I am sorry to hear that you are so disgusted by the person that I am. Leaving the church was not an easy decision for me, but I had to be true to myself no matter what it would cost. I try the best to live my life with moral truth and integrity and seek out reason and knowledge. Why is that so disgusting to you? I don’t understand why you hate Luke so much. He has supported and loved me through all of my choices. Luke has never forced me to do anything that I didn’t want to do. He has stood by me and encouraged me to make my own decisions and be the person that I want to be. I find it very hurtful and disrespectful that you and others in the family would imply that I don’t have a mind of my own and am under the complete control of the “Evil Luke.” I realize that you don’t understand my choices and that the implication of those choices might sadden you based on your religious beliefs. What I need you to understand is that I didn’t set out to rebel against and hurt the people that I love, nor are my actions in any way meant to be taken as a direct attack on you or any other individual.
I love you deeply, I want to be a part of your life, but if the stipulation for that is that I have to believe the exact same things that you do, then I am not sure that we will be able to be a part of each other’s lives.
I respect your right to believe what you want, express it as you deem necessary and disagree with my individual choices. One of the great things about life is that we are not all the same. There is great diversity all around, I cherish that. I also cherish my freedom to express myself. Face book is a space where I can express myself; I have not used it to commence personal attacks on anyone. I do want to encourage other people to challenge themselves and their way of thinking but I have never had the intention of forcing my own doctrines on anyone else.
I hope that you don’t allow this incident to destroy our friendship or make you feel that you can’t participate in FB because of your evil sister. I will not be offended if you block me, that way you can still interact with your friends that have the same values that you do.
We don’t see eye to eye when it comes to religion. I had always thought that would be okay because my family would love me unconditionally and could see that I am still a good person. I am sorry if I have misjudged you or anyone else. I am still planning to go to the family reunion but if my presence will be insulting to you I will stay away. Your call.
With love,
Cozette
Amanda Anderson Mickelsen:
Cozette- I have always respected your desire not to be part of the church anymore. thats fine. what I have a hard time with and I think others do is that you disrescpect our God and bash our religion constantly on FB. and I have ignored stuff over and over agan.Yes this is a free country and you have a right to express yourself. But I have a right not to feel religious persecution for what I do believe in. yes I feel disrespected. I have never riduculed you for your drinking smoking and new life style. How would I persecute you for you disbelief? voice my belief and be mocked? My way of life is something that you look down on because you think that I haven't thought things out struggled and persevered with a faith that strengthens me
and that thru it all I still believe in? Many of the things you post as statements you know will be offensive to others, does the picture on that screen represent you? Is that you? Because a picture of christ smoking is a picture stating hypocrisy. are you a saint smoking? so damn proud of your decisions! I have kept quiet, bit my tongue, tried to not let it bother me but I have integrity in what I believe, I am true to myself. I dont need to rebell in what I believe to be true to be myself. I respect that you have a mind of your own, you stubborn ox, you're so smart and know so much, you've been successful in life. Are you happy. What do you have going for you? what do you have to look forward to? addiction, money and parties? Yeah how long will it last? Luke has always tried to make distance in this family and you get it more and more. does the distance the seclusion help anyone? I once had a sister that I could talk to share with, cry with, do more than shop with. I dont know where that sisterhood went, you will always be my sister but I moarn your loss because we aren't there for each other anymore. I love you and I will always love you unconditionally!!!! but I dont want to feel belittled, judged and disrespected over and over again. Yes I know I've judged you, I have judged the distance I need to keep from you so that I dont offend you, I have judged how you act towards me and members of the family. I have watched as the smug smiles cross your face as you think of us as less than you. Judge me now.... I am imperfect. I am a believer in God and Christ. I am a strong person and stand for what I believe in. I am a sister that will always have an opinion and will never know everything. I am not a money driven person but I help provide for my own and I will always struggle. I am sick of feeling like I am the one persecuting you for your belief, the truth is I dont have to because your feelings of guilt are the only things that have ever persecuted you. I love you and hope you do have the strength to face our family face to face and tell us with no guile that you respect our choices and still love us and that you hope that we can do the same. You have never stood up to us and said I have made this decision I accept the consequences and I hope that you can love, support and respect my wishes.
With all my heart I hope love, unity and respect can be a part of our relationship. I will stop making calls and make my stand.
Sincerely-
Amanda Mickelsen
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and that is it. I never responded to this email. It was quite the tongue lashing, I was hurt and didn't want to lash back in anger. I am not sharing this experience to belittle my sister, but I needed to put it out there so that I can move on. I have more to share on this story, but that will be shared in another post. This experience has reminded me that we don't always know the affect we have on other people. I have been hesitant to talk to my family about my life change and it seems that has allowed for backtalk, assumptions and anger to brood. I apologize for that, not my choice.
To be continued...
It does sadden me to see that a rift in the family has happened because of life choices. I know I just said this but even believers have to know that GOD gave us that freedom of choice! And I feel that to put judgement on that choice and a disrepect of your own family is unbiblicle. Experience life! Live life! Love life! I am so happy you have found a place with love and a job that can help you do just those things! To judge you and your sucesses as a FAILURE just because you have done those things without GOD makes that "godly" person just as unbiblicle as they feel you have become. I hope that as family you can find a way to work past this. It is hard to do things on your own. Like is said before my boyfriend is a non believer and has had a seperation from his family because of this and some other choices he has made. Although he "acts" fine about it there are times I can tell he misses them.
ReplyDeleteI think you are a very strong person. I would love if you would share more with the world on the untruths you have found in the Mormon doctrine and history changes. I know of some of these and it hurts me to know that the believers of this religion turn a blind eye to the thruths of their religion. Education is what makes us stronger. Good luck! Family fueds are no fun.
Cozette & Luke: Janae and I have only known you for the past few months, but it's been really comforting to meet people that have gone/are going through the same internal battles that we were. It's a real shame that people can let family and friendships dissolve simply because one attributes their good qualities to their own hard work and not to the grace of a supernatural, fictional character. The good qualities and love are still there.
ReplyDeleteAs far as being offensive by expressing yourself -- tough. Eleanor Roosevelt put it best:
"No one can make you feel inferior without your consent."
If someone takes offense to something, that's their own insecurities coming out -- and they should really spend some time strengthening their convictions or addressing what's making them insecure.
Courtney -- It's really not that hard to find information about some of the issues surrounding Mormonsim, and religion in general:
For Mormon-specific information:
- MormonThink.com. It's run by members and non-members, addresses most of the hot topics, and offers many arguments and rebuttals on both sides. Most topics and arguments are well sourced
- ExMormon.org has a lot of other information, not all of it is sourced. More than anything, it's a good place to see that others have the same concerns as you.
Once you go down that route, and if you've come to the same conclusion that I did (and others), you'll quickly move on to taking a critical eye to Christianity, Abrahamic religions, and religion in general. For me, I think the best written, most concise approach at "debunking" religion was Richard Dawkins' "The God Delusion".