I was the young lady that attended every meeting—first to volunteer to give a talk or help with whatever was needed.  I was referred to as “perfect,” which is hard to live up to. I guess I just decided to go astray. No one influenced me or tempted me. I made the decision to start doing all the wrong things. I do not want to dwell on the stories of my past, but if it was wrong to do I did it. I was 17 and feeling unworthy, and I stopped going to my church meetings. I still watched General Conference and I know my testimony was still there, just buried deep inside. I was blessed during this time. Heavenly Father gave me three wonderful children. He also kept me safe while I was going around making bad choices. He loves us and hears our prayers always. Jump forward about 17 years. The Bishop and his wife in the ward area I was living in started coming to our house and invited my son to Cub Scouts. He started going and loved it. Soon he was invited to Primary and then wanted to be baptized, so the missionaries started coming over to teach him because he was over nine. My then boyfriend started taking the boys and went to church. I didn’t go. Soon my boyfriend wanted to be baptized, so we got married. I still didn’t go to church with them. My husband wanted to start paying a tithe, so we did. I remembered my father’s testimony of tithing. Then along came the Primary program. I went to see the boys and my hard heart was softened by the beautiful Primary children. I had several habits to overcome and I started working on them. However, smoking was a hard one for me. I started going to church and soon was called to be in Cub Scouts. This calling helped me so much—the boys and the parents were an excellent example for me. They all loved and accepted me. The sisters in the ward always gave me a hug which embarrassed me because I knew I smelt like smoke. They never seemed to notice. One Saturday before Fast Sunday I had the impression that our family should fast and pray for me to stop smoking. We did. At work a couple of people noticed that I was not going out for “smoke breaks” anymore and asked about it. I told them that my family had fasted and prayed for me and it worked. To my amazement they and their families had fasted and prayed for me on the same Saturday and Sunday. A sweet wonderful feeling overcame me, and I knew I needed to work harder to do everything I could to get to the temple. It had been a dream of mine to be sealed in the house of the Lord. However, I did not think that was possible anymore. My, how Satan wants us to think our loving Heavenly Father will not forgive us.  With a very loving and helpful bishop and his wife I was soon headed on the straight and narrow path. Our ward was also fantastic. We started taking the Temple Prep class and everyone dropped out except my husband and me. The teachers were a husband and wife and they took us in. They taught us how to have family home evening and family prayer, and they took us to the Visitor Center at the temple. They spent a lot of time with us and will be eternal friends. It did not come fast but we were sealed in the temple as an eternal family. Going through the repentance process I came to understand my Savior Jesus Christ’s Atonement. My faith grew and grew. My testimony of a living Heavenly Father and Savior, the First Vision, tithing, was growing; sometimes it felt like my heart would burst open it was so full. Each one of my callings has helped me grow and learn so much. I also learned life is more enjoyable sober and following God’s path. There is so much more, so many faith building stories, so many trials that taught me what I needed. So many wonderful friends that are examples for me to follow. I know Heavenly Father and Jesus love me, Janice Esplin Oviatt. With that knowledge I can do whatever They need me to do. I know following His plan is the only way to have true joy.

Kathleen Flake is the Richard Lyman Bushman Chair of  Mormon Studies at the University of Virginia . This paper was originally given at Sunstone Symposium XI, and published in Sunstone Magazine in October 1989. It is republished here with the author’s permission. I was never particularly aware of how many pillars there were in Washington until being asked to give this speech. The anxiety at having to define my faith was such that it was infinitely easier to analyze pillars. So, as I drove past battery after battery of pillars, passing the Capitol, the National Archives, the National Gallery, even the new high-rise condominium on Pennsylvania Avenue, and especially the various memorials—I would ask why was that put there and what is it about me and my continuing commitment to the Church of Jesus Christ that serves this function. I noticed that pillars serve a variety of purposes. Some, like those at the Jefferson Memorial, clearly support the weight of the entire structure. Others, like those of the Lincoln Memorial, support only the outer rim or porch. The last use worth mentioning is the pillar’s decorative function. In both old and new buildings, pillars would be placed under small ledges or beside doors, not for purposes of bearing weight, but to add grace and line and, of course, prestige. I began to realize my problem was not so much in identifying The Pillar of My Faith but distinguishing among the various props integrated into my personal house of faith—which were merely decorative, which were supporting porches or ledges, and which were bearing the weight of the entire structure? From the beginning, the decorative pillars seemed the easiest to recognize. Foremost among them is, I think, my facility in the Mormon culture. I know how to dress like a Mormon. I know how to talk like a Mormon. I know what is a polite question, and I know the helpful responses to the impolite ones. I know the organizational structure of our community and the amount of respect appropriate to give to each layer. Though I have never admitted it, and most would never guess, I like being an insider in this community. I enjoy understanding the nuances of our relationships to each other. Sometimes I imagine it must be like living in a small town that knows no geographical boundaries. The mayor is my cousin, and I went to school with the sheriff. I know how to avoid indigestion at the local restaurant and can pick the best conversations in front of the dry goods store. I have learned how to avoid the bullies and other doctrinal eccentrics. I know the stories in the town’s cemetery, feeling the connectedness of past and present. I know about lost pages of manuscript, oxen who have been healed, potatoes baked for late-coming handcart companies, even wine from Dixie and massacres in meadows. All of this is a pillar of sorts. It has the look of a pillar. It adds line and image to who I am. It gives me an identity, even credibility, regardless of any interior resources. To the uninitiated, five generations of Mormon progenitors and forty years of experience in the culture, including a two-year mission and BYU education, can even seem to be the cause rather than the effect of my Mormonism. In my experience, however, these cultural experiences and social graces cannot serve