no longer online and all those profiles have been removed. The site changing made me consider what if there was a place where we could actually share our beliefs and answer common questions. Somewhere unfiltered and uncensored (though we aim to keep it PG). So since we’re discouraged from saying mormon anymore #victoryforsatan, I registered the domain and created wasmormon.org. Hopefully it’s truthful enough and toungue-in-cheek enough to be informative and thoughtful yet playful. Though it I’m sure will have a slant away from active, believing members, I hope the term wasmormon can be inclusive of all those who were mormon. Including post-mormons, ex-mormons and [insert any mormon labels here] alike: ex, post, progressive, liberal, middle-way, new order, fundamental, unorthodox, conservative, inactive, less-active, big tent, anti, ex-ed, etc. If you think about it, even active, TBM, card-carrying members could be called wasmormons since The church is distancing itself from the term mormon altogether.

What is this site for?

This site is set up for you to tell your own “mormon story”. I’ve found it therapeutic to write my own story down, it has helped me process all that comes along with a deconversion. So, this site is a place to encourage others to do the same. This site is for users to share where they are with mormonism, have you left, are you still in the pew, have you been marginalized or removed? Create a profile to tell your story.

What Is a Profile?

A profile is your opportunity to share your beliefs and experiences in the gospel with others. Creating a profile is easy and the site will walk you through the steps of creating your own, uploading your photo, writing about yourself, and selecting relevant topics about the church that will help others better understand your story.

Share your own story to process your own journey and help others cope with their own transition. It’s easy to register and share your story, no matter how small.

Why Should I Create a Profile?

The old mormon.org website was a missionary tool intended to provide sanitized information about the faith. This site however, is a place for honesty and integrity and is built for you. Tell your own story, there are a few prompts but otherwise, we try to get out of the way so you can tell your story. You own your story and you’ll get to tell it in your own words. You can also choose to be included in the directory where anyone can read your story to understand where and how you fit (or don’t) into this mormon culture. We each have a right to tell our own story, and if we don’t the church will. Each story can help the believers understand friends and family who have left, and also help give others who have left a real sense belonging which helps during a crisis of faith.

How Do I Get Started?

Create an account with an email address and then create your own profile. This site is secured with bank level security and will never share or sell your information. You will not need to create or connect in any way to an LDS Account, thankfully this site is not affiliated with the official cojcolds. Register or sign in to get started.

I don’t know where to even start with writing my story, what do I do?

Your profile is set up so that you can start wherever you can and always come back to it later. Add to it or even remove things that have since changed. There are some questions you can choose to answer that may guide you in your telling. The site will continually be updated with more questions and you can even add your own questions to answer on your profile which will be added to the system so anyone can then answer them. Start small if you wish, add your background and only list a few high level things you have struggled with.

What are those profile questions?

When creating a profile there is an option to answer questions. There are many questions to answer, and you can also add your own questions. Also, to share the interesting answers to the questions there is a catalog of honest answers to each question to allow visitors to read the aggregation of answers per question. Here are the answered questions thus far.

What will people say about me?

Not much actually, there are no comments on the site so you have the floor on your profile. This site is more for stories, not conversations or trolls. Please refer to our community guidelines and code of conduct.

I’m not receiving a sign-up verification email

Please check your spam folder, and add yo[at]wasmormon.org to your contact list. Also, check that you’ve correctly input your email address. You could request a password reset by clicking the lost password link on the login form. If you are having trouble signing up, please contact us at yo[at]wasmormon.org and we’ll do our best to sort everything out with you.

Can I share my profile online?

Yes, it is created so that you have a shareable url unique to your username. Share it with others so they can better know your story. It’s a great way to introduce yourself online to others so that they know where you are coming from. It could also be useful to send to friends who have questions about where you are.

Do you have any other resources to help me?

Yes, there is a resources page with tools to help those in a faith crisis. Please send any links that you think should be included via the contact page.

Is this site secure?

