Introduction and Welcome

Part 1 of 4 · Ep. 727

Nicki Miles [00:00:00] Sa.

John Dehlin [00:00:28] Hello, everyone, and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories Podcast. My name is John Dehlin. I'm your host. It's April 12, 2017. We're broadcasting to you. We're recording and broadcasting live to you today from my home, my soon to be former home in North Logan, Utah. And we have, you know, every time I say this, we've had so many epic stories on Mormon stories. But today's interview, I think, is truly epic and powerful and interesting. And we're going to do it. It's going to be one of those three, four hour interviews, maybe longer, who knows? But there's a lot of really cool stuff in this story. So today we're interviewing Lance and Nikki Miles.

Lance Miles [00:01:18] Hello, John.

John Dehlin [00:01:18] Welcome, guys.

Lance Miles [00:01:20] Thank you.

John Dehlin [00:01:20] How are you feeling, Nikki?

Nicki Miles [00:01:21] I'm very nervous. Super nervous.

John Dehlin [00:01:25] All right, Lance, how about you?

Lance Miles [00:01:27] I just snorted. I'm so nervous. Say hello to snorted.

John Dehlin [00:01:31] Yeah, say hello to at least 60 people joining us live on Facebook Live. We're really hoping you guys will share with us your comments and questions live as well. But just to give you a real preview what this epic story is about, Lance and Nikki both, you know, for the most part, grew up in Utah.

John Dehlin [00:01:52] Some of the things we'll be covering. Nikki's father died when she was 13 years old. And we're going to talk about how that really sealed and connected her to the church at a very young age. Turns out that Lance and Nikki experienced quite a bit of sexual shame, discomfort, and even, I'd say a little bit of trauma from their adolescent years into their mission experiences. So we'll be able to talk about that. Turns out that Lance's father, who had served as bishop for many years and his ward in Eden, Utah, ended up coming out as gay in the 80s after serving as bishop.

Lance Miles [00:02:33] 90s.

John Dehlin [00:02:34] Oh, sorry. In the 90s. Late 90s. And. And you know, that's kind of traumatic for a Eden, Utah family to have their former bishop dad come out as gay. We're going to talk about how that was handled. And it is a bit of a tragic story, but there are some happy endings as well. But we're going to talk about how Lance and his family handled the coming out of their gay father who ended up passing away from cancer.

Lance Miles [00:03:03] Yeah, leukemia.

John Dehlin [00:03:04] Leukemia. So we'll talk about that then after all that, Lance and Nikki have their own Mormon transition, which we'll talk about, which culminated in their meeting with Marlon K. Jensen, who had just been released as church historian. So they spent a good hour and a half with Marla K. Jensen and we'll talk about how that did help, but it may not have helped in the way you might think it would have helped, or it may have helped in the exact way you would. You would think. But this is part of a series on meetings with general authorities. So we did the one with Trevor.

Lance Miles [00:03:48] Right.

John Dehlin [00:03:48] This is going to be one. And we're going to have a few more interviews about people's meetings with general authorities. But this is one of those epic stories that we couldn't just only talk about the time with Marlon Jensen. Then, if that isn't enough, we're going to talk about Nikki's feminist awakening, which happened, which then led to Lance's feminist awakening, which then led to all sorts of trouble in their marriage. Because, you know, when patriarchy reigns for a couple decades, it turns out it's not a trivial thing to readjust the marriage without patriarchy as the foundation. So we're gonna talk about that, and then we're gonna just talk about kind of where they are now with the church and with their kids and how they've all worked through that. Have we covered every. Is there anything else? Epic?

Nicki Miles [00:04:43] I think that's pretty good.

John Dehlin [00:04:44] Is that pretty good?

Lance Miles [00:04:44] Yeah, that's a good outline.

John Dehlin [00:04:46] All right, so welcome again. Thanks for those listening and joining us, watching on YouTube, but also everyone joined us live. We're now up to 100 people who have joined us live, which is a really good number. So we'll be taking your questions and comments throughout the interview, so please start posting. But with all that, welcome all the way from Eugene, Oregon.

Lance Miles [00:05:10] Thank you.

Nicki Miles [00:05:11] Thank you. Thank you so much for having us. We really, really appreciate this opportunity to share.

John Dehlin [00:05:18] It's our pleasure. Thanks for coming.

Lance Miles [00:05:20] Yeah, yeah, you bet.

Nikki's Background and Joining the Church

John Dehlin [00:05:21] All right, so Nikki, just because you're part of the story maybe is the first real kind of gripping part of the story. Why don't we talk about your family's background as it relates to the church and kind of talk us up to the point of how your dad and his passing sort of affected your membership in those early years?

Nicki Miles [00:05:45] Yeah, absolutely. So grew up in Price, Utah. I was actually born in our. But grew up in Price until I was 13 years old. Had a pretty great childhood. And my parents were not. They were active, but it was in and out. My dad had some alcohol problems, and he smoked and was constantly trying to quit and be active in the church.

Nicki Miles [00:06:18] But overall, I had a really fantastic childhood. Was very close with my dad. I was a very quiet child. And so I opened up with him when he was one of the people that I. He would take me fishing and we'd sit on the bank and I would open up to him. So he continued doing that just with me. And it was very, very connecting and special. And when I was 13, he was in a coal mining accident and. And was killed and left my mom with four children, ranging from the age of. I believe. My sister was 17.

Nicki Miles [00:07:00] I was 13. And then I have a younger sister and a younger brother. My younger sister, I believe, was 8 or 9, and my little brother was 5. So my mom was widowed with four young kids at a very young age.

John Dehlin [00:07:14] And you were living in Price?

Nicki Miles [00:07:15] We were in Price.

John Dehlin [00:07:16] So there's a coal mine in Price.

Nicki Miles [00:07:18] There's many coal mines, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:07:21] Oh, Carbon County.

Nicki Miles [00:07:23] There's a reason, yeah. Come from a family of coal miners. My mom comes from a family of 13 kids. There's 10 of them. She's number 12. There's 10 girls. I'm sorry. 10 girls, three boys. I was always taught to be a strong, confident woman, that women could do anything. And there were amazing things that people in my family achieved, women in my family achieved. And I have great examples and great instruction on how to be strong, how to be confident. And my mom was a convert at the age of.

Nicki Miles [00:08:05] When she was in junior high, she would go to seminary with her friend, and then she took the missionary lessons. Her mother didn't allow her to get married until she was out of the house and so baptized. Baptized. I'm sorry. So she got. She married my dad and got baptized. And so they brought us to church on Sundays. And when my dad wouldn't go, my mom would bring us. So it was very confusing for me as a child growing up, as a young woman growing up, because I wanted to be confident and strong and have that place in the world that I deserved as a woman.

Nicki Miles [00:08:51] But I was being told different in church. So it was very contradictive and very confusing for me. But when my dad died, I have an analogy that I use in my head that with the church, I chose to be in the church, and I made that choice on my own. It wasn't anyone's fault or anything bad that happened to me. Being in the church, I chose to tie these bows. And when the first bow I tied was when my dad passed away. And I clung onto the church for many reasons.

Nicki Miles [00:09:28] The hope that we would be a forever family was there. The hope that it would help my mom, that it would give her support. Because my older sister, who I love more than anything in this world, she went off and did her thing. She was old enough that she was ready. She didn't want to be in the home during all the.

Nicki Miles [00:09:53] The sadness and trauma. And she. She chose to. To heal a different way, you know, by. By leaving. And I was then the kind of the. The head child in the home and feeling like I needed to take that, some of that pressure off of my mom and so really, really dove into that role.

Nicki Miles [00:10:17] And then I. So that was the first bow that I tied was. And that was the one that always stuck because no matter what I did, if I was gonna. If I did wrong, I could repent and it could be forgiven of me and then I would have that chance to be with my dad again, but only if I was good and only if I kept the commandments. And so I struggled with guilt a lot for. For any actions that I did wrong that would keep me from that.

Nicki Miles [00:10:53] So that was the first bow that tied me to the church. And it was a strong one. It was, and it helped. The church was not bad. A bad place for me to go. Was it the only place and the only good way for me to be a 13 year old without a dad?

Nicki Miles [00:11:15] No, but it wasn't all bad. But it certainly kept me in the state of mind that my decisions and my plan was laid out for me.

John Dehlin [00:11:31] It kind of locks you in.

Nicki Miles [00:11:32] It did. I was locked in and I had locked myself in. I had chosen to serve mission. I chose to. I chose all those things to get married in the temple and to have kids and raise them in the church.

John Dehlin [00:11:49] How many younger siblings again? How many younger siblings?

Nicki Miles [00:11:51] So I have an older sister. A younger sister, and. Hi, tv. Hi, Michelle. And Jared is my younger brother. So there's four of us.

John Dehlin [00:12:02] There's four total.

Nicki Miles [00:12:03] Okay. And then my mom remarried.

John Dehlin [00:12:05] Right.

Nicki Miles [00:12:06] And he has six kids, so they're kind of. I'm right in the middle of all of them. Some of them, yeah. So good relationships with them.

John Dehlin [00:12:16] I think of you being tied to the church in two ways by 13. One is trying to keep your eternal family together. And then the other is trying to be the good, supportive child to your mom who had been through a lot and your siblings needed you. So you don't like me using the term Nephi, but unfortunately we don't have a female equivalent. But you were trying to be the righteous, faithful kid.

Nicki Miles [00:12:40] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:12:40] And in many ways I'm sure your family benefited from the social support the church provided.

Nicki Miles [00:12:45] Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:12:47] There was definitely that spiritual and moral and community and all that stuff.

Lance Miles [00:12:51] I think one thing that's really important to say here because some of my friends and stuff are Christians who believe that when they die, they'll just be with their family. But in Mormonism, we don't believe that if you don't get married in the temple, then you are forever alone. You're not with your family after this life. And so it's very important to have that family continuity. The ceiling in the temple. And so.

Nicki Miles [00:13:19] Yeah, well, it's what I believed. I believed that it could happen.

John Dehlin [00:13:23] Yeah.

Lance Miles [00:13:23] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:13:24] Okay. So that's a great intro to your story, Lance. Let's pick up on your story a little bit. Tell us about your upbringing, and then we'll merge them together.

Lance's Upbringing and Early Faith

Lance Miles [00:13:34] So I was kind of the opposite of Nikki. I think as far as my parents go, we. Not really opposite, but there is a difference. Born in eden, Utah, in 1973. Yes. Very conservative rural area, you know, and had a great life.

Lance Miles [00:13:57] My parents, we had a farm. And the church meant everything to my family for sure. You know, my mom and dad always struggled to make ends meet, and they did everything possible to provide for us as a family. My dad pretty much built our house on his own from scratch. And, you know, he had his main job, and then his second job was at the IRS at night.

Lance Miles [00:14:27] So I'm really sorry that I get so emotional about my dad because I was such a dick to him. I'm sorry to say it that way, but I just was. Anyway, so had a great childhood. Just played around the valley.

Lance Miles [00:14:50] You've got the lake there, the reservoir, and just had a really fun time. But growing up in the church, we were always very active. You had to be really sick if you were going to miss church. And, you know, we had family home evening, family scripture study. We would, you know, get really on board for a while, and then, you know, it was really tough. And so we would stop for a while, always going back and forth as my parents struggled to teach the kids the right way to behave and to learn and believe. And so, you know, one of the big things that I was really taught in my environment was to only associate with those that are members of the church, you know, with those that hold the same values.

Lance Miles [00:15:38] And luckily in Eden, you know, there's. Most of the people are members of the church. And so, you know, I had some. Some decent friends there, you know, Dusty and Ben. If you ever watch this, great, great kids, you know, to grow up with really good friends. And, you know, just the typical Mormon life of always going to church every Sunday, paying our tithing, you know, any Little bit of money that we made, we'd make sure we paid our tithing on it and just a hard working Mormon family.

Lance Miles [00:16:12] One of the big things that happened to me also kind of this time with Nikki was when I was just about 16 years old, my best friend died. And it was a real, real tragic thing for me because I had asked this girl out on a date to a dance and I was a garbage man. And back in the days where you'd be on the truck, on the back of the truck and you would throw the garbage cans over and anyways, I had this dance and so I didn't want to go be a garbage man. I wanted it to be clean and not get smelly and everything and just have the day.

Lance Miles [00:16:55] So I asked my best friend to work on the truck that day and he ended up getting ran over by getting killed. And. And that actually was on February 10, which will come in for another thing. But Britney's. Nikki's got a niece that was actually born on the day that he died. And so that day has always been a special day to see. Yeah, you know, life and death for me. But like with Nikki's dad, that death really propelled me to, you know, at least understand life better and the plan of salvation and Mormonism and wanting for his family to see him again. And it was a real, real hard thing for me. I was already a depressed, introverted teenager and when my best friend died, it really sent me into a spiral that was really tough.

John Dehlin [00:18:05] Was that compounded by pressures, messages around masturbation, you know, porn, sexuality?

Lance Miles [00:18:13] Well, not with my friend's death and him. There was an issue with that because we had been out the previous night and you know, the night before, the night before he died, the night before he died, we had gone out and it was Friday night and you know, we didn't do anything crazy at all. I mean, it's such stupid things, you know, but they weren't the best for the church. And so it's like I did. I had regrets and worried feelings like he didn't get a chance to repent of that. What is going to be his eternal salvation now with his family.

Lance Miles [00:18:56] And so that was a worry to me too, that I was out there to be kind of a culprit with him. So that was a, you know, kind of a guilt that I held on to for sure. And. But mainly just a tragedy of it, you know, my best friend dying really at that point, my only friend, you know, so it was really hard.

John Dehlin [00:19:20] Okay, did you, did you feel like you had a strong testimony growing up.

Lance Miles [00:19:26] That's a great question. I. I have never had a burning in the bosom. I'm a very. I just. I'm not a very emotional person. You'll be like, whatever. Yeah. But I am very logical. And, you know, I don't usually get emotional or in a big uproar. And so that. What was your question again?

John Dehlin [00:19:56] So if you ever had a testimony.

Lance Miles [00:19:57] Yeah, yeah, yeah. The testimony, it wasn't that big until my mission. I was much more going through the motions as a teenager. I was not rebellious. I never partied, I never drank. I tried cigarettes to be a cool kid, but they just were nasty. But I never was with girls, nothing. I did have my Eazy E tape. That was my downfall.

John Dehlin [00:20:32] On your mission?

Lance Miles [00:20:33] No, no, not on my mission as a kid. Just as a teenager.

John Dehlin [00:20:37] Is that a rapper?

Lance Miles [00:20:38] As a rapper, yeah. Easy.

John Dehlin [00:20:39] Who's Eazy?

Lance Miles [00:20:41] Shout out to Mark.

John Dehlin [00:20:43] Was that from nwa?

Lance Miles [00:20:45] Yeah, exactly. Yeah, he was part of it. I had no clue. I just a white kid that, you know. So for those of you.

John Dehlin [00:20:53] Go see Sack, go see Straight Outta Compton. You'll see what they're talking about.

Lance Miles [00:21:00] So I was. I was totally the. The Office Space. You know, that movie Office Space, when the. When the guy's listening to his rap music and then he closes down, you know, locks his car door. But anyways, so, you know, I was. I. I was rebellious, but I. But it was, you know, pretty small stuff. One time, you know, we used to. We would skip church a little bit and go to the store as teenagers.

Lance Miles [00:21:28] And I did. I mean, admittedly, I stole something, a piece of candy from the store, and I got caught. And it was, you know, during church on Sunday, and it was the worst thing ever. And, you know, my dad, he was the bishop then, and I think he was in the bishopric or something. I can't remember now. I mean, I was pretty young, but I had to be like, I don't know, 13 or something like that.

Lance Miles [00:21:55] And I was so scared because he had to leave church to come and get his son, who was not only breaking the Sabbath at a store, but stealing from the store. Right. I mean, it was a terrible thing and I felt so much guilt from it. But my dad came and he picked me up and we got in the car and the only words he said was, I'm very disappointed in Elaps.

Lance Miles [00:22:19] And, you know, that was enough for me. I just, you know, he didn't need to scream and yell. I just disappointed my dad. So I, you know, I really Wanted to be a good kid, you know, I had a great brother. My. I have four siblings. There's five of us kids. My oldest brother, he's the oldest, and then I've got two older sisters and then a younger sister. And so anyways, so that was, you know, the extent really of, you know, my bad teenage childhood. But I was a pretty, pretty stay at home, withdrawn, quiet kid.

John Dehlin [00:23:06] And again, your dad was your bishop from what ages?

Lance Miles [00:23:10] I don't know exactly. It was my teenage years up until about my mission, so probably about 13 to 18.

Nicki Miles [00:23:16] Ish.

Lance Miles [00:23:16] That's right then. Yeah, I was right during my teenage years. Yeah. And it was tough, you know, it was tough and I feel.

John Dehlin [00:23:25] Did you have to confess stuff to it?

Lance Miles [00:23:26] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:23:28] And.

Lance Miles [00:23:29] Well, we'll get into that in a minute more. But, you know, yeah, it was tough happening as a bishop, mainly because I was looked upon differently. Right. The bishop's son is supposed to be the good one. And so this incident really, you know, was not good. And it was not good for our family, you know, the rumors and, you know, family status and everything. Obviously everybody in the valley, old, old families up there, you know, that have been there for generations. And so most people know your business. Yeah, everybody knows each other's business there, you know, used to be. Anyway, so, anyways. But. So it was tough going through those teenagers with my dad as a bishop.

John Dehlin [00:24:15] Okay, so you hit the mission. That's when things start getting interesting. Right?

Lance Miles [00:24:22] Yeah. Well, let's first discuss about us.

How Nikki and Lance Met and Fell in Love

John Dehlin [00:24:25] Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. That was my next question. So when did you guys meet?

Nicki Miles [00:24:30] Yeah, we met as seniors in our seminary class.

John Dehlin [00:24:34] And which high school?

Nicki Miles [00:24:36] Weber High.

John Dehlin [00:24:36] Weber High, yeah. Shout out to Ogden.

Lance Miles [00:24:39] Yeah, The Warriors.

John Dehlin [00:24:41] Weber Warriors.

Lance Miles [00:24:42] Golden Black.

Nicki Miles [00:24:45] So, yeah, we met in our seminary class and just kind of fell head over heels in love and what we thought was love and really developed a bad relationship, A codependent relationship he had.

John Dehlin [00:25:04] How'd you think of it at the time?

Nicki Miles [00:25:05] No, I don't think I'd recognized that at the time. We were just close to each other and sharing the grief that we had, you know, we had shared.

John Dehlin [00:25:17] You'd lost your dad, he'd lost his friends. You both knew.

Lance Miles [00:25:21] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:25:22] Grief and talked about. We both had the same belief system, you know, and so it just. There was another one of those bows being tied that I tied. You know, I'm gonna share this belief system with somebody else. And we're together. We're gonna be good members and we're gonna live with these people we've lost again. And so, yeah, we dated and he. Lance, got called on his. We graduated from high school. Yeah, you got called on your mission.

Lance Miles [00:26:00] So, I mean, talk about the confessor thing.

Nicki Miles [00:26:06] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:26:06] So you guys were a little too friendly.

Lance Miles [00:26:09] So we, we. Yeah, we meet in our senior year in high school and we just fell in love with each other and just. I mean, just every aspect was so great with each other and, you know, we were way too hot and heavy for. For both of our parents. You know, my dad together all the time. We were always together. Yeah, it was five, six days.

Nicki Miles [00:26:35] Each other, each. We were. Yeah.

Lance Miles [00:26:37] Yeah. So obviously you love somebody, you lust after somebody. You're a teenager.

Nicki Miles [00:26:43] You're codependent.

Lance Miles [00:26:44] Codependent. You. You know, we got pretty close, got

Nicki Miles [00:26:47] pretty attached really fast. Yeah.

Lance Miles [00:26:50] And yeah, we were.

Nicki Miles [00:26:52] Yeah. So there were times when we had to go and. Because I always felt guilty about everything, every little thing. And so I was always going in to confess.

John Dehlin [00:27:07] Not to his dad, though, different bishop,

Nicki Miles [00:27:09] to a different bishop I had been to. And I would like to maybe get into that at a different time, my experiences with going in and confessing to priesthood authority, because I had some negative things.

John Dehlin [00:27:25] But it was your own bishop, not his dad.

Nicki Miles [00:27:27] It was my own bishop, but then there was a time when we both went in together and talked to his dad

Lance Miles [00:27:34] when I was getting ready on my.

Nicki Miles [00:27:37] To go on the mission. We wanted to make sure everything was on the level one.

Lance Miles [00:27:43] Yeah. So. And. And obviously that was tough, you know, sitting there, having to. To discuss. Discuss, you know, intimate things that weren't,

Nicki Miles [00:27:54] you know, that shouldn't have to be discussed with an adult, let alone.

Lance Miles [00:27:59] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:28:02] Was he wanting details, my dad? He didn't.

Lance Miles [00:28:07] He didn't want to. My dad was cool, you know, he was. He was good with. With things for sure. But Nikki's bishop, you know.

John Dehlin [00:28:16] What was your bishop like, Nikki?

Nicki Miles [00:28:19] Well, it depends on what bishop. But yeah, I had a bishop once that it was very. So after. Okay, should I get into this? This is a little bit. This. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:28:34] Does that come after. With the mission, when you start preparing?

Nicki Miles [00:28:39] Yeah, a little bit. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:28:40] Okay, let's follow the timeline.

Nicki Miles [00:28:41] That's great.

John Dehlin [00:28:42] So you guys do enough confessing?

Nicki Miles [00:28:44] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:28:45] Did you confess everything?

Lance Miles [00:28:46] I guess, yeah. Well, basically, yeah. Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:28:50] So. No, we didn't. No, we didn't.

Lance Miles [00:28:53] It was 20 some odd years in your mind, John.

Nicki Miles [00:28:55] We didn't because seven months later.

Lance Miles [00:28:58] Well, okay. Okay, so let's just go into this really quick because just. Just back to me and my own rigidness with stuff. Although I wasn't doing bad things. I wasn't really doing great things. I hadn't read the Book of Mormon yet, and I'm preparing to go on mission. I really actually want to get married to Nikki. The last thing I want to do is go on a mission, honestly. But it was expected of me. It is just. This is what you do. I mean, that is for me to

Nicki Miles [00:29:29] support him and make sure.

Lance Miles [00:29:31] Yeah, exactly. You know, we're doing things wrong by having a relationship anyways, and. And, you know, the potential to that. You know, we don't get. We don't go. Yeah. We're not morally clean and go on a mission and everything. So. So there was. There was that aspect of it. But then. But, you know, one of the things. When I was. When I was getting ready to go, you know, one of the things, I guess, about my home, my farewell. But my brother said, you know, Lance, he had gone on a mission previously. He's six years older than me, and he's like, the only advice that I want to give you is, if you go on a mission, stay on your mission. Do not come home. And that was big advice.

John Dehlin [00:30:17] Don't come home early.

Lance Miles [00:30:18] Don't come home early. Yeah, exactly. You stay on your mission, you either don't go out on your mission, or you make sure that you stay honest. Make it the full two years. Yeah, exactly. So I had that in the back of my head. But anyway, so. So it was a tough thing because I love Nikki so much, but I knew that I had to go on a mission. You know, it was just. It was just. I never even consciously said, yes, I'm gonna go. It was just expected. You know, I'm just going. And so I. I put in my papers, and, you know, we get them back.

Lance Miles [00:30:51] And just really quick with that, I open them up, and I'm excited. I really didn't want to go foreign because I didn't want to learn. I had no language at all, and I didn't want to learn a language.

Lance Miles [00:31:01] But I went about as foreign as you can get in the United States. I went to the New Mexico Albuquerque mission, which at the time, I was just like, new Mexico, my gosh. And so

Nicki Miles [00:31:13] anyways, his real home was closer. At one point, he was on his mission, and his mission home was further away than his home home.

Lance Miles [00:31:22] Yeah, I was in Page Arizona on one part of my mission, and my mission home was in. Was in Albuquerque. My. My home. Yeah, my real home was. Was closer than. It certainly there are people that are called to, like, salt Lake City west or whatever that are even closer. But anyways. But yeah, so just. Just to continue off my mission really quick, you know, I was like, oh, my gosh, you know, I'm going to Albuquerque. You know, it's kind of like in the book, more musical. You know, he's like, where am one the one elder in the beginning. But anyways, I get down there, and it was such a tough thing.

Mission Experiences and Challenges

Lance Miles [00:32:02] I was challenged to want to be there. I'm sorry. Let me just back up really quick about the mtc, though, because, you know, I got the call going through the motions. We have the farewell. I get into the MTC and I go, oh, my gosh, this is it. I am out here for two years. I don't even know what I'm doing. I haven't been studying, you know, preparing and stuff.