the function, though they may ape the form, of a pillar. None of these things are of real help to me when I have to decide the hard questions; such as, whether to support the Equal Rights Amendment or how to support the bishop who doesn’t want me to support it. And, when a desirable man offers me his bed, it’s not memories of the wonderful conversations in front of the dry goods store that informs my decision. These decorative pillars seem to crumble very easily under stress. I have a harder time admitting to the second type of pillar, namely, that which supports only a porch without bearing much of the building’s weight. Going to what has always seemed the core of the most consistently positive experience for me, I have to admit that my understanding of our theology is merely an appendage to my house and confess that my love of the scriptures and love for the life of the spirit is not what keeps me going back again and again to the Church. Indeed, this secondary pillar includes many exciting experiences, even miracles. If I were to describe them here, you would, no doubt, recognize them from your own experience. Healings and mendings both great and small. Fires of testimony heard and given. Revelations of hearts and minds, as well as information. Tongues to speak the ineffable. Even wisdom and understanding. These gifts have spared me much confusion and given me moments of great joy. Yet, however much I love these things, I must confess that their usefulness is limited in the face of demands for sacrifice, obedience, virtue, and consecration. They are supportive. They give me signals of what’s important. They even announce a doorway or two. But, I know they do not in themselves sustain me; they do not bear the load of the weight of this building that is my spiritual life. Indeed, these experiences and my knowledge of what we commonly phrase as “the Church’s truthfulness” has in the past seemed to be the very weight bearing down upon, rather than the pillar shoring up, my faith. I have only once said I didn’t know whether the Church was true. I was eight or nine years old and each member of my Tucson Ward primary class was to participate in the monthly testimony meeting. Never wanting to do what was expected of me, I stood up and said, “I don’t know whether the Church is true or not but hope that someday I will.” I remember it so well, not because there were any repercussions, but because I knew I had lied. I did know “it was true” and I searched in vain to remember how or when it first came to me. As the years went on I gave up on trying to find out why. I simply tried to change my mind. It never worked. Finally, twenty years later, having failed to change my mind, I just changed my life. I left for what turned out to be a surprisingly long time. In those years while I lived the life of a Gentile with as much zeal as I had the life of a Mormon, I never talked myself out of my testimony. I never rationalized my lifestyle as acceptable to God’s intentions for me, or a superior choice to that of an active Mormon. I was happier and that was what mattered to me. I was tired of being right. I was ready to try being happy. While in Kobe, Japan, on a mission I would hear the local bishop frequently bear his testimony that in the Church was the way to happiness in this life, not just the life to come. I envied him. The truthfulness of the gospel did not work that way in my life. Instead, it inspired a sadness so profound that it could only be overcome by religious zealotry. Later, as the debate over the ERA led to an airing of our community’s, if not our doctrine’s, understanding of women, their spiritual nature and potential, their relative value in the Kingdom, and their relationship to God, I found words for some of my old sadness in the fact of the Church’s truthfulness. Increasingly, that fact became less of a motivation to act, less of a reason to stay. So, I left. The fact went with me, but I left. It was in process of consciously deciding to leave that I learned that these pillars of testimony of the institution and dramatic spiritual experience were merely supporting porches in this house of mine. Or, more simply stated, my knowing that the “Church was true” was simply information—a hollow fact—when it came time for me to decide the important stuff. The important stuff, the crisis for me, came and still lies in the ontological questions related to my relationship to God and the opportunity to realize my spiritual potential through the Church. In 1979, I was a second-year law student clerking in San Francisco. The issues raised in the previous five years of acrimonious debate in Utah were not new to me. My first conscious consideration of such questions was at fourteen. I had abstractly wondered what God did with a female Moses. What did he do with women who had the spiritual attributes and potential of a prophet? What happens to the parable of the talents or the doctrines associated with the resurrection when applied to the present and future spiritual state of these women? Or, were there by definition never any women who had these attributes of faith and testimony? I immediately dropped the question, never asking it aloud. I was too intent upon denying the central fact of my life—that I was a woman and no amount of internalizing the male values of the Church would change my ecclesiastical destiny as dictated by my biology. Two years in the mission field finally forced this truth upon me, and I returned to Utah in 1973 intellectually confused about what I was supposed to be. Emotionally, however, I had a level of clarity that escaped me intellectually. For example, when a friend asked me if I had heard of this new magazine called “Ms” and described it to me, I said without hesitation, “I can’t afford to feel those feelings.” I was shamed by this manifest fear of an idea. In the six years that followed, I did feel “those feelings” and explored in depth the ideas raised by the feminist renaissance of the seventies. That exploration inevitably led to significant involvement in the donnybrook of the Utah State IWY meeting and the National Meeting in Houston. Numbed by the experience and fully terrorized by the raw power of the Church in political matters, I, like so many of my sisters, hit the deck. For me that meant withdrawing from both feminism and Mormonism. I just faded away into law school and benign inactivity, in the Church. But one decision leads to another, as we all know, and in the summer of 1979 I was facing a decision that would take me beyond inactivity and constitute a deliberate act in violation of Church law. I was having a terrible time making this decision but had promised to have it made by the time I picked Mark up at the airport. I took the round about way, all the while muddling through how I would respond to the demands of our relationship. Driving down the East Bay, I noticed the Oakland Temple on the skyline and instinctively drove up the hills to it. I suppose it was a superstitious hope that proximity to it might provide me with some intelligence or strength I could not muster internally. Because of my attire and the fact of its being Sunday, the missionaries at