Introduction and Welcome to Marc's Story

Part 1 of 3 · Ep. 1423

John Dehlin [00:00:00] Hello, everyone, and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories Podcast. I'm your host, John Dehlin. It's April 9, 2021, three days after the birth date of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or the day Jesus was born, according to, you know, how I was taught growing up. Anyway, just kidding. I'm John Dehlin, and I am so excited for today's episode. This is the type of interview I have wanted to do forever and. And I kind of have my golden interviewee who I get to interview about it. Today we are interviewing Mark Osland. Mark, welcome to Mormon Stories Podcast.

Marc Oslund [00:00:38] Thanks, John. I'm so excited to be here. So excited.

John Dehlin [00:00:40] And I'll just give you guys the preview. Have you ever wondered what it would be like to, number one, be in the church education system as a seminary teacher? You know, and we've had John McClay on, you know, talking about what it was like being in Seminary Institute when he was married to Brooke. And, you know, that was like, a really groundbreaking episode. And of course, we had Grant Palmer on when he talked about being in the Seminaries 2 program. But, but, like, imagine being in the in CES. I know I should say we had Jeremy Runnels on talking about letter to a CES director. What we've never had is somebody number one, who was kind of like, you know, over the past 10 years in CES working as a CES instructor. But it gets cooler. Like, think about starting around 2013, kind of two years before everything broke, right as the essays are starting to appear, right as the Mormon Internet is really getting going. And then, you know, boom, Kelly's excommunicated. I'm excommunicated. And then dealing with the CBS letter comes out. And then dealing with all the aftermath between, let's just say 2015 and, and, you know, 2019, 2020, when you lose your faith as a seminary teacher in Utah. And then you've got to figure out what to do, how to leave this job, can you even get a new job? And then what? You know, when you've built your marriage and your kids and your whole family and your whole life on this career, what the freak do you do then? That is today's episode, and we're interviewing Mark Osland, Summit. Probably most of you won't have heard of Mark, but he's super cool. He grew up in California. We're going to figure out what made him convert to the Mormon Church. As a dude growing up in California, he ends up playing baseball at byu. And then, of course, after he Graduated, becoming a seminary teacher for CES and doing all of that during this really volatile time where the Mormon Church is trying to modernize and, and deal with the Internet. So that's what this is like. Buckle up. This is your multi hour interview and it's going to be really important. So without any further ado, Mark Osland, welcome to Mormon Stories podcast.

Marc Oslund [00:03:07] I'm just so excited. And yeah, the story, there's so many twists and turns and yeah, somebody asked me, how long do you think it'll be? I'm like, I don't know, man, we can go for days. So, yeah, I'm excited to be here.

John Dehlin [00:03:18] Anything you want to correct about the intro? No, you nailed it. Add to the intro.

Marc Oslund [00:03:22] No, you nailed it perfectly. I'm honored.

John Dehlin [00:03:24] Okay. All right, all right. Well, here we go. So I don't think, you know, you're not going to be telling us this multi generational pioneer heritage kind of stuff. So my big question to you is what the freak would cause, like an intelligent, you know, human born in the US From Cali to freaking, especially your baseball star, like, to join the freaking Church of Jesus Christ of Latter. But take us back to wherever you want to start because there's usually a story that leads to someone converting.

Growing Up and Converting to Mormonism

Marc Oslund [00:03:54] 100%, yeah. 100%, yeah. You nailed it. And so I'm glad you think I was intelligent. Looking back, I'm like, I don't think I was that intelligent. It's probably part of it, you know, so when I think back, and maybe even before I start this, like, I have a lot of emotion, meaning I sometimes get angry. And it's, it's not because I'm a. I'm angry at Mormon people in particular. I think there's maybe a handful of people in this whole story that I'm going to feel specifically angry towards. Like, I don't know if I ever want to really see you, but the majority, like 99.9% of Mormon people, I just feel super compassionate for. And, and I have a lot of friends, family members, so that I want to say that off the bat, but yeah, like, I, I joined the church in 20. Or, sorry, 2008. 2007. Right. Right. At the end of 2007, December. How did I get there? Well, my dad was Mormon, but I had no idea, like, no clue at all. Didn't say a word to me till I told him I was gonna get baptized.

John Dehlin [00:04:50] Okay, so where are you living? Where were you born?

Marc Oslund [00:04:52] In Torrance, California.

John Dehlin [00:04:53] Where is that?

Marc Oslund [00:04:53] For those who don't know, it's in the south bay, so 15 minutes south of LAX.

John Dehlin [00:04:57] Okay.

Marc Oslund [00:04:58] And so.

John Dehlin [00:04:58] So that's like la, la, la proper.

Marc Oslund [00:05:00] The heart of LA, man. Yeah. So like, today, the Dodgers got their World Series rings. I'm pumped. Like, I'm LA through and through, you know, and I miss it.

John Dehlin [00:05:08] I gotta. I gotta shout out to Alan Mount, who I know is a huge Dodgers fan, and. And Scott Purvis, who's a huge Giants fan. My condolences.

Marc Oslund [00:05:18] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:05:18] Because I know he hates the Dodgers.

Marc Oslund [00:05:20] Sure. I don't know of your followership. Like, I don't know how many people are jazz fans, but, like, the Lakers are my team, so.

John Dehlin [00:05:26] Okay.

Marc Oslund [00:05:26] I want to alienate people. Like, I. I'm cordial, you know? But anyway, I. Born and raised in Torrance, lived in a part of Torrance called North Torrance

John Dehlin [00:05:33] that was this scary la.

Marc Oslund [00:05:34] No, no, no, no. We lived like where. Where we grew up. I mean, we're. We're five minutes from the beach. Right. So you feel the ocean breeze. I remember football practices feeling like, oh, two days are so hard. 75 degrees. And the coach is like, hey, turn to the ocean and get the air in your lungs. I'm like, that's not normal. You know, and super spoiled and just so suburban. Suburban, Upper.

John Dehlin [00:05:57] Upper middle class, kind of.

Marc Oslund [00:05:58] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:05:58] Okay.

Marc Oslund [00:05:59] I mean, the houses there are a million dollars. They're 1400 square feet and not pretty, but they're a million dollars.

John Dehlin [00:06:03] Yeah. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:06:04] So, yeah, I mean, yeah, it's a lot different than where we live right now in af, but. Yeah. So my dad was Mormon, my grandma was Mormon, so my dad was adopted. My dad was born and raised in the church, but I'm telling you, I knew literally nothing. The only experiences I had with Mormonism, there was two before moving to a different part of our city. The first one was my dad. He's a big dude. So, you know, I'm 6 5, my dad's 6 3. He's probably like 280 at the time. And we had a little stained glass window. And I remember sitting there, I don't. We were watching shows or playing trucks or whatever when I was young. And we see two figures in white shirts, you know, not angels, but, like, they're missionaries, you know. So we get a knock on the door and my dad, this big dude, he like, gets really shocked. Everybody get down. It's the Mormons. I'm like, what? Like, never even heard the word Mormon. I had no idea. I don't know what that is. And so he stands up, 6 foot 3280 jumps, rolls over the couch.

John Dehlin [00:07:01] Huge thud.

Marc Oslund [00:07:02] It's evident that we're home. And he's like, everyone, shut up. It's the Mormons. And we're all just like, what are you talking about? You know, that was my first introduction to Mormonism. I have no idea who they are, what they are. The next one is, I was playing catch. Like, I was. I was a baseball player, and in this home, I was playing catch with my mom. And somebody pulls up, and again, they're from the church. I think it was a home teacher. They pulled up and said something to my mom, and my mom said, oh, that's the Mormons. That's all I knew.

John Dehlin [00:07:33] Wow.

Marc Oslund [00:07:33] That's all I knew.

John Dehlin [00:07:34] Right.

Marc Oslund [00:07:35] Then we moved to a different part of our city. And then, you know, I start watching south park and I start seeing other things and hearing about Mormons, and I'm like, okay, so Mormons are weird, right? You know, the same thing that you've. That we've always been told Mormons are a cult. Joseph Smith had lots of wives. That's basically all I knew.

John Dehlin [00:07:51] You knew that?

Marc Oslund [00:07:52] I knew that after watching south park and talking to a couple people about Mormonism, you know, and then find out, you know, long run. Wow. South Park's actually right. But anyway, I felt just very off about Mormons. I also had this impression that Mormons were, like, Quakers. So, like.

John Dehlin [00:08:09] Or, like Amish.

Marc Oslund [00:08:09] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:08:10] Or Mennonites.

Marc Oslund [00:08:11] Exactly. Like, build your own furniture. Like, don't watch tv. Like, it was kind of. I've. I've combined Amish, Mennonites, Jehovah's Witness, Mormons altogether. Right.

John Dehlin [00:08:22] Weird.

Marc Oslund [00:08:22] Yeah. And old.

John Dehlin [00:08:23] Old school weird.

Marc Oslund [00:08:25] Exactly.

John Dehlin [00:08:25] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:08:26] Yeah. And so many of these just misconceptions. And. And so, I mean, religion is just not a thing. Where we're growing up, I know people were religious, but, like, it's. It's la. Like, we're not focused on religion. We don't talk about God. We had churches. It just wasn't a thing. We didn't worry about it with my friends. Growing up through, you know, middle school, I never ever talked about religion until my mom got baptized in a Baptist church. And I went to this Baptist church, and I remember thinking, like, okay, we go to Sunday school and the. Whoever they were. I don't even know who they were. I was too young to know. And my mom is like, you know, up front in this, like, tank, and she gets dunked, and my dad was there. I'm like, I don't know what's going on. We go to Sunday school.

John Dehlin [00:09:10] They're like.

Marc Oslund [00:09:10] They start quizzing me on Bible stories. I don't know anything about the Bible. No clue. And then I start feeling really bad because I feel like an idiot, and I don't know about Moses and Noah. And so then I go home. I'm like, I'm never going back there. So that's. That's all of religion for me. Like, that's it. That's all I knew. And my mom said, like, hey, if you pray and believe in God, you'll be okay. Didn't teach me how to pray. We said, like, family wrote prayers. You know, it was more just like a family unity thing with my grandparents, but it was never like, dear Heavenly Father, you know, the Mormon way. So that's all of my background up until my junior year of high school.

