how we kick (and keep) people out of the lds church

I've been talking for a while about how the Church marginalizes those who don't subscribe to a worldview that lines up with conservatism, but now I have some hard numbers to back me up, and they're pretty remarkable.

The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life reports that of the Mormons in the U.S. who attend church at least once a week, 73% are Republican. Of those who attend less than once a week, only 39% are Republican. That's more than 30 percentage points. Of Mormons who attend church less than once a week, 24% believe that military strength is a better way than diplomacy to ensure peace. The number almost doubles to 41% among those who attend at least once a week.

There are many likely explanations for this disparity, but my explanation is that conservative active Mormons send messages to those whose opinions differ that let them know they are not welcome. In this post, I intend to illustrate just how they send those messages.

The first way is Mormons' appearance. Walk into an LDS chapel and you will see--90% of the time--clean-cut, middle-class professionals. Say you have a visible tattoo, long hair, dyed hair, piercings. You are probably going to feel self-conscious.

You may feel this is a bit of a stretch. But the clean-cut appearance of Mormons has a direct political origin. The grooming section of BYU's Honor Code--from which all social standards for young Mormons originates--came as a response to the hippie movement and their liberal social views and politics. By maintaining conservative grooming as a community standard, Mormons send the signal that we don't believe in upsetting the status quo, even if that means tacitly approving of militarism and civil inequality. That this style choice has been essentialized as a spiritual principle is evidenced by the story of a young man who shared last week in Sunday School that his bishop confiscated his temple recommend when he refused to cut his hair and shave his beard before baptizing his friend.

The second way, related to the first, is the push toward conformity. Mormons look with suspicion on those who purport to be a part of the community without adopting the community way of dressing, speaking, and thinking. These individuals draw extra scrutiny, but with the motivation of discovering what sin they can link to the perceived deviation. That way, when this individual (almost) inevitably leaves the Church, the community can blame the individual--never themselves--and satisfy themselves with a clear etiology that involves a sin that they observed but didn't help rehabilitate.

The third way is the co-opting of LDS discourse by cultural conservatives. Mainstream Mormons prefer speaking in absolute terms. Activities are sinful or not. One knows the entire Church is true or one doesn't; faith and doubt are polar opposites. Truth is True, the Prophet is True, the members of the Church aren't perfect but the Church is Perfect. To muddy any of these clear doctrinal waters typically requires wandering from the usual Mormon vocabulary into the languages of modernism and post-modernism, anathema to the Mormon community. Doing so in Sunday School can lead to the scrutiny and suspicion I identified above.

The culture warriors who shaped the modern Republican Party preferred tidy semantic divisions to the endless self-referentiality of post-structuralism. To them, anything that questioned basic (read Eurocentric) notions of Good and Evil was Evil. Nevermind that different cultures (including the Middle-Eastern one from where our scriptures originate) have different values and belief systems; engaging those would be some sort of affirmative action handout. And so clear-cut blanket morality, something rather foreign to the scriptures with its emphasis on personal growth and repentance, got a foothold in mainstream Mormon culture. No wonder inquisitive young Mormons feel more comfortable in the languages of secular academia; we can't properly express our spirituality in church.

Finally, but by no means the most significant method, is the Church's explicit endorsement of conservative positions--opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment of the 70's and support of Prop 8 recently in California. These actions draw a lot of attention, but they are merely the blossom on the conservative activism tree. If the culture weren't overall geared towards conservatism, the pushback from the membership wouldn't allow Church leaders to be so explicitly conservative, similar to how Pres. Kimball had to stop speaking out against hunting.

My purpose with this post is not to tear down the Church, denigrate its leaders, or incriminate faithful, tithe-paying, home-teaching members. I must say that 95% of my church meetings focus on faith and repentance (or food storage). I'm trying to share the things that I've observed in the Church that have made me feel less welcome in the hopes that we as a Church can become more inclusive and fulfill the mission of going to every nation, tongue, and people. This Church will never fill the earth if any group of people is made to feel that they need to make a case for why they belong in the Church.

Luckily, my experiences outside of Utah have involved less Standard Mormonism and therefore have been more open, welcoming, and edifying. Lest we forget, we are gentiles, and our role in the restoring of the Church is to bring it to whom it rightfully belongs. Maybe if we start with the attitude that the lost tribes of Israel have something to teach us as much as we have something to teach them, we can stop being so jealous of Mormonism and gift the Gospel without dictating how it's used.