the Visitor’s Center assumed I was not a member of the Church and I did not correct them. I was searching for something and hoped that the uncomplicated dialogue would help—like the rehearsal of a catechism. Maybe there was something I had missed in my education or had forgotten that they could remind me of and restore my strength and desire. When they asked me if I knew much about the Mormon church, I answered that I was a law student in Salt Lake City and had had many opportunities to discuss the Church. They asked if I could believe that God spoke through prophets today and started to tell me the story of the Restoration. I admitted that I had heard the missionary lessons several times. They turned then to the Book of Mormon story. Again, not wanting to waste their time or to toy with them, I quickly admitted that I had read it and was very moved by it. By this time, they, too, were wondering why I was there. At each juncture in the conversation, they had offered me the balm they had, and I admitted that I had received it but it was not enough to motivate me to affiliate with the Saints and live the law of the gospel. We all sat there for a moment in silence wondering what my problem was. They thinking, why isn’t she baptized? Me thinking, why am I leaving this? Finally, I started to speak in an effort to reassure them that they had done all they could for me. Not having thought it through myself, I heard the words only as I spoke them. “You know how in your church you value the wholeness of the family and emphasize the necessity of each parent’s contribution to the emotional and spiritual development and well being of the child. That without the father the son, in particular, will have difficulty knowing himself and what he can become: his rights and duties, obligations and opportunities. And likewise, that without the mother, the daughter is going to suffer confusion?” I said, “I guess your church frightens me because I feel that, together with all these truths we’ve talked about, it offers me confusion as a daughter of God. While aggressively asserting spiritual distinctions between the sexes, it offers me no understanding of my rights and duties, my path of spiritual development. Or, worse, it entices me to set aside my womanliness and be, for lack of a better word, a spiritual ’tom boy.’ ” I left feeling sadly relieved of a great burden—the burden of trying to fit. I felt as if the Lord had heard my soul’s complaint and released me. It was as if I had been born in the midst of a Scout-O-Rama and someone had given me permission not to spend my days building campfires, raising tents, and tying knots. As if someone had said to me: “It’s okay if this feels like something you don’t want to do. You’re not crazy.” I even heard a hint of “You’re right in thinking that things are a little confusing and it can be stunting to your growth in the camp.” This was no epiphany revealing a true path. No justification for thinking the Scout-O-Rama was wrong. I simply felt relieved of what had been for me a life on the Procrustean bed of the Church’s single-minded interpretation of the gospel through the male experience and values. I was relieved of the social pressure to sleep in the Great Outdoors, talk about cars, or learn what a nautical mile is. Not that there is anything per se wrong with these things. They just were not going to get me anywhere. I was not a boy scout and, for the first time in my life, I felt that was okay. I had asked and He had given me liberally, upbraiding me not. However, I also lost all the sure measures provided by the Procrustean bed that had secured my life and informed so many of my choices. And, in the years that followed, I wandered far afield trying to find alternatives. But, before I get to that, permit me to clarify something. There are two central weaknesses to the analogy of my youth in the Church to having been sequestered in a Scout-O-Rama. First, the analogy can seem to trivialize the work which men are doing in the Church today. That is not my meaning at all and takes the metaphor too literally. I believe that men are accomplishing many great and good things in the Church. Second, the analogy trivializes the spiritual effect of male domination of all aspects of the Church structure. This, too, couldn’t be further from the truth of what I feel. But back to the story. I left the temple grounds feeling that progress for me required letting go of the Church for a while. I concluded that if I wanted to comprehend and access my rights and obligations as a daughter, I needed a break from the program designed for the sons. Ironically, I needed to do this because I had so fully learned their ways and adopted their spiritual values. When I had heard the stories of Daniel, the Sons of Mosiah, Peter, and Brigham, I not only loved the stories, I wanted to do what they did: face the lions, speak with the tongue of an angel, redeem myself from denial, and demonstrate unfaltering knees. I wanted to put on the whole armor of God, fight the good fight, run the good race. I studied the scriptures, said my prayers, gave talks in increasingly larger forums, learned and practiced the spiritual gifts—only to find myself all dressed up with no place to go. The Church simply had no public use for those arts in women. All the time I had been listening to the stories, the message had been intended for someone else. And, worst of all, I had come out of the experience thinking that something was wrong with me for wanting these things. I was made to feel that I was unnatural, not fully formed, unclean in the finest of Greek and Hebrew traditions, all because I wanted to do what Daniel, Peter, and Brigham—or even my father and brother—did. Once after a lecture series on women and religion, a man said to me incredulously: “You don’t want the priesthood do you?” Although it didn’t do justice to my thoughts on the subject, I couldn’t resist the simple reply: “Don’t you?” If it were not for a patriarchal blessing, I could simply conclude that my expertise at so many of the priestly arts is a result of my attempts to escape the stigma of being female in this church; the attempt to qualify by effort and talent where I couldn’t qualify by birth. But the madness of my situation was that I had received the blessing. Does the pot complain why has Thou made me thus? Yes, though it usually doesn’t do any good. But now the Potter had told me I didn’t have to sit on the shelf. I felt as if God had released me from the gifts and the conflicts. I felt as if God were giving me permission to not try to fit myself, my hopes and gifts into the program of the Church. In the years that followed, though my love for the Church did not diminish, my need for it did. Though my conviction regarding its unique endowment of the keys to the Kingdom did not abate, my trust in its benevolent use of those keys in my behalf did. I took more responsibility for the care of my own life. As I have mentioned, for the next several years I lived the life of a “Gentile” as enthusiastically as I had that of a “Saint.” I always expected that I would have to report on my stewardship someday—that God would invite me to be more responsive to the facts of spiritual life. Though I took great care not to volunteer to give that report, I would periodically drop in on a ward meeting. I thought of it as taking my pulse, trying to ascertain if it was time to do something about this unfinished business. By 1982, I was living in Washington, D.C., and I dropped in on the Chevy Chase Ward to take my pulse and left almost in a coma. I knew a few people there, one of whom was the first counselor in the bishopric who took the occasion to ask if I would teach one of the Gospel Doctrine classes every other week. I was thunderstruck with a mixture of foreboding and chagrin. Chagrin because, notwithstanding my studied expectation that God would call for an accounting, I had never expected this. I was filled with foreboding because I had no confidence that I was ready to act within the structure of the Church. Yet I knew this calling could not be rejected. Not that I didn’t try. What ensued was a dialogue as strange as the one in Oakland. I asked: “Does the bishop know about this?”