John Dehlin [00:09:51] So. So just to. Just to kind of weave the baseball stuff in. It's not easy to play Division 1 athletics.

Marc Oslund [00:09:58] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:10:00] So talk. Talk about kind of what, you know, led to that.

Marc Oslund [00:10:03] Yeah. Thanks. I. I just love sport. I feel like it was such a way for me and my dad to connect. Some of my favorite memories were just like, going to Dodger Stadium, being with my dad, talking about Dodger games, you know, Dodgers playing on tv. The most familiar thing in my entire upbringing was coming home after school after what have you. You know, practice and the TV being on and Vin Scully narrating Dodger games. And it was just such a family thing. Our whole family is athletic. So I played baseball, basketball, you know, football, soccer, my sister, soccer, softball, basketball, my brother, basketball, football, baseball. Like, this was just our family. And so, you know, we'd play catch and we'd. We'd hit and we'd have a ton of fun. And I just fell in love with it. And I was good at it. I was tall. I was big for my age. I think people expected me to be, you know, a leader because just solely from my height, I don't think I was more mature. I think it forced me to grow up really fast and. And I was good. I liked. I liked hitting. I liked throwing. I wasn't. I wasn't afraid of the ball. I threw hard. And so we just kind of kept honing those things because of my natural talents and my, you know, my love and my passion. It gave me more opportunities. And so I started playing on travel ball teams, and we'd go all around Southern California.

John Dehlin [00:11:25] Which sports?

Marc Oslund [00:11:26] Baseball. Baseball was the main one. I got offered to play soccer, like a club soccer thing. A week after club. I Got offered to play club baseball.

John Dehlin [00:11:34] Okay.

Marc Oslund [00:11:34] And so, so you kind of had

John Dehlin [00:11:36] to pick for sure.

Marc Oslund [00:11:37] And I chose baseball and I'm glad. I do wonder what would have happened if I would have chosen soccer. What would have happened? I love basketball, but I, I wasn't a good dribbler. I, I was, I'm tall, I'm 6 5. But like I'd be a guard, you know, in college and I couldn't shoot so that wasn't going to be my future football does play in, but not till later because I was, I was heavy. Like I was man in fifth grade five five, like 150 pounds, big dude. So I didn't play tackle football. Cause I would've had to play up like four age like with ninth graders or eighth graders. And my dad didn't want me getting hurt. Cause the development is so different, you know. So we continue to play and I just kept getting more and more opportunities. Um, we, I went on different teams. We'd go to Cooperstown, New York for tournaments. We'd go to Junior Olympics in Arizona. I, I performed really well at the Junior Olympics. So they put me on a trial team, the top 64 youth under 14. We went out to Florida and I was on this trial team where they're gonna have an opportunity for 32 people to go to Venezuela and play in, you know, a national thing. And I was number 33. I was the last one that was cut. And they told me, they're like, hey, we want you to have an amazing year. Go focus on football is right before my freshman year and we're gonna be watching you. And so it was just something I was always good at. I felt like baseball was my long term love, like slow and steady and football was my passion. And so all of this I just had. My dad invested a ton of money and I was grateful for it. You know I got scholarship to BYU eventually, but I think my dad and mom ended up paying for it before. Right. Just with all the supplies, clubs and trips. Yeah. I mean thousands and thousands of dollars and some really cool memories and, and a lot of success. A lot of my teammates and former people I've played against in the major leagues right now.

John Dehlin [00:13:32] Really?

Marc Oslund [00:13:33] Yeah. So Chris Bryant, who's like the top, he's like rookie of the year, then mvp. We played against him at San Diego.

John Dehlin [00:13:39] Really?

Marc Oslund [00:13:39] Yeah, he, he was the only guy that was straight up better than me. Like people. I, I mean I played against, you know, Matt Carpenter who won the World Series with, with the Cardinals. We played against Aaron Hicks, who's the center fielder for the New York Yankees. I mean, some good guys. Trevor Bauer, he's on the Dodgers now. We played against him. So, like a ton of dudes that are, that are just. I mean, me and my brother went through it. Probably 30 people that we played against or played with are in the major leagues. And so I was right there. Right. I felt like I was right there in it with them. And we moved actually from North Torrance to West Torrance because West High had like a great baseball team. And so we really wanted to be at West High, make sure that I had the best opportunities.

John Dehlin [00:14:19] You moved houses to be in the school district?

Marc Oslund [00:14:22] Yeah, and we wanted to step up. It was a little bit.

John Dehlin [00:14:24] That's commitment.

Marc Oslund [00:14:25] Yeah, for sure. So, like, we were really grateful and we loved West High and it was again, right by the beach. So it's a, it's a nice benefit for the family. But. But yeah, baseball was fundamental for me, for sure.

John Dehlin [00:14:36] Okay. But not religion.

Marc Oslund [00:14:38] No, never.

John Dehlin [00:14:39] Okay.

Marc Oslund [00:14:39] There's. It just, it just wasn't priority. Right. Family was hanging out, eating food, watching shows, sports.

John Dehlin [00:14:48] And it sounds like you had a pretty hep. I mean, I don't want to, I'm not trying to dig, but it sounds like you had a happy family life. 100%, like healthy, happy, generally moral, productive family.

Marc Oslund [00:14:59] 100%. Like my mom and dad are so good.

John Dehlin [00:15:02] They.

Marc Oslund [00:15:02] So we have a two year old now. And the way that I feel for him, I think I really get how my parents have always felt for me. Like, they just love me so much and they love all their kids. My dad told me right before we were about to have our two year old, he's like, Mark, you will never, you, you won't know what I felt seeing you for the first time. I'm the oldest of three. You won't know what I felt until you hold your kid. And I like, I got it. And I felt like I understood their love for me on a totally different level. They, they believed in us. Like they just knew they gave us every opportunity educationally, athletically, with homes. I mean, my dad worked super hard. My dad was at every practice, he was at every game. I mean, our baseball games are at 3pm so that means my dad has to drive to downtown LA at 4am, 5am, work, come right from work, right to our games, right to our practices. Same with my mom. She would drop off, you know, I would forget my bag for baseball all the time and she'd come and drop it off and provide food and we'd always have people over at our house and they're just so loving and welcoming. The only challenge that I ever really had growing up was my feeling of not being good enough. And the irony is that I had every support in the world. Parents, grandparents. It came because I was big, because I was forced to grow up really quick. And it happened my seventh grade year. So I'm a chubby kid, big kid. Sixth grade, we had a PE teacher. And again, I had my. I had baby fat. I was a chubby kid. Come back to seventh grade and it's. This so sounds so stupid, but for, you know, a 12, 13 year old, however old I was at the time, it was. This was like the moment that forced me to grow up. So I had. There's these shoes that were so dumb looking back, they're called soaps. And they have like this little plastic piece that like right on the, on the midsole so you could like go and run and grind on like on ledges, on curbs. And I had a big foot at the time. I was like size 13. And they only made them up to size 12. So all my friends had these soaps and I had like. I just wanted so bad to have cool shoes. And I remember going. And my mom was like, I know they're not the same, but are you sure you're gonna wear them? Like, you can't run very fast in them. Cause she knew that I was athletic. I'm like, no, mom, I gotta get them. They're cool. They're airwalks. And I remember when I moved out to go to college, the box was up in my room unused, because I just so badly wanted to fit in, you know, And I. One of these days, I'm after school, seventh grade year, my friends are hanging out wearing their dumb shoes, and I'm just kind of standing around because I can't do what they're doing. And our PE teacher from the year before comes up and he's like, mark, so good to see you. I'm like, oh, hey, nice to see you too. And he says, I haven't seen you since last year. I see you lost your baby fat. And I'm like, what? Like, I. I realized I was wearing like a goofy Hawaiian shirt, right? My hair was like slicked back. I just looked like a total dork. And I saw my friends that were around and kind of laughing at me. And that was the first time I became self aware that maybe the image that my family always had about me being so loved and lovable and Good wasn't how others saw me. And in that moment, seeing so many people just looking around and just laughing and feeling so self conscious, I determined I would never, ever let myself feel that again. Well, how would I do that? I would be the top dog. I'd be the most popular person at school. I'd do whatever the cool kids are doing. And immediately my grades plummeted. Why? Because cool kids don't do good in school. I had a teacher who looked right at me, was doing tutoring after school. She's like, mark, I know you know this. I was a 4.0 kid, you know? I know you know this. Why aren't you doing this? I was like, I don't know. And everything changed. Right. I started noticing, you know, friends at that age in la, people start smoking, drinking. I wouldn't do it that young, Right? But freshman year, again, ninth graders or with 12th graders, man, like, these people are about to go to college. They're 18 years old. I want to be cool. They thought I was cool. So what do you do? You got to drink, you got to smoke, you got to hang out with the cheerleaders. Right. You got to be a part of this. And so I grew up really, really fast, but I was always a kid at heart, and. And I only recently have started looking back and saying, wow, like, I really so much changed because I just wanted to feel like I belonged to.

John Dehlin [00:19:42] Mm.

Marc Oslund [00:19:43] So, yes, long story short, my family was overwhelmingly supportive. And the only thing that caused that was that sense of shame that was not ever brought on by them.

John Dehlin [00:19:53] Yeah. So you kind of committed in your high school years to kind of being popular and fitting in 100 and doing whatever it took to be popular. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:20:02] And I watched the show, like, watch any stupid high school drama. Right. If you call them chick flicks or whatever, just watch any of them. Who's the most popular person? It's always the quarterback, right. So I said, well, what do I got to do? I'm going to be the quarterback. So that became my goal. My freshman year. It was my first year ever playing tackle football, and I was like, you know, I played with the freshman team. Then my soft sophomore year comes around. And by the way, my freshman year, I played varsity baseball as a freshman. As a freshman, Yep.

John Dehlin [00:20:29] That's not normal, right?

Marc Oslund [00:20:30] No, it was.

John Dehlin [00:20:30] It wasn't in my high school.

