Tim Was a Mormon, an Ex-Mormon Profile Spotlight

In Germany, Tim was raised in an atheist family but was intrigued by the church. He met with missionaries and wanted to get baptized at 16 years old. At this age, he needed parental permission, which they did not give but he continued to investigate the church for two more years. He was baptized right after his birthday. During this time he was also in denial about his own sexuality, but he ignored it as he did with any other church issues he was confronted with. He’d been converted and relied on his own testimony of the truthfulness of the church.

Then he began to explore his sexuality and confirmed that he was gay. He hid this from the members of the church out of fear but was still given a prestigious calling in the Elder’s Quorum. This destroyed his faith in priesthood discernment since he knew he was not worthy of the calling, and soon his testimony of everything else was crumbling too. This was devastating and on top of that, the members were no help and blamed him for reading “Anti-Mormon” lies. Tim couldn’t ignore the lies and damage the church does (and still can’t). He is glad to know the truth, though painful, because it is better than living “a life full of ignorance and lies”.

I am from Germany. I started to hang around with the missionaries and talked with them for hours about the Church and its doctrine. I wanted to get baptized at 16 but I needed to ask my mother for her agreement. She said no – I got baptized 5 days after my 18th birthday. I never had doubts. I was a very firm, strong and conservative Member withour looking left or right. I fully believed in everything the Church teaches. I joined Mormonism, ignoring that I am Gay. I was a Mormon.

I somehow always knew that I am gay. But because I got in touch with the Church I thought that this is a sin and that I need to repent. So I started to hide it and tried so ignore my feelings for other guys. Also in my time of investigating the Church for almost two years I got in touch with problematic topics and all the criticism against the Church. But I did exactly the same; I ignored it and often said that these things are all made up to harm the Church.

But I met a boy. We had a wonderful time. I felt that this is what I always really wanted. This relationship between two boys, is nothing sinful or bad. But I was hiding it, because I was scared that the members would start to hate me. That they would start trying to make me straight and that they would tell me that I am a dirty sinner. I came to the conclusion that denying the love of human beings is the worst thing someone could do.

In the time where did “sinful things” in the eyes of the Church, I got my calling in the Elder’s Quorum. From that point I, knew that all this is nothing about inspiration, but just how you look on the outside. I wondered; Is it really that easy to deceive God, or is it just deceiving men? I lost my testimoy of the Priesthood.

I felt so sad, angry and disappointed at the same time. I cried for hours. Did I really just wasted 3 years of my life? Did I really believed in something, that is full of lies and intrigue? And yes, I did. And this understanding hurt me so deep. My Faith was a house of cards wich floor by floor, slowly collapsed with every new TRUE thing I learned about the Church.

All the members I talked to, didn’t really care about my concerns and doubts. They simply said I should not read ‘Anti-Mormon’ literature and that I should ignore these things. But I cannot ignore facts and science. I cannot ignore how the Church treats members of the LGBTQ Community. And I can and will not ever ignore and be silent about the hundreds of lies, the leaders of the Church tell it’s members.

Now I know the truth. And we all know that the truth sometimes hurts. But the truth is way better than a life full of ignorance and lies.

Tim

Read Tim’s full I was a Mormon story at https://wasmormon.org/profile/timwachter/