“Yes, it was his idea.”“Does the bishop even know who I am?”“Yes.”“No, what I mean is, does the bishop know how I live mylife?”“Well, it never came up.”I tried to reposition my argument:“Will I have to change how I live my life?”“He didn’t say you did.” I could feel myself trapped, straining at the net. I thought surely at some point he will set limits I can’t abide that will make him withdraw the offer or justify my rejecting it. But there it stood. I couldn’t give up yet though. “Do I have to attend any meetings besides Sunday School on the week I teach?”“No.”“Do I have to be sustained?”“Yes, but you don’t have to be present.”“Do I have to be set apart?”“Yes, but we can do it privately here.” I felt drawn and just short of being quartered. Because I knew this was the Lord’s handiwork and because I could not give up the hope of “someday” fitting in the Church, I had to accept this call. In the year that followed I continued to resist any other involvement with the institution and to respond as purely as possible to the promptings of the Spirit. What I eventually had to do, of course, was to change my life to conform to the law of the Church. I don’t want to cause any confusion about that. I now understand that, paradoxically, this was accomplished by giving me an opportunity to use my gifts without any demands from the Church’s structure. Finally, one day having escaped to the Blue Ridge at a Yoga retreat, I sat meditating upon the conflicts which I tolerated, even fostered, in my life in my attempt to ward off the threat I felt from the institution of the Church. It came to me as surely as any revelation I have ever received that, if I truly wanted to know God the Mother and be called her daughter, I would have to conform myself to the law of the gospel and make peace with her Son’s church. I bowed to this necessity and in doing so found the pillar to my faith. In the few months from the time I submitted to his will and traveled the distance from the bar to the temple without so much as a touch of vertigo, Christ has cared for me with a sweet genius I cannot adequately describe. It was in those days of learning him that I found the thing upon which my life could be ordered in such a way as to bear all the old and some new stresses. It is, I think, this pillar that will remain standing into eternity, years after other parts of my temple have worn away. It is most simply and ambiguously stated as the love of God. I fear this answer will disappoint you. That you would have me say something that sounds less sentimental, more exotic. Or, maybe I’m the one who is embarrassed to be talking this way after all the years of intellectual pyrotechnics. Nevertheless, I must say unequivocally, with John, that God is defined by the love he offers us and that this love is enough, his grace is sufficient. To use the metaphor given to me tonight: Just as surely as pillars surrounding the memorial to Thomas Jefferson securely hold the marble canopy high over his head, creating a secure womb-like world, so also the love of God as manifest in his Son shelters the life that is submitted to him. The strength provided by this peace is sufficient to withstand the cruelest neglect and to bear the weight of the most obnoxious of public judgments. In truth, many of the pressures remain. Generally speaking, women are not valued in our culture at large except as means to collective ends: as mothers and mates. Today, unlike in my youth, women can pray in sacrament meetings and other welcome changes have been made in the way in which women are treated within the structure. However, our roles are still largely perceived as temporal, and we are subject to ambiguous, if any, spiritual direction. Our exaltation is generally taught as derivative of our husbands. Sisters, I do not stand here revealing parts of my life to you in this way merely to encourage you to “bloom where you are planted” or only to say that God’s love will make you able to endure. I am trying to say something else. The power structure of the Church can be very distracting when one is trying to find her way to God. It is more than easy, it is sometimes thought to be required of us, to believe men stand in a relationship to God that we do not, that they have rights to access the powers of heaven that we do not. I am here to say that this is not my experience. Rather, what men have is expectations of and opportunities for empowerment that we do not have. By virtue of the fact that very little in the way of spiritual achievement is expected or even desired of us, very little is sought by us. By virtue of the fact that we are circumscribed by the type of church callings available to us and by the ecclesiastical authority granted within those callings, we are seldom forced to go to God and to spiritually stretch to perform our duties. Like ladies of the eighteenth century, we have been educated to perform the arts of and to stay within the drawing rooms of our society. Consequently, our grasp exceeds our reach and for fear of having our hands slapped we are waiting for permission to expand into the world that exists outside. What I have experienced is that, not only is it permissible, but it is incumbent upon us to do other and more than what we have been doing. If we will refocus our attention so that it lies upon Christ, the righteous desires of our hearts will be granted: we will be endowed to receive the rights of the fathers and mothers and be ordained to administer the same, namely, to be saviors upon Mount Zion, even to see the face of God and live. These rights are to be obtained in his House and fulfilled at his hand through the principles and ordinances of the gospel found in this church. Sisters, the Lord loves you as well. If you love him and come to him with a desire to receive these endowments of earthly rights to heavenly powers, it is then within his power to bestow them upon you and give you the opportunity—yes, even within the Church—to exercise them. This is his work and glory and it can bring you happiness in this life, not just the one to come. That is why we worship him which is what I have tried to do here.