Your comments, both corroborative and contrary, are welcomed.

speaking up day XIV: health care reform

(Sent to Senators Bob Bennett and Orrin Hatch)

I am writing to express my support of Pres. Obama's healthcare reform plan. I believe a public plan similar to the one which members of Congress like yourself enjoy would foster greater competition and cut out much of the waste and skewed incentive that is a part of our current healthcare system. While I am sympathetic to the basis of opposition to this plan, I am extremely disappointed with the efforts of House and Senate Republicans to compromise the efficacy of Pres. Obama's proposed plan. Instead of admitting that our healthcare system is broken, your party has been holding up reform by pretending that nothing is wrong. Suggesting that a government-run plan will increase bureaucracy in a system already rife with insurance company bureaucracy is intellectually dishonest, and any reasonable person without something to gain from the healthcare lobby can see that. With 50 million Americans uninsured, small businesses suffering from the bloated costs of providing health insurance to employees, and the healthcare industry making outsize profits without delivering the standard of care seen in other developed nations, it is immoral to do nothing but filibuster when real attempts at reform are being made. Why not at least make a proposal such as Senator McCain's during the campaign?

I am 27-year-old college graduate, and I was fired earlier this year from my non-profit job due to the economic downturn. This leaves me without health insurance, and consequently, I can't afford to see a doctor unless it's life-threatening. In the last couple of months, I've developed a persistent pain in my shoulder that I can't afford to get checked out. A couple of weeks ago, the lymph nodes in my neck swelled up. I don't know why, because I can't afford to see a doctor. Luckily, it went away with a little bit of rest, but if it had been tonsillitis that required surgery, I don't know what I would have done.

I hope you seriously consider these issues during your August recess.

Sincerely,

Nate Housley

I was out running this morning, feeling uncommonly tired. (I know I'm not in shape, but for some reason I was beat after like 4 miles of a 7 mile run. Sucky run.) As I was crossing an intersection, I heard from behind me, "You got this, dude. Keep going." I turned around and saw a burly dude with a long, unkempt goatee in a huge-ass truck, the same kind of person I would probably usually curse for driving too aggressively and being ignorant and hunting and liking Sarah Palin. But how often am I uninhibited enough to give some encouragement to a total stranger? I normally don't go in for that crap, but it actually cheered me up. So to you, stranger, I'm sorry I would have probably judged you too harshly, and thanks for the encouragement.

what conservatives should be saying

Republicans, I have some bad news: You lost. But you need to deal with it. Stop talking about Obama not being a citizen, stop whining about tyranny and oppression, and stop hinting at armed revolution. Why should you do this? Because you have been the most boisterous proponents of democracy and patriotism over the last few decades, but now you're just exposing yourselves as unprincipled sore losers. You even lost fair and square, unlike the Democrats in 2000 and 2004.

Assuming we can restore conservatives' faith in the democratic process that "the greatest country in the world" is based upon, the next conversation they should be having is how to demand conservative principles from their leaders.

While the GOP has been stoking the political discourse in the direction of tribalism and barely-veiled racism (the notion of a "real" America), the country has gone off the rails. This has nothing to do with family values, abortion, or affirmative action, and has everything to do with the cozy relationship between business and government. The banking world, enabled by Republican lawmakers for whom "free market" means an utter lack of accountability, made itself rich at the expense of the world's economy. The supposed growth of the last couple of decades, based on the highly touted principle of deregulation, has turned out to be illusory.

The most vociferous supporters of capitalism appear to have little to no faith in its powers, as they are the ones supporting massive subsidies for every industry from oil to farming. But by raising the specter of socialism, they gain the support of party-line Republicans for their continued government sponsorship of the economy. By decrying handouts for the disadvantaged, they pile on advantages for the already privileged and discourage competition and upward mobility by encouraging oligopoly capitalism. In discussing global poverty, conservatives dismiss suggestions that developed nations are robbing developing ones by talking about an infinite pie in which wealth is created instead of merely transferred. But when economic refugees from those same developing nations try to get some of that infinite pie here in America, conservatives get suspiciously protective of their own slice.

So why should conservatives care? Sarah Palin is immensely popular, and she doesn't worry about things like consistency or intellectual sophistication. First of all, fearmongering and tribalism may galvanize the already-converted, but blatant double standards (such as chastising liberals for criticizing Bush and then spreading all manner of libel against President Obama) and cheap tactics like blaming Obama for the economy, not to mention the ceaseless whining about the "mainstream media" (of which Fox News takes part??), are sure to alienate the growing percentage of people who are hesitant to declare party affiliation.