Yes, this site is using secure https. It is built using a secure system called WordPress as well as additional security features. Remember, your login is only as secure as your password. Please don’t put any private information into your profile that you don’t want online.

What happens to my profile information?

Your information is displayed on your own profile page and (if you wish) a link to your profile is included on the directory page. There are options to display your profile publicly or privately to only display your profile to other users with accounts so it will not be public or accessible by search engines. Profiles that allow, may also receive a spotlight post on the wasmormon blog and social media.

What does it cost?

Creating an account and a profile is free for you. This will always be free.

I have purchased a domain name and web hosting to run the site, so far it’s something I’m willing to pay, but if it becomes a burden, I may ask for small donations on the site. Some have asked so I’ve made a donation page if you really want to help fund this website and its mission. I believe in the mission of this site, so I am willing to pay some out-of-pocket expenses for general upkeep. I’m never going to place ads or attempt to profit from traffic or users on this site in any way. I will not share or sell any user information.

Can I edit my profile once it is published?

Yes, you can login and edit your profile at any time. Rest assured you can even remove or hide your profile entirely from the site, if you want to completely delete it just let us know via the contact form.

Will I receive any spam?

No spam. Your email is only used to create your account and is not displayed anywhere on the website and you’re not added to any external mailing lists that will send you email other than the automated notifications and password reset emails related to managing your account. There is a newsletter subscription where you can receive a periodic digest message announcing new profiles or news. Please refer to our privacy policy for any other questions about your private data.

What if I’m still a member of the church?

Congratulations on staying in the pew. To each his own. You can tell a faithful story here if you wish too. This is not meant to exclude faithful it believing members of the church. Technically any member of the church was a Mormon, right? If we were still Mormon, Satan would be winning!

Can I create a profile for someone else?

We ask that you only speak for yourself. You may feel inclined to create an account using a pseudonym or omit a photo, that is fine. But we ask users to refrain from setting up a profile for or posing as someone else: someone current (Donald Trump or Dallin H Oaks) or a historical figure (ie Helen Kimball, Fanny Alger, or Emma Smith). Even though many historical figures deserve a profile (like William Law, John Bennett, Thomas Marsh, Symonds Ryder, Oliver Cowdery, etc), let’s please stick to telling our own stories. If you want to say something about anyone else, please consider writing a post for the site that can discuss a quote or discussion about a current or historic person of interest in Mormonism.

What’s with the imported profiles?

There are some other sites that allow individuals to tell their own stories and in some cases, these have been imported from the other site to preserve them and for the sake of posterity. Some of these sites are exmormon.org, exmormonscholarstestify.org, reddit, wherewillyougo.org, and postmormon.org. If you know of any others please let us know and we’ll see what we can do about importing them too. The goal is to have a huge collection of exit stories in one place that are indexed, easy to find, and safe.

With each imported story here, either the individual, forum owner, or site owner where it was posted gave permission to import it, and/or attribution has been given. However, if you wish a story to be removed please let us know and we’ll do so. Also, if you wish to claim your story and update it or add a selfie, let us know an email address and we’ll create a user account to manage the profile.

Are there any community guidelines?

Yes. Keep it civil, aka don’t be a jerk. No hate messages or trolling. Be respectful and decent to others. Please refer to our community guidelines and code of conduct. If a profile is not following these guidelines, the contributor will be notified and asked to correct the infraction. The profile will likely be removed or hidden in the meantime. Please report any issues on the contact page.

Why was Mormon?

A few reasons, the main one being the domain was available. This site is modeled after the original mormon.org website where the church encouraged members to create profiles and they spent millions of dollars advertising the Mormon church. That was, of course, before the nickname became a victory for Satan. The ex-Mormon and even post-Mormon labels are viewed as scary and offensive (and they both already had sites associated with them – though somewhat defunct). When the church moved away from the Mormon term, it became a thing of the past (at least for now) and even the church was Mormon. It’s a simple non-judgemental way of stating what we were. Before I was an adult, I was a child. Before I understood, I was ignorant. Before my shelf broke, I was Mormon. It’s a statement of fact that hopefully helps to fulfill the site’s mission of destigmatizing even being an ex-Mormon.