I “quit attending” when I was about 16 due to a job that had me work Sundays. When I finally quit the job and started back to church, I felt like a stranger. I thought people would be happy to see me but I didn’t get much response. I had both great and horribly bad examples of members in my youth, and my family wasn’t a righteous example—although they weren’t terrible either. I guess I was left to my own devices. So I chose my best friend who was Mormon, and we partied heavily.  I always thought I would eventually marry in the temple, at least that’s what my parents and brothers had done—if I could just find a Mormon boy who drank but wanted to reform. Unfortunately no one I liked liked me back. So on I marched. I felt a bit like I wasn’t the right material for the “righteous families” as well. My plan was not working, so I quit praying and tried to hide from God. That doesn’t work. By the time I was pregnant and unmarried at 29, I felt I was excommunication material and was afraid to go back. So I stayed hidden for 26 years. By the time I was 40, I had an 11-year-old child and a husband who loved me and accepted me. We decided to go back to church, but which? We started at the Episcopal Church and that was my awakening. I started with the Bible study class and everything I had learned so long ago came rushing back. As I talked scripture with the group, they thought I was a preacher’s daughter. I told them I had received the Holy Ghost at eight from my father. I understood Isaiah. I talked about the home/visiting teaching program. They thought I was incredibly knowledgeable. I knew what revelation was about in that moment. I found my way to a church and asked the Bishop if I could see him. I cried and cried as I talked about the last 26 years of my life. I thought I would have to go before a council of some kind. He just hugged me and said “Welcome home.” My reconversion has changed everything for me, needless to say. I think I have a unique calling because I feel the broken-hearted, and I understand how the rescued people are just as capable of receiving revelation as the “ninety and nine.” Especially in a non-Priesthood holder family, I know I have access to God’s power and I am not denied (thank you President Nelson). I am a daughter of God, and I am never alone. We are all equal in his eyes.

I have not walked a traditional or simple journey of faith. I love the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but struggled with inactivity for almost thirteen years. This is the tale of my return to activity.  I was baptized in 2005 after meeting the missionaries who lived in our neighborhood and taking the discussions with them. I knew about the Church already; my college boyfriend’s parents were LDS, and his father had always been kind to me. We had talked about his faith and the seeds that he planted were cultivated by the missionaries’ lessons. However, it was not easy being the only member of my family who joined the Church. My husband was skeptical of the Church’s beliefs. While he respected the family-oriented nature of the LDS Church, he felt that the doctrine was “legalistic,” and the principle of tithing made him especially uncomfortable. My husband was eventually baptized, but quickly became inactive. As I grew in my faith, he started to look in other places for information on the Church, turning to sources on the internet and YouTube. As his discomfort grew, I also became less active.   I returned to church periodically, trying to resume activity; however, each time, it became a stumbling block in my marriage. I became confused. Who did I choose? My husband, or worshiping my Heavenly Father and my Savior in the true church? I became more uncertain when my husband tried showing me some of the material he found. However, I knew that the sources he was accessing were deceitful. My discomfort persisted as our family tried other churches. None of them brought me the certainty of truth, peace, and love that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints did. The Spirit had not left me. My quest for faith in Jesus Christ always led back to one place—the true church.   One day in the fall of 2018, my 13-year old daughter came to me, looked me straight in the eye, and said that she wanted to try going back to the LDS church—and that she wanted me to come with her. We talked about it, prayed about it, and decided that the Spirit was directing us to return to church. When I talked to my husband about it, he was not exactly excited, but he remembered the many times he had told our daughter that he would support whatever faith she chose. Now, he had to put that into practice! The beautiful Sunday she and I walked into our ward’s chapel for Sacrament meeting was one of the best and most memorable of my life. As I sat in the pew, listening to the sacred hymns, with my daughter smiling by my side, I knew with complete certainty that I was home. I realized that I know the truth, and as much as I love my husband and wish to honor him, I would find a way to nurture my marriage while also nurturing my faith. I made an appointment with my bishop, who turned out to be one of my strongest advocates as I returned to activity in the Church. I gratefully accepted a calling in the Relief Society, which has allowed me to get to know the women of our ward—and in so doing, I met a whole sisterhood who have supported and loved me as I became an active, involved member of our congregation. My bishop encouraged me to attend Temple Prep class; I did, and I loved every minute of it. The day I went to the temple for the first time was one of the most profound days of my life.   My faith has come full circle. My husband comes to church with us every Sunday now, and my fifteen-year-old son was baptized this month! Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ, The Gospel, the Church, and my faith are sources of incredible joy. I am not willing to live without them, and I have learned that when they are under attack, I must lean not upon my own understanding, but trust in the Lord with all my heart.

Due to an early childhood sexual experience, I did not consider myself clean before the Lord—especially when I recited the Young Women’s motto each week during church. This lead to my not valuing my virtue, and being raped by a recent convert to the Church. This is how I began my sexual life. We were friends and I thought I loved him. Our intimacy lead to disciplinary councils—he in his ward, and I in mine. He obtained probation, and I was disfellowshipped. In my fury and confusion about our different outcomes, I left the Church for over a decade. During that time, I focused on my education. My self-esteem grew based on what I could achieve academically. I continued to make poor choices about who I was intimate with, but I was careful enough not to get pregnant. Overall, I found my intimate relations to be empty and unfulfilling. After landing my dream job, I moved to a new town. At that same time, there was a temple open house that my mother invited me to. Inside the temple, I felt the Lord’s love for me. The Holy Spirit I was given when I was eight began to grow. Within a few months, I began to attend church again. I was living the life of someone who lived by Gospel principles, but I wasn’t partaking of the sacrament. I couldn’t, due to being disfellowshipped. I worked with the bishop to clear my record. I also met and began dating a man who wanted to marry me in the temple. Given my past mistakes, I couldn’t believe he valued my soul that much. We were sealed in the Lord’s temple in November 2006 and are the best of friends.