Lance Miles [00:32:22] You know, I've graduated seminary. I've gone to church every Sunday and all that kind of stuff. You know, I knew a lot about the scriptures and things, but I just went, this is my job. I got to figure this out. So I went on a binge of reading the Book of Mormon, and I got through the Book of Mormon. It took me through the two weeks, and then it was about four weeks or so, and I read completely through the Book of Mormon. So in the mtc, in the first couple weeks on my mission, because I just like, you know, I've got to. I've got. I've got to know this thing if I'm going to be out here.

John Dehlin [00:32:55] So.

Lance Miles [00:32:55] And then I really started to gain a testimony, but I guess to bring it back now, I went to Albuquerque, New Mexico, to the mission home. But then my mission president, who came out with me, he was brand new, along with this group of missionaries. But I got sent to this place. I can't remember now what it was called, Totokai or something, this trailer out in the middle of nowhere, like, nowhere on the Navajo reservation.

Lance Miles [00:33:23] And, you know, I open up the sink cupboards and there is this mold spore that has grown into, like, this big of a bush, you know, underneath the kid, the sink. And, you know, I had a mattress that was laid out on the floor. There was no nothing in this. It was a trailer, a mobile trailer. There was just nothing in there. We had a big potbelly stove, a wood stove that we had a little kitchen area. But I had my bedroom on one side and my trainer's bedroom on the other. And I laid there on that mattress and just whimpered and cried, and I just said, what have I done? You know, what have I done? And so that was me getting on my mission.

John Dehlin [00:34:07] The reservation can't be a fun place, place to be a Mormon missionary.

Lance Miles [00:34:13] It was an amazing place, or at

John Dehlin [00:34:15] least at first, right?

Lance Miles [00:34:17] It was so ridiculous how unprepared I was to know that people in the United States live like this. You know, it was the most bizarre like this.

John Dehlin [00:34:26] Meaning what?

Lance Miles [00:34:27] No electricity, no running water, you know, in hogans, in mud houses. I mean, there's still a lot of people, the older people that live in these mud houses that have, you know, one little window if they've made it, and then just a door, you know, and they all live together as one big family and stuff. But just the desolates of everything was just terrible.

Nicki Miles [00:34:45] You know,

Lance Miles [00:34:48] it was tough. One thing we skipped over was my temple experience. I don't know, was there something important

John Dehlin [00:34:55] about that, you want to know?

Lance Miles [00:34:56] Well, you know, there's a couple things that I really want to bring up about being a kid. And one was baptisms for the dead. You know, as a youth, everybody is supposed to go and do baptisms for the dead. And I was always this very introverted person.

Lance Miles [00:35:16] And I did not like to be naked in front of anybody, you know, at school. Like, I would never shower during school, you know, I just felt like nobody should be seeing my body, you know, and. But when I went in to do baptisms for the dead, you know, they used to make you wear the shield. So you'd get naked, you'd put this little cloth on that was open on both sides and then you walked around and get your packet of your jumpsuit, right?

Lance Miles [00:35:48] And so, you know, I went and I did that and I did the baptisms and then I came back in and there's the boys, they're, you know, the leaders are there and they're taking the boys jumpsuit off of them, right? That's all wet, soaked, and they're taking it off of the boy, these naked boys, which then go right into right next to it where they're throwing the jumpsuits and showering off right there, right? And then they go into the little locker room and get changed and come back.

Lance Miles [00:36:16] And it was such a horrifying experience to me because I'm just like, why does God want me to be naked? You know, what does? Me having now I'm naked in front of my leader, you know, he knows the most intimate parts about my body.

Lance Miles [00:36:33] When this is supposed to be this glorious temple experience, right? And so I hated it, you know, I just like, this isn't of God. To have people be naked in front of other people just doesn't make sense. And so I never did baptisms for the dead again. I just didn't like it, you know, I don't know. You know, it was a fun experience with the other kids and everything, but I just hated knowing that these guys are being able to see all these kids get naked, you know, just. And, you know, certainly in the world we see each other naked and everything, but I just thought God was different, you know?

Lance Miles [00:37:11] Anyway, so that was that. My experience with the temple was outrageous. And, you know, nobody knows this in my family until now, but, you know, I went there and.

John Dehlin [00:37:24] For your endowments.

Lance Miles [00:37:25] For my endowment, yeah, to go on my mission.

John Dehlin [00:37:28] And,

Lance Miles [00:37:30] you know, it's such a weird experience anyways, you go in there, they separate the men and women, and then they tell you, you know, if anybody doesn't want to be here, you can leave. Right? But I'm like, I have no clue what I'm even doing here. You know, I don't. I don't know what's going on. What am I supposed to do? And here I am. I'm supposed to be going on this mission. I've got, you know, all my family and friends.

Lance Miles [00:37:55] I got so many family members there in the temple ceremony with me and everything. And, you know, and so there's that. But I'm sorry, I want to fast forward again or rewind to the washing and anointing just because it's that same thing of, you know, I'm sorry that I'm not cool with everybody seeing my naked body. But the washing and anointings again, you get naked. This was at the time. They've changed this now. You know, Thanks a lot. You know, sorry.

Lance Miles [00:38:27] Yeah. Continue revelation that God can't know that, you know, it's. Anyways, so, you know, you get naked, you put on this shield, and that's. That's. It's like a Mexican poncho thing, right? For those that don't know, that's totally open in the sides. And so you're sitting there trying to grab at the sides, you know, while you carry your little packet of your garments that you have, right? Or the new. I guess not. I guess that's not in the Washington anointing. But anyway, so you're trying to hold on to the sides, go to the washing and anointing room. And I got this guy in there, you know, that starts praying on me and taking the oil, right?

Lance Miles [00:39:07] And dripping it onto my head and touching me all over My body and, you know, going underneath the shield and touching my body. And I am just like, why? What is God doing this to me for? Right. I mean, this guy represents Jesus or God, that this is supposed to be them as proxy for him giving me this. And so I was just. I was so. I mean, you know, I was traumatized by it. You know, I did not like it at all. It just was so weird that God is having these guys, you know, touch my. For me, my breast, which doesn't matter. But for women, I'm thinking, you know, you got somebody touching their breasts, my stomach, my genital area, you know, I just.

Lance Miles [00:39:54] I'm like, this is just gross. You know, I don't like it. But anyways, go through it because this is what you're supposed to do. This is the quintessential. This is how we get back to Heavenly Father again as a family. And my family's pushing me. This is it. This is what we do. And so anyways, then I get into.

John Dehlin [00:40:11] Let me just pause.

Lance Miles [00:40:12] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:40:12] The listeners. So talking about how difficult parts of your mission was. Sarah writes, as a mom of two boys, hearing this breaks my heart. So glad my boys won't feel pressure to go on a mission. Now. A lot of missionaries end up feeling like they're really glad they went, but it starts out really awful.

Temple Preparation and Unsettling Experiences

Lance Miles [00:40:33] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:40:34] And there can be really awful things that happen. So. Thanks for that comment, Sarah. Cameron writes, the beginning of the endowment ceremony really creeped me out. The first time I went through, I didn't feel entirely worthy, but I didn't want to out myself in a room full of people. It was incredibly awkward.

Lance Miles [00:40:54] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:40:54] So you're not alone.

Lance Miles [00:40:55] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:40:56] Thank you, Cameron, for sharing that. Spencer writes, if I could go back in time, I would have loved to just walk out when they asked if anyone doesn't want to be at the temple. But you can't. You're there with probably family and friends and other people.

Lance Miles [00:41:10] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:41:10] And they have that out. But who in the crud, when they're 19, is gonna do that?

Lance Miles [00:41:16] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:41:16] So it's. It's manipulation. They should educate you about what you're going to be experiencing and give you the chance then to back out before you're ever there. Not wait till you're there in that special moment.

Lance Miles [00:41:30] I went to the temple prep classes and they did not prepare you one bit for what was going to happen.

John Dehlin [00:41:35] Fortunately, now the whole temple ceremony is on.

Lance Miles [00:41:37] Yes. Thank you.

John Dehlin [00:41:44] The initiatory was very difficult for me. That creeped me out, too. Amy writes, it's so extremely coercive the way they get young people through the temple. Thank you, Amy. Bethany writes, they should allow you to walk out at the end after. Oh, they should allow you to walk out at the end after. Everyone is horrified. I don't know what she means by that. Anyway. And then Jesse says, I feel like I was conditioned to accept its weirdness, even by my parents. So in that sense, you're kind of gaslighting a little bit because everybody's like, it's the most amazing ever.

Lance Miles [00:42:19] Yeah, exactly.

John Dehlin [00:42:21] If you feel creeped out by people touching you in weird places, yeah, it's on you.

Lance Miles [00:42:25] It's my fault. It's God's plan. I am not the one. Either I'm feeling guilty, I'm not worthy for some reason, or I just don't understand. And when I was in the. In the endowment ceremony and we were putting on the robes, and this is the first time that I had ever really seen robes, you know, understood what. What the robes of the holy Priesthood were.

Lance Miles [00:42:46] You know, I just went, this is weird. You know, these are weird clothes we're putting on, you know, the baker's cap and everything. And I'm just like. But I'm looking around and I'm going, okay. I just don't understand it. I just. This is all traditions from thousands of years ago. We certainly. We don't dress like this. You know, we see the pictures of how they were dressed before and stuff. And so, you know, I just don't get it. You know, I'm gonna save any, draw, you know, not draw any conclusions for now. And this is my first time. Everybody says it takes a while to get used to it and understand it.

Lance Miles [00:43:15] And, you know, every time I go to the temple, I learn more and all that kind of stuff. So I just went, you know, okay, I'm gonna let it go for now. But then it really got crazy. And that was, you know, the second token of the Merkes priesthood, you know, the sign for it when you're raising your hands above your head and chanting. I went, I'm in a cult.

John Dehlin [00:43:42] Were they saying Pele el?

Lance Miles [00:43:44] No, it was just, oh, God, hear the words of my mouth. And so, yeah, everybody's hands are going up and down.

John Dehlin [00:43:51] It's totally Masonic.

Lance Miles [00:43:54] I had no clue what Masonism was, right? I mean, Masonry, whatever. And so I. You know, we're still all in the rows, though, separated. And so I'm just like, oh, my gosh, what is going on? But then we do the. The true order of prayer. And I'm a new initiate. And so they want them to come up, right? And so we come up there, and I've got my mom and dad and brother and sister and some other relatives there. And we're all in this circle, you know, doing the true order of prayer. And then we go and we do all the signs again. And, you know, that's when I just went.

Lance Miles [00:44:32] I cannot believe I am doing this. I am sitting here chanting, raising my hands above an altar, you know, and repeating a prayer of a guy. This is everything that I've ever seen on tv. This is cults. And I'm going, but my whole family is here.

John Dehlin [00:44:48] This.

Lance Miles [00:44:48] This. That cognitive dissonance of what are. Why. Why do I feel it? So again, it's my problem that I'm feeling this way. I am the one that should feel guilty because everybody else is having the time of their life. They're loving it, you know, so, yeah, there's something wrong with me. So anyways, there's my temple experience.

John Dehlin [00:45:07] Okay.

Lance Miles [00:45:08] It was not the best on your

Nicki Miles [00:45:10] mission and sat in your trailer with mold.

John Dehlin [00:45:13] And by the way, you missed. You miss the blood oaths and the penalty.

Nicki Miles [00:45:16] Yes, I do.

Lance Miles [00:45:17] I cannot believe that, you know, and this was just. I went on my mission in 92, so I got my endowments out. I think I got them out right after I was 18. So I was in 91. So just barely. It had barely changed.

John Dehlin [00:45:30] Yeah. Penalties before. You used to use your hands to show different ways you would kill yourself in a very violent way.

Lance Miles [00:45:37] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:45:38] If you ever revealed.

Lance Miles [00:45:40] Yeah. You know, the signs and tokens. The signs and tokens.

Nicki Miles [00:45:44] Yeah.

Lance Miles [00:45:44] Yeah. And that. That I had no clue about that until afterward when we started finding everything out, how. How much has changed, you know? So anyways. Yeah, so.

John Dehlin [00:45:56] So, okay, so you get to Albuquerque. It's. You cry. It's difficult. We're jumping back. Come on. No non emotional land.

Lance Miles [00:46:06] My mission to my trainer was abusive. He had a very bad temper. And like the potbelly stove, he got mad. He kicked that thing over. He put his hand through a wall. You know, it was. It was crazy. I mean, my first few months was really, really rough, but then I just fell in love with the Navajo people. I fell in love with them.

Lance Miles [00:46:32] These people have nothing. Are just so humble and great. That's when I fell in love with the Book of Mormon. And so when you say that about a testimony of the church, I really gained that testimony on my mission.

Lance Miles [00:46:49] And I was so happy to take this book. This is my mission book. My book of Mormon. It got left in the back of our truck when I was a missionary and it got soaked and soaking wet in tea snow spots. But I kept it to this day because it just, it meant, you know, it's always meant so much to me.

Lance Miles [00:47:13] But to read the Book of Mormon, to be with the Navajos and to hear. My mission president, which was Keith Sellers was our mission president. He had a PhD in religion and in religious studies and he knew the scriptures backwards and forwards, everything about them. And to learn so much about the Book of Mormon and the Navajos and the Lamanites and their history and their story, I loved it so much. I fell in love with the Navajo people, you know, and felt like they're such a great people because of this book. So I gained a testimony of the church. The truthfulness of the church. The truthfulness of the Book of Mormon, really, while I was out there on my mission serving those people, you know, the Navajos were just great.

Lance Miles [00:48:00] And, you know, I was a. I'll say I was. I won't be derogatory. I'll say I was a good missionary because I baptized 34 people. Most of those people were children of inactives. The Navajos are kind of like all Lamanites and they're pretty inactive. You know, they're pretty easy going people. And so they'd get baptized, then go inactive. But their kids, they love the Navajos, love the Mormons and the Mormon Church. And so we baptize a lot of their kids and younger people.

A Difficult Incident and Apostolic Involvement

John Dehlin [00:48:31] But anyways, so you received a phone call, what, seven months into your mission?

Lance Miles [00:48:39] Yeah. Yeah, let's talk about that. Yeah. Okay.

Nicki Miles [00:48:43] All right. This is something we've never talked about about before publicly. No, this is something that really only Lance and I know.

Lance Miles [00:48:51] Yeah. Only my mission companion at the time knew about it. But. But it hasn't been talked about.

John Dehlin [00:48:58] Okay. So it's kind of sensitive.

Lance Miles [00:49:00] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:49:02] Okay.

Nicki Miles [00:49:02] This will be maybe a surprise to some people listening.

Lance Miles [00:49:05] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:49:07] All right.

Nicki Miles [00:49:07] Because, you know, sometimes you keep secrets so you can stay faithful. No.

Lance Miles [00:49:16] No.

John Dehlin [00:49:17] Okay.

Nicki Miles [00:49:18] Sorry, guys. Yeah, yeah. So you can talk about it.

Lance Miles [00:49:23] No, go ahead. I don't know.

John Dehlin [00:49:24] It starts with you.

Nicki Miles [00:49:25] It starts with me. Yes. So he's on his way. Yeah. Here I am in Arkham, Utah, devastated, because now this boy that I've been with for a year and a half, that I've codependent on him for my happiness, I don't know how to be happy without him. I wanted to go away to college, but didn't.

Nicki Miles [00:49:54] And so he's on his mission, and he's starting to have these great experiences, and he's right home to me. Oh, my gosh, I love these people and having fun, and he's out there having a life, and I'm there sitting still, living at home, going to Weber State, working. I mean, I really didn't have much of a life. I didn't have many friends.

Nicki Miles [00:50:16] And I started feeling really jealous that he was getting this experience. And so I thought, well, if I'm gonna wait around for him, then he can wait around for me, and I'm gonna go on a mission, too. So I started to get into that process of going on a mission. And because I.

Nicki Miles [00:50:38] You brought up that term of. I'm one of those people who always felt guilty about every single thing I did and wanted to confess and make sure that I had that place in heaven with my family and the people my dad that I had lost.

Nicki Miles [00:50:57] I. I felt like I needed to come clean. And so I went to my bishop and told him that I wanted to go on a mission. And he said, is there anything that is not settled in your life? And I said, well, there was this one thing, you know, with Lance before he left that you guys had left

John Dehlin [00:51:21] out of your confessions that I don't.

Nicki Miles [00:51:24] I had left out personally. And my bishop at the time asked me, well, is this something that Lance has resolved? And I said, I don't know. And he said, well, I'm obligated to contact his mission president. And so at that point, I just, you know, I thought, my world's ended.

Lance Miles [00:51:45] Yeah, it was no longer about her.

Nicki Miles [00:51:48] It wasn't about me going on a mission anymore. And now there's this.

John Dehlin [00:51:52] Now you're worried.

Nicki Miles [00:51:53] Now I'm worried, and I'm worried that everyone's gonna know, and I'm not gonna, you know, not just that everyone's gonna know, but, man, maybe I'm not gonna be able to go do this. And is he gonna get sent home? And this really breaks the bow that I tied to the church, you know, this is. This is not working. So he then gets in contact with Lance's mission president. And you can take it from there.

Lance Miles [00:52:24] Let me just say, too, because this is still not, you know, having sexual intercourse. No, this is just because.

Nicki Miles [00:52:32] Heavy petting, I guess it was a good term for it.

Lance Miles [00:52:36] It was just that it was. I think what had happened was it happened after we had basically confessed everything, and I was ready. I was basically, you know, I was going on my mission, and so I didn't bring it up, you know, just, hey, we're gonna get rid of that in our life, and I'm gonna be separate, a better person. Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:52:56] And the problem will be solved.

John Dehlin [00:52:58] So then.

Lance Miles [00:52:59] Yeah, so then the bishop, you know, again, it's not just about Nikki. You know, it's not just about the person that's confessing and trying to make them be better. It's now, holy cow, we've got a guy that potentially didn't confess everything on his own. You know, we got to go after this. And so, yeah, so her bishop called up, I don't know, got ahold of my stake president, which then immediately called up my mission president.

Lance Miles [00:53:28] And so my mission president gives me a call up out of the blue and basically says, I mean, I don't really remember, but he basically says, you know, there's a great possibility that you'll be going home other miles. And I'm just like, what is going on? I'm out here finally, like, really having a great time on my mission, really getting involved in the work, loving the people, having great experiences. And now this comes to rock my world, and, you know, there's a good possibility I'm going home. So he says that.

Lance Miles [00:54:02] That because you had gone to the temple before you were a Melchizedek priesthood holder, you're out on your mission. You're a missionary now. This has to be taken up to the Quorum of the twelve Apostles to get authorization for you to be able to stay.

Lance Miles [00:54:21] And so I'm all, okay. And he's like, I'll be calling you back to let you know. I never talked to my parents. They never called me or anything like that. I don't know if they were ever made aware that there was a problem or not.

Nicki Miles [00:54:36] They never let us know.

Lance Miles [00:54:38] Yeah, we've never talked about that at all. But anyways, so I immediately, right then started to fast. I was like, okay, I have got to get through this. I cannot be sent home for this. This is so stupid. And I'm out here doing good and bettering my life and becoming better. And so I started to fast, and I didn't get an answer back. We didn't get a thing resolved for three days. So I fasted the entire time. I fast for 24 hours. I take a glass of water and then fast again, and take another glass of water and fast again. But at the end of that fast, it came back that L. Tom Perry, had given authorization for me to be able to stay on my mission.

John Dehlin [00:55:22] And isn't it kind of crazy that this is Something short of intercourse. And yet it's having to get approved by an apostle.

Lance Miles [00:55:34] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:55:35] Isn't that kind of crazy?

Lance Miles [00:55:37] It is, but I mean, again, you know, what I said, and then how

John Dehlin [00:55:42] disrupted, how disrupting it is to your mission, it's something that's clearly in the past. And then you're just trying to go on a mission.

Lance Miles [00:55:50] Right.

John Dehlin [00:55:51] And your whole. I mean.

Nicki Miles [00:55:53] Yeah, I mean, I'm waiting to see if he's gonna stay because that's gonna affect whether I go or not.

Lance Miles [00:56:01] You know, this has just rocked her whole world. That where she was wanting to do something for herself, has now just completely screwed over my life potentially. You know, like. Like coming home from your mission. I mean, we know it. It's the worst thing you can do as a Mormon.

Nicki Miles [00:56:17] It's a hard place to be as when you come back early.

Lance Miles [00:56:20] Yeah, yeah. It is so challenging. So anyways. But, yeah, I don't have it exactly right. But. But I like to say the. The arbitrary authority that we put over people that we've, you know, that we, I don't know, allow to rule over us. You know, it's like the church has no authority over it, but we give it absolutely authority, absolute authority. You know, it's just amazing. And then we're grateful to them for allowing us to do whatever it is for me to stay on my mission. I am. So. I'm out here paying for this myself. My parents are, you know, they're paying for this service.

Lance Miles [00:57:00] And, you know, there's a chance that because I haven't come completely force rightly clean on it, that I should go home. But when you're there as missionaries, you believe the guilt is so heavy on you that you have to follow every rule that people's salvation is contingent on you being a faithful member. And so that's a lot of guilt to hang on to, a lot of responsibility that if I'm not the very most faithful missionary, there's a chance that Satan could get that person and make them not want to be a member. And they go to hell for all eternity because of me, you know?

John Dehlin [00:57:45] So is this, like, massive conflict for you guys? Just.

Lance Miles [00:57:49] Well, it was for our relationship.

John Dehlin [00:57:52] And individually, were you tormented individually?

Nicki Miles [00:57:56] Oh, yeah. It was so stressful. I was. I. Yeah. I don't even know how to explain it. I just was dumbfounded and devastated. You know, this is not what I thought it was.

Lance Miles [00:58:10] Like this one little sentence made this chain reaction that you couldn't get back.

John Dehlin [00:58:17] Yeah. Yeah. So the end. And by the way, fasting Three days is not a trivial deal.

Lance Miles [00:58:25] No, it was not. It was not.

John Dehlin [00:58:28] That can reach the point of medical.

Lance Miles [00:58:29] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:58:31] So anyway, so you did end up getting El Tom Perry comes through.

Lance Miles [00:58:36] Yeah, yeah, he comes through. And, and you know, he's always been my favorite apostle since then, you know, for, for 20 years. Whenever I hear, I was like, hey, there's my guy. You know, he took care of us. Yeah, yeah, he took care of me. Yeah. So anyways.

John Dehlin [00:58:53] Okay, so you're able to finish out your mission. Anything else about your mission you want to say?

Lance Miles [00:58:58] Yeah, well, there was, there's a couple experiences on it that I love to talk about. One of them was dealing with a potentially one of the three knee fights.

John Dehlin [00:59:10] Nice.

Lance Miles [00:59:11] We, we had a gentleman out of the blue. I was stationed in Kayenta, Arizona. And we were in this little like not even a fifth wheel, just a regular travel trailer is what we lived in. It was just horrific. The conditions, it was great. But this guy comes up, knocks on the trailer. He had been up. We lived in the, in the church's parking lot. We had a senior missionary couple next to us in a trailer next to ours.

Lance Miles [00:59:39] He comes down knocking on our doors, saying, I want to be baptized. And we're like, okay, we don't know who you are. Have you been working with anybody? He's like, no, I've been traveling, I have nothing. I was out on the road hitchhiking when out of the blue, a guy came up to me and started walking with me and we started talking about things and he gave me, he handed me a Book of Mormon and told me that I should read it and get baptized.

Lance Miles [01:00:10] And then the guy like just went away. I don't remember everything, but it was so crazy, like, oh my gosh, this had to be one of the 3D fights. And so for again, those people who don't know about Mormonism, in the Book of Mormon, when Christ comes to the Americas, he sets up the church just like he does in the New Testament. He calls apostles 3. And he asked the apostles, what do they want? Right. If I could basically give you one wish, what would it be? And three of the apostles say to stay.

Lance Miles [01:00:41] How do they put it? To stay living on the earth until Christ comes again. And so he supposedly grants them that desire. And we've got three 2000 year old guys living on the earth. And so, you know, this experience just went to. Holy cow. You know, that was one of the three knee fights. That is crazy. You know, and so the guy, we do a quick run through on the Discussion. And he gets baptized in a week, and then he leaves to go back home, like in Kansas or something like that. So. And he takes off again. But it was just one of those things.

Lance Miles [01:01:22] It was just such a weird thing that just totally sounded like, you know, that. That you hear the. The stories of the three Nephites, you know, and. And how they're. They do these elusive acts of kindness, you know? So anyways, that's still part of our doctrine.

John Dehlin [01:01:39] These. These doctrines about John the beloved still living.

Lance Miles [01:01:42] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:01:43] The three Nephites still walking around thousands of years later. And don't forget Cain and Cain Kane

Lance Miles [01:01:48] still roaming the earth. So.

John Dehlin [01:01:50] And we haven't gotten rid of that, then do we really believe it?