Marc Oslund [00:20:31] Yeah, no, it was. It was rare. And I mean, we had people that were going. We. People going to school in Hawaii, Pepperdine. I mean, top, top, top people in the whole area. And I'M playing as a starter on. On the varsity baseball team. So what do we do after? Well, we go to parties. I'm 14 years old, 15 years old, and these, you know, 18 year olds hanging out with their girlfriends and whatever, drinking and so I'd be there. I'd be there right there with them. And in my heart, I knew I was still that little kid, but I also believe I really had to fit in. Right.

John Dehlin [00:21:01] What position were you?

Marc Oslund [00:21:02] I was. So I ended up pitching at byu.

John Dehlin [00:21:04] Okay.

Marc Oslund [00:21:05] But all through high school, I was a first baseman and a pitcher.

John Dehlin [00:21:08] Okay. Yep.

Marc Oslund [00:21:09] So I thought I was gonna. I thought I was gonna hit at byu, but they didn't let me in. I was surprised.

John Dehlin [00:21:13] They wouldn't let you what?

Marc Oslund [00:21:14] They wouldn't let me hit. I felt like you. I thought that they were gonna have me be a position player too, but I mean, I was. I was a decent pitcher, but still.

John Dehlin [00:21:22] So when you. So when you. I'm not a huge baseball fan. I know it's different in National League versus America. Correct. At byu, if you pitched, you could win.

Marc Oslund [00:21:29] Yeah, you could. I mean, hypothetically, but most of the time, pitchers are like non athletes. You know, they always gave us a hard time, like, oh, pitchers are not athletic. I'm like, I'm more athletic than all you guys. Yeah, exactly, exactly.

John Dehlin [00:21:40] So, okay, so you were saying parties and stuff.

Marc Oslund [00:21:43] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:21:43] Freshman year parties, Getting in quarterback.

Marc Oslund [00:21:46] Yeah, exactly. And so I remember, like, hanging out with, like, the senior cheer captain as a freshman. Right. And like, they were friends with somebody who's playing basketball at a different school in our city who ended up playing at University of North Carolina. So I'm like, I'm in the heart of, like, whoever again, remember, these are in quotes. Cool people.

John Dehlin [00:22:06] Okay.

Marc Oslund [00:22:07] Because we're all high schoolers and we all think we're cooler than we are. But I thought, man, I'm. I'm really in it right now. And so I succeed. You know, I do well my freshman year on varsity baseball, sophomore year, so it's football season. Right. And start training for that. And I tell my coach, hey, I want to be. I want to be a quarterback. And they knew I had a good arm. And so because I was a baseball player, I was like, right there with another senior. He ended up getting the starting job, which obviously infuriated me because I'm like, I'm competitive to my core. Kobe Bryant was like my role model, and Kobe was like, no, Take no prisoners. And only looking back do I see, like, there is. Kobe hated losing more than he liked winning. And I realized I hated losing more than I like winning. But it was to cover the deep wounds of feeling vulnerable. Like when I was a 14 year old, being laughed at, that was the core. The core was I never, ever, ever want to feel vulnerable. And losing was vulnerable. And so that's why I just, I didn't lose in high school, right? Like, I literally didn't lose a single game I pitched in high school at BYU. I only lost three games total out of, out of, man. I was 10 and 1 my freshman year, and then I was 8 and 2 my sophomore year before I got hurt. So I just, I just, when I play, I don't lose because it was, it was shame, right? Just obviously not healthy, but it was utilized. Coaches loved it. And so this guy gets the starting job. We go to Santa, my first varsity game. I've literally, I've only played one year of football. I've never played quarterback. Our quarterback gets hit by somebody and punches a dude and gets thrown out. So now I wasn't planning on being the starter. They put me in and it was like a whirlwind, right? I'm just like, I have no idea what's happening. And we ended up losing that game. I started the second game because my, my coach got kicked or my quarterback got kicked out and so loved it. We ended up losing that one too. And like I just said, so I don't lose in baseball, but I did in football and it was like devastating. Eventually, like, the quarterback comes back and I'm, we're still neck and neck and, and, and seeing what we can do to, you know, get me in the starting job. Eventually they said, hey, we want to get you more snaps. So they move me back down to JV and I get hurt. Um, I, I just like planted my leg. They roll into my knee, I tear my knee. I'm in a ton of pain, right? Tear my MCL and my meniscus and it just hurting. So at this point, I'd already been at parties and a couple of my friends were like, hey, this might help. And so they introduced me to weed. I'm like, oh, okay, let's, we can do this. And obviously it helps, right? For different reasons too. And, and that was kind of like my introduction. That was just kind of who I was. And it wasn't a thing. It wasn't, it wasn't a big deal. It was just like, that's what you do. Like, my neighbors, everybody had parties. Their parents knew. They, they just like, just don't drink and drive, don't do something stupid. But the feeling of being like, yeah, yeah, that's, that's what high schoolers do was very felt by me. And like, yeah, we make dumb mistakes, but my family is always like, mark, come on. Like, just don't be dumb. Never shame, never guilt.

John Dehlin [00:25:18] That's so great. Yeah, it's so good.

Marc Oslund [00:25:20] Oh, dude, the best. Like, oh, yeah. I hope I can be half the parent to my kid that they were to us. Like, they were just nothing but love, you know? So I rehab. I placed sophomore year of varsity baseball. We ended up losing in, like, the quarterfinals. Um, I wasn't pitching. I, I, I, I don't want to get the wrong impression. I'm, I might come off arrogant. I'm really not. Like, I, I don't want to portray that. I'm like someone, someone that's better than I am. I'm, I really am just like a big hurt kid that was fortunate with some, some, you know, natural talents. Right. Junior year comes around. I'm the starter on the, on the football team. Our running back was amazing. He ended up playing at University of Southern California with Pete Carroll. I mean, so he's, he's awesome.

John Dehlin [00:26:04] What was his name?

Marc Oslund [00:26:05] His name's Ryan Bauckham. He was, he ended up playing cornerback and he got hurt. He was driving a motorcycle down the 405 or the 110 and ended up getting hurt. So, yeah, a mess. But yeah, like, man, we, we were good. We tied one game to one of our rivals and we went all the way to the state championship for the first time since, man, 1982.

John Dehlin [00:26:25] Is there like four a five ace?

Marc Oslund [00:26:26] Yeah. So we were division, I think they call it division three. Okay. So it's opposite in California, the, the division one's the top two, three, and it goes backwards.

John Dehlin [00:26:34] So medium sized school.

Marc Oslund [00:26:36] Yeah, for sure, for sure.

John Dehlin [00:26:37] Still super competitive.

Marc Oslund [00:26:38] Definitely. We had probably 2,000 people at our school and we had four high schools in my city.

John Dehlin [00:26:42] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:26:42] Public highs, and we had a couple other private ones. So super competitive. I, I consider ourselves to be one of the better ones in the area. And man, it was awesome that year, though. That was the year when religion came into play.

John Dehlin [00:26:54] Right.

Marc Oslund [00:26:55] And knowing all of that about my background, where I was kind of, you know, getting involved with drugs, I wasn't, I wasn't a druggie. I wasn't like an alcoholic, because recreational use. Exactly, exactly. And of course, there's stupid moments, you know, getting blackout or whatever, those things aren't good. But that's what high schoolers do.

John Dehlin [00:27:12] Yeah. To learn how to manage it.

Marc Oslund [00:27:14] Exactly, right. Exactly.

John Dehlin [00:27:16] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:27:16] And we learned.

John Dehlin [00:27:17] Right?

Marc Oslund [00:27:17] We. We definitely learned the hard way. And so my first day of school, junior year, there's this girl that I had not seen before. And I still remember today what she was wearing. She was wearing, like, you know, a yellow shirt, jeans, and rainbow sandals. Because it's la, right? And I'm walking from our high school's, like, outdoor. The buildings are separated by just, like, green because we don't have to have everything inside. Being in Utah, where it's cold, you know, you have to do that. And I remember walking from one building to another, and we crossed paths, and something about her. She was tall. She was like, five, ten, Polynesian. Half Polynesian. So tan. And I was just drawn to her. I was like, who is this person? Right? And eventually, like, my friends tell me who she is. Her name's Faith. You know, Faith's playing volleyball at west now. She came from Redondo High, which is just, you know, a block up the road or two blocks up the road. I get to know her a little bit, and I, at that point, felt like I was kind of like the man. I'm like, no, I'm. I'm like. Like, I'm a junior now. I'm the starting quarterback. I'm a. I'm the best player on our baseball team. Like, I'm. I'm it. And one day, Faith, like, walks right up to me at lunch and was like, hey, do you want to come over my house today? I'm like, what? Like, it was so straightforward. I was just not prepared for that because I thought. I thought I was really cool. I knew now, looking back, I wasn't, but I thought I was. And Faith was very direct. So I came over to Faith's house, and we hung out. Faith's super cool, laid back, really good family, and just really enjoyed it. Eventually, Faith and I kept hanging out more and more and more. And, you know, one day we had. We have just beaten a team that we hadn't beaten in years from Manhattan beach called Miracosta. And I am talking to Faith after the game. We were just texting, you know, back in the day, when you don't get free texts, and I'm texting, and I'm like, you know, we're talking about how good things are. And Faith kind of says, hey, do you want to hang out with me this weekend? Oh, for sure. So I go over to her house on Saturday, come home, we're texting again Saturday night. She says, hey, do you want to hang out with me tomorrow? Yeah, for sure. She says, cool, well, you got to come to church first. Church? What. What do I wear? She's like, white shirt, tie. So. Right. Faith's Mormon. White shirt, tie, button up. I'm like, wait, I thought. Thought you wore, like, bonnets and, like, you know, whatever. She's like, we're not Quakers, man. Like, and so, literally, that's what I knew, right? So I go over to her house, and Sunday morning, and I go to church for the first time in our ward in Redondo beach, and I see people I've known. My wife now was actually in that ward. We knew each other since fifth grade. And.

John Dehlin [00:30:04] Oh, wow.