I was raised in an LDS home with good parents. Life hit hard for me in my early years. From the ages of 8-12, I was repeatedly sexually abused by a neighborhood family. At age 13, my father suddenly died of a brain aneurysm. Within a year of his death, my mother remarried. My abuse, my father’s death and my mother’s new marriage brought chaos, confusion and heartache in my teenage years, and I was unable to completely process all the traumatic events that had taken hold of my life. At age 21, I was married in the Salt Lake temple and we had five beautiful children together. Life seemed good, though we did have struggles as every married couple does. Our biggest struggle was the disruption of my psychological life because of my abuse. I used therapy for many years as a means to help heal my wounds and our marital struggles, but to no avail. There was a defining moment in my life when I knew I really needed help. In our seeking for help, my husband and I made choices that ended up taking us away from the Church, from God and eventually from our belief in Jesus Christ as our Savior. When we left the Church, we felt our testimonies were strong about Jesus Christ but slowly and ever so methodically, Satan took hold of our lives and our hearts and we left behind the greatest source of happiness—keeping our covenants and living the gospel. During our 10 year absence from the Church, we made disgraceful life choices together that tore apart our family, stimulated deep pain and trauma for ourselves and our children, and brought me to the point of constant suicidal thoughts with a severe lack of self worth. For a year, my life was in utter darkness. I refer to this time of life as a living hell. I use that term within the exact definition. As Alma the younger, my heart and soul were wracked consistently with internal torment and I was harrowed up almost daily by my sins. The only answer I could find was to end my own life. My only saving grace at that time was knowing the anguish I would cause my children by doing so. Especially after my painful childhood experience with the death of my own father. I had hidden from my extended family what was actually going on in my life. My life became so dark and so desperate, I finally turned to a brother who I wasn’t very close to at the time, and confided in him my suffering. In my greatest moment of pain and desperation, I turned to him and his wife for help and solace and moved into their home with my children. I was broken in almost every way a person could be. I had been living with my boyfriend. I used cannabis illegally and smoked cigarettes daily to numb my pain. I drank alcohol, dressed immodestly and, most days, walked around in a consistent despondent, depressed stupor. All this didn’t stop them from bringing me into their home and loving me unconditionally. During this time, my brother regularly questioned me on my current spiritual or religious beliefs. Over the past couple of years, I had been exploring atheism. This exploration was partly what sent me down my suicidal path. His interest at all in me and what I believed was enough for me to feel loved and that I had value. We spent many long days and nights researching and discussing my beliefs and questions on God and Jesus Christ. His wife, who has become my closest friend and confidant, sought opportunities to make me feel loved by inviting me to things that she hoped would get me out of my sorrow and despair. She took me to lunch with her friends, thought of movies I would like and asked me to watch them with her, sat and held me while I cried without judgment or guile. The most effective effort they made was to invite me to everything under the sun that was church related. Everyone in the ward warmly welcomed me to these events despite my church activity or membership. Then they invited my son Pratt to go on Pioneer Trek. Of course, I had heard of Trek and, at the time, thought it the most ridiculous way to honor our pioneer heritage. But Pratt really wanted to go so I conceded. The preparations were quite extensive, and every ward member we came in contact with during the process was kind, generous, and charitable. Pratt came home from Trek a changed boy, desiring to get baptized and feeling the love of God like he never had before. I couldn’t deny the obvious transformation and knew it was partly because of the love of so many ward and stake members who gathered around my son to help him understand our Savior and the love he had for him personally. I was going through my own understanding of the Savior’s love for me. The closer I came to the realization of Jesus as my Savior, the more aware I became I needed religion. I spent many weeks wrestling with God to know where he wanted me and, like Joseph Smith, fervently asking him what church I should join. The LDS Church was not on my list. The stake held a meeting where many who attended shared the miracles they felt during Pioneer Trek. I will be honest, again, I desired to mock their experience. Yet even with my disbelief, it was during that evening, the spirit of the Lord poured out upon me in ways it never had before. I was overcome to tears by the love I personally felt from my Heavenly Father and by the testimonies of these church members. I was in awe of their service to each other and their service to their God within their trek experience. The spirit weighed upon me the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ and, like never before, I longed to be part of the joy and peace I felt in that evening. It was then I turned my heart and life over to my Heavenly Father and told Him I would do anything to return to his fold. Soon after this experience, I quickly contacted my brother’s ward bishop to confess. Even with the previous burning in my breast, I was nervous to fully become a member. In my sinful life, I was cool, in every sense of the word. The last step of my conversion was to shed my pride and “coolness,” and this bishop who had only held the position for a month was the perfect man to help me do so. His ignorance in the exactness of his calling was exactly what I needed. His love, gentleness, understanding and compassion toward me brought me deeper into my testimony and my desire to shed my “cool” persona and walk with God as I saw him and so many other ward members do. As soon as word got out of my newfound testimony, the Relief Society stepped in and personally invited me to attend Sunday meetings, and welcomed me with open arms and hearts. I often refer to myself as the “misfit toy,” feeling like I’ve never belonged anywhere. At first, I felt awkward, and just couldn’t see where my place might be among my ward sisters. I regularly worried they would judge me. Slowly my shame dissolved and because of their reassurance and lack of judgment, I felt loved, valued, and accepted as myself. I realized I wasn’t defined by my past mistakes but welcomed as a daughter of God whose gifts were wanted and needed. In my past and current wards, the outpouring of kindness and service has been astounding! The smiles in the hallway. The sweet introductions on my first days and weeks of attending church. The thoughtful gestures of help of any kind. My ministering sisters coming and welcoming me by answering questions or bringing me an inspirational quote. Loving notes placed on my door by someone anonymous. Considerate texts just to check in and see how I was doing. And best of all, sisters taking the time to make “healthy” chocolates for me making sure they knew my diet restrictions! All these things were part of the foundation I could build on to feel safe and secure within the framework of something that ultimately felt so daunting and difficult. You see, it has been the small, simple things that have made all difference. My heart is so full of gratitude for everyone in my families—ward and personal—who could unconditionally love me. My experience has shown me that charity is the key that unlocks the heart of the wayward son or daughter or lost soul. Charity is the gift of loving someone despite the choices they are making or life they are living. Though I may disagree with someone I care for regarding their personal lifestyle choices or sins they might be committing, my testimony runs deep that my lack of judgment, my ability to see the person as they really are as a son or daughter of God, and my desire to help bring them the joy that can only come through our savior Jesus Christ is what brings about the miraculous transformation which I have felt. Our elder brother Jesus Christ can and does work miraculous transformations! His Atonement and sacrifice brings us back to ourselves in ways nothing else can. Only His love, grace and mercy can save us. Our part as ward family members and within our homes is to always have hope. To believe the Lord can and will perform a miracle in your life or the life of your loved one. Pray always for them. Put their names in the temple. Reach out always and be the serving, helping, loving hand they need to feel the safety and support to change.