Lance Miles [01:01:53] Yeah, I don't know. I mean, we have to, right? If we're going to take the Book of Mormon literally and everything, then we have to believe that there's these three guys that do what? Like, you know, I. It just.

John Dehlin [01:02:05] It just.

Lance Miles [01:02:06] It doesn't make any sense when you start to think about it, because you think that they would be heading up the church, you know, they got 2,000 years of wisdom that they could give us. They met Christ himself, you know?

John Dehlin [01:02:18] Yeah, they.

Lance Miles [01:02:18] They'd be pretty powerful witnesses. Where are they anyways? We wouldn't have faith then, so they would give us too little faith.

Nicki Miles [01:02:26] That's not me.

John Dehlin [01:02:26] Direct.

Lance Miles [01:02:26] Okay. I'm sorry. Sorry.

Finishing the Mission and Coming Home

John Dehlin [01:02:28] So any other story?

Lance Miles [01:02:30] No, I don't know. Yeah, I. I just want to look really quick for. For my.

Nicki Miles [01:02:36] Okay.

Lance Miles [01:02:36] So did they ever.

John Dehlin [01:02:37] Did they ever come back to you and say, hey, you can or can't go? How did it get resolved with you? Okay.

Nicki Miles [01:02:44] I think it was he. I don't know if they gave you permission to call or if you just called, but he called and said I get to stay. And I remember sitting on the side of my bed just feeling this rush of relief, you know, that, oh, my gosh, we dodged a bullet. You know, we. We can still move forward. And so I move forward with getting ready to go on my mission and go down to the MTC for a month and have some real emotional psychological struggles. At that point, Lance kind of stopped writing because I think he was kind of ticked at me, you know, I think he was kind of.

John Dehlin [01:03:30] Did you stop writing her for the rest of my.

Nicki Miles [01:03:32] A little bit.

Lance Miles [01:03:33] I was pretty frustrated, you know, that.

John Dehlin [01:03:36] All you're doing is being honest.

Nicki Miles [01:03:37] I was. I was just trying to.

John Dehlin [01:03:38] You want to be with your dad someday, you're not gonna be lying to your bishop.

Nicki Miles [01:03:43] I can't do it. Yeah. Yeah. So I think that it definitely Taurus. And so now I'm in the mtc. The man that I'm in love with and dependent on doesn't like me anymore because I was a good girl. And now I'm at the MTC and alone because I can.

Lance Miles [01:04:08] I only like the bad ones.

Nicki Miles [01:04:12] So, yeah, no, I really struggled emotionally at the mtc, wondering if this is what I really wanted to do, you know, should I be here? Should I not? I struggled with the language. I missed home a little bit, but it was. At that point, it was nice to get out and be on my own for the first time, you know, and. And be outside of my home. I had gotten an apartment for a few months, but then it flooded, and I ended up having to go move back home. So my one attempt of trying to get out and do something on my own kind of failed.

Nicki Miles [01:04:52] And so then now I'm here at the MDC feeling okay. I don't miss my family too much. This is exciting. But my boyfriend's not riding, and I'm codependent on him emotionally. And so it's just tearing me apart going, I don't know what's happening, you know?

Nicki Miles [01:05:09] And I went to a counselor there, and she. They counseled me for a few times and gave me some good tips, and, hey, try this and try that. And I said, okay. And so I try it for. For a day or two. And then I'd go back to them. I'm still. I'm questioning. And they pulled out a letter from the First Presidency that said, sisters, we appreciate your service in the church. We love our sister missionaries, but know that your first priority is to be a wife and a mother in Zion.

Nicki Miles [01:05:49] And so the counselor was good. She said, you're choosing between two good things. If you go home and try to reconcile with your boyfriend when he gets home and you get married in the temple, that is a good choice. Okay. And so that's what I was hoping for. I was hoping for that.

Nicki Miles [01:06:12] And I wasn't really wanting to go out of the country. I wasn't really wanting. I was wanting the experience. I was at the age where most people are experiencing that, and I. And I wasn't. And so when I decided to choose between two good things, I chose that I wanted to go home. And so then they called my bishop and my mom and my. My stepdad at the time, and they. My bishop, my mom, and my stepdad came down to the empty seat, and I sat at the end of a table with probably My mom and the counselor, and then I think seven priesthood leaders, including my bishop.

Nicki Miles [01:07:01] And they started at one end of the table and went around and each person told me why they thought I should stay. And my mom just reminded me of this, this story. And I just want to give appreciation to my stepdad for doing this because it was powerful when he was the last one and everybody had got done taking their turn saying their thing, and they said, well, camp, what do you. What do you think? And he looked at me and he said, nikki, what do you want?

Nicki Miles [01:07:41] I said, I want to go home. And he said, then you're going to go home. I was not emotionally, psychologically, in any way ready to go serve a mission. I was torn up. I was still going through trying to figure out my dad's death and mourning and where I was and then all this guilt. I just was a confused 21 year old girl, you know, I was very 19. Wait, how old was I?

Lance Miles [01:08:19] 21.

Nicki Miles [01:08:21] I just was. Yeah. So I came home and I thought, okay, I'm gonna just go back and get a job. And they said at the mdc, just give us a call if you feel like you want to come back. We'll just. All the paperwork is done. Your visa's in line to get processed. And if you go home, just take a break and think about it and if you decide you want to come back, then we'll let you come back. And so I came home and started working again. And then Lance came home from his mission. And at this point we had not been communicating very much at all because I think that

Lance Miles [01:09:05] I was really frustrated that she came home because

Nicki Miles [01:09:11] he. I think, and maybe I'm wrong, but I think he was excited to come home without me there because he wasn't as codependent on me at that time because he is gone out and served a mission and grown and learned. And so I feel like he was kind of excited for me to be gone so he could do his thing and move on. And plus, he also felt like it would be a really good thing for me to go out and serve a mission because I was not growing, I wasn't branching out and doing my thing. So, yeah, I came home.

John Dehlin [01:09:49] I just have to note, and this is a theme that we'll probably cover okay at the end too, but you're just this girl who's living everyone else's life for you. Your dad dies, so you're trying to be the good daughter to your mom, you're trying to be the good old sister to your younger Siblings. You're trying to be righteous in the church. You got a boyfriend now, so you're. He's on a mission now. He wants you to go on a mission, so you're gonna go on the mission. And maybe you wanted to go to school, but like, it just. How must. How that must have felt? And you probably even weren't aware. No, no, Everyone had their Marriott marionette strings.

Nicki Miles [01:10:35] No, I wasn't. And nobody intentionally did that either. I. I want to clear that I don't blame anybody like my. My parents or the church or anything for. For my experience. That was my experience. And I'm going to choose to learn from that and move on. But. And hopefully. And this is the only reason I'm doing this, because I get petrified talking in front of people. If it can help one person out there that feels trapped, that feels tied up, I just. That's what I. That's my hope. That's my hope that that will happen. So.

John Dehlin [01:11:22] Because looking back, what was happening to you, if you had to restate that

Nicki Miles [01:11:27] dynamic, what was happening to me at that point?

John Dehlin [01:11:31] Just overall, what was your life about?

Nicki Miles [01:11:35] Living that, doing everything the right way for who? For everyone. So they could not worry about me.

John Dehlin [01:11:43] Everyone except who? Me.

Nicki Miles [01:11:46] Everyone. And it's not. It wasn't. And then I got married and it was for him. You know, I gave everything to him. Then I have kids and hello. I mean, that's. Every mother gives everything. So it's like.

John Dehlin [01:12:07] It's like the giving tree, right? You're like the giving tree, right?

Nicki Miles [01:12:14] Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Yeah. So. So here I am, this confused, 21 year old confused girl, and Lance comes home and of course we see each other and we just are like, bye, love you. You know, it was like, oh, my gosh, this is. This is who I want to be with. But then come to find out there was a. Somebody else. Thought he was pretty awesome too. So she followed kind of home from. From his mission. And so after all that pursued him.

John Dehlin [01:12:56] You're thinking about another woman at this point?

Lance Miles [01:12:58] Yeah, yeah, yeah. From her mission. I mean, she's. She's not doing things right. Right.

John Dehlin [01:13:07] Oh, really?

Lance Miles [01:13:09] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:13:10] You were disappointed that she came home?

Lance Miles [01:13:12] I was disappointed completely that she came home, yeah. And. And so that. Because again, I knew our relationship as teenagers, how dependent we were on each other, and I really did. I was able to break away from that dependency on my mission. And I grew so much. Even though it was such a hard challenge, I got a lot of growth out of it. And so when Nikki Decided that she wanted to go on a mission. I was so excited, excited for her because I knew that it would help her grow so much.

Lance Miles [01:13:49] And so when she came home, I was. Personally, I was devastated by it because I just didn't care about what people talked about. It's just her own personal growth that she would have had by being forced into situations that are not comfortable. Right. And so I was pretty disappointed in that.

Lance Miles [01:14:10] And I wanted her to be out on her mission, but she had this real fear that I was going to come home and not wait for her and get married. And she would.

Nicki Miles [01:14:19] How could I even imagine losing the one person that I am emotionally dependent on? And how unfair to do that to somebody. To be so emotionally dependent on somebody that they don't have room to live their life.

Lance Miles [01:14:35] Yeah, it was a tough situation. And again, this has kind of been in our marriage. Tough things in our marriage we've had to deal with. But So I served 20 months out on the Navajo reservation, have incredible times, Learned so much. And then the last four months, I go back to Albuquerque and I am among the mean whiteies again, you know, and I. And I at that point, I hate white people. Like, I have become Navajo. I got, you know, I got this. This fake adopted into a Navajo family that I would just. It was so much a part of my life. I just love those people so much.

Lance Miles [01:15:16] It is. It absolutely is. And so. But I go back to Albuquerque and I'm trying to, you know, be around the whities. And, you know, one quick experience. We're walking up the road and this big old truck comes up. And these guys throw a salt shaker out of the truck. They're probably going 40 miles an hour. And boom. Hits right on my leg and blows up and creates this huge, you know, welt on my leg and bruise. And, you know, I just hated white people. I'm just like, why? Why are you doing this? You know, coming from the Navajos, they would give you the shirt off the, you know, they would.

Lance Miles [01:15:50] They leave you a shirt. You know, they're so such kind hearted people. And back. Back to this. But there was a great family there that we really got involved with. And we were trying to baptize one of. One of their friends. But the gal was. Was, you know, she was younger, but kind of our age.

Nicki Miles [01:16:07] And.

Lance Miles [01:16:07] And we really started having a lot of, you know, lights for each other in the end there.

John Dehlin [01:16:13] Yeah.

Lance Miles [01:16:13] And again, Nikki and I are not doing good at all.

Nicki Miles [01:16:17] And, well, you came home and things felt good, but it was Awkward.

Lance Miles [01:16:21] It was awkward.

Nicki Miles [01:16:22] And it was.

Lance Miles [01:16:24] But I had her and her sister come, and they're beautiful singers and play the piano and stuff. And so I had them come to play at my home. Comedy.

John Dehlin [01:16:34] All the way.

Nicki Miles [01:16:35] From New Mexico.

Lance Miles [01:16:35] Yeah, from New Mexico. And a Navajo family that I'd really gotten close to in Page, Arizona, they came up, too. And. And so, anyways, so I had this. This quick. And, you know, sorry, Celeste, I really screwed up. I'm just saying that she was the one that followed me home. I know you don't care, but I always felt bad. No, she was. She was just a white girl, but she had family up here.

John Dehlin [01:17:04] Wasn't a missionary, though.

Lance Miles [01:17:05] No, no, no, she. Yeah, she was. Her dad was the bishop of the ward that was. We were serving in. And then they had family up here, so she was up here a lot. Anyways, and stuff. But anyway, so, you know, I started to go out with her and stuff, but then I just. I won't want to just say this about going by. I don't know. Do you have anything else before?

Nicki Miles [01:17:31] Go ahead.

Lance Miles [01:17:32] Okay. So things aren't good with Nikki. And. But then. So this gal, she goes back home for a while, and Nikki's wanted to go out with me and stuff, you know, And I'm not liking it because I want to break off and let Nikki have her individuality for a while, and I have mine. But then I'll probably say this, because I haven't said this to you, but we were at her mom's house, and they had a swimming pool.

Lance Miles [01:18:01] And so I'm sitting out there on the lawn chair in the swimming pool, and again, we're not dating. We're not back together at all yet. And she's out there on a little floating thing in her bikini on her stomach. And I'm just, like, looking at her in her life, and I was like, oh, my God, I love that girl. You know, I love her. And so as hard as it was to, you know that I didn't want to be with her because I wanted her to grow. I wanted. I wanted. And I wanted myself to grow. I wanted. I was excited to have some individuality.

Lance Miles [01:18:36] Yeah. Some experiences. But in that, you know, that day at your mom's house, I just was like, gosh, I can't let go of this girl. You know, it's tough.

Nicki Miles [01:18:47] So anyways, so at that point, he was given me hot and cold, you know, And I was like, I don't know what's going on with this guy. He's in love with me yet he's going off and dating someone, somebody else. And so I thought, okay, I'll just go back on my mission. I'm gonna just do this, let him do him, and I'm gonna go do me and be strong and confident.

Nicki Miles [01:19:15] And we went out on a couple dates, and of course, 20 something years old, you're gonna be snuggling and kissing and hugging and back to our old ways and back to naturally. In my opinion, now is a way to naturally connect with somebody and have a relationship, but again, no intercourse. But decided to go back on my mission and went down to the mtc. I was reassigned to the San Fernando, California mission to wait for my visa to go to the Philippines.

Nicki Miles [01:19:56] And then again with the guilt and wanting to be with my dad, wanting to eventually have an eternal companion, wanting to go along with the plan, you know, and so went down there and felt guilt and went in, went to the mtc. To the mtc, went to the mtc. I was there for a week and couldn't live with the guilt. And so went in and said, I need to confess something. I don't believe it will keep me from going home, but I need to get it off of my chest.

Nicki Miles [01:20:38] The priesthood authority that interviewed me proceeded to. To have me tell in full detail what. What went on between us physically, in. In. In full detail. Like, I was humiliated. I was embarrassed. And it wasn't the first time I had felt that way from a priesthood leader.

Nicki Miles [01:21:09] He was very rude, he was very unloving, not compassionate. Just, nope, Sister Miles, you are going home. And so I called up my mom and I apologize to all those who I've told this story to differently because that fact hasn't always been out, that I got sent home that second time because I had made out with my boyfriend before I left.

John Dehlin [01:21:41] You felt like you had a lie?

Nicki Miles [01:21:43] I did because I wanted that. I wanted an out. I wanted an exit to grow and live my life. So I made out with Lance, went down to the mdc, confessed that in full detail. Everything I did, they send me home. I call my mom, she comes down and gets me. She sends me home and I. Or she takes me home. And on my way home, I said, I need to go call Lance and let him know. So I called Lance and said, they're sending me home from the mtc. And he basically said, okay, well, I want to get married. And so what did you tell your

John Dehlin [01:22:28] mom as a reason? Did you give your mom a reason?

Nicki Miles [01:22:30] I believe I told my mom the real reason.

John Dehlin [01:22:33] Okay.

Nicki Miles [01:22:33] Yeah. I believe my mom knows pretty much all.

John Dehlin [01:22:38] But you're saying there's some people you weren't truthful with?

Nicki Miles [01:22:41] Yes. Yes.

John Dehlin [01:22:41] Who is that?

Nicki Miles [01:22:42] Everybody else.

John Dehlin [01:22:43] What'd you tell them?

Nicki Miles [01:22:44] That I just decided that I wanted to get married and that I would come home. And. And we decided that we wanted to get married. And. And so nothing else was said because I didn't want the embarrassment. I don't want the humiliation. Nobody else. I didn't want anyone else to know because I'm grateful, of course, and because I wanted to stay on.

John Dehlin [01:23:07] How about. Because it's private.

Nicki Miles [01:23:09] Yeah. How about that?

Lance Miles [01:23:11] Oh, my gosh.

Nicki Miles [01:23:13] It's private. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so I totally just kept that. Spun it a different way. That would make me fit the mold better, but, yeah. So came home, and then we were married six months later.

John Dehlin [01:23:35] You weren't disappointed in her the second time?

Lance Miles [01:23:37] Well, at that time, you were doing it with her. I know. I was. I was just back into her. I just like, let's just do it. Let's, you know, it's A mission would be great, but this isn't gonna work. You know, obviously. I mean, she's. She's kind of. I. I said, no, you need to stay. And she's like, no, I'm coming home. And. And, you know, so I'm just like, okay, well, then let's get married, you know, let's do this, you know, And. And, you know, one of the things. Nikki has dated a lot of guys and stuff, but I only dated a couple of girls, you know, my entire growing up. And so I definitely.

Nicki Miles [01:24:19] We were not ready for marriage by any means. I wasn't ready for a mission. I wasn't in any state to be ready to be married and start having kids. I just. It just was not healthy.

Lance Miles [01:24:33] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [01:24:34] It was not emotionally healthy for me.

Lance Miles [01:24:36] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:24:37] And I just want to note, all this epic drama, and no one ever had sex.

Lance Miles [01:24:43] Exactly.

Nicki Miles [01:24:43] Right.

Lance Miles [01:24:44] Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:24:45] That kind of crazy. A little crazy, right? You know, and all these men wanting details about what? Two teenagers.

Lance Miles [01:24:52] I'll tell you what. When. When we were young, before my mission and Nikki confessing some of our escapades, I just could not believe what the bishops were asking her to confess. The details of it. Not just, you know, I was with a guy, but. Okay, now, how were you with a guy? Did you have clothes on? You know, were you cry?

Nicki Miles [01:25:15] Hunting climax? Did one of you climax? Did you. I mean, it was. It was full detail. Where did he touch you? Was it with clothing or without clothing?

John Dehlin [01:25:25] And how did that Happen.

Lance Miles [01:25:27] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [01:25:28] Here I am, a young girl going through this at least once a year. I'm promiscuous because I'm trying to fill this void of my dad. It wasn't the right way to do it, but I.

John Dehlin [01:25:44] It's also totally natural.

Nicki Miles [01:25:46] I would go be promiscuous and.

John Dehlin [01:25:51] And then there's that word promiscuous. I know. Which instead of like loving.

Lance Miles [01:25:55] Exactly.

Nicki Miles [01:25:56] Normal feelings and how to deal with them. And so yeah, I, you know, it

Lance Miles [01:26:06] was, it was tough. Our teenage years were really tough for both of us. Well.

Nicki Miles [01:26:11] And then it didn't lend for good path for marriage and raising kids.

John Dehlin [01:26:19] Why is that?

Nicki Miles [01:26:22] Because we were not. We were. We didn't. I don't feel like I really chose it. Like I feel like it. It was the plan and that was the next step and that's just what you did. But like I was talking about my bows. I feel like every time I would tie a bow to the church that would connect me and keep me anchored to the church, that gap would close where I wouldn't have an opportunity to even entertain other thoughts. You know, when I was in the MTC and it's a choice between two good things. I didn't even allow myself to entertain others any other options when there were thousands of options I could have done as a 21 year old girl position.

John Dehlin [01:27:17] You could go to Europe.

Nicki Miles [01:27:19] That was so tight that I could not. I didn't have that space to think and go, what is it that I truly believe? What is it? What is my moral compass? What is it that I. What are the values I think are important? What do I want to gain? Where are my qualities? Where. It wasn't all about me. It was about the plan and it was about doing the next step and doing what was right. Because that's what was going to make me happy and that's what was going to keep me connected to my family forever.

John Dehlin [01:27:56] So more and more bows being tied on.

Lance Miles [01:27:58] Yeah. Constricting her more and more. But boy, she looked lovely. Boy, tied up in bows.

Nicki Miles [01:28:04] The marriage was the biggest one and then the kids. It's like you just get more and more and more and it gets tighter and tighter and tighter and that gap gets closer and closer and closer. I look back, sure I had opportunities and do some LDS women take advantage of that opportunity when that window is open? Of course they do. There's women out here, out there that are have master degrees and do this and that and they're businesswomen and whatnot. All the things that I didn't choose to do, but I didn't. I'm happy for them that that gap was not as tight for them as it was for me because it gave them. It gave them opportunity to see what else was out there because there's a lot. There's a lot out there.

John Dehlin [01:29:04] So this feels like a natural kind of break for the first part of the interview. I think the next big thing is to talk about your dad. Is there any quick.

Family Mission Stories and Gendered Expectations

Lance Miles [01:29:16] I guess just a couple more things. One thing about mission and an interesting thing. My sister wanted to go on a mission really, really bad. My second older sister.

Nicki Miles [01:29:27] Be careful what you talk about, though.

Lance Miles [01:29:30] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [01:29:30] We just want to be respectful.

Lance Miles [01:29:32] Yeah. Okay.

John Dehlin [01:29:35] I mean, if it's really important to your story.

Lance Miles [01:29:39] It was important to me becoming a missionary because she wanted to go on a mission. And, and she was, at the time, I think she was 19 or maybe even 20. And so, you know, at the time you had to be 21.

Nicki Miles [01:29:54] And.

John Dehlin [01:29:55] Oh, yes.

Lance Miles [01:29:56] And so she sent in to the first presidency or whatever to get special permission to be able to go a year early on her mission, and they denied her that. And then she ended up going and going to Wyoming and getting with a guy and getting pregnant. And it was devastating to our family. I mean, and it was devastating to her. And again, you know, this thing that, you know, should be celebrated, even, you know, getting pregnant and bringing another life into the world, it was so hard for us. But.

Nicki Miles [01:30:34] But it was celebrated.

Lance Miles [01:30:35] Yeah, it was. And. And we, I think, you know, we're as good as we could be as conservative Mormons, you know, for her being pregnant out of wedlock. But to me personally, it really hit me because I was going on my mission for my sister, you know, I was going to go out there and be that missionary that she couldn't be. And I'll say my disposal disappointment to her, you know, I was very disappointed that my sister would give up going on a mission and go and get pregnant. You know, the guilt and the shame that I put her through for that. And it's frustrating to me at this point, looking back, you know, how arbitrary that was. They. They just want women to go and get married. You know, you don't. Better don't become an independent person.

Nicki Miles [01:31:28] Person.

Lance Miles [01:31:28] Because I think even. Did you go on a mission, Margi? Okay, even. Even, you know, mission sister missionaries go out there, they become more independent, you know, as a missionary. And, and I think that, that every sister, every, you know, the women should have to go on missions just like the guys.

John Dehlin [01:31:48] Well, now they Are so.

Lance Miles [01:31:50] And they really are now that. That, you know, but it's still. Why is it still not 19 instead of 18? You know, I mean, that the girl. Because they lowered the age to now be 18 for guys. But they still have to make women different. Right. They still have to know you have to go at 19. You can't go at 18, you know, but now because it's 19, a lot more women are going. But anyways, I just. The arbitrary of it. And we know this for temple ceilings at the same time how, you know, guys seem to get temple ceiling so much easier than it is for, you know, canceled temple ceiling canceled than it is for a woman to get it canceled, you know, And.

John Dehlin [01:32:27] And it's because a guy can be sealed to multiple women.

Lance Miles [01:32:30] Right.

John Dehlin [01:32:31] And a woman, if she's sealed to a man.

Lance Miles [01:32:33] Yeah. But even then, if he wants to get unsealed to a. To a lady, I think that that is given more than it is only

John Dehlin [01:32:42] if she is getting sealed to someone else. But they'll. They'll be. Tend to want to. Not.

Lance Miles [01:32:46] Not. Yeah, gotcha.

John Dehlin [01:32:47] They'll tend to want to say, keep their first marriage. Go ahead and get married in the second.

Lance Miles [01:32:51] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:32:51] If the woman. First woman doesn't have someone else to be sealed.

Lance Miles [01:32:55] You don't like that?

John Dehlin [01:32:56] My wife's loving that. So what else about your story before we talk about.

Lance Miles [01:33:03] I'm sorry. Let me just go back to here really quick just to. If we're just finishing.

John Dehlin [01:33:07] Cover everything.

Lance Miles [01:33:08] I know. No, I hear you. I just want to make sure that I got. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, I think I. I think I got. Oh, a couple more things on my mission. That was kind of funny. My. So a mission president being very, you know, stalwart in the. Oh. Oh, my gosh. A couple things. I'm sorry, slow down. Okay, sorry.

John Dehlin [01:33:28] We won't be able to cover everything. I know, but so just talk about the most important.

Lance Miles [01:33:32] Okay. This one's important to me because they're all important. When I was in Gallup, we went. We got with a family that was peasant Pentecostal, I think is what they were. But they invited us to a church meeting of theirs. And so my companion and I, we went to this meeting. And during the meeting, you know, they. They started speaking in tongues. So somebody would get up and start speaking all this gibberish, Right. And then another person would get up and they would interpret the gibberish for them. And I turned to my companion, and we were just kind of laughing at each other because we were like this is not how God works.

