What frightened me the most about leaving the Mormon church --- and losing my belief in a higher power altogether --- was the perception that religion is required for morality. I was afraid that leaving religion would turn me into a person devoid of values. I thought I would lose the love I had for people. I was afraid I would lose my inner compass that told me how to differentiate between right and wrong. And Mormon culture supports the idea that leaving causes a person to become lost. The authorities taught me to fear the world outside the rigid confines of the Mormon Church.
When I first started questioning the Mormon Church, I was not doing so out of toughness or bravado. I was scared and confused, with no idea of what the future held for me. I thought my doubts made me a bad person. I held on to the Church in desperation, praying that I could somehow resolve my issues. I prayed and read my scriptures. I attended church every Sunday. I went to seminary every morning. I participated in my youth activities. I followed the admonition that bearing your testimony will strengthen it. And nothing worked --- I was as full of doubts as before. I had been promised answers if I was faithful enough but the answers never came.
Then one day I said to myself --- “What if there is no God? What if it’s OK not to know?” And with that question, all of my issues melted away. The world made sense again. But a part of me was still frightened of what being an agnostic meant. I didn’t know what life would be like without religion to provide structure.
Ten years after leaving, I have learned many lessons, the most important of which is that losing faith in God doesn’t mean losing faith in humanity. Who I am --- the very core of what makes me a person --- is unaltered. My love for people is still intact. My sense of what is right and wrong still exists. The joy I find in life is still there. And I have found that the stripping away of a rigid belief system has opened my eyes to the inherent goodness of humanity. I have discovered that good people are found in all walks of life. Goodness is not reserved for a single group of people but exists in the diversity of the world around us.
