In 2006 I began regularly post on the R&P. At the time, I was aware of anti-Mormon trash, but overall really just didn’t care about it. When I began my journey into apologetics, I taped my favorite passage of scripture to my screens and walls around where I used my computers. I wanted to be aware of the impression I gave people as a Christ follower (yes a Mormon) and that I strive always to bring glory to His name, not shame. So when people became really horrible, I would breathe, pray, read my verse, and if needed – walkaway for a bit to meditate on God’s great love for me AND that horrible person whoever it was.
Over the course of the last couple of years, I’ve slowly lost that patience – even though I really want to be patient like that with people, the more I see of people in RELIGION the more disgusted and frustrated I become. I can totally see why there are so many loose canon Christians or people who don’t even want to come to church of any kind, out there.
What was entirely unexpected was that a poster named TerroRista and I became fast and close friends. We would talk for hours at times about Jesus, God, the Bible, and daily application. What surprised her was that I genuinely loved my Savior. I learned later that this really surprised a lot of Christians who had generally false ideas about Mormonism and the Mormon people. They realized the Gospel – the good news of a Savior and redemption, was something that I not only understood and but something I had totally engraved into my heart. Something that was just as precious to me, a Mormon, as it was to them, Mainstream Christians.
When I left the LDS church, I was in a whole lot of confusion – why on Earth would God pull me out of the Church I loved so dearly? Why to a church that was so foreign and loud and irreverent in worship and praise and in everything? Why a Trinity believing church? Why Evangelicals of all the groups? Why? Why? Why?
My journey both makes me appreciate what I’ve learned from personal experience – the kindness and loving nature of Protestant Christians in such an extremly different environment than what I would have found acceptable for me. And shortly before I “came out” so to speak about my desire to rejoin the LDS church, my friend TerroRista came out that she was returning to Catholicism. Which, is another heated apologetic debate – is Catholicism a Christian church and are Catholics Christians? I love Barbie to death, but I’ll be the first admit that I’m not comfortable with everything, but for me – unity with her and with a sister in Christ, is more important to ME than being in any way a voice of any kind of dissent to her. I see things that I disagree with as preferences and unimportant in the great scheme of things. Salvation issues have not changed for her, but rich traditions of church fathers have.
What I’ve loved about her journey (and mine) is that we’ve both been very humbled. Save for my Sunday night small group, my outlook on Mainstream Christians was just appalling. I just couldn’t stomach the doctrine or the sickening pride that it seemed to breed in people. “I’m right, you fail. Have fun in hell.”
With her journey into Catholicism and her rejection from close friends because she’s now the dark they – the light – cannot mingle with, has really brought her a new level of empathy, compassion, respect, and humility for other faiths. This is something she will readily admit, she always struggled a bit with.
This heavily contrasts with the breeding of Mainstream Christian apologetists. Which in turn breeds so much frustration in me as someone who isn’t concerned anymore with Mormon, Christian, Catholic – just someone who loves Christ and wants to follow Him. Someone who wants to cling to Him during a storm, when everything is going wrong and I just need a good cry. Someone who looks to His example of how I should live as His disciple.
I am SICK of people. I am SICK of apologetists and their semantics. “I told you what the Bible said, deal with it.” Apologists aren’t telling people what the Bible says, it’s telling people what THEY think the Bible says. The Bible didn’t stand up, grab some Starbucks and start chatting with them. I am SICK of churches, I am SICK of the pride that Christianity seems to breed in people. I am just SICK SICK SICK with it all. If I could up and move to the woods and live there and just worship God without any church affiliation, I think I’d be completely fulfilled.
The utter lack of humility in Christianity is driving me insane. Christ was a humble servant who taught by example, who washed the feet of His disciples while they bickered – yet MCs always seem to be bickering about SOMETHING. They can never seem to just agree to disagree.
On the one hand I totally desire to be in fellowship with others who love their Savior and at the same time, I cannot get far enough away. On a recent blog, TerroRista posted some pics of how Catholic leaders and followers look more humble than Protestant ones. I have to say, that for me – the following image is the most humble MODERN day visual of humility and service.
Hopefully this is enough ranting for now. 
). Therefore, for me, it’s not like God was chilling out in heaven, sipping a Virgin Daqueri with a pink little umbrella when suddenly Adam and Eve ate the fruit and He was shocked. Oh so shocked. “Well, what the hey do I do now? Shoot, they messed everything up…” Of course, perhaps the omniscent viewing time outside of time, just might be another assumption of the Bible. Grrr – now I’ve gotta keep a better list of all the assumptions I’ve heard the Bible makes – just alone about God’s nature it’s adding up. Warning – don’t read that blog, it’ll be horribly long. 
