Many years ago someone gave a talk at General Conference where they talked about God’s love. They taught the doctrine that I have been taught my whole life, that we are all God’s children and he knows and loves us. As part of their talk, they challenged anyone who hadn’t felt God’s love for them personally to kneel down and ask God to feel his love. I felt like I fell into that category so I accepted their challenge, knelt by my bed one night, and prayed to feel God’s love. And then I felt nothing. And continued to feel nothing for many years.

I’m not clear on the exact timeline but during this time of feeling nothing, the church changed its policy and no longer allowed children of same-sex couples to be baptized, among other things, until they were 18 and had moved out of their house. I was the primary president in my ward at the time and while there weren’t any children in our primary who this directly affected my heart hurt for the families in the world that it did affect. This policy change also caused a lot of confusion for me.

In addition to these two things, I started to notice other things that didn’t feel right to me. Many of the things that bothered me (political affiliations, judging others, materialism, superiority, etc.) were done by the members and are the church’s culture here in Utah. I know that people are not perfect and they make mistakes but I started to feel like maybe I didn’t belong. Then there were the things that the church as an institution is doing. Some things they say the doctrine is one way but then in practice it seems like the doctrine stated isn’t followed. Things like women being just as important as men, LGTBQ+ people being welcome and needed at church, etc. Then there are the sexual abuse issues, federal fines for illegally hiding money, and not taking accountability for wrongs done in the past among other things.

For years I questioned all of this and more but didn’t dare study it out and look for truth. When you start to wonder if your foundation is faulty or if the truth you were raised with isn’t so true it is scary. It all felt very black and white to me, like either it was all true or it wasn’t true at all. I wasn’t ready to admit that it wasn’t true at all but I also felt strongly that it wasn’t all true. I didn’t know where to go next.

For a long time, it felt like I was just spiritually existing, just going through the motions. I went to church because that is what I had always done but I didn’t feel like I got much from it. I didn’t let myself open up to the truths that I could find at church because of the untruths that I didn’t know how to handle. I didn’t tell anyone how I was feeling either. I didn’t know who was safe to talk to about this. I didn’t want to tell someone who would then tell me that I needed to try harder with the so-called Sunday school answers. I also didn’t want to shake up someone else’s testimony and lead them to experience the pain I was experiencing. It was a lonely place to be.

Eventually, I started to find little pieces of hope here and there. Guests on podcasts that I listened to regularly, people on Instagram who had similar beliefs as I do, etc. These small things helped me along and showed me that things aren’t as black and white as I thought. Once I was able to give up my all-or-nothing thoughts about the church I was able to find bigger pieces of hope, books on adult development, podcasts by people in similar situations, etc. I even had an experience where for a few minutes I’m pretty sure I was feeling God’s love for me individually.

I’m still a work in progress. For now, I am choosing to stay in the church and attend in the ways that feel right to me. I don’t know if that will always be the case but I feel good about where I am. I don’t feel like I have any answers but I feel compelled to share this experience so I can maybe provide some hope for others out there who are having a similar experience. Hearing other people’s stories and struggles helped me to through mine. I wish the reality of faith journeys was talked about more and figure that I can do my part by putting my story out into the world. Thanks for being here and if you have a similar story, I would love to listen to it.