Marc Oslund [00:30:04] Yeah. Crazy, right? We didn't date, and I knew she was Mormon, but I knew that Mormons were, like, too good. And so I was like, I'm kind of a sleazebag. I am never gonna, like, approach her because I knew that she was too good, right? And she wouldn't be interested in some sleazy quarterback, you know, loser guy. And so, Faith, I had a good experience. We were sitting next to each other in sacrament meeting, then we went to Sunday school, and I was like, this is great. And then we split off for. For priesthood and Relief Society. And she's like, hey, bye. Go with my dad. I'm like, what? Like, you know, her dad's super, super nice Polynesian dude. But I'm kind of scared because it's like, hey, this is my daughter, man. Like, you dating my daughter? And so anyway, and then we split off again, and I'm with the young men, with the bishop, and I'm just like, what is going on? Right? And we go back to their house after church, and we kind of had a debriefing. And I'm like, yeah, it was better than I thought. Like, there was no, like, you know, goats being sacrificed or whatever, culty things that I had no idea because I didn't know anything about religion, really. And so. And nobody made fun of me in Sunday school like they did at the Baptist church and that my mom went to. And so, yeah, in general, I had a good time. Even my baseball coach, when I was in Little League, he was there. I didn't realize he was. I didn't know.

John Dehlin [00:31:15] Oh.

Marc Oslund [00:31:16] And he wasn't going to church at the time, but then he comes back. And so all these people that I had community interactions with, I'm like, wait, I've kind of been surrounded by Mormons. And so one day, I'm at Faith's house again. We're hanging out at night. And Frank, who's her dad, a great guy, kind of pulls me aside and says two things. Mark, I really love having you here. You're a great person. You've been really good to all of our kids. They all love you. I love you. I said, thanks, Frank. That's so nice. Second thing, he's like, gives me further strength of the youth pamphlet. Never seen it before. He says, if you want to date my daughter, you live these standards.

John Dehlin [00:31:52] Whoa.

Marc Oslund [00:31:53] I was like, okay. And I read through it when I got home. I'm like, not doing that. Not doing that.

John Dehlin [00:31:58] Right.

Marc Oslund [00:31:58] None of it. I'm just like, that's. That's intense. And in my mind, I'm like, and Faith's not doing that either. And I truly don't think I would have been even interested in Mormonism if it wasn't for Faith being she. She was a good person, a great person, but wasn't one who was keeping the rules the way that Mormons should. You know what I'm saying? I don't think I was having fun. For ex. Yeah. For lack of a better word. Right. And we were having fun.

John Dehlin [00:32:23] Developmental high school, 100%.

Marc Oslund [00:32:25] The way that. The way that normal kids would develop.

John Dehlin [00:32:27] Right.

Marc Oslund [00:32:28] Which plays into when I'm teaching seminary and the way that I interact with kids and what they bring to me, I'm like, that's normal. Right?

John Dehlin [00:32:35] Can't wait for that.

Marc Oslund [00:32:36] Yeah, that's coming up.

John Dehlin [00:32:37] Right.

Marc Oslund [00:32:38] And so, you know, I also have to tell you, the first time I met Faith's dad, it was. I was at Faith volleyball game. You know, she did great. She was really talented. And Faith, Faith's like, hey, come meet my dad. I'm like, I don't want to meet your dad. Like, that's scary. It's the first time I ever met a parent, you know? And so Faith brings me over and Frank, who's her dad, looks at me. He's like, mark. Real confused. Like, he was like. Like we knew each other somewhere. He's like, is that Mark? I'm like, that's me. You know, like, he's like, I home taught your dad. Frank was the guy that home taught when, like the two experiences I had the Mormons knocking on the door. I think Frank was one of them.

John Dehlin [00:33:19] Oh.

Marc Oslund [00:33:20] So it's like, what in the world? You know how Mormon world can get really small.

John Dehlin [00:33:24] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:33:24] And so those are the tie ins

John Dehlin [00:33:26] even in Southern Cal, right?

Marc Oslund [00:33:27] Yep.

John Dehlin [00:33:28] Yeah. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:33:29] Turns out our neighbor, who's old, old, old, like 80 years old, they're Mormon. Two doors down, they're Mormon. I'm like, what is going on? I had no idea, you know? And so I just continued to go to church just because I like hanging out with Faith. I like being with her family. After, Faith would invite me over for family home evenings, and, you know, with the missionaries came by and just very casual. Never any pressure. Faith was really good about making sure that I didn't feel like I had to do something I didn't want to do. But she was also really good at just saying, like, hey, this is what we do. This is our family. And I remember she invited me to watch General Conference. And, like I said, the image I have of religion in my mind is so. I don't know if warped's the right idea, but I had this image of, like, somehow Mormon Corporation piping in, like. Like the wizard of Oz, piping into their homes and just having, like, the prophet speaking in their home, not on tv. I don't know what I was picturing, but it was just this really warped view of what was going to happen. I'm like, no, thanks. I don't want to have 10 hours of this random dude talking to me, you know? So I was still resistant. Eventually I got to the point where I said, hey, it's good for you, but it's not for me. And I continued to just go. Baseball was great that year. We. We lost the state championship in football, which was devastating. The team that we played was from Compton, and a couple of the people. So Richard Sherman, who was a cornerback for. Yeah, yeah. So he.

Baseball Career and College Recruitment

John Dehlin [00:34:58] Seahawks, right?

Marc Oslund [00:34:59] Yeah, exactly. So he went to that school. He graduated the year before. But that whole team was stacked. I mean, guys going to USC, Washington, UCLA.

John Dehlin [00:35:05] Like 12.

Marc Oslund [00:35:06] Huge. Exactly. Like huge, huge, huge players. My coach wasn't really good at recruiting. He didn't want to put his name on the line and have somebody not perform, which was unfortunate. But that team just. They fell in love with me. They all came up. Hey, number 12. We love you. We love you. We're going to. Anytime somebody comes and asks for a quarterback, we're going to tell them to go to West High. And so I started getting looks in football. So I had, you know, Arizona. Arizona State come by. USC came by. I think that was just a token, like, hey, we're gonna recruit your running back and we'll say hi to you, too. I don't think that was ever serious. Fresno State, Utah State.

John Dehlin [00:35:41] Oh, fun.

Marc Oslund [00:35:41] Yeah. So Utah State came by. John, this way. This is why it's so hard for me to, like, I'm a Utah now. Like, and probably not leaving Utah State came by when I was playing baseball, said, hey, we'd love to offer you a scholarship. We'd love to have you here. And I remember saying, oh, that's such an honor. Like, I'll think about it, getting done, turning to my friends and being like, I'm never going to Utah. You know? You know what I mean? Like, it was just Utah was the land of the weird. I just never had any need to ever go to Utah. We did play, like a tournament in Taylorsville for like, three days, and that's all I knew. So, you know.

John Dehlin [00:36:15] And what year was this that you were getting recruited?

Marc Oslund [00:36:19] 2006. Okay, 2006.

John Dehlin [00:36:21] Okay.

Marc Oslund [00:36:21] So right at the heart of, you know, USC was really good at the time, and, man, I was pumped. I was honored and, and it was really cool to see so many people coming by. I had some, some not official offers, but they were really starting to get there. But then I'd have to shift gears for baseball, and then baseball started up. So my first letter ever from baseball was Stanford. And they said, hey, send us your. Your transcripts. And at the time, I think I was probably less than a 3.0. Why? Because popular people don't do good in school. You know, even though I was smart and sent him my transcripts, never heard back, you know, because they're like, we're not taking you. But then I got letters, you know, from Long Beach State, which was like a dream school for baseball for me again. SC for baseball? Yeah, yeah. Usc, University of Southern California. UCLA was like my dream. My dad was a big Bruin fan, so I wanted to go there. They never gave me a letter that was like, it was, it felt like a dig. But I, I mean, they, they, they love the Orange county people. We, I guess, in the South Bay didn't get as much love. But anyway, and then, you know, Fullerton and Irvine and these other UC Riverside and, And I started taking recruiting trips. San Diego State was another one.

John Dehlin [00:37:30] And I think people. And tell me if I'm wrong, but I think some of the, like, the big known Division 1 schools for, like, basketball or football aren't necessarily the top baseball schools.

Marc Oslund [00:37:42] Correct.

John Dehlin [00:37:42] And some of these schools you're mentioning that people go, oh, that sounds like a podcast school. Yeah, there's some. Is that right?

Marc Oslund [00:37:48] There's not for baseball, 100%. Yeah. So, like, I mean, you have to think that the hotspots for baseball in the whole country is California Texas, Arizona and Florida. Georgia. Right. And so, like Long Beach State is as a Cal State school. It's a local school, it's commuter school. But I mean, they're, they're top 25. They're putting out people like, all the time. Multiple MLB players. It's the closest school to my house. I love the environment at Blairfield. Cal State Fullerton, same thing. Top 25 program. UC Irvine becoming a top 25 program. And again, I never, ever thought I would leave Southern California. I was going to grow up there. The only time I would leave would be to play pro ball for some other team and then I'd have my home in Southern California. San Diego State offered me a scholarship for football. They were also home of Marshall Fall. Yeah, see, you know. Exactly. And Tony Gwynne was the baseball coach there. And so, like, they said, hey, if you want to play baseball too, we're going to look at that. And I'm, I'm pumped. I'm like, yeah, I'm gonna play football and baseball in San Diego. Like, in my mind, it's a party school. I'm in San Diego. I'm playing two sports I love. Yeah, let's do it.

John Dehlin [00:38:52] Where's Kwai Leonard? Where do you go?

Marc Oslund [00:38:53] School. Same thing. San Diego State.

John Dehlin [00:38:54] See, those are some legends, man.