Lance Miles [01:34:06] We know this is. This is not God doing this. This is from Satan. Because we know that speaking in tongues is. You actually speak in somebody else's language that they understand you. Right? That's our traditional way of understanding the speaking in tongues. And so I was so, you know, perplexed by why they think that that's coming from God right now. I'm not going to say anything more about that until later on, but that was a big eye opening thing to me. That man, people think some really weird things.

Lance Miles [01:34:36] And then another thing with the same family, they were really religious. And so we got into a Bible bashing thing. We actually had our mission president come to them for a meeting to talk about the scriptures. And one thing that was on my shelf that I never thought about until our endpoint part was, you know, in the Bible it says that the everlasting gospel will be from the everlasting mountains or never ending mountains or whatever. And supposedly Mormonism, we believe that's from, you know, the Alaska down to the tip of South America. Like there's, you know, the Rocky Mountain range. That range goes through the entire continent.

Lance Miles [01:35:17] So from sea to sea, see, it's never ending. That's the way it's interpreted. So we go through this Bible bashing thing and then we get back, well, the guy calls up our mission, our apartment, and he says, hey, I was talking to my pastor or whatever and he says that that everlasting mountain range is actually these mountains that are in a circle over in Europe, that are in a circle.

Lance Miles [01:35:45] And you know, at the time I just like, I hate the Bible that it's been interpreted so many times that, you know, it's not a good testament of Jesus Christ because it can be interpreted to anything, you know, but that was just another eye opening thing to me that somebody can interpret things differently, you know.

Lance Miles [01:36:01] Anyways, that'll be more into my cracks later on. But. And then just one last thing about my mission, we almost got to know, I think that Jesus at least had one wife, if not multiple wives on our mission. Our mission present was to get it like really give us some meat. But then Elder Kirby, he's all, I can't keep a secret because he did not. He's all, if you think I'm going to show you, this is not for, you know, the regular members. This is something that, that is very special that only, you know, you guys, I want to share with you guys. And he's also, you have to be able to keep it a secret.

Lance Miles [01:36:36] And my R1 mission, I can't keep a secret. So he didn't tell you, but it was going to be on how Christ was actually married because it's such an integral part in Mormon theology. Right.

John Dehlin [01:36:50] How did you find out if he didn't tell you?

Lance Miles [01:36:52] Well, because we were talking, the topic was about marriage and I can't remember, but it was really, it was focused on marriage and Christ. And I don't know, we were just discussing about the A, you know, sealing ceremony and stuff. And so he's like, you know, he's really getting into it. He's like, let me, let me show you something.

John Dehlin [01:37:09] And then.

Lance Miles [01:37:10] But because that missionary, you know, wasn't going to be able to open up his. Or keep his mouth closed. We didn't get it. So anyways, that. I think that's about it.

John Dehlin [01:37:18] Okay.

Nicki Miles [01:37:20] So.

John Dehlin [01:37:21] No, it's good. It was just. We just want to make sure everything. So that, that's great. Is the next part about your dad.

Marriage, Early Family Life, and Church Involvement

Lance Miles [01:37:28] The. Well, so we go into just quickly about our marriage. We got married in the manti Temple in January 5, 1995. And so I guess we'll say this January 5, 1995, we get married in the temple. We have Hayden, our firstborn son in 1997. In March 25, 1996. 7. And there we can quit it for right now because then it gets into my dad.

Part 2 of 4 · Ep. 728

Nicki Miles [00:00:00] Sa.

John Dehlin [00:00:28] Hello everyone and welcome back to my interview with Nikki and Lance Miles.

Lance Miles [00:00:36] That's right.

John Dehlin [00:00:38] So far we've covered Nikki's loss of her father and how that started tying her to the church to be the good daughter to get her all family back into the celestial kingdom again. We talked about their respective mission experiences and how maybe they're a little too friendly with each other or not friendly enough, depending on your perspective. And how that led to massive pre and during and post mission trauma as they're trying to be worthy and you know, had a little bit too much fun according to the church and at the same time, nothing serious or severe that in any way should warrant such trauma.

John Dehlin [00:01:20] Talked about all that. We talked about them getting married and it's just a really moving first. First part. First couple parts. And so we're touched. We're so grateful to have so many people joining us through Facebook Live. And now what we're going to do is we're going to, we're going to focus the next little segment on the story about Lance's dad because it's truly kind of a harrowing, epic story and it deserves its own little segment.

Lance Miles [00:01:50] Thank you.

John Dehlin [00:01:51] Yeah. So. So you get off your mission, you get married, you've got all these experiences.

A Parent Coming Out and the Family's Response

Lance Miles [00:01:56] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:01:57] Talk to us about when things started unraveling for dad. And this is in the late 90s, right?

Lance Miles [00:02:01] Yeah, yeah. So I get off my mission June of 94, we get married January 95 and we, you know, move into an apartment doing, being, having our regular life. And then our oldest son Hayden's born in March of 1997. When that happened, we had our baby blessing and everything was great there. But then during this time, my dad started to, he started to change. He went from this, my dad and I, we always had a great relationship. I love my dad. He was a very hard working, you know, we had a farm and he worked his fingers to the bone on the farm and in his jobs trying to make ends meet. And I really looked up to him. But he started to change and he was wearing different clothes.

John Dehlin [00:03:06] It's important to say he had been Bishop.

Lance Miles [00:03:08] Yes. Yeah, my dad.

John Dehlin [00:03:09] And super righteous again.

Lance Miles [00:03:12] So super righteous. Like, you know, we couldn't say but. Or shut up in our house, you know, no swearing whatsoever. Just really.

Nicki Miles [00:03:24] He never saw his parents fight?

Lance Miles [00:03:26] Never. That's another huge.

Nicki Miles [00:03:27] Never argued.

Lance Miles [00:03:28] Never a voice raised in my recollection that my parents never ever fought.

John Dehlin [00:03:32] Did he drink coke as a bishop? It doesn't matter.

Lance Miles [00:03:37] It's okay. He was okay. Like in those Kinds of things. Like on Sunday, you know, we would definitely. Sunday, we wouldn't go out, you know, to keep the Sabbath day holy and stuff, but we could still watch tv. I spent a lot of time outside on Sundays and stuff. But it was definitely, you know, that. That's a sacred separate day and stuff. But anyways, our movies. No.

John Dehlin [00:04:00] Our movies.

Lance Miles [00:04:01] No. Yeah, that was very frowned upon. And so. And he was always in callings, you know, he was. We were a stalwart family in the ward for sure. And. And my mom is just a saint. I mean, you know, you'd see her on her recliner every day reading scriptures and stuff. You know, just everything that she did and does is, you know, was an eye single to the glory of God.

Lance Miles [00:04:27] And so. But my dad just started wearing different clothes, so he wasn't bishop at this point, obviously. He had gotten out of the bishopric when I was about 19, by the time I was on my mission. And so it had been a few years anyways. But he was balding, and so he got these snaps put in so he could wear a toupee, and he had some cosmetic surgery done and stuff. So we just started as a family, started kind of going, man, Dad's kind of acting different. He's caring more about his body than he should, especially as a Mormon. Right. We're not.

Nicki Miles [00:05:09] As he should.

Lance Miles [00:05:10] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:05:10] As he previously did.

Lance Miles [00:05:13] Yeah, yeah, sure. And anyway, so this is just all of a sudden, we just started catching on to it. And so then, you know, things weren't sounding very good between him and my mom. And we asked my mom, and they had been sleeping apart for the last few months anyways, which we had no clue about at all. For all intents and purposes, their marriage was just perfect. Everything was happy and great.

Lance Miles [00:05:42] And so this was a real struggle. We were like, why is dad sleeping upstairs? You know, there's. Obviously, there's issues here. So we started to kind of talk about things. And then I. I can't remember if it was just me or somebody else. Went up, got onto his computer and searched a few things. And some there all of a sudden, within just a few minutes, really seeing that man, there's something going on. What did he say about.

Lance Miles [00:06:09] Was it a gay bar or. There's something on his computer that really alerted us. Didn't say that he was gay, but that he. He had been going, yeah, like, there's like, why would you ever have this stuff on your computer?

John Dehlin [00:06:20] Right.

Lance Miles [00:06:21] And so we start kind of freaking out about that. And. And so we all get together As a family. Now, just for context, my youngest sister was actually on her mission in Leeds, England, right now at this time that we're seeing this. And so anyways, there's enough worriedness from everybody that we decide to kind of

Nicki Miles [00:06:44] have a family meeting.

Lance Miles [00:06:45] Yeah, family meeting.

John Dehlin [00:06:46] Intervention.

Lance Miles [00:06:47] Yeah, exactly. And so we get everybody there, you know, all the spouses, you know, because all of my family was married, except my sister, that was on a mission. And so we all gather around and, you know, my dad's there, and my mom, you know, looks directly into his eyes and she says, rulin, are you gay? You know, that was. That was her question. And, you know, he just kind of hung his head and said, yes, yes, I am. You know, and then. And so that was devastating.

John Dehlin [00:07:24] All the kids are around.

Lance Miles [00:07:25] Everybody's around.

John Dehlin [00:07:26] You guys, like, looking at each other, shaking your head.

Lance Miles [00:07:28] Exactly. Looking down the floor, crying.

John Dehlin [00:07:31] Oh, yeah. Were you there?

Lance Miles [00:07:32] Yeah, she was there. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:07:34] It was like a whole family. Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:07:37] Not little kids, but.

Lance Miles [00:07:39] But all the adults, all the siblings, their spouses.

Nicki Miles [00:07:43] Yeah.

Lance Miles [00:07:44] So. So we just. I don't even remember it. I mean, we just started freaking out as, you know, family members and immediately,

John Dehlin [00:07:54] like, hug him and say, we love you, or.

Nicki Miles [00:07:58] I think it probably happened. I don't know how much meaning there was. It was tough.

Lance Miles [00:08:04] It was very tough. There was a million different emotions going on, you know.

John Dehlin [00:08:09] What were your main emotions?

Lance Miles [00:08:13] Well, I'll say definitely as stupid as it is, but this natural thing for ignorant people is the pedophile component, you know, that, oh, my gosh, if he's gay, then he could be a pedophile, you know, and here we are all having young kids around our dad, you know, and this cannot happen anymore, you know, and just the betrayal of it was huge for us.

Nicki Miles [00:08:42] And I want to say we were very uneducated.

Lance Miles [00:08:45] Oh, my gosh.

Nicki Miles [00:08:47] On any of that sort of thing, to make a compassionate decision was. It was hard.

Lance Miles [00:08:57] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:08:57] What made you feel betrayed?

Lance Miles [00:09:01] That he had lived his whole life saying that he was straight, and now he's changing it to be gay now. And especially at the time, you know, I've been taught by the church and society really my whole life that being gay is a choice, that you're not born that way. It is a conscious choice that you're making to be gay. And so it's really hard for me to understand at the time why he'd be choosing that. But just that frustration.

Lance Miles [00:09:31] The church is true and what the prophets are saying is true. And so my dad saying that he didn't choose it is a lie. He's lying to us. He chose it. And so that was certainly my attitude. I mean, I've been raised as a very conservative, right wing Christian person.

Lance Miles [00:09:58] When I first voted, you know, I didn't even look at the candidates. I just checked Republican for all. You know, it's like, I mean, so, so being gay, I, we had no one. I've never interacted with, with any, anybody that's gay in my life. You know, it's, we have no clue what's going on with it. And so, but that was probably one of the, the most devastating things that that came out of it was, you know, dad can't be around our kids anymore. You know, there's just, we can't trust him. And what about the fact that your

John Dehlin [00:10:30] former bishop is now coming out as gay?

Lance Miles [00:10:34] He died. What do you mean that person died? That person, that righteous, good person is now dead. And this, you know, evil spirit is now here. Right. And so this is why I have such a hard time with it.

Lance Miles [00:10:56] Sorry. Because that's how I felt. This best friend of mine, you know, my dad, who was, who would have done anything for me, I am now saying all of that's out the window. You know, who cares what you've done for 56 years in your life? You're gay. You know, and again, he didn't, he didn't do it the right way. You know, he didn't come out and say, look, there's not a right way. There's not a right way. And, and his just makes it that much harder for the, the life that he was living to ever come out.

Lance Miles [00:11:37] But anyways, because he had, he had acted upon those feelings and stuff behind my mom's back and things. There was a lot of easy reasons to say, you're a horrible, despicable person. We don't want you in our lives, you know, Anyway.

John Dehlin [00:12:04] Is that what you felt? You're a horrible, despicable person. We don't want you in our lives.

Lance Miles [00:12:09] And the thing was, as he started to explain things and some of the things that he was. Current activities that he was currently in, the reason why I bring up Hayden's blessing was that he was standing in the circle of that blessing just a few months before this revelation comes out, which means he had already gone and acted on these things before he was standing in the circle. And to me, that was just, it was such a.

John Dehlin [00:12:44] You dishonored the priesthood, right?

Lance Miles [00:12:46] Yeah, exactly. You know, I mean, we're told that, you know, we shouldn't have A blessing if we have bad thoughts, you know, we shouldn't be participating in that. And so it was very easy for me to just think everything bad about the guy. And again, all of that love and companion compassion that he had and companionship towards me and my struggles as a teenager went out the window, you know, And I just went, you're not. You're not the person that you used to be. And you can't be in my life anymore.

Lance Miles [00:13:21] And so just like what a parent does to a gay child, I did that to my dad and basically told him, I don't want to have anything to do with you, you know, you will never be around our kids anymore alone, you know, and he just loved his grandkids.

Lance Miles [00:13:42] That was everything that he lived for with those grandkids. And our whole family took him away from him. You know, nobody. We were all.

Nicki Miles [00:13:58] We said he couldn't. We did get to the point where he could come to the family get togethers if he was alone.

Lance Miles [00:14:05] Yeah, if he came alone, he could come to, you know, Christmas and birthday party.

Nicki Miles [00:14:10] He said, I'm not gonna do that.

John Dehlin [00:14:12] Meaning, not with who?

Lance Miles [00:14:14] Well, yeah, and this, you know, this was later on as he. As he got a partner. But so. So, you know, I just had all this, this, this. This feeling of, gosh, what's the word? Betrayal from him. Here he is acting one way in his life when he totally believes something different. He's going through something different.

Lance Miles [00:14:43] I just couldn't believe that. I couldn't believe that he would do that. We cut him off. We went and talked to our own bishop about it. Our bishop gave us good advice. He said, love him, you know, you gotta love him. And I was like, how do I. How do I. You know, that thing? And it just was brought up again. Hate the sin, not the sinner, right? Love the sinner, hate the sin.

Lance Miles [00:15:11] That's kind of what he was portraying there. But, you know, he was mainly just, love your dad, you know, But I couldn't do it because I was like, the sinner is committing this sin. You know, how do I love my dad when he is being with guys,

Nicki Miles [00:15:29] you know, sorry for it.

Lance Miles [00:15:33] Yeah, yeah. And that was a big thing. So when we get into it, so we have the meeting and it was just devastating. It was. Everything came out and, you know, and he told us how he was feeling about things, but he wanted to give it a try. He's like, I am willing to. To try. But here's a couple of things, though.

Lance Miles [00:15:55] In it, He said that, you know, how Long have you known about this? Well, since I was a kid, I've known that I'm gay. And he's like, well, you've never talked to anybody about it? He's like, no, I've talked to all of my priesthood leaders.

Lance Miles [00:16:12] I didn't want to go on a mission because I was gay, but they told me that if I go on a mission that I would turn straight, you know, which is just the most asinine thing in the world. You're there 24 hours a day with another guy. You know, you're supposed to turn straight because it's God's work, right, that God's gonna help you out there. So he went on a mission, you know, just get married and you'll turn. Just date girls. You'll get rid of those feelings. Just get married and you'll turn straight. Just have sex with a female and you'll turn straight. Just have kids, you'll turn straight, you know, and again.

Lance Miles [00:16:40] And he said it, that when he got called to be bishop, he went in and talked to the stake president and said, look, you know, I've got these feelings. I can't be bishop. And the state president said, just be bishop and you'll get over these feelings. So this is just a few years prior. This was like late 80s that he was being told this still. And so anyways, so he was trying his whole life, and he's finally getting to the point where he couldn't try anymore. And so. But he said when it came out, he's like, you know, I. I will do whatever I can.

Lance Miles [00:17:19] He wanted to save the family, you know, I mean, he didn't want to. To ruin all of our lives and everything. He was just such a loving, loving guy. And so. So then we went to Evergreen, and Evergreen is the. The counseling, you know, the. I don't know, you know.

John Dehlin [00:17:39] Yeah. Evergreen was the reparative therapy organization that the LDS Church used to support before lawyers started suing reparative therapy organizations for making promises they actually couldn't. Yeah, so it'd be these big support groups. It's basically what has become Northstar, which were these men's groups, primarily, where men would try and pay therapists and go away on weekends and do all sorts of masculine, manly things to try and ungate themselves.

Lance Miles [00:18:11] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:18:13] And on the side, there would be a lot of hookups going on. Well, and so, because you're supposed to be curing yourselves around a bunch of other men. Right. So there's always this level of hookups with this Level of pretending like. And in many cases really trying to change.

Lance Miles [00:18:31] Right.

John Dehlin [00:18:31] What never happened was nobody ever changed. A lot of people would put themselves forward as having changed and as examples of change, in many instances they were either just white knuckling it or lying.

Lance Miles [00:18:44] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:18:45] But it's just for decades, this sort of sham that was sold to gay and lesbian Mormons that caused a lot of people to kill themselves or to go crazy or to be depressed.

Lance Miles [00:18:57] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:18:58] Or it was a great place to find hookups. Like it was all that stuff.

Lance Miles [00:19:01] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:19:02] Now it's been folded into North Star and North Star is trying to make it better.

Lance Miles [00:19:07] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:19:08] But in many ways so much of that is just repeated at northstar. Yeah. Anyway.

Lance Miles [00:19:14] Yeah. So he, you know, he said that we would try to go and do counseling through Evergreen. And so we went to. He started doing. Going to those meetings himself. And then we had family meetings too, where we could all go and discuss our feelings as a family.

Nicki Miles [00:19:35] Right.

Lance Miles [00:19:36] And you know, it's an interesting thing and I'll bring this up because you are way more in the know of it, but the guy then. I don't know who the guy was, but whoever he was at Evergreen said that, you know, for women, the cause of homosexuality for women, he says the vast majority is because they were abused, sexually abused. And you know, in their, you know, well, whenever. But in their adolescence, whatever, that they find that. That's a real correlation there. But then he says we're kind of stumped on for men. But it's somewhere in that first 18 month period that they're finding that if the dad didn't connect to the baby. Good. In that 18 month period, then there's this sense of non masculinity or whatever and they become. They have more of a propensity to be gay. So that's. That was the line that we were told back then.

Church Teachings on LGBT Members and Personal Reckoning

John Dehlin [00:20:33] And a lot of women, we know that one in three women are sexually abused at some point in Utah. And so you always pick things. And we know that men are busy with their jobs and serving in the church. And so if you're going to try and make up or conjure up an excuse for why people are gay or lesbian, you want to pick something super pervasive.

Lance Miles [00:20:56] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:20:57] So of course for women you pick abuse because so many women are abused.

Lance Miles [00:21:00] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:21:01] And for men you pick a distant dad.

Lance Miles [00:21:03] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:21:04] Because so many dads are busy.

Lance Miles [00:21:05] Yeah, exactly.

John Dehlin [00:21:07] But if there's anything that the scientific literature has shown is that sexuality is not tied to things like rape. Plenty of women who are raped don't become lesbians. Plenty of boys that are raped don't become gay and who didn't have a distant father in many ways. But that's just people making stuff up so they don't have to, like, realize that it's actually biological.

Lance Miles [00:21:31] Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's exactly, you know, how it was happening. There was my dad for evergreen. So we were going to the meetings, but then after several meetings, he's just like, this isn't working. You know, this is. He's all, this is a great place to hook up with people. That's what he said. He's all, half the people here are just here to hook up. You know, it's not. And then he's like, yeah, there are some people that are. That are trying to make it work, but their lives are just, you know, they're not happy people, you know? And so he decided to pull the trigger and, you know, say, I'm gonna live as a gay man.

Lance Miles [00:22:17] You know, I'm not. I can't do evergreen anymore. I've gone through too much in my life, and I've got to just live as a gay man. And so he and my mom, he was pretty immediately excommunicated. So to tie in, Marlon Jensen, he is our family friend.

Lance Miles [00:22:38] Us living in Eden. He lived over in huntsville. And our siblings, we went to school together. He's got a pretty big family over there.

John Dehlin [00:22:48] You said danger died.

Lance Miles [00:22:51] So when my dad came out but was still wanting to. To be in the church with the family and everything, we got ahold of marlon Jensen to give my dad a blessing. And I wasn't there for the blessing, so I don't know what was said there, but marlon Jensen did give my dad a blessing.

Lance Miles [00:23:10] And, you know, come to find out, Marlon's done a lot of work, you know, I think has done a lot of help in trying to move the church along with the lesbian gain issue. But anyway, so just kind of a unique circumstance there that my dad was able to get a blessing from marlon.

Lance Miles [00:23:28] But, you know, pretty quickly, it unraveled, and he's like, I've got to live my life authentically. Which is so funny because, you know, the church just sits here lately and hounds on these counterfeit marriages, you know, and I just go, what is more counterfeit? My dad, as hard as this is for my mom to hit. Hear this again, you know, that we're repeating it. My dad said being married to my mom was like living with his sister. And you know, what. What a terrible thing that is for both of them. You know, both of them were cheated.

John Dehlin [00:24:11] My mom sleeping with your sister.

Lance Miles [00:24:12] Yeah, yeah. You know, I mean, it is, but then.

Nicki Miles [00:24:16] But then they were also cheated out of what a real relationship is. Both of them. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:24:23] So for you, a counterfeit marriage, right?

Lance Miles [00:24:25] Yeah. I mean, what is. What is more counterfeit than, you know, for me, if I. If I was forced. If I was forced to live with a guy the rest of my life, I would call that a counterfeit marriage. I would not want that. You know what I mean? I would not be happy in that marriage. Now, my mom and dad, again, they seem to have a great marriage, according to my life, anyways. I never saw anything bad, that they didn't like each other or anything like that.

Lance Miles [00:24:59] Now, we put our parents in a whole different light as children than we do as adults, but they seem to have a good marriage. And I think that there was a lot of love. And my dad. And my mom has absolute compassion for my dad, but my dad has absolute compassion. Compassion for my mom, too. And, you know, even though they were having to get divorced and everything, he wanted my mom to be taken care of and. And make sure that. That, you know, she got everything that. That she needed for them separating. So what else?

John Dehlin [00:25:32] So Marlon blessed your dad, but it didn't.

Lance Miles [00:25:34] Yeah. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:25:35] So.

Lance Miles [00:25:37] Yeah, so he got excommunicated, and. And it just threw his life into a tailspin. You know, luckily he had a job with the Ogden school district, and, you know, luckily things weren't so bad there that he had to leave. He was able to stay there. I don't know how his relationships were there. There's a lot of Mormons that are, you know, obviously everywhere here in Utah. And so he.

Lance Miles [00:26:06] But we. I'll just say me personally, as one of his children, destroyed his life. I did everything wrong that I could have. And the thing that is so sad to me is he, in part made me that way because he raised me that way. You know, he raised me to not think that being gay was okay. He raised me to think that.

Lance Miles [00:26:35] That there will be no gay people in heaven. Right. That we will. That only those who. Who become gods are going to be those that are married in the temple, you know, a husband and wife. I mean, that's God's plan, right? I mean, it's. That's why we're here, is to get bodies so that we can go and have eternal sex for all eternity. And how to.

Nicki Miles [00:26:56] That's what we're taught.

Lance Miles [00:26:57] That's what we're taught. And so how do two gay people do that? It doesn't make any sense. You know, boy came back, so.

John Dehlin [00:27:06] So, yeah, so then he gets sick.

Lance Miles [00:27:12] So we go through this big issue with him, and. And we start just living our lives, and we see him maybe, you know, a couple times a year at most.

Nicki Miles [00:27:23] We have a couple more kids.

Lance Miles [00:27:25] Yeah, we have a couple more kids during this time.

John Dehlin [00:27:28] And he's not. He stops being close to your family?

Lance Miles [00:27:33] Well, somewhat. We would.

Nicki Miles [00:27:35] He would come, but at that point, he had gone on and developed this relationship with this man. And so he would come alone to things and come over to our house and see the kids.

John Dehlin [00:27:48] But you'd still let him come?

Lance Miles [00:27:50] Yeah, but it was so tense, and, you know, it was just superficial, Superficial, completely superficial. And he just kind of sat there, and everybody just kind of sat around him and, you know, just weird. It was just the weirdest thing. It just was not good at all.

