Hiding in the Backwaters Just one more blog on the net.

An Irish Son

I was born in the heart of Dublin
To a holy book full of rules

I may not have been born in Dublin like Brian McFadden, but I could pass quite easily, especially now that I'm letting my beard grow out. Couldn't pass for Catholic, though. My religious upbringing was somewhat different. These days I'm questioning my relationship to that upbringing more and more. I haven't been to church in eight years, and yet I've never resigned my membership. I suspect most people know that you don't just walk away from the Mormon church. They will follow and find you unless you resign your membership in writing. Even then, they don't always make it easy for you.

At first it just wasn't something I felt that I really needed to do. Why should I care if some church wants to believe I'm a member? It's also a step that would be painful for my family and I just didn't feel strongly enough about the necessity of resigning to do that to them. More and more, though, I'm starting to wonder if the balance has shifted. I've been listening to "Irish Son" quite a bit the last couple of weeks...over and over some days.

Weddings, deaths, and baptizing children
That's my debt paid to the church
I don't need that kind of salvation
When I get hurt

Sometimes it feels like I'm in an abusive relationship. Every new act of repression is a slap in the face, an assault on my personal identity. Declarations of love and compassion don't just ring hollow, they feel deceptive and manipulative. "We love you. If you just wouldn't act on your feelings, we wouldn't have to attack you." And yet, I can't bring myself to leave. It all seems so pointless now. I've written the letter, but I have real anxiety about actually sending it. Part of me wonders what that is all about. Part of me thinks I'm being melodramatic.

The lunatics let run the asylum
How can we find peace inside your home
When you can't trust your own

There isn't much of Mormon doctrine that I believe anymore. I don't know that it's a specific rejection of Mormon doctrine as it is a rejection of any religious dogma. I drove past a Scientology building this morning and had to wonder why we so quickly and relentlessly ridicule a belief in malevolent alien spirits possessing our bodies, but give a pass to Satan, demons, angels and virgin births. Is one really more likely than the other?

We brushed off the accusations
And bowed before your lies

And yet, is it really true that I don't believe anymore? Consciously that is true, but is there some visceral part of me that still clings? Otherwise whence the angst? Is it echos of truth or something tantamount to brainwashing? Some whispering of the cosmos or years of fear and shame? Maybe it has something to do with being Mormon is more than owning a religious belief system. It's an identity. Turning your back on three-quarters of your life isn't an easy thing to do. I wonder how I would have felt if I had bailed at 14 like my little brother. Who knows. I certainly don't.

So here I sit, seeing no point in having my name being on the rolls of the Mormon church, but unable to act on it.

This is the city that raised me
With the religion they gave me
Now I'm old enough to know my own mind
But it was leaving that saved me
I've seen so much that has changed me
So just break with your past
Feed your own mind
'Cause this Irish son has moved with the times

Easier said than done, apparently.