Marc Oslund [00:38:56] Exactly, exactly. And like, in my mind, even though, like, now I'm literally nobody, like, I really thought, I'm like, that's the trajectory of my life. My parents always instilled that confidence in me. They always. And I had all these opportunities and I'm watching my teammates and my. From high school, my teammates from other schools go on to play college at top schools. One of my teammates went to Fresno State and they were in the College World Series. And I'm like, this is, this is what we're going to be doing, you know, and so in this time when all of this recruit recruiting is happening and it's. It's just really exciting. Well, Faith and her family decide to move from Redondo to Highland, Utah. And so I was, like, devastated. Right, Because Faith was such a. Of integral part of my junior year. I wouldn't say that we were like, we had a healthy relationship because I don't know if it's necessarily super possible to have a healthy relationship as a 16 year old, but nonetheless, it was definitely a big part of my life. And so Faith moving up there, like, I went with them their first week and helped them moved in, and I was just like flying home. I was just, like, devastated. But then I Got really excited for football again, right? And so I talked to Faith on the phone and we'd stay in touch. And our team was. I mean, we were rolling. We were just dominating people. We made the state championship the year before. Lost just barely by seven, by seven points against an amazing team. We were the favorites. We beat a team like 50, nothing, 42 to 6. Like we're destroying teams. And one day before practice, it's our easiest practice. This Thursday before a game on Friday, we just have this, this. We wear like just shoulder pads and helmets. We don't tackle anybody. Super laid back. And I was the quarterback, so I had to. I forgot to get the ball that we needed, you know, and so I went into the locker room and our coach always said, don't run in the locker room with cleats. And I ran into the locker room with cleats and I slipped. And immediately I was like, something's off with my knee. Like, it just differently than the one I tore my. My sophomore year. I'm like, something's off here. And I'm just kind of pretending like I'm not hurt, you know, I didn't just slip in the locker room and. And hurt my knee. I. I jog with the team and I'm like, something's off. I start trying to do a sprint for a warmup and as soon as I do, my knee just poof, like explodes. And I'm like on the ground and I'm like holding my knee in pain. And because it was such a laid back non contact practice, I think my coach was just surprised. Like, what, are you joking? So he came over laughing. Good one. I'm like, oh, my knees. Like, okay.

John Dehlin [00:41:33] Oh, yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:41:33] I'm like, no, my knees really hurt. He's like, oh. And man. So I didn't, I didn't play that game. I. I got an mri and it was like, hey, my piece. My pcl and my knee was torn. My. My meniscus was torn. And there was something going on with my ncl and so I'm just like, dang, dude, did I just lose my scholarship? Did I just lose this thing? Football was my, My passion, you know, not my long term love. My passion. And I was devastated. I took like a bunch of pain pills before the week four game trying to play. And it was evident, man, I had a knee brace on and it was evident I couldn't do it. My coach said, nope, I'm not playing you, which is a good coach, but I lost it. Like, I started throwing stuff. It's Our. Our biggest rival. I started beating in there, like, lockers, and I'm. I'm just. I'm livid. And. And then I tried to play the fifth game. I finally convinced my coach to let me play. And I. Look, I know it wasn't good, but my role model is Kobe, right? He tears his. He tears his Achilles. He hits two free throws and walks off like, I'm gonna play. So I take a snap and step. And my knee explodes again. And I'm a big dude. I'm bigger than most people on the field, even as a quarterback. And they're not tackling me. I'm just kind of standing there, spinning around, and the refs blow it dead, and I limp off the field. And that was the last time I ever played. And San Diego State never called me. And, man, it went from. Life's really good. Like, I'm living the dream. Family's good, friends are good. Like, everything's good, too. What just happened? So, as you know, from my experience earlier, like, you know, we go to parties and we do whatever, and so I. Same thing. Trying to drown my sorrows or smoke away my sorrows or whatever else. And I remember vividly sitting in and. And Faith wasn't there. This girl who I really liked wasn't there. And so all of a sudden, I'm. I'm realizing I'm not that good at school. I'm not doing that good at school. I don't have football. I don't have this girl. I don't have anything. And I remember sitting in the corner of a party in the dark with, like, a hoodie on, and somebody walked up to me, and I had, like, a drink. I was like, what? Like, are you good? I'm like, no. Okay. And they, like, walked off, because how's the high schooler supposed to cope with that, you know? But right around this time, I'm just, like, going deeper and deeper and deeper into just feeling really crappy. And I'd been to church enough. I didn't go without Faith's family, but I'd been to church enough where I knew that that was a. That could be a part of my life. And anyway, it was kind of planted in. In. In my mind. And so Faith is playing at Lone Peak High volleyball team, one of the best, like, volleyball teams in the state.

John Dehlin [00:44:18] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:44:18] And they make the state championship at uvu. And I end up saying, hey, I'm going to fly up. I'm going to see you. I'm going to see you play. We had a 3 o' clock game instead of a 7 o' clock game that Friday. So I flew up, met their family in Salt Lake, hung out with their. With them in Highland, went to their state championship game. They won state championship that weekend. In between games, though, Frank, her dad takes me to byu. It's like, I want to tour you around byu. Never been, never thought about byu. Said, I want to go introduce you to the baseball coaches. Okay. I thought Frank had an appointment with the baseball coaches. He didn't. He just showed up. And the baseball coaches are never there. They're always gone. They're recruiting, practicing, doing whatever. It just so happens as we came in, there's two. There's the head coach and the recruiter coordinator that are sitting right there. And Frank says, hey, this is Mark Oslin, you know, from Torrance, California. You really need to take a look at him. And I go, yeah, sure. Well, they call two people to ask about me. They call. The first one is an All American. He ended up baptizing me. Right. Long run. His name's Murphy, and he's a great, great guy.

John Dehlin [00:45:27] It's not Dale Murphy.

Marc Oslund [00:45:28] No, Murphy Sua. So he got drafted by the Dodgers. He was an All American at byu. He was the one that introduced me to my travel ball team in la. So we're family. We had some family connections there. And Murphy's like, you got to get this guy. Like, he's. He's a stud. They call the next person who's another one of my coaches the same thing. You need to get this guy. So a couple weeks after that, BYU ends up offering me a scholarship. And I wouldn't have taken it except for what happens that weekend. So I'm feeling this devastated sadness. Loss of football. It's Sunday morning. I have to fly back home. I just got in an argument with my mom because she was like, why do you love her family more than ours? And just typical teenage stuff, you know, I'm just feeling really bad. And I remember going to church with Faith, because that's kind of a requirement with, you know, their family. And we sat in the back on, like, you know, the folding chairs. And I remember sitting in the back and just looking around and thinking about how miserable I was inside. And, like, outwardly miserable, too, right? I just had, like, my. My demeanor was just sad and depressed. Whereas everybody, you know, this in Mormonism has that very cheerful, like, Mormon joy. Tm like, you know, like, make sure even if you're miserable inside, you're smiling. If you're smiling, like, then. Yeah.

Spiritual Experiences and Family Joins the Church

John Dehlin [00:46:48] Mm.

Marc Oslund [00:46:49] For sure, you're. You're. Yep. You're living the gospel. So I now know that. But at the time, I'm thinking everybody's happy and I'm not. And I remember sitting in the back, the sacraments getting passed. And during this, all of this, in my mind comes a couple thoughts. I think, maybe the church is, like, good and true. Maybe that's why I'm not happy. Then when I thought maybe, I remember Faith's dad telling me just the brief story of Joseph Smith when he didn't know to pray. And so I said, like, a super quick prayer. I was like, God, if this is. If this is true, let me know. And the sacrament gets passed, and I'm just kind of waiting, like, what is supposed to happen now? What do I do? And then a member of the bishop gets up, starts sharing whatever he's sharing. And for some reason, this, like, rush of emotion comes over me, and I'm just sobbing. And in my mind, the connection goes to, oh, the church is true. I think looking back, I can recontextualize it and say, I really wanted to belong. You know, I really wanted hope. I really wanted perspective. But in the moment, that wasn't even a thought. It was, oh, my gosh, this is true. Everything they've told me is true. And I'm sobbing, right? And Faith's dad, Faith turns to me. He's like, are you okay? I'm like, just, I know the church is true, you know? And then Faith's dad turns to me, and he actually could hear what her. Like, he could make out what I said. He's like, we'll talk about that after, you know. So we go back home to their house right before my flight, and Frank says, mark, what you were feeling, do you know what that was? I was like, yeah, Frank, that's the Holy Ghost. He's like, do you know what that. You know what that means? I was like, yeah, I need to go on a mission. He's like, yeah, you do, but you need to get baptized first.

John Dehlin [00:48:33] You know?

Marc Oslund [00:48:35] So there it was. There it was. And there's. I mean, this is the turning point. Everything where I am right now happens because of that moment. And at the time, I was pumped. I'm like, okay, well, I'm going to be 100% in. I've always been 100% in on whatever I do. So I'm going to be the best Mormon. I'm going to be. I'm going to give up, you know, drinking. I'm going to give up this I'm going to. I guess, you know, I'll go to byu. I went home and I. I met with Murphy, who's an amazing guy, and he was just asking me, like, tell me what you felt. I told him my experience. His son gave me a copy of the Book of Mormon because we were friends. And so I had that. And he's like, okay, we'll set up the meetings with the missionaries. And so my first missionary lesson was we had two sister missionaries. I still remember them. They're amazing people. I'm in contact with two of them, which I love, and I still have fond feelings towards them. And I remember driving up this big hill to this person's house I'd never been to. And the missionaries were riding bikes, right? The sister missionaries, which is so sad. I'm like, why does it. What are sister missionaries? Why do you have bikes, man? Like, and it's up this huge hill and they're just, like, dripping sweat and panting. And I'm just like, my heart feels so bad. And I had a truck, and so I know it's the missionaries, you know, and I like, pull over. Like, hey, you want to ride? And they're just, we're good. And I'm like, you're not. Like, get in. Like, I don't know mission rules. Like, you can't be alone with a single guy. Like, I didn't know that. I'm just like, these people are weird. They're weird, you know? And I. And so I had these doubts in my mind, like, what am I doing? Like, these are weird people. But then I had this. That whole belief that I had been taught, if you know it's true, you have to do it, you know. So, you know, I have the missionary discussion at this person's house. I tell my dad, I'm going to my friend's house.

John Dehlin [00:50:25] So they don't know. They don't know.

Marc Oslund [00:50:26] Just hanging out, you know, and it ends up being right.

John Dehlin [00:50:30] No idea.

Marc Oslund [00:50:31] No idea. So they end up come. I come, I come back. And, you know, I had a good experience. I watched like, the Restoration, the video, the old one, like the 20 minute one for which, again, there's so many, like, foreshadowing to a seminary, you know,

John Dehlin [00:50:46] Joseph Smith and the Baptist.