Lance Miles [00:28:08] And so, yeah, two years later, in. In 1999. So we. I think we just had Haley or. So there's. He calls me up, right? I can't remember exactly how I announced it, but he announced that he had leukemia, and he said that I didn't know what leukemia was. Now here's something for you, too. I immediately go, you're covering this up. I bet you have aids, and you're covering this up for leukemia. That's the kind of mindset that I was in.

Lance Miles [00:28:45] So sorry. So. So he announces that he has leukemia. And then after, you know, it's going for a while, I'm just inside. Another just horrible thing that I say to myself is, why couldn't you have just held out a couple more years with mom and let this secret die with you? You know, that the time. That's what I would have rather had than to be known as, you know, ruling the gay guy son, you know, the excommunicated ex Mormon, you know, terrible person.

Lance Miles [00:29:28] Another thing just to go through all the negatives. I wanted the negatives out there because it shows what religion does to people. But my dad was a temple ordinance worker, and so I was like, this is an item that I had to put on my shelf. But where is the discernment to allow a gay person into the temple?

Lance Miles [00:29:56] And again, in these ordinances, like my washing, anointing, where I am standing there naked in front of another person with just this little tarp thing on, if that person is gay, are they getting turned on by me doing this holy ordinance?

Lance Miles [00:30:17] Are they having bad thoughts going through their minds? Wow, we're supposed to Be doing this thing that's the most sacred thing for God. I told Nikki I will never do another washing and anointing initiatory, where he. Because I'm like, I'm not gonna allow gay people to look at my naked body, right? And so that was just again, this thought of, why is the church allowing people to be naked in the temple? You know, I mean, just that statement alone for me right now, it just screams wrong all over it. But anyways, and then for them to not have the discernment that, hey, we've got a gay person in here, and what that could do, you know, mean to people that there's no discernment there.

Lance Miles [00:31:08] And so anyway, so that was another big thing. But. But, you know, it just made me think. And then another thing that I did was I was the one that had to really expose the extent of him. So I went out and I sleuthed him. And I was on the Internet. I was the only one that was really Internet savvy at the time. Time. So I was there following him. And it was terrible what I did to him. I mean, what he was saying and stuff was nothing bad by any means, but me going after him and secretly trying to stalk him online and find out where he's going and having a different Persona and asking him questions and stuff and trying to elicit, you know, answers from him.

Lance Miles [00:31:51] It was just such a horrible thing for me to do. But I had to get to the bottom of it. I had to be that stripling warrior for my family to know, what kind of sin has this guy done that is infiltrating our family?

Lance Miles [00:32:10] It was horrible. But at the time, it was another eye opener to me because I started researching and I had missionary people that were gay. Now, I never thought of gay people on the mission before. You know, I was like, how would you go on a mission being gay? That is like, absolutely the wrong thing to be doing. And then to come to find out

Nicki Miles [00:32:30] there's all these missionaries that are gay,

Lance Miles [00:32:31] and I'm like, I'm being associated with these guys and I'm not supposed to be right. I mean, that's my attitude in the church. Because the church is like, you know, if you. You know how they are. I mean, all the teachings of, you know, be careful, or all of a sudden you could wind up giving each other hand jobs. You know, I mean, that's. It is that. That's the mentality of it. I mean, Boyd K. Packard, that. That pamphlet that he had, the.

John Dehlin [00:33:00] The.

Lance Miles [00:33:01] I don't know. Yeah. The little factory pamphlet and stuff, you know, it's. I mean, it's just you. You. You know, if you look at any. Anything homosexual, you. You might go that way, you know? Anyways, so it's just.

John Dehlin [00:33:15] So instead of being. Instead of it just being this normal way to love people and you date in high school and you. You know, it's a normal thing. And by the way, I'm not attracted by every woman that I look at.

Lance Miles [00:33:31] Right, right. Exactly. Yeah. Right.

John Dehlin [00:33:32] It's like every gay person is turned on every male.

Lance Miles [00:33:35] Right. Even if they're naked.

John Dehlin [00:33:37] Like, we're all just humans and we all have bodies, and we all love a subset and are attracted to a small subset. Said. But for everything else, it's just bodies. It's just normal stuff. But everything gets charged and twisted.

Lance Miles [00:33:52] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:33:53] Within, you know, a weird religion, basically. Confusing and confusing. Yeah.

Lance Miles [00:33:58] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:33:58] I think that's that.

John Dehlin [00:34:00] And how confusing that he taught you all this. So you're like.

Lance Miles [00:34:03] Exactly.

John Dehlin [00:34:03] So you. You're hating him because he taught you to hate him.

Lance Miles [00:34:06] Right, exactly. You know, that. That is the. The insidiousness of this, is we're teaching people to live this way, you know, to think this way.

John Dehlin [00:34:17] Yeah.

Lance Miles [00:34:17] I don't know. It was so sad to me. But anyways, so the final years, what were they like?

John Dehlin [00:34:24] So.

Lance Miles [00:34:25] So he comes and, you know, then. Then to kind of add the fake insult to injury, you know, he. He gets with a guy who's half his age. And so. So that was just kind of like the icing on the cake for us. It's just like this. This guy is crazy. You know, dad has totally gone off the deep end. We can't have anything to do with him, you know, so. But anyways, so. And, you know, he gets leukemia. I can't remember if he had leukemia after he was in the relationship or not, but Anyway, so leukemia, 1999. And then, you know, we're just kind of going through the motions, and he's continuing to get sicker and sicker, sicker and sicker.

Lance Miles [00:35:04] And finally it comes down to where my sister calls up and says, hey, you got to come right now. Dad's on his deathbed. He's ready to go. I don't know if there's anything else that you want to say before that.

John Dehlin [00:35:18] Yeah. Were you about to speak up?

Nicki Miles [00:35:20] I just wanted to share a little bit of my experience with that and watching it all happen and unfold and my own perspective on my father and the. On this person, because I didn't have. I mean, I Had my stepdad, who was the most incredible person that could have ever been put in that position.

Nicki Miles [00:35:40] But as my father in law, to watch this happen and to watch his emotion and the confusion, and I had so much conflict because in my heart I felt like there's nothing wrong with being gay. Everybody should have love, everybody should have connection.

Nicki Miles [00:36:00] But, yeah, I couldn't voice that and I couldn't say that, not even to Lance, because he's my priesthood leader and he's going to tell me how we're going to deal with this. You know, he's going to tell me that, no, he's not going to be around our children and I'm going to follow along because he has the priesthood. And what do I know? You know, it's what I feel is just feelings. So. So again, I was very conflicted.

John Dehlin [00:36:29] Again, you're tied up to the church, not allowed to really have your own thoughts and feelings.

Nicki Miles [00:36:35] Well, I think I was allowed. I don't think that I allowed myself.

John Dehlin [00:36:40] Yeah, yeah, yeah. I knew it wasn't quite right.

Nicki Miles [00:36:44] I knew it wasn't quite right, but I.

John Dehlin [00:36:46] You're certain that I can do that for both.

Nicki Miles [00:36:48] Because of spiritual experiences that I thought were spiritual experiences at the time. That's what made me feel like it was right, the church was right. So I, I'm gonna follow it, you know, even if I, I'm not even gonna give myself room to. To choose a different way.

John Dehlin [00:37:08] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:37:09] I'm. I'm just gonna say being gay and in the church is wrong. When in my heart of hearts is, no, that's not right. Everybody should be able to have a relationship and be loved and be married.

John Dehlin [00:37:25] And these are the types of things you look back later and say, I wish I had.

Nicki Miles [00:37:30] And you can't. And you can't live in the what ifs.

John Dehlin [00:37:34] You do feel that.

Nicki Miles [00:37:35] Yeah, for sure.

John Dehlin [00:37:37] How did I let the church control me so much?

Lance Miles [00:37:41] And for me, I mean, it's so ultra hard because he's dead now, you know, he died and I never got to say I'm sorry. You know, that's. That's, that's the one regret.

A Parent's Illness, Death, and Legacy

John Dehlin [00:37:50] Let's go back to the.

Lance Miles [00:37:51] Yeah, so. So Nikki was always a little bit nicer than I was. I mean, I, I was just. I was just ridiculously bad. You know, I really held a grudge against him for the perceived hurt that he did to our family. So my sister calls me up and at this point, you know, one thing I said to you earlier, my dad, even though we had really disowned him. When we moved up to Oregon, he was the first person to help us out, you know. And he helped you move, right? Yeah, to move. He drove a car up there, you know, all on his own, and we hardly even talk to him about anything. You know, it's like, okay, thanks, dad, for being able to do this. And he took time off work, drive up the car, loses his license and stuff. Just that love of a parent, you know,

John Dehlin [00:38:42] he never stopped being your dad. Yeah. Yeah. You could cut him off, but he would never.

Lance Miles [00:38:48] Yeah. And I looked at that, our own kids, and I see that same love. I would never cut my kids off, you know, if they're being bad and they want to go do their own thing. But the minute they come back to me, I would be there in a heartbeat for them, you know, no matter what, if they dislike me, you know, or not. So anyways, so my sister calls up and says, you know, dad's on his deathbed. You got to get down here. And so Nikki and I get in the car with the kids, we get our family together, and we cruise back. She lived at the time in Layton.

Lance Miles [00:39:28] I can't remember. And so he came and stayed with her. And we had about a week with him. He was in bed, but he was. He was. He was conscious and able to talk a little bit, but he was really getting to being bad. And so we worked him through. And I got. I've got. Oh, yeah, I've got kind of a funny experience.

Lance Miles [00:39:53] He was. He was hurting so bad and, you know, so much pain and anxiety and everything going through those last final stages of life, that one evening, I gave him a priesthood blessing to release his spirit from his body that he would be able to pass on. And because he was. I mean, he wasn't eating or drinking anymore, you know, really right at the very end.

Nicki Miles [00:40:20] Just a waiting game.

Lance Miles [00:40:21] Yeah. And so I gave this very emotional priesthood blessing to him to say, let go, Just be done. And that was in the evening. That was at night. He made it through the night. And then the next morning, he wakes up and he's, like, coherent, and he's starting to talk a little bit. And so we actually called a couple. One of his really old friends, Darryl came by and, you know, got to talk with him for a little bit and stuff, but inside I'm going, what? You know, he's got to die. You know, I just gave him a blessing to release his spirit from his body. He should be dead. He's doing the opposite. He's living, you know, so Now I'm like, conflicted, going, no, you shouldn't be dead or alive because I just gave you a priesthood blessing.

John Dehlin [00:41:14] Right.

Lance Miles [00:41:15] This is. I mean, this is how the dynamics work when you believe in this stuff, you know? And so what a weird thing that

John Dehlin [00:41:23] we think we can send a straight away. Right. Somehow we have the power to do that.

Lance Miles [00:41:28] Yeah, exactly.

John Dehlin [00:41:30] So it's our decision to make.

Lance Miles [00:41:32] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:41:33] Right.

Lance Miles [00:41:33] How arrogant. Yeah. So I'm like conflicting, conflicted inside because, great, I'd love him to hang on. But at the same time, now, again, I'm going, my own worthiness. Am I unworthy of this priesthood blessing and stuff and all the questions that arise because of it? Well, luckily, God always answers prayers, right? Yes. No. Or wait. We just needed to wait. He died. I'm sorry to be flipping about it, but, you know, it sucks that I'm sitting here now hoping that my dad dies so that my blessing can work. You know, I mean, just that thinking that we get into. And so when he died, I saw a man there. I didn't see some, you know, homosexual person having sex with another guy. I saw a human being there. You saw your dad? I saw my dad there. It was so hard.

John Dehlin [00:42:50] And.

Lance Miles [00:42:54] My rock shifted. It didn't break my rock, but it shifted. And, you know, I was. I was grateful that I was able to spend that last week with him.

John Dehlin [00:43:10] What changed it for you?

Lance Miles [00:43:12] Just seeing the humanity of it that, you know, the. The. What's the word?

Nicki Miles [00:43:25] Like, the rawness of it.

Lance Miles [00:43:26] Yeah, yeah. You know, just. Just how. How sad. And, you know, it's like seeing a little animal dead.

John Dehlin [00:43:35] Like the severity.

Lance Miles [00:43:36] Yeah, yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:43:38] I don't know.

John Dehlin [00:43:39] Humanity, basically.

Lance Miles [00:43:39] Yeah. And so, you know, I just went, this. This guy was the best guy on Earth.

Nicki Miles [00:43:48] He was a really good guy.

Lance Miles [00:43:51] Yeah. He had a big funeral. Even after everything, he still had so many people show up to his funeral.

John Dehlin [00:44:00] Did Marlon show up? Do you remember?

Lance Miles [00:44:02] No, I don't remember if he did. He may have.

John Dehlin [00:44:05] I don't remember. But anyways, so you made peace with them. Were you able to tell him that? No. You weren't able to tell them?

Lance Miles [00:44:13] No, I was. I was still homophobic. I just. I was able to separate a little bit, finally where I could separate my dad from this gay person, you know?

Nicki Miles [00:44:28] But you. You didn't know a game piece from it until we left?

Lance Miles [00:44:33] No, Yeah, I. I didn't at all. So I don't know what else I want to discuss with my dad. I'll say this. I won't get to the end of it yet. So because he had cancer, he was able to record his own eulogy. So he planned out what he was going to say, and he still had a testimony of the church at the time of his death.

John Dehlin [00:45:06] Death.

Lance Miles [00:45:08] He didn't believe in the Bible, actually, as much as. Kind of interesting. He said the Bible's been interpreted so many times, you know, which. Our standard line. But he believed that the men, the brethren, were just wrong on this thing. But his big thing that at least was profound to me, was in his eulogy. He said that how could those 11 witnesses, witnesses of the Book of Mormon, be lying about it? So he stuck. The foundational faith for him was those 11 witnesses of the Book of Mormon. My dad died believing that Mormonism, I think, is true and that the brethren were just wrong on this thing. Maybe, like, with blacks in the priesthood, they could. They could be wrong about. Blacks in the priesthood, they could be wrong about. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So.

Nicki Miles [00:46:06] But I think that's probably. I think he had a testimony when he did.

Lance Miles [00:46:11] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:46:12] And the two. For me, most powerful things about that story, number one, is that he could remain. It just shows the power of religion, that he'd been through all that terrible stuff, all those blessings and promises that didn't come through for him, this incredibly terrible treatment from a church that he had served and a family that he had loved. And somehow, through all that, he can still maintain his belief. That just shows the power of religion over people. And I don't know whether to say that that's good or bad or tragic or what, but. But I guess it's beautiful that you were able to regain some loving, compassionate feelings for your father before he died.

Lance Miles [00:47:02] Yeah. Yeah, it was great. It was just far too late.

John Dehlin [00:47:07] Far too late. Any final words about your dad before we end this episode? And advice to other people who may be gay, may have a gay child.

Lance Miles [00:47:21] Oh, my God.

John Dehlin [00:47:24] Have gay parents, or even not about LGBT stuff, but just about differences in family. Any closing messages? Why don't you start, Nikki? What'd you learn from the experience with his dad?

Nicki Miles [00:47:38] Oh, okay. I learned that we're all here trying to make connections, and we all need to feel love on the deepest level that we can possibly feel and whatever that means, you know, for. For a man or a woman or whoever we are, you know, whatever body we're in that we can just see, be compassionate and not think that one person is more entitled to love than another, because we're not. We're all entitled to love and to have connections and companionship.

John Dehlin [00:48:32] Love. It Lance, what would you add?

Nicki Miles [00:48:37] Well,

Lance Miles [00:48:39] put family over anything else. Put love over anything else. You know, I look at, you know, our thing was, right, God. God first, then the church and then husband and then wife.

Nicki Miles [00:48:57] Right.

John Dehlin [00:48:59] That's the order of the church.

Lance Miles [00:49:01] And. And I just go, no, you put family above all else. Everything else is just dogma or whoever

Nicki Miles [00:49:11] you consider your people.

Lance Miles [00:49:12] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:49:13] Because not everybody has family, but some

John Dehlin [00:49:17] get rejected by their family.

Lance Miles [00:49:18] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:49:18] Put your people first, whoever those people are.

Lance Miles [00:49:22] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:49:22] You know.

John Dehlin [00:49:23] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:49:25] Upfront in your life and important.

Lance Miles [00:49:29] Yeah. For kids. You know, I think ours is a somewhat. I'm sure that not as many people at 56 come out as being gay anymore as they used to. But I think my biggest thing is to say stop the hurt sooner than later. You know, Stop the ball rolling sooner than later. It's just gonna get worse and worse. You know, it just. There's. There's no good outcome to it. I mean, you know the statistics. One of your best podcasts ever was your. Your whole, you know, the survey for everything. It taught me so much. I love that. But, you know, love. Love beyond anything else. And it's not. It can't be conditional love. It can't be judgmental love.

Nicki Miles [00:50:19] You know,

Lance Miles [00:50:21] I don't know. I just need to. Yeah. How do we say marriage is of God? What we have is of God. And a gay person. You're supposed to be celibate the rest of your life, your entire life, not even having bad thoughts because we know that thought crimes are bad. And so. So you can't even have thoughts anymore, you know, for your entire life. And just you wait, because the next life's gonna be worth it. I just can't buy that anymore. This is the only life we know. We make it the best we can right now.

John Dehlin [00:51:09] Beautiful.

Nicki Miles [00:51:09] That simple.

John Dehlin [00:51:11] All right, so let's just. I want to thank Lance and Nikki for again sharing such a personal story. Several of the people listening through Facebook have just said, what amazing openness and honesty and candor and vulnerability. So that's an amazing story.

Nicki Miles [00:51:28] Thank you for giving us this platform.

John Dehlin [00:51:31] So thanks everyone who's been tuning in on Facebook Live and those who are watching on YouTube or listening on the podcast, we're going to go ahead and wrap up this. This episode, and then we are going to come back for some final stories.

Nicki Miles [00:51:45] Thank you.

John Dehlin [00:51:46] But this was super powerful. So thank you for sharing. Thanks for everyone for tuning in. Thanks to Cody for running the camera. And stay tuned, because next we're going to be talking about their faith crisis and how they ended up meeting with Marlon and Kay Jensen to resolve all their concerns. Concerns. And what happened when they tried.

Part 3 of 4 · Ep. 729

Lance Miles [00:00:00] Sam.

John Dehlin [00:00:28] Hello, everyone, and welcome back to this Mormon Stories podcast interview. I'm John Dehlin, and you're joining me in part three or four, depending on how it gets cut up. Of this epic journey of Nikki and Lance Miles. We've talked about so many interesting and important things.

John Dehlin [00:00:50] Last episode, we talked about how Lance's father, who had been his own bishop, came out as gay, how he was estranged from the family and ostracized, how he came down with leukemia, and how Lance was able to have some loving and caring thoughts for his father shortly before his death. But how sort of tragic that was that the family hadn't been taught, even by the father, ironically, to be more loving unconditionally to a family member. So it was a great, great story. Thank you guys so much for sharing that. I know the listeners were touched.

Prop 8, Doubts, and Stepping Away from Callings

John Dehlin [00:01:33] So now we come to the part of the journey where you're still active and believing members of the church. Your father's passed away. Maybe you've shifted. You said the rock under you shifted, where you sort of maybe got the sense the church had it wrong on LGBT issues, but you still proceed as faithful, committed members for many years after that experience.

Lance Miles [00:01:57] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:01:58] So talk to us about whatever you need, you know, whatever you feel is relevant. That takes us to your faith crisis and what that was about.

Lance Miles [00:02:06] Okay, start it out. Start off with you.

Nicki Miles [00:02:10] You're the one that started all this anyway.

Lance Miles [00:02:14] Jeez. Okay, so it was me.

John Dehlin [00:02:19] Yeah, yeah. Thought you were gonna say it was me.

Lance Miles [00:02:23] That's a good one. So we. My dad died in 2004.

John Dehlin [00:02:29] Turn it on.

Lance Miles [00:02:31] My dad died in 2004, and we continued to just. Yeah. Live our lives faithfully in the church. One unique thing, you know, California. The Prop 8 was happening down there in California, and my sister lived down there, and she had a sign saying no to Prop 8 or. Yes, yes, I'm Prop 8. Yes, I'm Prop 8. Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:02:59] And Prop 8 was trying to make same sex marriage illegal.

Lance Miles [00:03:04] Yeah, yeah, exactly.

John Dehlin [00:03:05] Mormons would have been for it.

Lance Miles [00:03:06] Yeah, yeah. So. And so she had that sign, and I, you know, I had changed enough to go, I don't think that I put that sign in my yard, you know, but that was the extent of it. Didn't have any talks with my sister about why she's supporting it or, you know, how that conflicts with our dad or anything like that.

Lance Miles [00:03:29] Because the church is true and gays are not, and Prop 8 is what needs to be done. Right. And so. But I kind of felt like that that wouldn't That I wouldn't have done that, but. But we were still faithful. You know, we had a little dip in our faith for a little bit, but, you know, we really were strong, faithful members of the church. When we moved out to Oregon, we realized how different the church was outside of Utah. And we played a pretty important role in our membership there. As one of those, you know, I don't know, those 10 families that, you know, never turn down a calling are always there.

John Dehlin [00:04:14] Is there one warded Bend or multiple wards?

Lance Miles [00:04:16] It's in Eugene. Eugene, yeah, that's what I meant. Yeah. There's a lot of members there. There's maybe 20,000 on their roles there in the Eugene Valley.

John Dehlin [00:04:27] So a stake, there's three stakes. Three stakes. Okay.

Lance Miles [00:04:30] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:04:31] Okay.

Lance Miles [00:04:32] So

John Dehlin [00:04:34] a lot of Mormon ducks.

Lance Miles [00:04:35] Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.

John Dehlin [00:04:37] Yeah.

Lance Miles [00:04:38] A lot of Mormons out there and. But we were always just a good, you know, Star wars from stalwart in all of our callings and stuff. Nikki was really magnifying her calling. I mean, Nikki worked at least 40 hours a week on church stuff, everything. She was heavily involved. I mean, you can talk about it, but we both had been, you know, in our callings all the time. And at this time, this was 2013, Nikki and I were. You were, what were you in the church?

Nicki Miles [00:05:17] Oh, I had just gotten. I had just gotten released as the second counselor in the Stake young women's presidency. I had just put on a new beginnings program and was getting ready to be the six year camp leader for girls camp the coming summer. So. So, yeah, I mean, I had always

Lance Miles [00:05:41] had something on my plate, very busy and I was the first counselor in the young men's presidency at the time. And just to kind of fast forward to the event on February 10th of 2013, here's as coincidental as it is, February 10th, where my best friend had died previously and Nikki's niece was born, here it was again. And I'm sitting in gospel doctrine class and just a few months before, I guess for Christmas, a few weeks before, Nikki had gotten me an iPad for Christmas or. Yeah, right around Christmas time. So I had my scriptures on it. And church is just coming out with all this new technology stuff. Really cool, all of the study guides and everything.

Nicki Miles [00:06:36] You weren't cool unless you had your scriptures.

Lance Miles [00:06:38] Yeah, everybody was starting to have the scriptures. Starting to have problems with people playing games during sacrament meeting and stuff because they're on their phones and iPads. But anyways, so we're sitting there in gospel doctrine class and we're studying D and C Doctrine and Covenants for the year.

Lance Miles [00:06:59] During the lesson they mentioned the scripture. And so I turned my scriptures open on my. I don't know if I can't remember if it was on the iPad or not, but anyways, I turned them open and I just kept reading from the little scripture that we had. I just started reading and I just happened to come across a scripture and It's D&C 49, 16.

Lance Miles [00:07:23] It says wherefore it is lawful that he should have one wife and they twain should be one flesh. And all this, that the earth might answer the end of its creation. And this has been in the scriptures the entire time that we, you know, that I've ever had the scriptures and everything, never thought about it, but it just struck me that day that it said deliberately that he should have one wife.

Lance Miles [00:07:49] I don't even, can't even remember who this is talking about. But anyways, but it caught me. One wife. Why in 1831 did God give Joseph Smith revelation that this person should have one wife? And then we go and we practice polygamy afterward. And so I'm sitting there, gospel doctrine class. I've got my iPad. Usually I'm just like, you know, I have these questions which we all have these shelf questions.

Lance Miles [00:08:17] But I go home, I'm hungry, you know, we want to eat. I want to watch the football game. The kids, you know, get them taken care of. We usually have a big Sunday dinner and just all the normal stuff that you do. And then obviously you got work and just busy, busy, busy lives. I mean, we were doing stuff with the church probably at least five nights a week. We spend, you know, most of our Sundays we're doing church stuff and a few nights a week and then lots of times on Saturdays we were doing stuff with the church, but with me having the iPad, I was like, I'm going to get to the bottom of this right now. Why do we have one wife? And so I went on to Google and I typed in DC4916

John Dehlin [00:08:58] and I

Lance Miles [00:08:58] put in one wife. And because I was in gospel doctor class, I wanted a good, reputable website, not anti Mormon. This is one of the first times I've ever really looked at anything on the Internet. So I type it in and I'm looking through some of the different links and here is this one called fairmormon.org don't know what it is. Click on it. It's got a picture of the temple and stuff. It looks legitimate, like it's a church run kind of a website. And so, and I start reading about the scripture and about polygamy and about why, you know, why the scripture and stuff.