On April 6, 1994, the airplane carrying the Presidents of Rwanda and Burundi was shot down over Kigali. That moment was like “oil on fire,” setting off the devastating Rwandan Genocide. Yvonne Baraketse’s father, Chief of Staff of the Rwandan army, was also on the airplane and killed in the attack. Yvonne was 14 years old. Her immediate family lost many relatives and friends in the violent aftermath, managing themselves to escape to Belgium. Although prayer had sustained her through the terrors of war, now a refugee she ceased to pray, feeling God had abandoned her and her people. But while in Brussels, she found the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ, which enabled her to forgive and look forward. She subsequently was made a refugee a second time in Hurricane Katrina, and was inspired to seek an MPA after observing relief efforts there. Yvonne lives in gratitude for her life, and has dedicated it to building bridges and lifting others: through service, through education, through dance.

Emily Bates suffered severe migraines from a young age, leading her to pursue a career in science in order to study the genetic causes of the condition. She now is an associate professor at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, and runs a lab studying the molecular mechanisms of birth defects. Emily has led groundbreaking discoveries in the field of genetics, overcoming dyslexia, cultural pressures, and self-doubt along the way. She feels that God has led her from the beginning down this path. Emily sees science and faith as compatible methods of seeking truth, and relies on both as she runs her lab, partners with her husband to raise their daughter, and works to understand the nature of God and of the human body.

Kristin Hodson is the founder and executive director of The Healing Group. As a LCSW and Certified Sex Therapist, she specializes in maternal mental health and healthy sexuality. In this interview she discusses issues regarding sexuality that are unique to conservative religious cultures, developing the confidence and skills to talk with our kids about intimacy, how we can better identify and support mothers who might be struggling with postpartum depression, and the importance of seeking out Christlike love and understanding in our relationships with those in the LGBTQ community.

Leslie Schwartz-Leeper’s parents divorced when she was very young. Her mother raised her six children by herself, and taught them that the bottom line of the gospel is love. Leslie always had a testimony, but drifted in and out of the Church through her teen and young adult years. In her early thirties, she married Ian, a non-believer of Jewish/Episcopalian heritage, at the same time as she returned to the Church. Leslie talks about her positive experience undergoing a Church disciplinary council, about the ways Ian supports her and their children in Church activity, about some of the challenges of a mixed-faith marriage, and about the peace she has in her partnership with a man she chose for his intelligence, kindness, and love.

I was the girl who dreamed of getting married at 18 in the temple and having six kids. I did not imagine I’d ever be still single and old enough to serve a mission. Lucky for me, the Lord had different plans for me—I think the Lord knew that I needed a little more preparation for what he had in store for me and my life. I ended up serving a mission in Salt Lake City, and spent the entire time on the east side, serving in suburban areas much like the one I grew up in. It was here that I experienced people being “loved into the Church” over periods of years and decades. It was also here that I witnessed and was saddened by the bitterness toward the Church from neighbors and friends who were snubbed because they had politely declined invitations to church. These experiences on my mission were vital in my preparation for what lie ahead many years later. I didn’t meet my husband until I was 29 and we didn’t marry until I was 33. In the years leading up to meeting him, I had prayed fervently for a husband and received many blessings from priesthood leaders. Every blessing I received always told me that “my husband was being prepared for me” and that I should be patient. Patience was not a virtue I possessed, so I began to pray for patience and of course the Lord delivered. In 2007 I moved to the Seattle area to live with my brother after having my heart broken in Salt Lake City. I was a rock climber, and one of the first things I did upon moving was to find a climbing gym. I had no intention of falling in love with someone not of my faith, but that’s what happened when I met Bartek at the gym. We both recall the first time we saw each other—feeling the pull of two beings who recognize one another’s soul. We started off climbing together, and after our first kiss, I told him that I was Mormon and had certain boundaries and most certainly wouldn’t marry him. He was agnostic and against any organized religion and certainly couldn’t see himself with a religious person. Needless to say, our courtship was long and rocky, but we always felt pulled back to one another and so we kept dating. He is a careful decision-maker, so it took him four years to decide he could marry me. In that time, though I had fasted and prayed fervently and KNEW that I should marry him, I continually doubted my answers because of the pushback I got from family members and church leaders. I had a bishop who flat out told me that the Lord would never tell me to marry outside of the Church, and that if I married Bartek I would eventually go inactive. I had some tense and guarded conversations with family members who could not understand why I was “settling” and just thought I was being overly picky—passing up nice Mormon boys for a guy who climbs. These were all people I love and respect, so I felt torn between what I knew the Lord had revealed to me through sincere prayer, and what others who truly did have my best interest at heart were counseling me to do. I realized that ultimately, I am the only one guaranteed to receive revelation for my life, and I needed to trust the Lord and the answer I was given. When we did decide to marry, we laid out some ground rules. We agreed first and foremost that we would not try to change one another. I would not try to convert him, and he would not try to discourage me from worshipping. My one deal-breaker was that we raise our children in the gospel and let them decide their own path when they are old enough to make an informed decision. Everything else we would learn as we go. Before I made the decision to marry Bartek, I made a commitment to myself that I would choose not to be offended by what other people say. This has been important, because people say some really thoughtless things! I’ve been asked more times than I can count if I married my husband because I was inactive at the time, or if I settled for him because I couldn’t find a Mormon guy. Once, I was even asked flat-out (not by my bishop or priesthood leader) if I hold a temple recommend. Because of this commitment, I have been able to laugh