Marc Oslund [00:50:50] Look, look at these angry Baptists or Methodists and, wow, you're gonna go to hell. And just. It, it was so, you know. You know, it's propaganda, right?

John Dehlin [00:50:57] Where he's a great father, he's a great husband, he, you know, loves people of color, right? All that, right?

Marc Oslund [00:51:03] All of it. All of it. And so, like, loves Emma.

John Dehlin [00:51:06] Yes, loves his one wife, Emma. Exactly.

Marc Oslund [00:51:10] And he translated the place. And I don't remember what the old video showed, but I'm sure it was like him, like, you know, looking directly and just reading it word for word instead of looking in the hat. And so, like, it was just the very, very soft, happy version of it. Only one account where he. Where, you know, he sees God and it's perfect. There's no angels or blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. All the stuff that we don't get. And so I'm watching this, I'm like, well, I had this experience, so therefore this must be true. I come back, like, three hours later, right? My dad's like, where were you for three hours on, like a Tuesday night? Nowhere. You know, I go into my room and I'm like, you know, washing my face, and I'm like, I'm. I gotta be Mormon now. Like, I remember for the strength of you. He's like, be honest. So I feel guilty. And so I'm like, dad, I just had a missionary lesson. He was like, do you know I'm Mormon? I'm like, no. You know, and then he asked, are you doing this for your girlfriend? I'm like, no, of course not exactly like, no. And he asked again. And my dad has always been very trusting. And they don't. Like, I'd come home late from parties, they wouldn't ask. Like, they just. They didn't. They weren't stressed about it. They just knew that we were good kids. But, like, my dad was serious. He's like, mark, are you doing this for your girlfriend? I'm like, dad, I. I really. I think I. I believe it's true. It's like, all right, well, you know, I'm not going to stop you. And I end up finding out after talking to him more throughout, you know, the next couple months, my dad never liked church. My grandma, who is the sweetest, like, the most typical, like, from Springville, just like, so sweet, never said a bad word. Like your old turkey was the meanest thing she ever said. My dad's like, oh, yeah, your grandma would dump cold water on me in the morning to get me to go to early morning seminary in Manhattan Beach. And I'm like, what? Then my dad, when he's 18, so he knows a couple people. Like, who's. He's the Waddell. Christopher Waddell. Like, they went to. They're in the same ward. My dad knows him very well, so he's like, the preside in the presiding bishopric, you know? So my dad is like, oh, yeah, I know all these people, like, Featherstones and all. Like, he's. He's just aware of a lot of them. And so I start really, like, man, Mormonism is actually a little bit deeper than I thought. My grandma's side, you know, not blood, because my dad's adopted, but, I mean, they're pioneers from England, right? And so I have that lineage, even if it's not blood. And. Yeah. So my dad decides to sit in on my second missionary lesson, and he starts crying. And my. My current. My wife right now, Rachel, she was at the missionary lessons because she was my friend, and that's who I started sitting with when Faith was gone, right? So when I'm at church, I have to sit with somebody. I knew Rachel. So I sat with Rachel and her family. I love Rachel's parents. I love Rachel's family. I wanted to be, you know, associated with them. So Rachel came over, and a couple other friends came over, and my dad is just like. He starts sobbing. He's like, I know it's true. I'm just not living it, you know?

John Dehlin [00:54:08] Really?

Marc Oslund [00:54:09] That's what he says. Yeah. Isn't that crazy? So I'm like, what's going on? And now I'm thinking, like, forever families.

John Dehlin [00:54:16] This is it.

Marc Oslund [00:54:17] This is happening, you know? I know. I know. And then I. My mom, who's never been Mormon, never was Mormon. The only thing my dad ever told her, my mom smoked before they got married. My dad's like, you know, you don't have to be Mormon, but I'm not gonna marry you if you smoke. My mom quit. But, like, you know, my mom and dad both drank. My mom. And there's just, again, no religion, really, in our family. And so I remember seeing my mom being cordial and kind when the missionaries came over, but also being like, I'm going in the back room. I don't want to be associated with this. So we get done, and me and my dad are kind of debriefing. He's like, you got to tell your mom. So a couple days later, I work up the courage to tell my mom. I don't know why I had this sense. Maybe it was just her look that she kind of gave. Like, I don't like this. And I told her, and she starts crying. She's like, I just. I don't want to lose you. I think she. I think she was thinking, like, what's that movie, the Waco, right? Where the mom of one of the kids who's there is calling and is like, please, like, come on, just come back home. I think my mom was thinking, oh, crap, like, he's joining a cult. And my mom was being very, like, trying to be supportive, but also, like, I really don't want this to happen. So she starts crying. I got mad. I'm like, mom, like, I'm not joining a gang. Like, my friends are like, I have Bloods and Crips for friends. Like, I could be doing this. I'm joining the Mormon religion. And she's still crying. She's like, I'm just gonna lose you. And. And I chalked it up to. On the oldest. She sees the. What's coming next. She sees going off to college, not in California. She sees getting going on a mission. She sees getting married in the temple. And she was right. But I was not very sympathetic to her, of course.

John Dehlin [00:56:04] Because you're 17 or 18.

Marc Oslund [00:56:05] Exactly. And it's true.

John Dehlin [00:56:07] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:56:07] And I'm like, well, whatever opposition. And I remember being told, whosoever loveth father and mother more than me is not fit for my kingdom. And so right off the bat, I feel like I'm being. I'll use the word indoctrinate. I don't know what I was feeling then, but these are being planted in my mind. Nope. The church. Over everything. And, man, I remember getting. Having a discussion with my dad. Well, this is. So I get baptized. It was a good experience. Right. I mean, it felt positive. But I think the good experience was.

John Dehlin [00:56:45] Did your dad baptize you?

Marc Oslund [00:56:46] No. So my dad. My dad was active. He was still drinking.

John Dehlin [00:56:50] Sometimes they use that as an opportunity to reactivate a member. Because if he was just a priest, he wouldn't have even had to be an elder.

Marc Oslund [00:56:57] Yep.

John Dehlin [00:56:57] He could have technically baptized.

Marc Oslund [00:56:59] Exactly.

John Dehlin [00:56:59] But that didn't happen.

Marc Oslund [00:57:00] No. But they did allow him. And this is what's so interesting. I don't. I don't know how this worked, but they did allow him to be a part of my ironic priesthood ordination. Just to be in the circle.

John Dehlin [00:57:08] Right.

Marc Oslund [00:57:09] Which is really cool. And so I was.

John Dehlin [00:57:10] So he was an elder at some point.

Marc Oslund [00:57:12] Yeah. I think he was just a priest.

John Dehlin [00:57:13] Okay.

Marc Oslund [00:57:14] Which is which? I don't remember. Like, can you be a priest? And. And maybe.

John Dehlin [00:57:18] I don't know.

Marc Oslund [00:57:18] Yeah. Yeah. I was a seminary teacher like, a year and a half ago. How do I forget? But, yeah, you could be a priest, I think, and ordain some anyway. But, like, my dad was there, and that was special for me. But Faith's dad Gave me, you know, the gift of the Holy Ghost. And Murphy, who was my baseball coach, and he was the one who baptized me, and my dad was there, and my grandma, this frail, sweet, tiny woman from Springville. I remember the day that I got baptized, my tiny grandma, who came up to, like, my waist, gave me this hug. And while it felt like nothing substantive because she's so frail, I could hear her just, like, squeezing me as hard as she could. So happy that somebody in her lineage is going to now be Mormon.

John Dehlin [00:58:03] Wow.

Marc Oslund [00:58:03] Yep. And so she was like. I found out she was like, Stake Relief Society president and loved in the ward. And so my.

John Dehlin [00:58:10] Why'd she go inactive?

Marc Oslund [00:58:12] She. She was going. I just didn't know. Oh, really?

John Dehlin [00:58:14] She kept that from you? That's so weird.

Marc Oslund [00:58:16] I think it was my dad. I think my dad said, don't force it on them.

John Dehlin [00:58:19] Huh.

Marc Oslund [00:58:19] I think. I don't know.

John Dehlin [00:58:20] Your dad had never lost his faith or lost his testimony. He just became a Jack Mormon.

Marc Oslund [00:58:24] Yeah, basically. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:58:25] By Mormon standards.

Marc Oslund [00:58:26] Correct. So he felt bad because, like, he was 18. And then, you know how it happens. Are you going on a mission? Are you going on a mission? Are you going on a mission? And my dad's just like, I don't, like, want to do this. So he goes off to Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo and is like, I'm done. I'm not doing Mormon. I'm. I'm free. I don't need your pressure. I think he felt a lot of.

John Dehlin [00:58:43] Not a bad school, by the way.

Marc Oslund [00:58:44] It's a great school.

John Dehlin [00:58:45] Is that where Weird Al went?

Marc Oslund [00:58:46] I don't know. Yeah, my. My dad. I love San Luis Obispo. Like, I would gone there if I guess Aussie. I think Ozzie Smith went to. Maybe I'm making that up. But anyway, so that would have been a baseball school, but I had. I had bigger sites. And so, yeah, my grandma was just proud, right? So proud. So happy. Just beaming. There's pictures of me in the small jumpsuit because they didn't have one that fit me, and I had this giant wedgie, and it was miserable, you know, and. Wow. Yeah. Super random. And like, a couple. Just a couple friends were there. So Rachel, who's my wife, she was there, and I had Faith. Faith was there. They came down.

John Dehlin [00:59:21] Right.

Marc Oslund [00:59:21] And so Faith's dad was there. Exactly. And like. And then ward members, you know, turns

John Dehlin [00:59:27] out I was golden convert, man.

Marc Oslund [00:59:28] Oh, I was. I was the golden one. I think I might have been one of the only mission, like, baptisms for These missionaries who were ending their mission. And I love the missionaries, like one of them from South Africa, and I just loved her, and she's amazing. And I remember. I remember getting taught about tithing. And, you know, they did little skittles, because somehow they found out I like Skittles. And. And so they gave me 10. And, like, if you give us one bag. You know what I mean? And then they dumped the whole bag out, and I'm just like, this is amazing. And I didn't catch. And I would never blame them because I, as a missionary myself, I now know, like, oh, okay, I know you don't know much of anything, so whatever they're perpetuating or sharing is either been taught to them or forced on them by mission presence or what have you. But the phrase families can be together, not families are. I didn't even catch how insidious that phrase was.