Secondly, encouraging willfully ignorant party loyalty doesn't bode well for our democracy. If you want to talk about the responsibility associated with rights, let's talk about the responsibility of being a voting member of a republic. If you think a democratic government can survive without an educated populace, you're fooling yourself. Identifying the liberal bias of the New York Times (I'm not denying it) doesn't give you license to ignore unpleasant facts, global warming being the most obvious example.

So does this mean that conservatism is dead? If the Republican Party continues to be its standard-bearer, then probably. But if I were a conservative, I would be trying to rescue principles of limited government and accountable capitalism from the clutches of those politicians who are only conservatives on the campaign trail. The Democrats' solution to the current economic crisis is to put in place more government control of certain industries, like financial and auto-making. I don't know if this is the best solution, but it's certainly better than the Bush model of government bailouts without any suggestion of accountability ($700 billion to Wall St. and Republicans are making a fuss about health care??). I would really like to see Ron Paul acolytes speaking up for an alternate plan so Congress can have a proper debate instead of Republicans simply gumming things up, watering things down, and injecting absurd amendments into legislation (but at least now I can take my guns into national parks).

Does this mean that social issues are irrelevant? Not at all. But the fact is that the GOP has been using social issues to gain the support of their base in order to push through their economic agenda for decades. Only through examining the true economic agenda of the Republican Party can Republicans regain their claim on conservatism.

activist university, pt. II

BYU reserves the right to curtail an expression of thought that “contradicts or opposes…fundamental Church doctrine or policy.” The issue at hand is how BYU promotes a conservative worldview as fundamental Church doctrine.

What’s wrong with that?

From a personal perspective, my experience at BYU left me feeling alienated from the Church that I love and serve. I got into the habit of constantly second-guessing myself, and felt intimidated into not expressing my own personal convictions. I feel bitter and somewhat betrayed to this day. As if it’s not hard enough trying to overcome selfishness and improve oneself, the things that I saw as my improvements marginalized me from a community which is supposed to exist to support individuals in their betterment.

Some, specifically those on the same side of the Church’s culture war, will say “tough break.” A lack of empathy is defensible in the case that people like myself are genuine enemies of the Church and its mission; maintaining a community inevitably requires some sort of exclusion.

But is it appropriate to equate a particular social philosophy with revealed doctrine? The doctrine of the Church, as I understand it, is unique in relation to other philosophies. While it is in harmony in some instances with other worldviews, it often offends the same worldviews at other points. The social philosophy and political agenda that BYU implicitly endorses and equates to fundamental Church doctrine—limited government, personal responsibility, anti-abortion, anti-gay rights, anti-feminism, anti-relativism, and the enshrinement of Western cultural products as morally and aesthetically superior--is exactly in line with this country’s religious right. In fact, by all indications, it appears to be its product.

The threat of communism united two rather divergent groups--fiscal conservatives and social conservatives—under the banner of “American” values. While fiscal conservatives are known for their disdain of government intervention, social conservatives favor the government’s sponsorship of their particular, traditional, Judeo-Christian values. At the end of the Cold War, the undergoing shift in values in America—away from sexual morality and towards emphasizing fairness, inclusiveness, and tolerance—provided conservatives with a new threat of invasion to unite around. The new enemy, seen as corrosive to “American” values as communism was to capitalism, was multi-culturalists, feminists, and so-called moral relativists.

Where the Gospel is an eternal set of principles, the conservative worldview is easily contextualized historically and will likely follow the typical arc of humankind’s ideas, namely overcompensation and correction; one might say that the Republican Party is currently split over the notion that now is the time for correction.

Divine inspiration guides the LDS Church, and so the argument may be made that the Church’s leadership takes into account some knowledge of future events that hasn’t been revealed to the general public. But if this is the case, why isn’t it explained as such? Why do most reconciliations of conservatism and the Gospel, aside from the ones that are purely tautological and rely on the fact that there are few contrary voices, appeal to the scriptures and not to new revelation?

If our current leadership is privy through revelation to something that supports a conservative worldview, why do the teachings of the early leaders of the Church seem to support what are now progressive causes? If those teachings were mistakes, the preferences of men speaking as men and not as prophets, why do the most fervent supporters of LDS conservatism imply the infallibility of our current prophets? Given the logical paradoxes of such a stance, maybe there is a supplementary motive for putting caps on free inquiry.