Lance Miles [00:09:38] But then I click back to one of the links and it opens up more topics. And so I'm in gospel doctrine class all of a sudden. I've never heard of FairMormon.org before. I never had even thought of the term apologist. Never heard of what an apologist was.

Lance Miles [00:10:00] Apologetics. And I'm now looking at this website and it has dozens and dozens of topics that are these problems. And I am going, holy cow. I've never thought about this before. I've never thought that we had this kind of a problem. I never thought about that problem. And now it went from blacks in the priesthood and polygamy to holy cow. We've got hundreds of questions that they're trying to answer. And so I just started reading during the rest of the gospel doctrine class. I just started reading on this website.

Lance Miles [00:10:35] And we got through church that day. We got through church that day. And then Nikki says, well, I just start researching more. On Sunday I got home from church and I just kind of started researching more. Then I had to go to work. And so I'm just doing work activities and stuff. But then I'd come home from work and I'd start researching more and more and I just stayed on fairmormon.org I didn't want anti Mormon things, but I'm sitting here looking at fair Mormon, just going, why are we having so many questions that seemingly don't have answers to them? And so then on Thursday, Thursday and Friday, I didn't have to work.

Lance Miles [00:11:20] And so I think it was. I think it was. Was it Thursday night? I can't remember. It doesn't matter. I started reading everything. I stayed up all night. I'd read till like 2 in the morning, then go to bed for a few hours. I'd wake back up and I studied all day, all day Thursday, all day Friday, into the night, and then all day Saturday. And you know, this whole time Nikki is.

Lance Miles [00:11:48] I'm throwing out little questions to Nikki, just things that we had never heard of before. Like, did you know Joseph Smith had other wives? You know, it was, yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:11:59] And at this time I'm busy. I'm busy with kids, busy with my parents, busy with all kinds of things, but at the same time, I'm having him be pretty much absent and studying and sharing with me bits and pieces of everything, waking me up in the middle of the night and saying, oh my gosh, did you know this. Let me tell you this story. Did you know this about Joseph Smith? And it was just one thing after another.

Lance Miles [00:12:28] Yeah. So. And this is all during that first week. So I go from being a completely ignorance is bliss member to all of a sudden seeing all of these problems that we're having. And I just. I couldn't believe it. I had been told my entire life, you know, that to stay away from anti Mormon stuff because it's all lies. You know, it's all these things that Satan's trying to use to get members away from the church.

Lance Miles [00:12:57] But all these questions were mainly from the history of the church and from what went on in the beginning of the church. They weren't lies. They were just, you know, the church was different back then when it first started. And so.

Lance Miles [00:13:15] But I'm only on Fair Mormon because I don't want to be associated with anything else. So between Fair Mormon and then I got on to mormonthink.com and I would read something on Fair Mormon and then go to FairMormon or MormonThink and go and basically get the par on Paul Harvey. The rest of the story. Right.

Lance Miles [00:13:32] Fair Mormon was always just. They would be so bland or they would use one apologetic argument that wouldn't make any sense when they would use, you know, the same evidence in a different apologetic argument. And so every time I would go, mormon think wins this one. You know, the rest of the story wins this one.

Lance Miles [00:13:56] I get why this happened. If we hear the entire story before, there was all these questions, but now I'm starting to get these answers. And the answers are meaning that this is fraudulent. This is not right. This is not what I have been told my whole life.

Lance Miles [00:14:13] I really started delving into that. Nikki was pretty standoffish at first. She was a little bit worried that I was spending so much time in it and coming up with all of these negative things all of a sudden. And it just happened that our oldest son, Hayden was going to seminary at the time, early morning seminary. And it was like on Wednesday or Thursday after I had been studying this stuff and really finding out especially well about all kinds of stuff. But he gets in the car when I picked him up from seminary and he's all, dad, why could blacks not have the priesthood?

Lance Miles [00:14:49] And I'm like, son, that is a very good question. You know, why don't we go home and talk to mom about it? Because Nikki was still a little bit standoffish. I had realized why blacks were denied the priesthood, which is they were a bunch of bigots. They were Racist people that didn't want blacks to have the priesthood following in, you know, what culturally. And, you know, Christianity was already. But anyway, so.

Lance Miles [00:15:18] But that was a real thing that he had. So we start. By Sunday morning, I had stayed up all night. Saturday night, Sunday morning of that next Sunday, February 11th, I'm sitting on the bed. Nikki's really questioning me, and I sit on the end of the bed, and I'm just bawling like that, kind of bawling, saying, I think that I have lost my testimony in the church and the truthfulness of the church. And, you know, she came and sat down next to me and she was like, you know, I don't remember, but it was such a painful, scary thing. So I went in and I got released from my calling.

Lance Miles [00:16:00] I just can't do this with what I know what is going on right now. I can't be here dealing with these young men, these boys, and being a good leader to them when I am having this huge faith crisis.

Lance Miles [00:16:15] So I go into the bishop that Sunday and I tell him that I can't do it. I need to be released from my calling. I don't tell him why. And so he says, okay, you know, that's fine, and, you know, if that's what you need to do. And so I leave there and we go home and I continue to study. That next Sunday, we get back and I try to go to church. And during Gospel doctrine class, you know, we just have this blow up in there. That. That to me, I was like, I know the truth of this issue.

Lance Miles [00:16:52] And they didn't say it, you know, and it was about the church's name. The church was started in 1830, and it was the Church of Jesus Christ. And then, you know, they said, and when did it change, you know, to the Church of Jesus Christ, Latter Day Saints? Oh, in 1838. Well, in 1834, they took Christ completely out of the name for four years because they were running from their debtors, and Christ's name wasn't even in there. And in the Book of Mormon, we know how important it is that the church be named after Christ. And for four years, they didn't even have it in there.

Lance Miles [00:17:21] And I couldn't believe this thing, you know, something so simple. But then when you go and you look at the kirtland, like the cornerstone thing, it actually says right on there, the Church of the Latter Day Saints, it doesn't even say Jesus Christ. So it's not like it's hidden. But I never knew that, you know, So I was really frustrated. Nikki was grabbing onto my leg like, settle down, Lance. You know, it's all good. But this was given by our stake president, a former stake president who was really verse in the scripture, really knowledgeable and I know that he knew that we had a change.

Lance Miles [00:17:55] And it's this small thing, but it was a big thing to me. And I just realized if I stay in the church, I'm going to get excommunicated because I can't not know all these things and then hear this whitewashed story in church and not speak up about it. I am an outspoken person and I'm going to tell the truth and that's going to get me in trouble quickly with the church. So I was like, nikki, I can't go to church anymore.

Lance Miles [00:18:19] So I leave that week. And then the bishop just quick on the bishop, the bishop calls me back in and he's all, lance, I've been doing some thinking and praying and it's really come to my mind that you just need to repent. You need to repent and get back to work and quit being lazy. Now he's a gruff old, you know the time and 72 year old guy that we had a good relationship with. But anyways, I was like, bishop, it's not that easy. This is not about me being burned out of my calling or needing to repent.

Lance Miles [00:18:58] I am having a serious faith crisis. And so he's like, you know, what's wrong? And so I got into it with it and I went through and I started to detail out some of these things and one of those was like the word of wisdom. You know, the word of wisdom for several years had really been getting to me because of the hypocrisy of it that it's this word of wisdom and now it is a commandment. Right before it was a word of wisdom, it was something that, hey, the wise people follow this kind of thing. But now it's like if you drink coffee, you can't go to the temple, you can't get a temple recommend.

Lance Miles [00:19:36] And in fact, going back to my mission, my mission president said, this is my black and white thinking that if you drink one ounce of coffee and not repent of it, that you'll go to hell. That was my upbringing in the church, was it is so black and white that if you don't repent you're not going to make it to heaven. So anyways, I talked about the word of wisdom to the bishop and I said in the word of wisdom, meat is two times. It's Said it's forbidden to eat meat in the word of wisdom. Only in times of famine and in times of cold weather.

Lance Miles [00:20:10] Right. In winter. And those are the only times you're supposed to eat meat. Otherwise, they're animals with spirits and we shouldn't be killing them. But the church owns the biggest cattle ranch in Florida, in Hawaii and stuff, and we eat meat at every gathering. And so I said to my bishop, why are we eating meat, you know, in the summertime? I mean, it's our biggest barbecues. And he goes, because it tastes good.

Lance Miles [00:20:38] You know. That was his answer to that. Yeah, to that question. And then I talked about blacks in the priesthood because I was so hurt by us denying blacks the priesthood. And so, you know, I talked to him about that and how God could deny blacks the priesthood. You know, the temple blessings for 150 years. Hello, Facebook people.

Lance Miles [00:21:08] Whoa. How God could deny blacks of priesthood for 150 years and be okay with that, you know, and so I talked to the bishop about that. And now in 2013, the scriptures say that they don't know why blacks had the priesthood. They were denied the priesthood, you know, and the bishop just said to me, well, that's the way it goes, you know, I just couldn't believe that from. From my ecclesiastical leader. He was so, like, it doesn't matter, you know, what's it to you? Why are you worried about this kind of stuff? It's the past anyways. So it did not go good with my bishop. And

Nicki Miles [00:21:55] do you want me to take over?

John Dehlin [00:21:58] So what was this like for you, Nikki? You had given your whole life to this church, and now your husband's starting to doubt the whole thing.

Nicki Miles [00:22:06] Right. And what were your initial reactions? I've tied all these bows. My first reaction was fear. The second reaction was I was intrigued.

John Dehlin [00:22:18] Why?

Nicki Miles [00:22:19] Because he was saying things and getting information from reliable people, reliable sources. And I was intrigued because it almost felt refreshing to hear that the stuff I was taught wasn't right. And so I started to have a glimpse of, whoa, what do I feel about this? How do I feel about this principle in the church? And so, yeah, Lance just kept feeding me, feeding me. And then he left with our son Hayden to go to Moab on a trip. And I was home and had some time to myself and was really thinking and pondering and wondering where this was headed and what was going to happen with it.

Nicki Miles [00:23:16] And so I had decided that I had learned enough. It went from handful of questions, the things on my shelves, to an entire wheelbarrow that I could Not. I could not justify carrying around anymore. I could not justify staying in a church, which wasn't all bad. And I get that. And I understand those that stay know these things and stay.

Resigning from the Church and Why

Nicki Miles [00:23:48] Whatever their reason is, is their reason, and that's. That's okay. But for me, I couldn't. I couldn't justify staying. And so I called up Lance and I said, are you. How are you feeling about everything? And he says, I've just been learning more and more, Nicki. I just don't think I can do it.

Nicki Miles [00:24:12] And I said, I don't think I can either. And I said, I think that we need to start thinking about what we're going to do if we're going to just go inactive. Are we. You know, I mean, there were so many options to now choose.

Nicki Miles [00:24:28] How are we going to go about this? Are we going to keep the church in our lives? Obviously, there's really good things about the church and the things that it brought into our lives. Are there other ways and avenues to get those things? Sure. But that was what we were in.

Nicki Miles [00:24:45] So we decided that when he got home that we would. I decided I couldn't stay in my callings any longer and that I needed to get released so that I wasn't dropping the ball on anybody. And I went forward and did that and got released from my callings. And Lance came home from Moab, and we turned around. I had a concert trip planned, that I was gonna just go and be with my sisters.

Nicki Miles [00:25:19] But we decided to take advantage and Lance came along and we decided to get together with each of our families and let them know that we had decided to resign from the church. Not just go inactive, but we.

Nicki Miles [00:25:38] We had decided to resign, take our names off of the church, off of the records. And so, yeah, we continued. We followed through with that plan. It was the scariest drive to Utah I've ever had. We went and talked to my mom and my stepdad first. And she was nothing but loving and kind and understanding and respectful, as we were with her, too. I would respect it that she.

Nicki Miles [00:26:13] She still had beliefs. She still does. And I want to always respect that. With any of my family members that are still members, I want there to be respect, but there needs to be shared respect. I think that a lot of times that respect doesn't. Doesn't go both ways, and. And that's tough. It's tough when I feel like respecting, but then I get the things get thrown in my face. But anyway, yeah, we came back to Utah and. And told our families and do you Want to take over and explain what happened to your family and how it led to us meeting with Marlon?

Lance Miles [00:26:51] Yeah, okay. Just on our way just to give a shout out to Grant Palmer with what you guys just did with him. On our way. Driving back, we actually read the insider's view of Mormon Origins, which Nikki hadn't been really involved in a whole lot of stuff, and that was a really eye opening book to her.

Lance Miles [00:27:11] So for me, it was so tough because I had gained such a great testimony of the Book of Mormon. And when I started to have my faith crisis, the Book of Mormon was the last thing that I got into because I didn't want that to be not true because I had been out. I started spent two years telling these, you know, Navajos that they're, they're Lamanites. But anyway, so we, we have this meeting and, you know, everybody's freaking out because we say, hey, you know, we're coming in. We tried to make it not to be a big deal, but we wanted to meet with all of my family and all at once.

Lance Miles [00:27:49] And so we did it on a Monday night and we cruise up. My brother's got a nice house up in Eden. And so everybody met up there. And just quickly we got my mom, who I didn't say this, but after my dad died, he was excommunicated from the church because his homosexuality.

Lance Miles [00:28:13] But after he died a year later, they reinstated him as a member of the church. That was such a big thing to my family because we were all like, oh my gosh, he's an eternal. We're an eternal family again.

Lance Miles [00:28:30] And so that just made this hero worship that much more, you know, that man. These men allowed dad to be back in the church and so we can have our eternal family. And so we go to my family and so we've got my mom, who, you know, wants the eternal family. She totally believe in the church, you know, saint beyond saints. My oldest brother, who is now the patriarch of the family, having to take on even more responsibility because now my dad's gone, was the patriarch, you know, when my dad came out because he was now the male leader of the family. My sister and her husband had a daughter on a mission, right?

Lance Miles [00:29:13] Shawnee was on a mission and then. And then her husband was a counselor and a bishopric. And then my sister and her husband both work for the church. So we've got. All of my family is just stalwart, active lds, you know, real, again, you know, real black and white thinking.

Lance Miles [00:29:34] So we, we get there and, you know, it's It's a horseshoe of all of the believing, you know, all the family members. And then Nikki and I in the middle of it. And I'd say that's one thing to recommend, is never to do what we did.

Lance Miles [00:29:56] So we sit down and we just immediately say, you know, we've got something important to share with you guys, and we want, you know, sorry. We wanted to do it all together.

Nicki Miles [00:30:08] I had written an introduction because we were so nervous about how to present it. And so I read this introduction to them, like what was happening, and it was really not received very well. And it was actually given in a really kind way.

Lance Miles [00:30:30] Yeah, we made it as loving as we could. And then. And Nikki read it, but it said in there that we're resigning from the church, so we no longer believe in his truth claims, and that we're resigning from the church. And everybody was obviously devastated by it. My brother immediately pulled out the. He's in the bishopric and pulled out the. I can't remember where, but, you know, how many times have you read the Book of Mormon in the last couple of years? Are you praying, going to church, all those kinds of things, you know.

Nicki Miles [00:31:05] Yeah. He definitely took the priesthood role there to make sure we were doing everything.

John Dehlin [00:31:11] So

Lance Miles [00:31:14] we said, you know, we can get into some of these things if you guys want to hear them, you know, but we want to be respectful to your beliefs. And, you know, and so. But nobody wanted to hear anything. Nobody wanted to talk about stuff. My brother equated it with me looking at porn, you know, delving into church history as to either looking at porn or having an extra marital affair.

Nicki Miles [00:31:44] You're just supposed to stay away from it.

Lance Miles [00:31:46] Yeah. You know, which I wouldn't think that studying church history should be equated to that. You would think that studying church history would make you want to be a member even more. And there should be no reason to inoculate somebody from God putting his religion back on the earth. And so that was really, really hard to take. That was a personal

Nicki Miles [00:32:11] to me.

Lance Miles [00:32:11] I mean, you know, he was just doing what he thought was best, but that really hurt me.

Nicki Miles [00:32:17] Yeah. Yeah.

Lance Miles [00:32:18] And then, you know, so we start mudsling kind of back and forth and, you know, with things. And we talked about revelations and, you know, they were talking about. Because they just had the missionary program changed from 19 to 18 years and how that was revelation, you know, And I just like, are you kidding me? You know, statistically, the church loses so many kids during that year gap of high school, you know, as a business decision it's the easiest decision in the world to move them down to 18. You know, it doesn't take God to make that kind of a thing. Anyways, no one's going to win.

Lance Miles [00:32:57] Yeah, we start going back and forth. Another thing that just really hurt me because now I just, you know, come to this real realization of how terrible I was to my dad and how I was just completely, completely wrong. And, you know, my sister said, you know, I'm so glad that dad listened to his leaders and married mom and had us so that we could be raised in the gospel, you know, and I just. I just could not believe that. That we are going to, you know, hurt two people's lives. You know, a woman that deserves to be married by a straight man to give her all that love and compassion, and a gay man to be able to live a gay life and love the gender that he likes, you know, and you're gonna.

Lance Miles [00:33:49] You're glad that they sacrifice all of that so that you could be alive. You know, don't you think Heavenly Father's plan would be that you would go and, you know, get in the body of another, you know, faithful Latter Day Saint, and those two people could actually live better lives? You know, I just. It was such a tough thing.

Lance Miles [00:34:07] So we. We had this tumultuous. It was a good hour long, you know, back and forth kind of discussion that really. A lot of feelings that were hurt, and it was not good at all. I just would not recommend that to anybody.

Lance Miles [00:34:22] I think it'd be much better to do it on a one. On one more, you know, intimate, you know, loving kind of a thing.

John Dehlin [00:34:28] If at all.

Lance Miles [00:34:29] If at all.

Nicki Miles [00:34:30] If at all.

John Dehlin [00:34:31] Yeah, because they don't want to know.

Lance Miles [00:34:32] I know they don't.

John Dehlin [00:34:33] They don't want to know, and they

Lance Miles [00:34:34] certainly don't want to talk about.

Nicki Miles [00:34:35] And I certainly don't want to tell anybody what I know unless they're ready to hear it.

Lance Miles [00:34:40] Yeah. Yeah. So it was tough. We ended that evening with everybody, you know, crying and distraught and everything. And then the next day, you know, I went over and I did a bad thing with my mom. I went over and just kind of, you know, threw everything at her. You know, I had the scriptures out, and I was going through all these things saying, you know, what about this and what about that and everything. And, you know, it just comes down to, I know that it's true. I have a feeling that it's true. And I don't care what you say, you know, it is true.

A Personal Meeting with Elder Marlin K. Jensen

John Dehlin [00:35:11] So was the Marlon meeting During this time.

Lance Miles [00:35:13] So right then, my brother calls me up, and he says. He says, hey, would you guys be willing to meet with Marlon Jensen? And I just was ecstatic. I was just, yes, you bet we will. Because I knew the answers. I knew what Marlon was gonna say. I knew there wasn't gonna be any hope for us. But I wanted, you know, them to be able to know that there's a general authority that we talked to who bought off on these things, and it's not just us, you know, being led by Satan. And so I said, you bet. We would love to. And I said under one condition.

Lance Miles [00:35:49] I want you to attend that meeting, too. I want you to be involved in it so you can hear and you can be a witness to what is said there so that you know that we have some validation for some of these points. And so this is 2013. Yeah, April. April. About April 17th, I think.

John Dehlin [00:36:08] And this is after Marlon had been released his church historian, correct?

Lance Miles [00:36:12] Yeah. So he had been released the year previous, I think was. And he had just been in there for, you know, five or seven years or so, delving with the most intimate parts of church history.

Nicki Miles [00:36:23] Right.

Lance Miles [00:36:23] And so I was loving. You bet. You know, all my questions were really on church history for my foundational testimony claims. And so I wanted to hear it from the horse's mouth. You know, it was going to be this great interview. So anyways, my brother said, okay, I'll see if I can set that up. He gets in contact with Marlon. Marlon just happened to have his lunch hour free. He was working, but he had his lunch hour free. Marlon is a lawyer. I don't know what kind, but. But he's a lawyer. And so we cruised down to Ogden, where he had his building. My brother met us there, and we go up into his office.

Lance Miles [00:37:00] Got a lovely office with a nice conference area table. So we sit down there. So it's Nikki, myself, Marlon Jensen at the head, and my brother on the other side of the table. And, I don't know. You want to start us off on the meeting?

Nicki Miles [00:37:14] Oh, no, You. You get into it. Because I was the woman in that meeting, and I was barely recognized.

Lance Miles [00:37:22] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:37:22] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:37:23] So.

John Dehlin [00:37:24] So you were kind of silent and not.

Nicki Miles [00:37:26] I was not really engaged.

Lance Miles [00:37:28] She would speak up every once in

Nicki Miles [00:37:29] a while, but when I did, then the meeting came to a close because it was getting too secular.

Lance Miles [00:37:36] Yeah. Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:37:37] So.

John Dehlin [00:37:38] So you felt like you're. You weren't really acknowledged as a legitimate person.

Lance Miles [00:37:42] No, not at all.

John Dehlin [00:37:43] You're.

Nicki Miles [00:37:44] He was there for Lance.

Lance Miles [00:37:45] This was Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:37:46] I don't even care who you are or you're just the wife.

Lance Miles [00:37:51] No, not. Not to say Marlon's a great guy.

John Dehlin [00:37:54] Yeah.

Lance Miles [00:37:54] You know, he was a super nice guy, but. Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:37:56] How it was.

Lance Miles [00:37:57] I totally agree. You know, it's.

Nicki Miles [00:37:59] Whether you. He's a nice guy or not.

Lance Miles [00:38:01] That's how it was, Right.

John Dehlin [00:38:03] Yeah.

Lance Miles [00:38:04] You know, it's just that patriarchy. So we get into there, and he. He kind of starts off by just saying, you know, I've met with a lot of people who've gone through faith crisis, you know, and he ends up saying, you know, by the end of the meeting that he's had at least two or three hundred of these meetings.

Lance Miles [00:38:29] And I didn't know at the time about Boise. Not Boise Rescue, the Swedish Rescue. You know, I didn't know that he was all involved in that anyways, so he's all, you know, just lay it out there. Tell me. Tell me what some of your problems are. And, you know, one of the big things for me was Joseph Smith having all those wives. You know, I had never been told that. I never understood that Joseph Smith was married polygamously. I understood that there's a revelation, but that it was because all things had to be restored and that the women. All those men that died coming across the plains and the women needed to be taken care of.

Lance Miles [00:39:09] Those were my two Go to arguments for why polygamy was. And so when we got into the polyandry where women are married to two men, where Joseph Smith married the women who were already married to living men, and Marlon didn't have an answer. He's just like, I don't know why that happened. You know, he didn't. He didn't try to sugarcoat things. He was. He was pretty straightforward with us that we don't know why that happened. And so, you know, but we went on with, you know, a bunch of.

Nicki Miles [00:39:45] Oh, we talked about the first visions. We talked about the Tenderhook plates. We talked about Book of Abraham. We talked about. Oh, my gosh.

Lance Miles [00:39:56] So let's just go ahead. Ye.

John Dehlin [00:39:58] Yeah.

Lance Miles [00:39:59] And I really want to get into that, because that was really troubling to me. But the first.

John Dehlin [00:40:03] You can remember answers he gave.

Lance Miles [00:40:05] Yeah. So the first vision was really interesting because, you know, come to find out, in my research that I was doing, nobody was talking about a first vision. There was no members knew about it, you know, and there was no persecution from it, you know, because it was so much. The actual first vision that Joseph Smith had was so much smaller of an event than what it came out to really be. And so, you know, but Marlon. So I said, you know, we're taught that Joseph Smith was mocked and persecuted for seeing God and Jesus, you know, in this first vision, and yet there's no historical record for that at all.

Lance Miles [00:40:41] And he said, well, there is. There is one record. Where was it the Methodist preacher, I think that he would told him, and he said that that wasn't God or whatever. And so as a 14 year old, I can see why Joseph Smith would think that he would, you know, that that was persecution for him and that was it, you know, that that was the extent of the persecution that Joseph Smith got. And I just like, yeah, you know, it doesn't make any sense. You know, we played it up way too much. And so there was that, the. The book of Abraham. Just to get into that, you know, the Book of Abraham, I never really thought about it much, but, you know, we actually have Egyptian stuff, you know, why are people not members going, hey, does this actually match what the Egyptians say, you know, in our book?