about these questions and approach these people with a little more compassion because they truly don’t understand and (most of the time) mean well. We have been married now for seven years and have two children, a 5-year-old boy and a 3-year-old girl. Our path has not been easy by any stretch. Our son has special needs, and developmentally is about the age of a 2-year old. I attend church alone with my two toddlers, and if I’m honest, I dread sacrament meeting with everything in me. My kids are very cute, but difficult and busy, so I don’t usually get anything out of it because I am busy chasing them. My ward is wonderful and understanding, and I do have some dear friends who will often offer to take one of my children to sit with them so I can manage only one child at a time. They don’t mind that my son screeches and wanders during the meeting, and there are several families who will kindly offer their toys to keep them occupied. I am ashamed to admit that in weak moments, I find myself coveting the lives of women with husbands who diligently help with children during sacrament meeting and hold family home evenings. At these low times, I wonder how my life would have been different had I married the Mormon boy who did want to marry me, but whom I didn’t feel right about marrying at the time. While my husband and I are best friends, and share a lot of similar values, interests, and opinions, I am saddened to think that I can’t share some of my most cherished feelings with him.  I had decided early on in our courtship that I would never hide my religion from him so if I have a spiritual experience, I will share it with him knowing that it generally falls on deaf ears. He listens and nods politely, but I know he’s not really interested. I won’t lie. Life is hard. Would I recommend marrying outside of your faith? No. Not unless you have prayed about it and the Lord tells you to do so. Would I do things differently if I could rewind? Maybe, I don’t know. Do I regret my decision? Absolutely not. This has changed me for the better. This has changed my family for the better. In my patriarchal blessing, I have been told that it is through MY testimony that my children will be taught the gospel in my home. This is what grounds me; I know that I followed what the Lord wants me to do. I know that my husband is a good man and has a pure heart. I know that as long as I personally am always worthy of a temple marriage, that my children and I will never miss out on the blessings of an eternal family, regardless of the path my husband decides to take. More importantly, I firmly believe that Bartek and I were meant to be. Even as I write these words, the spirit confirms this to my heart. Because of our differences, we push one another and challenge one another to be our best selves. The greatest blessing of being married to a non-believer is that he doesn’t allow me to live my religion casually. He makes me a better believer because he asks “why?” and forces me every day to evaluate WHY I believe. That is a precious gift.

I was raised a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I sang songs about marrying in the temple in primary. I learned that a “celestial marriage” meant that I would marry a man who held the Priesthood, and was worthy of that Priesthood as a member of the same church. Both of my parents were members and I remember walking to church together, sharing traditions of reading scriptures together (sometimes), family prayer (sometimes), and praying before every meal together (always). My husband was raised by a Catholic mother and a Jewish father. His mother took him to Catholic Mass most Sundays and he went to Sunday School to learn about the Bible. His father did not join them. My husband’s parents were great models of a loving relationship that did not share the same belief system. My husband and I share many of the same morals and priorities. We both feel a great responsibility towards taking care of the Earth, working hard, and being honest. Our lifestyles are similar in many ways. He never had been a big drinker and when we married, he agreed to give up drinking alcohol in our home. He ended up hardly drinking alcohol at all after we were married. He doesn’t do drugs or smoke. Neither of us drinks sodas. He drinks tea and I don’t. We both eat home-cooked, healthy food and exercise regularly. We both believe in making the world a better place. Before we decided to marry, we discussed how we would live as a couple and eventually as a family. He agreed that we could raise any potential children in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and asked me not to expect or pressure him to attend or participate in church. He can be found in the audience any time I speak or play my violin in sacrament meeting. He probably will also come whenever our daughter performs or speaks. We decided that we would pray together as a family before meals. In that prayer, we hold hands like his family did for prayer. He kisses my hand and our daughter’s hand at the end of the prayer. It is one of my favorite family traditions. I have shared my thoughts when I was preparing a Relief Society lesson and listened to his perspective on the topic. The key to a mixed-faith marriage is respect for each other and honoring the other’s agency and belief system. There are some things that are different than they would be if I had married someone who was raised Mormon. Our family is not as devout as my family was growing up. I cringe a little bit when I hear some primary songs. I worry at times that our daughter will feel that we are not as good as the families that are composed of all Mormons. I feel we are lucky to be in this family. We have a loving home with very few arguments. We believe in an equal distribution of household chores between husband and wife and our daughter sees that men should be expected to cook and clean just like women are. She also sees that my husband is proud of my career and educational advances, so that allows her to value her own potential to contribute to the world outside of her future home. I feel a sense of freedom to be myself with my husband in ways that I may not if I were married in the temple to someone who started with the same expectations. When I encounter challenges to my faith, I know that my marriage does not depend upon my activity in the Church nor my loyalty to its leaders. For example, when the Church instituted a policy that excluded children of same-sex couples from baptism or the gift of the Holy Ghost, I felt that this was completely against the principles taught by Christ in the Book of Mormon and the Bible. I was distraught. I thought about completely leaving the Church. My husband put my grief into perspective by telling me that no organization is perfect, including any church. He reminded me of what I value in the Church. He told me I could do what I want, but he thought I would probably miss it if I stopped going. I never felt that my marriage hinged on whether I want to go to church or not. So I know that my decision to go or not to go to church is my own. That freedom is valuable to me.