Why, if support of a worldview that exists in service of a political agenda comes from revelation, doesn’t the leadership acknowledge the problematic relationship of doing so and attempt to reconcile the points at which conservatism conflicts with LDS doctrine? These loose ends suggest to me that the likely explanation is that our leadership, like much of our membership, simply prefers conservatism and, as a result of movement conservatism’s fatalism, attempts to essentialize it as inherently more moral and correct than liberalism in an effort to save our society from some supposed cataclysm (the former BYU president Ernest Wilkinson’s actions were premised partly on a belief that the U.S. was ripe for destruction due to the corruption of the Kennedy administration).

I mentioned the conflicts of conservatism and LDS doctrine. If you’re familiar with this blog, you’ve read some that I’ve outlined before. I’ll run some of them down quickly, for the sake of a self-sufficient post.

The scriptures and the teachings of early prophets are not as friendly to capitalism as conservatives would like to think. Where free-market capitalism values greed as a motive for material growth, greed is roundly denounced in scripture, and material growth is treated more as a temptation than something to vie for. Military aggression is expressly denounced. Self-sufficiency, the primary conservative value, would likely fall under the “lack of faith” or “pride” category. While conservatives fear the company of those with different philosophies, Jesus welcomed sinners and publicans and offered forgiveness to those who offended him. Where conservatives frame multi-culturalists and feminists as rabble-rousers who threaten traditional values, Joseph Smith campaigned for abolition and women’s rights, radical causes of his time. He was a fierce defender of the freedom of religion, while conservatives push for state-sponsored Christianity. Additionally, the spirit of LDS doctrine and of Christianity communicates that there is no need to fear if one is living by certain principles. Movement conservatism promotes fear of societal change and the advancement of historically marginalized groups as a political force, even to the point of abandoning certain principles (constitutional rights, freedom of inquiry) in favor of a political outcome.

While Mormons can relate to the threat of invasive outsiders, we seem to forget that EVERYONE to us is an outsider, as detractors of the Church have come from every religious and cultural persuasion. Joseph Smith held the strongest criticism for other religions, while intellectuals and progressives didn’t draw nearly as much ire. In the contemporary Church, in pursuit of our political goals, we’ve tried to make good with the merchants of religion that Jesus and Joseph Smith derided. (By the way, judging by the Republican reaction to Mitt Romney, we haven’t nearly succeeded.)

Furthermore, what are some of the potential drawbacks to BYU’s close relationship to conservatism? First of all, the alienation of otherwise strong, valuable members like myself; I’ve heard plenty of similar stories. Secondly, the alienation of those to whom we’re supposed to be bringing the Gospel. Walk into any LDS chapel in the country and tell me if you don’t find a predominance of white, middle-class conservatives. It’s not that liberals and minorities aren’t receptive to truth, it’s that we deride the aims of people who don’t share our zeal for preserving the privileged class status of white, middle-class males. The insular mindset, the one bent on preserving the purity of a certain community, does not seem to work well with our mission to bring the Gospel to the lost tribes of Israel.

And aren’t we shooting ourselves in the foot in another way? Conservatives paint fear-inducing pictures of an open, tolerant society, but the old guard that progressives are trying to tear down contains some of our most feverish opponents. A tolerant, pluralistic society, while still fundamentally opposed to the principles of revelation and eternal truth that the Church is founded on, would nevertheless be more wiling to coexist in disagreement than the conservative activists we unflaggingly try to woo.

As a final word, I want to make it clear that I am not trying to tear down the Church, or at least what the Church means to me (I’ll tear down conservatism nearly every chance I get). I debated whether or not I would publish this. It’s cathartic for me to articulate my grievances with what have been very negative experiences for me. But ultimately, I hope that this post will be of some value to those who have felt like myself. Another effect of BYU’s close alliance with conservatism is the co-opting of LDS discourse by conservatives. Those who feel differently are left without a vocabulary, as it were, to discuss their spirituality. As a consequence, we feel alone even though there are many of us. This post is part of an effort to create a discourse for us others.

If you disagree with me and view my perspective as sinful, I would invite you to try to help me through my sin with the same compassion that you might show someone addicted to smoking. I’m skeptical that this would happen, however, as you view me (someone who lives the commandments and standards of the Church and attends church regularly, by the way) as someone who pollutes the otherwise pure LDS community, and I’m better off being excised than allowed to compromise the Church’s integrity. I know the way you think because I internalized this attitude at BYU and almost kicked myself out of the Church.

For everyone else, this post is also an affirmation of my comfort in being a practicing Mormon and in trying to change what being a Mormon means.