Lance Miles [00:41:30] And I thought about it, but then I just, like, I don't want to get into that. I don't want to have anything less than my testimony. So I'm not even going to look at that. You know, that was my feeling as an active member. But then, you know, come to find out it has nothing to do with any of the papyru and everything. And, you know, so. So Marlon, you know, talks about the.

Lance Miles [00:41:53] What is the theory? The catalyst theory. So he said, I tend to hang on to the catalyst theory that these are actual funerary scrolls, which we know they are. And then he went to dnc, Is it seven, Section seven where he gets revelation. He's having it out with Oliver Cowdery or something about John the Baptist. And in DNC, I think it's Section 7 or Section 9 or something. He gets this revelation of a scroll of John the Baptist that's still buried and reads off the scrolls showing, you know, Oliver, whoever that he's right, you know, but it's a scroll, you know,

John Dehlin [00:42:36] some scroll in a cave Israel.

Lance Miles [00:42:38] Exactly.

John Dehlin [00:42:39] Joseph Sable.

Lance Miles [00:42:40] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:42:42] Translate a scroll that's not even in front of him.

Lance Miles [00:42:43] Yeah, but Marlon is using that as evidence now towards this. Right. That he did this once before with scroll and now with the book of Abraham. That was just a catalyst to get his mind thinking and. Revelatory juices flowing. And then he came up with the book of Abraham.

Lance Miles [00:43:08] But, you know, to me, the book of Abraham is so horrible because it Is so racist. You know, the book of Abraham is where it says blacks can't have the priesthood. You know, and if Joseph Smith is just making this up, then it's Joseph Smith who's saying blacks can't have the priesthood. It's not God. And for all intents and purposes now, you know, every other. Now all the apostles say, we don't know why that was. You know, it was just men, you know, that wasn't from God. And so, you know, here we deny thousands and thousands of black people the priesthood for 140 years or some odd years, and we just don't know why, you know, and we just leave it at that.

Lance Miles [00:43:51] You know, President Hinckley gets on the interview and says, that's all behind us. You know, let's move forward. You know, who cares about the hurt people left in our wake? We're looking at the people that we've got out in front of us, you know, and I think that that's a huge thing. I was a white, heterosexual, married, returned missionary, born in the covenant, raised in the church. Man, I had it made.

Lance Miles [00:44:17] I've got no problems with my life. But women, gays, you know, single people, There are a ton of problems that the church just doesn't want to address. Anyways, going back to Marlon, though,

Nicki Miles [00:44:35] So

Lance Miles [00:44:35] the book of Abraham, the catalyst theory, and he was fine with that. I don't know if you want to talk anymore before I get into the peep stone.

Nicki Miles [00:44:45] Oh, yeah, no, that's good.

Lance Miles [00:44:47] Okay. So the peep stone was a really big thing for me because I had heard something about peep stones as a kid or in my youth, but we all know that the urim and thummim were two white stones also, right. That were used in it. And so I never thought anything of a peep stone. Well, when I realized when I found out that he had this peep stone that he dug in a well and found 20ft underground, that he was just digging a well for a guy and that he used it and treasured, you know, all of their treasure seeking and everything. Nicky and I, we were just blown away at that. His treasure seeking before, you know, and when he got the.

Nicki Miles [00:45:29] The.

Lance Miles [00:45:30] The golden plates and Chase. Sally Chase had her. Her green peep stone, and they were running after each other, trying to steal the plates from each other, you know, that. And she would. He would go and hide them, and she would look in her peep stone and come after and find them, you know, And, I mean, it's just the most funny, you know, at this point looking back in history, way to be acting, you know. And so I could not believe the peep stone. And the thing that I couldn't believe about the Peep stone was in the Book of Mormon, it specifically talks about the Urim and Thummim, the Nephite interpreters.

Lance Miles [00:46:07] You know, it talks about them from the Jaredites, that the Jaredites had them, what, 2700 years before Christ, that they had these stones that were then passed them physical stones passed down generations. This is what. So, you know, I say to Marlon, I go, marlon, can I give you a scenario?

Lance Miles [00:46:25] And I said, the Jaredites have this Urim and Thummim that they get from Jerusalem when they come over, right? They bring it from the Tower of Babel. It's physical to them. They're keeping it safe. They have generation from generation, they pass it down for 2000 years. It finally comes into the Nephites hands, right?

Lance Miles [00:46:50] Alma and his brother and you know, go to Zarahelma, whatever, and they, they, they find the 24 tablets with the stones. This stone was specifically, you know, kept safe here so you could translate these 24 tablets. And that's where we get the Book of Ether from. Then those stones, they, they keep those stones, you know, sacred, you know, physical stones kept safe from generation to generation for hundreds of years, right? Hundreds of years. They're so sacred, they're mentioned all over in the scriptures. They're so sacred that they are buried in the box with the golden plates for the specific purpose of then translating them. You know, once the plates, once the plates get found by Joseph Smith.

Lance Miles [00:47:31] And so now, you know, it's 421 AD they get put in a stone box. God keeps these physical, all these physical items because all they are is physical items from everybody. He keeps them all safe for another 1400 years buried in the ground.

Lance Miles [00:47:45] Then Joseph Smith finds them, you know, says there he puts them on the, the Urim and thumb, says they're most, the most spectacular stones that you can see anything through them when you look into them. And then he uses those to Translate the first 116 pages of the Book of Mormon. They lose the hundred and sixteen pages, Moroni gets mad and takes back the Urim and Thummim. And so Joseph Smith just pulls out his trusty Peep stone that he's had all along, sticks that in his hat. And our entire Book of Mormon that we have today is done with Joseph Smith sticking his face in a hat, looking at a peep stone to translate that whole no plates no, Urim and Thummim.

Nicki Miles [00:48:23] The urim and thumb that has tenderly been passed down for thousands of years.

Lance Miles [00:48:28] So I'm getting pretty hyped up at this, right? And what he had said, though, beforehand, Marlon Jensen said that he believed Joseph Smith had graduated. So he graduated from using the Urim and Thummim to using the peep stone. That was his next degree, whatever. And then just. He graduated to just getting revelations in his head. And so that. That's Marlon's explanation for it. So I said, you're telling me that God has saved these stones for the very purpose of translating the Book of Mormon? Moroni gets mad at Joseph Smith for losing 116 pages. So he takes them, and now you have to use a peep stone, you know, and.

Lance Miles [00:49:11] And you call that graduating? That's what I said to Marlon. And that's when Marlon said, you know, this meeting is getting too secular. You know, I feel like the spirit in this meeting is getting too secular. And so if you can only talk about these things on such a sacred, faithful thing, that has got to be worrisome to people. You know, that is. That is a cult mentality, that we can't talk about things unless it's in the most appropriate circumstance or else you might have doubts on it. You know, if we can't discuss things academically, how are we ever going to get to a better knowledge? I don't know.

John Dehlin [00:49:50] So you weren't loving that response.

Lance Miles [00:49:52] I couldn't believe that response. But, I mean, it was par for the course. It was exactly what I expected. But, you know, it really left me, you know, just going, Marley doesn't have any answers, you know, and. And in all honesty, he looked tired. He looked like he was ready to be done with having to go to Sweden and, you know, having to go and do all these rescues and. And speak to members about the same things over and over again, you know, but yeah, we really talked about polygamy and polyandry and how if you were. Actually, I never understood why polygamy was such a pervasive thing in Mormonism.

Lance Miles [00:50:37] I mean, it sounded like it was so horrible back in the day. Why would we continue to lose members to it? But when I started studying, I was like, you have to be a polygamy if you really believe in this. You really have to believe in polygamy if you're going to be a good Mormon. You know, if we were to stay in this, I all of a sudden realize, I get why people go to these fundamentalist Mormon Sects, because they're just trying to do what Joseph Smith established on Earth.

John Dehlin [00:51:03] Anyways, what did he say about polygamy and Joseph. He called Joseph what?

Lance Miles [00:51:08] Oh, yes. So I'm sitting here talking about marrying 14 year olds and all these teen brides and 11 women who are already married and all this stuff, and he turns and he says, you know, Joseph, he didn't want to practice polygamy. An angel with a drawn sword had to come and to command him. Yeah, to command him to practice polygamy. He didn't want to practice polygamy himself.

Lance Miles [00:51:37] And I turn out, and this was kind of the end of the conversation. I just kind of turned at him and I'm like. I'm like, with all due respect, Marlon, if I wasn't a member, do you know what I would call that kind of behavior? You know, that is a deviant type of behavior. You know, that is abuse that. Sexual abuse that is happening with that. That I have to marry you and I mean, obviously have sex with you because this angel told me to. Why doesn't God ever come to women and say, and I know that there's a case or two in there that these women had these nice spiritual experiences afterward, but why doesn't.

Lance Miles [00:52:18] Why didn't God go to, you know, Fanny Alger then and say, joseph is going to be coming to you. You need to marry him, you know? No, that didn't happen to any of these women. You know, I mean, come to find out, you know, Emma was like the 23rd person that he was actually sealed to. You know, I mean, it's just. It's crazy. And Emma didn't.

John Dehlin [00:52:42] And for all the uses of an angel and a flaming sword.

Lance Miles [00:52:45] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:52:45] Right.

Lance Miles [00:52:46] You could, you could.

John Dehlin [00:52:48] You're gonna get people from the Kirtland bank from losing all their fortune.

Lance Miles [00:52:52] Exactly.

John Dehlin [00:52:52] You could. You could, you know, prevent the Hans Mill massacre. You could prevent the Mountain Meadows massacre. Why not send an angel, a flaming sword to keep the, you know, the people in St. George for massacring all the men, women and children.

Lance Miles [00:53:08] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:53:09] Or, you know, I could think of 20,000 better. Or keeping little 14, 15 year old girls from being abused. Right. Why? Why use it? To force Joseph.

Lance Miles [00:53:20] Yeah. Into that.

John Dehlin [00:53:22] To sleep with children.

Lance Miles [00:53:23] It makes no sense. It just. It doesn't make sense at all. But it does make sense. It doesn't make the right kind of sense for the church.

John Dehlin [00:53:31] Right. What did he say about your dad and the LGBT stuff?

Lance Miles [00:53:36] So kind of in the end, we talked about my dad a little bit, and he really doesn't is where I really felt good with him, because, you know, he was like, there's still a few of the brethren that It's a split quorum. There's a few of them that are just holding out that, you know, we cannot allow homosexuals to have participation in the church. But he's all, you know, I'm hoping that that will change and that there are some that have much better attitudes towards that. And so he was really kind of getting emotional there. He was really loving on that, you know, and then I can't remember if I knew.

John Dehlin [00:54:14] He acknowledged the quorum of the 12 split.

Lance Miles [00:54:16] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:54:17] There's division in the quorum.

Lance Miles [00:54:18] Yeah, yeah, he did acknowledge that. And. But. And at the time, I didn't realize that he had gone to California for that meeting to say sorry, basically, you know, for Prop 8, what the church was doing there. So he talks about the temple ceremony, right?

Lance Miles [00:54:33] Yeah. So, you know, we talked about that. And he mentioned, you know, that it is a hard ceremony for people. And he mentioned his daughter. You know, his own daughter had a really hard time with it for a couple of years or so, and they really had to work through that, you know, and so. And, you know, I was glad for that, you know, in doing my research on the temple, you know, back to being naked, you know, at one point, they had big tubs in there where you'd strip completely naked and just stand in a tub. You get completely washed and annoyed, you know, like, I'm glad we weren't at that point. But, yeah, you know, so. So there was that with him. God, what else was there?

John Dehlin [00:55:16] He knew the essays were coming.

Lance Miles [00:55:18] Yeah. So one of the interesting things was he had mentioned that there should be, like, 30 to 35 essays of kind of the most troubling aspects about the church history and stuff. And then it was right after that, that November or something, when they published the first essays, but they had already made the change on blacks in the priesthood. They had made that change in the scriptures. On the online version of the scriptures already that they added two paragraphs, saying basically that they don't know why it was instigated, but. But it's, you know, basically an apology. Yeah, it's over now. Oh, that was another thing.

Lance Miles [00:55:57] You know, I asked Marlon, I said, why won't the church apologize for any of this? You know, and he's like, they just don't. They take the stance at Mountain Meadow. That was where this came from. He said that Was it him or somebody else was able to say sorry in A way that it was. It was more of an apology than it had been. I can't remember. They didn't quite apologize, but yeah, it was.

John Dehlin [00:56:28] And.

Lance Miles [00:56:28] And he said that was a step forward because there were some who didn't want that, you know, and so.

John Dehlin [00:56:34] So he confirmed their apostles who don't want to hear apology.

Lance Miles [00:56:37] Oh, yeah, yeah. It was. I mean, it was pretty blatant that the church doesn't apologize, you know, I mean, how.

John Dehlin [00:56:43] They told us that Oaks is. Told us.

Lance Miles [00:56:44] Yeah, Yeah. I mean, how. How. Why would God apologize, You know?

John Dehlin [00:56:49] Yeah.

Lance Miles [00:56:50] So.

John Dehlin [00:56:53] And then overall, having met with hundreds of people like you, did he give you a sense for his success rate?

Lance Miles [00:57:00] Yeah. So for us, I mean, he really just said that people in your circumstances who have basically gone down the rabbit hole as far as we have, that. That usually, you know, we don't retain those members. But he gave us two good pieces. Well, two pieces of advice.

John Dehlin [00:57:20] What was it?

Lance Miles [00:57:21] You know, I tell him, yuka. Oh, okay. So at the end of the meeting, you know, he basically said that. And then he said,

John Dehlin [00:57:31] the two things

Lance Miles [00:57:31] I want you to do is one, lean into the church. And then two. It's kind of funny because he said it kind of slowly. He's all, don't study church history. And I started laughing because. Period. That's all I want. Don't say church history because you don't want to know, you know, but he said, too little. Don't study church history too little. And, you know, I totally get that. You know, why you want to make sure you have the whole story. And so doesn't that show confidence?

John Dehlin [00:57:59] He's saying, hey, keep studying and you'll.

Lance Miles [00:58:01] Yeah. You know, he said the same thing that just happened on Trevor's side video,

John Dehlin [00:58:07] that the more he studied.

Lance Miles [00:58:09] Oh, yeah, yeah, exactly. Trevor, right. What was his name? Trevor was the guy interviewed.

John Dehlin [00:58:16] He was quoting Matthew Grow.

Lance Miles [00:58:18] But Trevor was saying that the more he studied, you know, Trevor. The more that he didn't like Joseph Smith. And then, yeah, it was Matthew Grow that said, no, the more I studied, the more I fell in love with him. And that was basically the same kind of thing.

Nicki Miles [00:58:33] I guess it depends on what you're studying.

John Dehlin [00:58:36] Yeah.

Lance Miles [00:58:36] And who you are, you know, and you're.

John Dehlin [00:58:38] What your job is.

Lance Miles [00:58:39] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:58:39] What your job is. Where your paycheck comes out.

Lance Miles [00:58:41] Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. All of those things.

Nicki Miles [00:58:44] So a lot of factors. So.

Lance Miles [00:58:47] Yeah. So.

Nicki Miles [00:58:49] So we left the meeting feeling very validated.

John Dehlin [00:58:55] Yeah. Yeah. You were smiling so happy. Why were you happy after that meeting?

Lance Miles [00:59:02] Oh, my gosh.

John Dehlin [00:59:03] So how successful was he at resolving your concerns?

Lance Miles [00:59:06] Well, I'll say 100%, because he confirmed them all. You know, he was 100% successful at confirming the problem.

John Dehlin [00:59:16] What about giving you answers that made you feel better about the Church?

Nicki Miles [00:59:20] No, I don't think he said anything that made me feel better about the Church. In fact, I've left feeling more betrayed.

Lance Miles [00:59:29] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:59:31] And this is someone who was church historian, who's seen the inside of the

Lance Miles [00:59:35] vault, who knows it all, who knows it all.

John Dehlin [00:59:37] I mean, spent more time than probably anyone, I think.

Lance Miles [00:59:41] So we talked a little bit in the beginning about church history and about Arrington and how they shut everything down in the 90s and, you know, really went on this defensive thing. And, you know, but again, you know, the thing is, he's not a true historian, you know, Marlon was. He's a lawyer, you know, who happens to be a general authority that they can trust and put into this position. You know, why can women not be a church historian? You know, is there a reason why a woman couldn't look at church history with a. You know, I don't know. I just, you know, why does it have to be a guy? Is one of my reasons.

Nicki Miles [01:00:23] Why does it have to be a guy in every aspect of the church? Yeah.

Lance Miles [01:00:29] But for the church historian, you know, I think he had access to a lot of stuff there. I think that they trusted him enough to be able to open up a lot of things to him to say, what are we going to do about this problem? I think they realized the huge problem that they had on their hands, and what can we do to get some answers to that? But obviously, you know, searching through all of the archives, you know, there's just no good answers to all the problems.

Nicki Miles [01:00:56] Well, and my hope is that these bishops out there, people who are going through this and feeling validated with the truths that they're finding, my hope is that these bishops and the people that these people in faith crisis are going to them, that they can be more loving and more. More considerate and understanding, you know, because it was very painful to have given, given, given, given, given so much all of this time, all of this money, all this effort, all of this devotion.

Nicki Miles [01:01:40] And then the way we were treated when we left was so dismissive. The bishop was sorry, he was sad, and we were breaking his heart, is what he said. Nothing about how we were feeling and what we were going through, but we were breaking his heart.

Nicki Miles [01:02:06] And the other counselor, he was so kind and nice, and he didn't quite understand, but he was actually Very emotional and showed compassion and understanding. And then when we said, we have our letter of resignation, here it is.

Nicki Miles [01:02:31] The second counselor got up and said, well, those go straight to the stake president. He got up, not a handshake, anything, and shoot us out the door. I mean, it was really cruel. I mean, we have devoted so much to this religion and to be treated with such disdain and dismissal was really disheartening. And I feel sad for other people who are in the position we were four years ago.

Nicki Miles [01:03:05] That's why I guess I really want to say to the groups and the people that have helped me afterward that I don't know what I would have done without that support.

John Dehlin [01:03:18] So which groups

Nicki Miles [01:03:22] in Portland? There's a meetup group. And we started doing that in the beginning. That was really helpful and sharing stories and sharing opinions and laughs and other things. And then there were a group of ladies that invited me and we only went over to the coast once, but I call them my coastal ladies and they all know who they are.

Nicki Miles [01:03:50] And I've only been with them one time. And I don't think I've ever told any of them how much they meant to me to have that support and that love. Because when we left, if we came back and we. We sent out a letter to, to all of our, our friends in the ward because that was our life, that's what we had.

Nicki Miles [01:04:20] And we sent out a letter and explained our situation. I thought very clearly and I. It was really disheartening. The relationships that I lost and the relationships that I thought were real that weren't. And it's been really nice to develop new relationships. And I'm so grateful for the friendships that I've made over the last four years with post Mormon people and with non member people who have helped me through this, who have supported me and given me that strength, because it's hard.

John Dehlin [01:05:03] Yeah. A couple questions coming in. Just. Just to finish up with the Marlon interview, then we'll come back.

Nicki Miles [01:05:09] Oh, sure.

John Dehlin [01:05:10] So how did it feel for you to just be silent for the whole meeting and not really be talked to?

Nicki Miles [01:05:15] It was.

John Dehlin [01:05:16] My wife had the same experience.

Nicki Miles [01:05:17] It was something that I was used to at the time. I don't think that it bothered me because it was, it was kind of the norm going into any kind of meeting with, with priesthood. It. I just was playing the part, you know, I was just being in the position I was supposed to be in at that time. And so. But it wasn't until after we left, maybe even a year after, and we were Discussing. Discussing all of this with some people. And I thought, where was my voice? Where was my voice in that meeting? And why was it not there and why did I not speak up? And that was really eye opening and made me realize that I had a voice and I'm starting to use it.

John Dehlin [01:06:12] That's great.

Nicki Miles [01:06:13] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:06:13] Many are asking about your brother.

Lance Miles [01:06:15] What was his experience? Yeah, great question. My brother had a severe case of. He was kind of starstruck. Yeah, starstruck. He was hero worshiping. You know, it's. Marlon Jensen is, you know, a high person in the church, and it's an honor to be able to know him. And it was an absolute honor to be in his presence. And I think for my brother, I don't know, I don't think he heard a word of the problem.

Nicki Miles [01:06:52] There was a lot of shaking heads and agreeing with Marlon.

Lance Miles [01:06:57] Yeah. And it didn't change his attitude.

Nicki Miles [01:07:01] Not at all.

Lance Miles [01:07:02] That really shows us what you talk about, you know, that you can't talk to members until they're ready for it. You know, it really showed that to us.

John Dehlin [01:07:11] You emotionally convert to the church, and oftentimes, yeah, you know, you stay for the emotions.

Lance Miles [01:07:20] It was so interesting, the differences in opinions that we had. We went down, we got in the elevator, and Nikki and I, we're just grabbing each other's hands and just smiling so big at each other.

John Dehlin [01:07:33] Smiling. Why?

Lance Miles [01:07:34] Because we knew. We knew that what we had found was right and that the church is not true and all of these immoral things that the church tells us is moral but goes against my own morality. I can now let go and I can live my morality. I don't have to say, you know, that you're a bad person for drinking coffee because coffee is the stupidest thing to ever have on a health list.

Lance Miles [01:08:09] But so we went down that elevator, you know, just elated, just holding each other's hands. And my brother, you know, came in with us, and we were going down. And so, you know, I can't remember exactly what he said, but basically he said, so what do you think? Or are you gonna stay? Or whatever? And we're like, we're leaving. We have our answers, you know, and he's all, why? You know, what about what Marlon said? And we're just like, he gave us.

Nicki Miles [01:08:36] Didn't you hear what he said?

Lance Miles [01:08:38] Yeah, he gave us the answers. And so. But that's when he said, can't you just stay and go inactive for a while? Why is this so sudden? Because this was sudden for us, you

Nicki Miles [01:08:50] know, why do you have to take your name off.

Lance Miles [01:08:51] Yeah. Why do you have to resign from the church? Just go in active for a while and think about it and continue to learn and study and stuff. And I thought, lee, I can't do that. That would make me such a hypocrite to do that, to keep my name on the records when I know that it is not the true church. It is not even an organization that I want to be associated with. And. But, you know, and so I said, that'd be so hypocritical of me. And Lee said, aren't we all hypocrites, though? You know, aren't we all hypocritical? Why this? Why, you know, why die on this hill? And it's just. He just doesn't understand. He just hasn't gone through what we went through to get to this point. And so did Marlon kind of warn

Life After the Meeting and the Children's Paths

John Dehlin [01:09:37] you about your kids or make you worried a little bit?

Lance Miles [01:09:39] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:09:39] What did he say?

Lance Miles [01:09:40] Well, that's. That's funny because he. He did say, where will you go if.

Nicki Miles [01:09:49] Can I ask you a question? If you're not gonna be here in the church, where will you go?

Lance Miles [01:09:55] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:09:56] How'd that make you feel?

Nicki Miles [01:09:58] In my head, I thought, anywhere else.

Lance Miles [01:10:01] Yeah, we were.

Nicki Miles [01:10:02] I mean, anywhere else.

Lance Miles [01:10:03] It just wasn't scary.

Nicki Miles [01:10:04] It wasn't scary. And I said to him, there are so many other ways. Oh. Because we were being told that how can you have teach your kids the word of wisdom without the word of wisdom? How can you teach your children morality without personal progress and the guidelines and everything that the church gives you? And in reality, there are so many avenues to do that.

Lance Miles [01:10:34] And that was one of our things, too, with living outside the church, seeing so many non members and non religious people that had morals, that were good people that weren't Mormons. For me, it was such a change because everybody here is Mormons. And it's easy. The judgmentalism of people living here that you're not a Mormon or you're a Jack Mormon. I mean, I can't believe I really felt like I was so not judgmental, but I can't believe how judgmental I really was when we finally came out and let it all go, that we're all human. I'm no longer special now.

Nicki Miles [01:11:10] I had to keep myself in check with my own moral compass. And now I was judging somebody and going, oh, I don't. That's not something I want anymore. And to change that pattern of behavior.

Lance Miles [01:11:25] Yeah, yeah, it was awesome. It was such a great thing to have experienced because we left there knowing that our family knows that, you know, that there's something more to this than just us wanting to sin or being

John Dehlin [01:11:43] lazy if they care to see it.

Lance Miles [01:11:46] Yeah, yeah. Oh, exactly. You know, so it's weird, but I

John Dehlin [01:11:50] think the most important thing that happens is you feel valid.

Nicki Miles [01:11:52] I felt. Exactly. And nothing else mattered.

Lance Miles [01:11:55] Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was big for us.

John Dehlin [01:11:59] How do you think he still believes? I mean, surely you felt like it was kind of Marlon to meet with you.

Lance Miles [01:12:04] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:12:05] Generous. And that he still is a sincere believer. Right.

Lance Miles [01:12:08] Yeah. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:12:09] How do you make sense of that?