Are you connected with the official church?

Ha ha, nope. wasmormon is not affiliated or in cahoots with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints or the Corporation of the Presiding Bishop of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints or any part of it. I have yet to receive a cease and desist order or anything of the like. This is a website and anything I’ve written here are my own words (except for what others have written on their own profile or blog posts). I speak as an individual telling my own story, but also many facts (mingled with opinions). I don’t mean to offend anyone and if anything I’ve written has, please accept my apology and let me know what it was so I may take more care in how I express myself. This site is wasmormon.org. The official position of The church is to avoid using the term mormon. It’s a victory for satan. They don’t want to be called mormon anymore anyways, so I’m usiung wasmormon to distinguish this site.

Who made this site? and why?

Me. To help process my own faith transition I wanted to write down my story. I thought it could be nice to share it online as well. I’m also a website developer, so I’m always building websites (some say I even obsess over building websites). I had the idea to build a site where I could share my story and it grew into allowing anyone to share their own mormon story too. After thinking about it, I realized I already knew how to build it and valued the idea enough to do it. A few weeks later I had it up and running! Then I invited some to contribute and started writing blog posts to dive deeper into a few topics. I am happy it has helped a few share their story. One of the first people I shared it with was Bill Reel – he created his own profile and said “Wouldn’t it be awesome if there were 100,000 profiles on here”.

Join in, let me know if you have any ideas on how to make this site better, more appealing, or useful, or if you’re interested in contributing blog posts.

What’s with the blog?

I’ve added the blog to the site as a place to post and organize thoughts regarding a faith transition and various shelf breakers. The content centers around quotes from leaders, exploring a topic in church history or doctrine, analogies for faith transitions, comments on current events or simply site updates. Are you interested in contributing? We’re completely open to that, this is a platform to give people a place to share their stories and thoughts. When creating a profile look into the profile settings and mark that you’re interested in contributing and we’ll send you information. Otherwise, just contact us and mention you want to submit posts and we’ll fill you in on the details.

A few site members have contributed posts and you can either find them mixed into the blog, or listed on their individual profile page.

Love it! How Can I Help?

The best way to help is to contribute your own story. We understand that some are not prepared or in a position to do this publicly at this time. If you want to contribute in other ways, we have a How to Help page that details a few ideas: donate, add your profile, share profiles, share media from the site, follow on social media, and even contribute blog posts.

A Note To Family and Friends

We would like to share this message with active and/or believing mormon family and friends. We know that many of you might be confused about our choice to leave the church. We don’t blame you if feel this way. There was a time when we didn’t understand why anyone would step away from the church. We couldn’t imagine being in the place we are now.

Here’s what we would like you to know:

No one offended us. We love you every bit as much as we always have!
We no longer believe in the truth claims of the church and we no longer trust the church as an institution; however, we still see much good within Mormonism.
If you love the church and you feel it helps you to be a better person, we respect your choice to stay fully active. It is not our intent to get you to change your mind.
We don’t need to be rescued! There were aspects of our faith transition that were extremely painful, but we have worked through them. We have peace.
If you have questions for us, we are completely open to talking about anything. If you know someone who has left the church and you want to know how you might approach them, we may be a good resource for you.
We hope that you might find a way to understand that the church may not be a safe place for everyone and that some people leave the church because they are following their conscience.

We have made the choice that is right for us.

This website exists because we understand the challenges the post-mormon community faces and we aim to help alleviate some of these challenges. We hope those transitioning out of the church to become the best new version of themselves and maintain healthy relationships with those still active at church. We will forever be grateful for our journey through mormonism and for all the good things we learned as active members even if we simultaneously recognize things we may have learned or experienced that were not as good or even harmful. In the place we are now, we believe in the power of love more than ever before.