John Dehlin [01:00:21] I was gonna say I was gonna use that word.

Marc Oslund [01:00:22] It's insidious can be if there's so much conditional. And I'm. I'm not even picking up on how indoctrinated like that is, you know? Do you get what I'm saying?

John Dehlin [01:00:33] I mean, it's such a. It's so fraught because the teaching is. Is the hook. It's like, oh, families can be together forever, and what's not to eternal families? And it just pulls on your heartstrings. And we did when I was. You know, I'm older than you. For me, it was. It was a film called the Families Are Forever. And it's the same thing. A kid dies, and then the parents are worried, will they ever see their kid again? Then the missionaries come, and they're like, oh, I'll see my kid again. And so, like, what's not to love about that, right?

Marc Oslund [01:01:02] Yep. Yep.

John Dehlin [01:01:03] But then you're. The insidious part is that the church is creating the scarcity. Yep. You know, because Christians are like, of course we'll all be in heaven together. Yes. But the church is like, oh, you can be together forever if you pass your tithing. Give us your life. And that's. That's the insidious hook.

Marc Oslund [01:01:21] And While simultaneously bashing Catholics for indulgences and whatnot. And I'm like, It's not. Like, I'm not believing it. Right. Because I'm only hearing the good side. And. And, like, looking back, I. I'm now thinking about my dad, and I. What an. Like, I wouldn't be as. Yeah, sure. Like, whatever you need to do. As my dad was with my kid because he's going to grow up in Utah. And, you know, when everybody starts turning eight, hey, my friend's getting baptized. I don't feel like I could just say, yeah, if you want to. I feel like I owe it to him to explain, you know what, if you make this choice, I can't stop you, and I don't want to stop you. But let me tell you this. This, this, this, this. And so that never happened. And part of it, the problem is

John Dehlin [01:02:00] your dad still believed it.

Marc Oslund [01:02:02] Exactly. Exactly. And I don't think he knew a ton of it either.

John Dehlin [01:02:04] Like, I think he knew basic stuff, but I didn't. How would he have?

Marc Oslund [01:02:08] Yeah, exactly. And so, like, look, I still think the ideals, whether or not I believe them, that's. That's irrelevant. But the ideals of Mormonism, they're still compelling intellectually. The idea is that you're known by a divine being, that you're loved by a divine being, that everybody matters, we're all siblings. The idea that we can be families forever, like, those are, Are. Are compelling ideas. And so that's what I, I was believing. I. The Joseph Smith thing just kind of came along second. Right. Or even the idea of prophets, the idea that, that God still speaks and that he still loves us, that's a compelling idea. The nuances that start coming, the fine print, the culture, that stuff was never explained. And I don't blame the missionaries.

John Dehlin [01:02:55] No, they didn't know.

Marc Oslund [01:02:56] Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:02:57] Yeah, they don't know.

Marc Oslund [01:02:58] How would they know? No, they're just like you. Exactly. I mean, back then, 21 years old, right? Yeah, yeah, they don't know anything. And so, but, But I, I'm. I didn't realize the fine print for years, dude. I'm teaching seminary before I start seeing the fine print.

John Dehlin [01:03:12] Of course. Can't wait for that.

Marc Oslund [01:03:13] Oh, man, it's no hurry.

John Dehlin [01:03:15] Yeah. This is great. This is important.

Marc Oslund [01:03:17] Yeah, well, and it's. It's fundamental. And I just. Sometimes I wish that things would be different and, like, you know, this wouldn't happen. But, man, I met so many good. It's just, it's tension.

John Dehlin [01:03:26] So, I mean, I just. This is just like a public service announcement, like, just from talking shop and Mormon stories for a second. Every once in a while, the church will come out with a promotional video where they'll say, some Harvard person or some, you know, chemist becomes Mormon. And I'm just like, how in the world would someone in 2020, educated, bright, thoughtful, successful, join this church when, like, the members who love it and have Been a part of it for their whole lives are like leaving in droves. And this is answering that question.

Marc Oslund [01:04:00] Yeah, exactly. Because we're not taught the nuances. We're taught the things that I still think are compelling and the things when I was a missionary that I thought was compelling. And again, I don't believe it now, but still, intellectually, I can tell somebody, you know what I see the value.

John Dehlin [01:04:17] Yeah, of course.

Marc Oslund [01:04:18] Even if I don't believe it, there is value, right?

John Dehlin [01:04:20] There is value, tons of value.

Marc Oslund [01:04:22] Part of me just like, no, there's not. You know, like, there's no value. But like, I. I'm learning, like, now that hurt from some of the trauma that we'll talk about. Now that that's subsiding, I can see it more clearly. Like, there is value to it. But I am at the point now where I think, in general, I think Mormonism is net negative.

John Dehlin [01:04:38] Well, let's not. Let's not get ahead of ourselves.

Marc Oslund [01:04:40] Yeah, you're nice, you know.

John Dehlin [01:04:42] No, no, no. Just because we, you know, there's still a lot of story to get to, for sure, but. But I mean, we could talk about that at the end, but I mean, this is. This is important. So, you know, you're the golden convert and there was a lot of value for you, for sure.

Marc Oslund [01:04:57] And look, and it's during Prop 8, too. This is what you need to know. So I remember before I got baptized, like planning meetings in Elders Quorum. Look, I'm in. I'm in LA and we're talking about Prop 8. And at the time, I assumed I knew gay people, but we didn't talk about gay people. We would use, you know, the slurs for gay people just because that's how idiots like us talked. And I didn't know anyone's in my direct friend group that was. That was gay or queer, what have you. And so I didn't feel super passionately. I'm 17, 16, 17 years old. What do I know about politics or anything? But I do remember planning meetings in the Redondo 2nd Ward about how we're going to knock doors and canvas neighborhoods, about Prop 8, about how we're going to stand on corners and how we're going to, you know, I don't remember if it's yes or no, but, like, we're going to be up there. Nope. We do not want gay people to get married. And while I was not in any way an ally or knew enough about politics to even know what was happening, I remember thinking, this feels weird. It felt strange to me, because I believe that we, in church, we just talk about God. Why, why were we talking about politics and canvassing and protesting? Like, the idea of protesting anything for what? And so I was, I, I wasn't aware enough to be able to be like, oh, this is wrong. Only in looking back do I think, holy crap, like, this is happening. Like, my mother in law, who I adore, was on corners protesting not because she doesn't like queer people, because she does, but because she felt like she had to. And so, like, man, like, looking back, holy crap, I'm in the heart of Prop 8 in California when I get baptized. Like, I join the church, when people are starting to say, peace out, I'm done. I'm saying, this is great, but I don't, I just don't know the fine print. None of it historical, doctrinal, you know, social, political, none of those fine print. I didn't know any of it. I was just so joyful.

Deepening Conversion and LDS Teachings on Sexuality

John Dehlin [01:06:52] So I'm guessing that when I talk about informed consent, that probably rings a bell because even though you loved it and you were enjoying it and you chose it, you. How much did you know you were. What did you. How much did you know you were getting into?

Marc Oslund [01:07:05] Nothing, Right? Like, I was like, oh, I'll go, I'll go to BYU and I'll go on a mission. I'll get married in the temple. That's what I thought. But all the other.

John Dehlin [01:07:11] Give your life to it.

Marc Oslund [01:07:12] Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah. And I'm like, well, what's 10%? Like, I, I wasn't even thinking about tithing. But that stupid lesson, man, that lesson stuck. I'm like, the Skittles. I want more blessings. Like, man, like, you know what I mean? Like, none of this is becoming like. And so, like, looking back, I wish I could look at myself and, and, and give myself the love that I needed. Because that's what I was craving. I was craving community. I was craving purpose. I was craving healing from feeling totally unwelcomed and unloved. And I just desperately felt like I needed a true belonging, not one where we're partying and doing stupid stuff. And I felt like now looking back, I'm like, that's what it was. It was my subconscious or even my conscious saying, you need a place where you can belong, a healthy, good place. And I didn't realize that it wasn't healthy, right? Because I didn't see it or it

John Dehlin [01:08:02] was healthy until it wasn't. I mean, I mean, we can have that debate.

Marc Oslund [01:08:06] No, I think you're right.

John Dehlin [01:08:08] I, I still think my upbringing was healthy. It wasn't perfectly healthy. There were, it was healthy and unhealthy. But you look at how many amazing humans and families come out of Mormonism. They're doing things right.

Marc Oslund [01:08:23] For sure.

John Dehlin [01:08:23] You know, for sure.

Marc Oslund [01:08:24] There's a lot of good. Yeah. And, and I'm. That's where I'm still.

John Dehlin [01:08:28] We'll get there. We'll get there.

Marc Oslund [01:08:29] Yeah. Don't, don't let me forget because this is something I'm currently.

John Dehlin [01:08:31] We'll come back to it. We'll come back to it.

Marc Oslund [01:08:33] So yeah, so I get back baptized and I'm pumped. And like I told you, just a couple of my friends were there. That's on a Saturday, confirmed on a Sunday, go to school on Monday. And I remember being late to like my government and civics class or whatever in the top floor of our third story building outdoors and, and Ms. Aukerman who is just super sweet lady, you know, from Indiana and always said Washington instead of Washington. And we had just random busy work that we were doing because she didn't want to be there. It's Monday and I didn't want to be there. Nobody wanted to be there. And it's dead silent and we're doing busy work. And Ms. Occamon goes, Mark, I'm like, yes, Ms. Ackman, are you Mormon now? And everybody, everybody's like in front of the whole class. Whole class, what? Remember we don't talk about religion. Nobody's religious that I know. I'm the quarterback. People are, people are aware of me. And so everybody perks up. They're like. And I'm like, yeah, just like, why? And I'm like, what? Like right off the bat I'm already having to defend all of this. And I don't, I truly don't know how people found out. My next class, the teacher found out there was people on campus that I had never, I never spoken to, that when I walked by they were like, like whispering. I'm like, how does this whole 2000 person campus know that I joined the Mormon Church?

John Dehlin [01:09:51] How?