Nicki Miles [01:12:10] Yeah, Well, a lot of people do. There's a lot of different reasons why somebody stays. You never know what's anchoring them, what bow is still tied, that they have to keep it tied for whatever reason. But I didn't, and I'm happy for that. Yeah.

Lance Miles [01:12:31] Yeah. You get into it, you know, I look at us and I go. I'm grateful that we lived in Eugene. You know, would this have happened here in Utah? You know, would we have been able to stand up like that in Utah?

Nicki Miles [01:12:43] And there's the what if game. You know, what if. What if, what if.

Lance Miles [01:12:47] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [01:12:48] And can't do that.

John Dehlin [01:12:51] Yeah.

Lance Miles [01:12:52] Yeah. So, yeah, I think, like I said, I. I think beyond saying that, I think that he's ready for retirement. You know, I don't know.

John Dehlin [01:13:04] I.

Lance Miles [01:13:05] You know, I. I think Marlin's a pretty liberal guy as a general authority as far as the way that he answers stuff and not trying to be combative. You know, I mean, I look at some of these other apologists that I dealt with, and, you know, they're just so dismissive, you know, and all the same tired arguments that we've been hearing since the church began. You know, it's just Satan knocking, you know, trying to break down our walls, and it's not. We need to change the. The story. If it's the same tire arguments, then maybe it should be known to more people what the problem is

John Dehlin [01:13:45] anyways.

Part 4 of 4 · Ep. 730

Lance Miles [00:00:00] Sam.

John Dehlin [00:00:29] So I think it wouldn't be. I think we would be incomplete to not talk. Just really briefly, Nikki, about your feminist awakening and.

Nicki Miles [00:00:39] Oh, yeah, right.

John Dehlin [00:00:40] And what? You know, kind of like, I guess you told us all these bows, you were tied up.

Nicki Miles [00:00:47] Right.

John Dehlin [00:00:47] Right. To the church, Right.

Nicki Miles [00:00:49] Yeah. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:00:50] And you had been pushing down your inner voice for decades.

Lance Miles [00:00:54] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:00:55] Living everyone else's life to make sure

Nicki Miles [00:00:57] everyone else was happy and content. And.

John Dehlin [00:01:00] And then all of a sudden, all the bows disappeared.

Nicki Miles [00:01:02] They did. And what was that like for you? Well, it was really. It was kind of unsettling at first. It was like, what do I do? Who am I? What do I believe? So there was a lot of internal things happening, like, okay, what is what with the church? Do I want to keep? And what do I need to let go? And so when I figured that out, then I was like, okay, this value, this principle, this moral is important to me, and I get to. To have that be part of who the new Nikki is, you know? And it was so exciting because I didn't have limits.

Nicki Miles [00:01:47] I didn't have. I still. It's still so exciting. I don't have limits, and I get to grow in whatever area and whatever way I want. And, of course, I value my husband's opinion and love him. He's part of me. We've been together for 22 years plus, you know, been married 22 years. And he's my best friend, and he's my companion in this world right now. And I wouldn't want to be with anybody else because we have history and we. We know each other. And I'm so glad that we were able to come out of this together, because as difficult as it was, I'm glad our marriage could sustain it because it got rocky.

Nikki's Feminist Awakening and Redefining Her Identity

John Dehlin [00:02:40] So once you had your feminist awakening, but your whole relationship had been built on a patriarchy.

Nicki Miles [00:02:45] Right.

John Dehlin [00:02:45] How did that become hard for you? What things. What things did you start noticing? And what became hard?

Nicki Miles [00:02:51] It became hard. The verbiage that Lance was using, I noticed, did not sit well with me. Gosh. Well, like,

Lance Miles [00:03:08] I don't know. It's still.

Nicki Miles [00:03:09] It's still coming out, I guess, you

Lance Miles [00:03:11] know, kind of like it's a work in progress. It is. It is.

Nicki Miles [00:03:15] It's a work in progress because I'm learning to find that voice, to say, no, that's not okay. To speak for me or interrupt me or assume or that sort of thing. So he's been very good, and I definitely want to recognize him for that, that he has put forth a lot of effort to change his patterns in the way that he speaks and to branch away from that patriarchal personality in our, in our marriage, because it doesn't fit with either of our personalities now.

Nicki Miles [00:03:53] So I do want to give you credit for changing that. And for me, I just feel like, I feel so free to be able to be the mother that I want to be. I felt so trapped as a mother teaching my kids things, but wanting to teach them differently.

Nicki Miles [00:04:13] And it's just, I feel so liberated to be able to reach out and grab something if I want or to get rid of something if I want. If I don't want a value or a stipulation on myself, I get to release that nobody else, you know, and it's, I think Lance and I started working in the business again together, and it's never worked out in the past, and it has been such a fun experience this, this time going around because there's an equal level of respect and there's, there's equality.

John Dehlin [00:05:00] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:05:01] And we're, and we're being more intentional, more intentional in our actions and our words and our thoughts and,

John Dehlin [00:05:11] And Lance, what was it like for you to realize that you had been part of the patriarchy?

Lance Miles [00:05:17] Yeah, it's horrific. I mean, it is such an eye opening experience. Coming from. Feminism is like this dirty word, right. In Mormonism. I mean, to be a feminist should not. You just, you just don't want to have that kind of be associated with that. And so for me, being the man of the family, being the, the person that is supposed to give the final answer on things and, and to have the expenses and, you know, earn the money and all of the, the traditional typical things, it's been very eye opening how often I catch myself and obviously she catches me of, I'm not acting, you know, as equal as I should be, you know, equitable. And so what, was there a story

John Dehlin [00:06:23] you wanted to tell that represented your awakening, your feminist awakening?

Lance Miles [00:06:29] Well, I think, I mean, I would love to. The thing about it is when I, when I started to realize everything, I realized what patriarchy does and how, how it has held women back forever. Right.

John Dehlin [00:06:48] And, and.

Lance Miles [00:06:53] You know, I, I get, I get frustrated myself because all I wanted for Nikki when we were dating, going on missions, was to be more sure of herself and have her own, you know, I don't, you know. Yeah. And, but just like my dad did, I continued this patriarchy way, you know, this. Oh, yeah, you know, I did the same thing. And every time that she would say, I don't think that's Right. I'd go, but I'm. I'm the priesthood leader. You know, it wasn't. It wasn't bad. But there was that. That authority, you know, and so.

Nicki Miles [00:07:40] And I played into it, too. I didn't stand up, you know, I believed in the priesthood authority.

Lance Miles [00:07:47] Yeah. And so as I start to look at this and. And I go back clear back to Joseph Smith with all of these women and how he treated his wife and. And women in general, and I just go, I don't want anything to do with this. I watched part of conference, just this last conference, and I look up there and all these men are up there on the stage, right?

Lance Miles [00:08:09] And you get these few token women that are there because of an uproar, Right. If it wasn't for women uproaring, all there would be is men up there on the stage. And so I look at this and I look at the bishopric, the high councilman. Everything, everything is ruled by a penis. I mean, it is. And why, you know why.

Lance Miles [00:08:37] Sorry. But you know what? I really. It just dawned on me. What have I been doing to Nikki? Nikki has been struggling and trying so hard her whole life to be that independent, confident woman. And I haven't helped out one bit with her religion.

Lance Miles [00:08:54] And, you know, when we get down to it, you know, think about the temple. And so it was when we were really getting into the feminist thing, you know, I went to her and I took her in the patriarchal crib, and I said, disrespectful.

Lance Miles [00:09:14] I said, hello, Emma, I'm Nephi. And I'm sorry, but that was just such a big thing to be. Because I was gonna hold that for those that don't know it's your temple name. It's this new name that you get in the temple. And I was gonna hold that for Nikki the whole rest of my life. She's never gonna know my name. I'm gonna. I'm gonna know something about her that she will never know about me.

John Dehlin [00:09:47] Her name.

Lance Miles [00:09:48] Her name. You know, my name. She doesn't. She has no clue who she's supposedly married to, you know, in the next life, until I come and pull her up and call her by her new name out of the grave, right? And then does she ever even get to know my name? We don't know. I mean, it's never told. And so I just like, why can't

John Dehlin [00:10:10] you just keep your own name, by the way?

Lance Miles [00:10:12] Right? Well. And then come to find out. I know exactly.

John Dehlin [00:10:18] They rename you.

Lance Miles [00:10:19] Well, and in masonry, I mean, that was part of the Masonic thing was to get a new name in Masonry. You know, I mean, it's. And so to be holding that such an arbitrary, you know, thing at this point, again, is completely sacred. And I'm sorry if you think that we're being flippant or terrible, but, look, I just said my new name, and the heavens didn't open. And I'm not dead right now. You know, it's. And I look at the Book of Mormon and how much God was playing and toying with their lives and how we just don't have that, you know, in our real lives, you know?

Lance Miles [00:11:01] But this patriarchy, I just. I got it. I get rid of that in our life and in our marriage, you know, it holds our. Oh, see that? It holds our women down. That's the wrong thing to say. It holds women down. They're not ours, you know?

Lance Miles [00:11:20] You know, I really struggle with that. And so every day, I'm catching myself going, I got to be a little bit better than yesterday at this, you know, and we're slowly working through it, But I look at our daughter and, you know, all of our kids, but our daughter especially, because I knew the hell that Nikki went through going into those bishops interviews by herself and that I was going to send my lamb into the slaughter, you know, because I've been told and directed, and this has been the process my whole life. And I didn't want that for my daughter, you know, as a man.

Nicki Miles [00:12:03] No.

Lance Miles [00:12:03] I am not gonna allow her to sit across a desk from some old guy and tell him her most intimate details about her life. That is not gonna happen.

Nicki Miles [00:12:12] Not just her life, her sexual life, her sex life.

Lance Miles [00:12:15] Yeah. And so anyways, the.

John Dehlin [00:12:20] The Jason jumps in to say that Masons don't give each other new names.

Nicki Miles [00:12:25] Oh.

John Dehlin [00:12:26] So apparently that's us, huh?

Lance Miles [00:12:27] Interesting. I thought that I had read that. No, no, no. In the 1800s with it.

John Dehlin [00:12:33] So, Nikki, are you thrilled to kind of be breaking the cycle a little bit with women?

Nicki Miles [00:12:40] Yes. And my. The thing is, is I think my real motherly teachings that I wanted to teach and couldn't, I think I kind of still did because she. She came out of the church just, like. It was a little hard for her emotionally. But this girl, she is just, like. Nothing's gonna get me down. No one's gonna tell me what. I mean. She is just. She's very opposite of what I was when I was her age. So, yeah, to answer your question, I'm really happy to break that cycle.

John Dehlin [00:13:18] For yourself?

Nicki Miles [00:13:19] For myself, and for her and for whoever else comes along.

John Dehlin [00:13:24] Because patriarchy hurts men.

Lance Miles [00:13:25] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:13:26] Doesn't just hurt women.

Nicki Miles [00:13:27] You're right.

Lance Miles [00:13:28] And it hurts society. I mean, every time I look back at the quotes from the leaders in the 60s and stuff, you know, with the ERA movement and stuff, the church was against women having equality. You know, I just. It's dumbfounding at this point, but that, you know, the church doesn't want women to have rights. You know, this. What did you call it? Your.

Lance Miles [00:13:56] I can't. Oh, well, I guess it's just your bows, but, you know, the gilded cage set on a pedestal that the women are just. They're the most beautiful creatures that we just should respect and keep them up on a pedestal, but don't let them out of that cage, because we'll bite. Yeah. You know, and what man wants a woman to bite him? I mean, that's a funny thing. But seriously, when we have to work together in our marriage and I can't just put my foot down and say, no, this is going to be the way it's going to be.

Lance Miles [00:14:24] That takes work, you know, and there's a lot of people that don't want to do that kind of work. You know, I would much rather have it that, you know, like, in business, this is the way it's going to be done, you know? Yeah. I'm the boss and this is the way it's going to be. You know, we can't have that. You know, we've got to have it. Be much more of an equality in it. So. But so our daughter, you know, she was really struggling in as a young girl, and we left when she was 12, and she continued to struggle for a while, but, man, she has really come out of that so much better than I think that she would have ever been in the church, ever.

Lance Miles [00:15:07] I'm so grateful that we were able to leave when we did and get our kids out when they did. Our son, Hayden, he was already really questioning the church when we were active members, and we really had some struggles with him.

Lance Miles [00:15:23] But going to where he locked himself into our bathroom because he's got some little things on his phone, and I'm kicking down the bathroom door because I'm so worried about what he's doing as a teenager. It's crazy. And now the discussions that we have are so amazing. I mean, they're so. They can be so deep and we can go down every aspect. We don't have to worry about hurting their testimony. Oh, you haven't. You haven't. You Know, delved into this enough to really talk about that, you know, blacks in the priesthood now I can just say, you know, they were a bunch of racists. You know, they really were. And we can go and talk and have.

Nicki Miles [00:16:05] And we don't even really talk about religion much anymore. Now it's more. It has evolved into real conversations about real things on this earth that are happening. And there it's. It's so nice. I was just telling Lance on the way here, it's so nice to sit on the sidelines and watch my kids become who they want to be, you know, And I'm happy for them and proud of them when. If I would have been in the church, if they would have done anything but go on a mission, get married in the temple, they would have been a disappointment.

Lance Miles [00:16:44] Yeah.

Nicki Miles [00:16:45] And they really wouldn't have. But now we don't have to have those boundaries. And it's fun to sit back and watch our kids.

Lance Miles [00:16:56] Our relationships with our kids just changed night and day between when we left compared to when we left.

Nicki Miles [00:17:05] We just had our son experience death for the first time. And it was surprising to. I. It just keeps sneaking up on me, all this freedom that I have and all this liberation, and to be able to sit and talk with him about death and ask him what his thoughts and feelings were and what he believes and validating that and sharing what I think and not sharing what his thing he thinks. And of course, they're all three different perspectives, but. But, boy, that's what mattered to him, you know, that having that support and being able to talk about things, not being told how things are, but discussing, you know, it was just really refreshing.

John Dehlin [00:17:57] Yeah. So, Nikki, Lance, there's so much more you guys have that you've written in terms of notes. I think we should probably wrap up, even though.

Lance Miles [00:18:08] Yeah, I know.

John Dehlin [00:18:09] There's a lot more wisdom.

Nicki Miles [00:18:11] I understand. You can only talk for so long.

John Dehlin [00:18:14] No, no, no. I just think. I think I want to make sure that the story with Marlon and the story about, you know, your feminist awakening and how that connected, that was so beautiful. I don't want to. Why? I just don't want to do anything to dilute that.

Nicki Miles [00:18:31] Sure.

John Dehlin [00:18:31] So sure. Our listeners have been really. We have still over 100 listeners tuned in. They've been really great. But. But if each of you wanted to prepare kind of some closing. Closing thoughts or statements or just, you know, if you were to summarize. And I'm really curious what you would say to your dad, you know, now.

Lance Miles [00:18:51] Yeah. Oh, geez.

John Dehlin [00:18:52] You know, and if that informs. Any advice you'd give to people. Yeah, maybe it'll be a repetitive. But who wants to go first and kind of give a closing testimony, so to speak?

Lance Miles [00:19:03] You want to end us? Do you want to go first?

John Dehlin [00:19:06] Why don't you go first, Lance?

Lance Miles [00:19:07] Okay.

John Dehlin [00:19:08] And we'll give.

Lance Miles [00:19:08] All right, so the. My closing statements. Holy cow. All I can say is if I can have one word of advice to anybody, there's a good analogy of a bottle. I've got this bottle of water right here. And John, you don't know me from Adam. You just met me, you know, very recently. If I told you to drink this water, you know, this liquid, would you.

John Dehlin [00:19:41] I'd be concerned.

Lance Miles [00:19:42] Be concerned, right. There's certain things. If I told you that. No, it's water, right. It's clear like water. It's in a bottle like water. I mean, there's some pretty good indicators that it's water. But you really don't know. Right. If you only trust my testimony and what I do, then, you know, and that's what is going to give you the faith that this is actually water and not going to kill you. You know, is that. Is that good enough for you? Is it good enough to depend on, you know, these scriptures, what other people have written down for your life and what is important for you?

Lance Miles [00:20:20] There's so many other ways we can test this with the chemicals. We can put a litmus test on it and see what its acidity is and all that kind of stuff. There's so many more ways that we could go after this to make sure that this is actually water before we go and taste it. And I think that I just want to put that out there to everybody in life is don't depend on one person. You know, we have a multitude of options in our life right now, and for us, we can't be held down by just one way of thinking. We've got to look at everything.

Lance Miles [00:20:57] You know, if we only look at one way, we may be drinking that poison and not realizing it. And, you know, I don't mean to say that the church is poisoned. There's certainly good things that the church does, but there is a lot of people that it hurts also.

Lance Miles [00:21:12] And the problem is, and we get to the crux of it all the time, is this is supposedly God's one true church on the earth. The only way to get back to God again, like my mission president said, if you drink one drop of coffee and you don't repent of it before you Die, you will not go and live with God again. And I know that there's nuances and everybody has their specific brand of faith, but as a whole, in the church, that is what it's about.

Lance Miles [00:21:40] And I just look at things now and I just go, why didn't I go and search every available avenue to make sure that I was actually getting at the truth? It's so important to me. There's a lot of things I just wanted. I kind of honed in on Rock Waterman with his new scriptures and stuff, right. That he's creating Denver Snuffer. Denver Snuffer. Thank you. And I really, you know, spent a lot of times. And I've got these scriptures and like John's like, what the heck's going on?

John Dehlin [00:22:13] Right?

Lance Miles [00:22:14] So I've got. I made up my own scriptures because I figured, why not, right? So here's the beginning. The first book of Lance. Chapter one, it says, be kind, Be kind. And that's it. All the rest is dogma. All the rest just says, be my kind of kind. Be my kind of a person. So that's the only thing that I

John Dehlin [00:22:42] want to leave with people is the book of Lance. Be kind. You see that Book of Lance?

Lance Miles [00:22:52] I mean, you get these things and you get God justifying incest, killing kids. You know, all. You know, the Navajos, we didn't even get into it, but the Navajos think that they're a cursed nation with dark skin because their ancestors rejected the gospel. You know, I just. It is sickening to me. This was the hardest thing. I didn't want the Book of Mormon to not be true because I had such a huge love for it. And when I found out what it was, you know, that it wasn't true and that this racist book, I'm sitting there telling people about this book that is. That is giving a lie to their ancestry.

Lance Miles [00:23:33] And now we don't even know who the Lamanites are. You know, the church is backing off of all of those things now. You know, it's just. It's just too much for me, you know, be kind. There is no reason to sit there and read the ramblings of people, you know, ages ago who had no knowledge, you know, I mean, and everything anyways, I don't know my dad.

Lance Miles [00:23:55] That is. The two regrets that I have in life is one, converting 34 people on my mission, telling those Navajos a fake story about their rich cultural and ancestors history, and two, how I treated my dad. My dad was the greatest guy on earth. He was the greatest dad that you could dab.

Lance Miles [00:24:16] And, you know, I treated him like scum, like less. Less than nobody, because nobody. I don't care about my dad. I actually, you know, treated him and felt bad, you know, felt anger towards him and hatred towards him. And all I can say is, you know, if there is some possibility that he's around, that he knows how much

Reflections, Gratitude, and Closing Thoughts

John Dehlin [00:24:44] I love him,

Lance Miles [00:24:49] And I'm sorry. I am. He did not deserve. He did not deserve to have to be treated that way. Anyways,

Nicki Miles [00:25:17] I think mine's just simple. Be intentional.

John Dehlin [00:25:20] Be intentional? What do you mean?

Nicki Miles [00:25:22] I mean be intentional with everything you say to somebody, everything that you do. And of, you know, we. We all judge. We all look around and say, hey, he shouldn't be doing that, or I shouldn't be doing that, or whatever. But, you know, if we can just have compassion, if we can just be intentional. Sometimes it's okay to not be kind. You know, sometimes it's okay to be angry. Sometimes it's okay to stand up for yourself. But whatever you do, be intentional and make sure you're doing it for whatever reason you're doing it. Make sure it's a good reason. Make sure that. That it's your reason. Make sure that whatever you are intentionally doing fits in your moral compass.

Lance Miles [00:26:10] And

Nicki Miles [00:26:13] you can't go wrong. You can't go wrong. If you do that and just make connections. I feel like that's what this life is all about, is making connections and learning and feeling feelings and enjoy enjoyment. Enjoyment in life.

Lance Miles [00:26:34] Enjoy this life.

Nicki Miles [00:26:35] It's just. I'm grateful every day that I get to get up and choose. And sure, some days are crappy and I make really bad choices sometimes that have consequences, but every day I'm happy.

John Dehlin [00:26:56] Beautiful. Great stuff. Thanks to you both.

Lance Miles [00:27:02] Thank you, John. So I want to just. If we're closing.

John Dehlin [00:27:07] No. Oh, go ahead. We're still saying goodbye to this.

Lance Miles [00:27:11] Yeah, yeah, but you have putting the call out there, and I have not. I got pretty standoffish about donating anything, any organization after getting screwed over by the church. So I have not been a monthly donor to you, but I have listened to probably every one of your podcasts, and Nikki is actually just starting to listen to them herself. So I have. I'm presenting a check to you for 500 bucks, man, for. For the Open Stories foundation for your cause.

John Dehlin [00:27:44] Thank you.

Lance Miles [00:27:45] I really appreciate you, John. You know, you going through your faith crisis and trying to make it work and, you know, all the ins and outs and everything, but in the end, you know, just all the stories, they have helped me immensely.

Nicki Miles [00:28:01] And me and our kids.

Lance Miles [00:28:04] Yeah. So thank you. Thank you for what you do.

John Dehlin [00:28:06] Thank you. Well, good. Well, it's been so, you know, I called it an epic story, and I think it's remained epic. I think you guys totally met expectations. But it's been a fantastic story and I just want to thank you both, Nikki and Lance, for sharing. Being so vulnerable. So many of the listeners said you're helping people. You're making a huge difference.

John Dehlin [00:28:38] So many of our listeners were touched. So I think you're gonna. We are probably going to change lives and save some lives through this interview. So I just want to thank you guys for that amazing story. I want to thank all of those who have tuned in either on Facebook Live. I want to thank you guys for tuning in and your comments and questions. I want to thank everyone who's listening on the podcast or through YouTube.

John Dehlin [00:29:06] I always want to thank the donors. I mean, I appreciate this so much. This doesn't go to me. My salary is set. This goes to the. To the foundation, and we're transparent with our finances. And this money goes to support the mission of the nonprofit. So this goes to save marriages. This goes to prevent children from killing themselves who are lgbt.

John Dehlin [00:29:31] This goes to prevent husbands and wives from divorcing each other, parents from estranging their children to create workshops and retreats where people can share their experiences and not feel so alone and build community, just like the type of community you experience.

John Dehlin [00:29:51] That's what the Open Stories foundation does full time. We're creating community and content and support to help people in their transition. So thank you so much for that. Thanks to all of you who have donated, who have helped to make the Open Stories successful. If you value these interviews, please consider a donation. Those donations are tax deductible and they go exactly to what you put the money towards, which is saving lives, saving marriages, bringing families together, preventing depression and anxiety, and helping people build a beautiful and healthy life once orthodoxy doesn't work for him anymore. And that can be in the church. And that's why we've got Mormon matters and a thoughtful faith to support people who want or need to stay in the church.

John Dehlin [00:30:40] And then we've got Mormon stories and Mormon transitions and others for people wherever they need to go. So thanks for tuning in. Please donate $10 or $20 a month can keep us alive. If you can do a recurring, recurring donation, as always, just to close Cody. You can't see Cody behind the scenes, but he's been manning the mixer and the cameras. I want to thank Cody Layton for joining us on the Open Stories Foundation. Your donations go to make it so Cody can do all the audio and video editing and post production and post all this stuff on the Internet. So, Cody, thanks for your help.

John Dehlin [00:31:17] And of course, Amy Grubbs is our director of operations and she makes all this possible along with our board of directors. So this has been wonderful. And thank you. And this continues our series on interviews with general authorities. If you've got a story about a meeting with the general authority, we'd love to hear it. We're going to be showing a few more over the next few days and weeks, but this was a great one. So again, Lance and Nikki, thank you so much.

Lance Miles [00:31:46] Yeah, thank you.

Nicki Miles [00:31:46] Thank you.

Lance Miles [00:31:47] Appreciate it.

John Dehlin [00:31:47] And everyone out there on the Internet.

Nicki Miles [00:31:49] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:31:49] Thank you. Take care. Watching on YouTube and listening. Please tune in again soon for another episode of Mormon Stories podcast. Check us out at mormonstories. Org. Take care, everybody. Thank you.

Transcript © 2026 John P. Dehlin. All rights reserved. Brief quotations are welcome with attribution and a link to mormonstories.org; all other use requires written permission.