Marc Oslund [01:09:52] I. I still don't know. I think maybe somebody who was there told somebody. And then you know how teenagers are. And even before, you know, we had. It's AOL instant Messenger, you know, so I'm sure that's, you know, where it was happening. But it was so surreal. I go to my football practice sixth period and my coach is like, are you Mormon? I'm like, yeah, coach. She's like, what? That's a cult, man. I'm like, did he say that? Oh, yeah, because he's so. He's a Christian dude. And like, we weren't supposed to pray, you know, because separation church and state, especially in California. But before every football game, he was the one who prayed for us. So, like. And he, like, loved Clay Aiken. And like, you know, like, that was. That was his thing. And so he's like, what do you believe? And the missionaries, because I think they knew that I was influential, they're like, hey, carry these around with you as articles of faith. Pass along cards.

John Dehlin [01:10:37] Oh, my goodness.

Marc Oslund [01:10:38] So I gave a pass along card to my coach, and he reads through it and it says, like, we, the articles of faith are first, blah, blah, blah. And he's like, what does this mean? What does it mean? Articles of faith are first. And I'm like, no, no, no. The articles of faith are, comma, first. Faith in the Lord, blah, blah, blah. He's like, okay. I was gonna say, you don't put faith in Lord first. I'm like, why am I having this discussion?

John Dehlin [01:10:56] You know?

Marc Oslund [01:10:57] Like, I'm not ready for this. I don't. John, I truly knew nothing. Yeah, I remember reading the first part of the Book of Mormon and just feeling like it was torture. Like Nephi. I didn't know how to say it. It was Nephi and Lehi. Like, I. I knew nothing. And that's what I mean in foreign consent. Like, I didn't read it. Like, they asked, like, yeah, I have a testimony of it. Why? Because I had that one moment. And if that was true, then everything else is true. And so, man, I just. And it was. I felt. And I totally. I bore my testimony. I was passionate about it. Like, that moment when I felt that sense of community and that sense of, like, love and acceptance. I truly believed at the time that that was God speaking directly to me. And I felt like it was powerful. And I remember later reading about Paul turning or Saul turning to Paul and being like, that's me. I was the sinner, right? I was the one that thought Mormonism was a cult and laugh, laughed at south park and drank and smoked and did all this bad. And now I'm a witness, you know? And so, yeah, and it just. It just kept going. And. And from that point, I was branded as a Mormon. And for the first time since my seventh grade year, I remember sitting with my friends outside our little lunch table, my football teammates who were playing and I wasn't. And I remember sitting there and them laughing at me and Feeling like I was alone for the first time since seventh grade. And so, man, a hard moment. And what did I do? Well, what I was taught to do was you turn to the Lord, you pray, you read, you go deeper and deeper and deeper in. And so I remember talking to my center. So I'm a quarterback at the center. We obviously had a close relationship, and he was a Christian dude, and we talked quite a bit, and I asked him, hey, will you read the Book of Mormon? He's like, yeah, I'll read it. I'm like, hey, but you have to have an open heart. And he's like, okay. A couple weeks later, he came back. He's like, I read it. I'm like. And like. I'm like, that's true. You know? He's like, nothing. I'm like, you didn't do it, right? And so I went through the whole Moronius promise. Like, did you have a sincere heart and real intent? You know, the same. I was like, did you actually want to join? He's like, yeah, I would have. I'm like, I don't believe you. You know, and so anyway, he's. He's now. He's now a pastor somewhere, and I think he's in, like, South America. So, anyway, yeah, what a crazy experience. And I. And, like, I'm feeling super isolated because my dad won't go to church because he doesn't want to alienate my mom. I'm the only Mormon. I. My grandma's in a different ward, and she's old, and she's not going. Yeah, she's not going. Just because she's old. The sacrament. She'd get the sacrament, whatever. And so on Sundays, I'd feel super alone. I'd sit with Rachel, who's my wife. I'd sit with her family. I'd go do all the things alone. I'd be. I was the priest quorum, first advisor or whatever. And then I go home, and I'd go to my sinning family, who's drinking and watching TV on the Sabbath, you

John Dehlin [01:13:50] know, and you start to look down

Marc Oslund [01:13:51] on them 100% immediate judgment, these wonderful

John Dehlin [01:13:55] parents that have been so good to you. I'm not trying to rub it.

Marc Oslund [01:13:57] No, no, no. Rub it in, please. Because. Because it emphasizes what my mom was feeling that I couldn't grasp at the time, where she's like, why are you like, mark, we've always been so good to you. Like, how could you ever think about us this way? And again, what's the phrase? Like, if you love Father and mother more than me. You're not fit for my kingdom. So I'm like, God comes first. And because I had no one to teach me, because my dad wasn't teaching me, other people weren't teaching me. Where did I go? I went to prophets. So I read ensign after ensign after ensign after. Like I read and read for. I'm talking about hours. And I learned the gospel. The gospel from prophets, from the ensign.

John Dehlin [01:14:41] Were these paper ensigns?

Marc Oslund [01:14:42] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:14:43] Where'd you get em?

Marc Oslund [01:14:43] I don't even remember. Missionaries, friends, others, like in the church, people who would give them to me. And I just, I was hungry for them. And I remember searching on my computer more and more and more. Right. And I'm just, I was just starving for it because I felt like, oh crap, I feel this thing. My family's not living this thing. I need support. I need understanding. People ask me questions I can't answer. So I, I just like became, I would never say like a scholar, but certainly someone who just wanted to learn everything possible.

John Dehlin [01:15:13] And I mean, you didn't get seminary.

Marc Oslund [01:15:15] No.

John Dehlin [01:15:16] And so you, you were basically using the ensign to give you the education. You didn't get in seminary, Correct?

Marc Oslund [01:15:21] Yeah. So Rachel. Yeah, Rachel invited me to go to seminary. And I was like, so I had one semester left of high school.

John Dehlin [01:15:26] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:15:27] This is how she explained it. She's like, well, you wake up at 5:30 and you sit in and talk about church for an hour. I'm like, no thanks. You know.

John Dehlin [01:15:35] Exactly. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:15:36] Sounds, sounds absolutely miserable. And, and so obviously I didn't want to do that being a senior. I'm like, dude, I got, I'm at least going to try to sleep in, you know, So I never did that. The enzyme was my understanding. And of all things I could have read, like, I think the enzyme might have been the worst. Like because it's just so correlated. It's so, and especially the older enzyme. Now we're starting to see like how to deal with a loved one.

John Dehlin [01:15:58] Oh, that's nice.

Marc Oslund [01:15:59] You know, could you imagine, like, I wonder what I would have felt in 2008.

John Dehlin [01:16:03] Right.

Marc Oslund [01:16:04] If that was the article. And I'm thinking about my mom.

John Dehlin [01:16:07] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:16:07] What would have happened in my relationship? Because what did happen was she continued to be hurt, I continued to be frustrated. We grew very, very strained. And my mom, I think I get my hard headedness from her. And so I'm not budging. I know this is true. Right. And she's not budging. And I just like, I can't trust you then mom like that was basically the feeling. And we grew much more separate then. And looking back, I'm like the, it makes me so sad because I was being loyal to this religion and then the, you know, foreshadowing who just continue to stab me in the back after I gave everything to them. It started with giving up my family. Then the next step I gave up was baseball. Where. Look, BYU is a great school. Like it is. I don't think it's as good as we think it is. Like the Harvard of the West. It's not, you know, it's not Stanford, it's.

John Dehlin [01:16:59] It's not.

Marc Oslund [01:17:00] But it's a good school. And it's, it's certainly, I think, better than Long Beach State or Cal State Fullerton, academically. Academically, baseball wise, it wasn't. Yeah, it's a cold weather school. Look, I'm from L. A. Man. I don't know how to exist in the winter still. I've lived here for, since 2009. I still don't know how to live in the winter. And I would have loved to have played. And like, I remember I signed my, my letter of intent a couple weeks later. I think it was like February before baseball started.

John Dehlin [01:17:24] And so your knee didn't take you out of basement?

Marc Oslund [01:17:26] No, I rehabbed it and it was fine. And I was never super fast and so it didn't affect me a ton. I rehabbed it and I was all good. Thanks for remembering. I totally forgot that even happened. But yeah, so I signed the letter

John Dehlin [01:17:40] of intent and you were a first baseman.

Marc Oslund [01:17:41] First baseman, yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. And like I was, I, you know, hopefully I'd hit ball pretty far so I wouldn't have to run, you know, super fast either, but decent hitter I was, Yeah, I hit like 420 in high school. Like, yeah, I mean I, I led the league in home runs like two or three years. So like. Yeah, that's why I was surprised. I'm like, wait, I'm not hitting at byu. What the heck, you know. So anyway, I, I had gotten, you know, offers for different, different schools. I signed with byu. I had a great year. I was the player of the year in our area. I mean, and we were, we were a very good team. Again, we lost. So Nolan Arenado, who's like a stud third baseman, he plays for the St. Louis Cardinals making hundreds of millions of dollars. We lost to his team. I wasn't pitching. Let me pitch every, all four years. It was this one guy who, who is a good guy, but he just lost every Year. And I'm like, why? Literally, I've never lost. But anyway, stupid. It's like high school. Why am I. Why do I care? I'm still passionate.

John Dehlin [01:18:37] Like,

Marc Oslund [01:18:41] no, I never want to be. Like, I remember watching Friday Night Lights, like, the movie and thinking, I'm never going to be like, Tim McGraw's character, who's just like, all you got is memories and babies, man. And now I'm looking back, I'm like, dang it. Like, no, like, there's more to my life.

John Dehlin [01:18:54] Memories. Exactly.

Marc Oslund [01:18:56] And so anyway, like, it was a great year, and I end up going to, like, a showcase tournament. And I dominated this team. Like, I had 10 strikeouts in, man, four innings. Like, I. I mean, everybody but two. I struck out. And all of the players were going to PAC 12 schools. Arizona, Arizona State, USC. And right there on the spot, coaches from Irvine and Fullerton, who, again, top 25 programs, walked up to my dad and said, we're gonna give him a scholarship right now if he'll sign with us. My dad says, sorry, he. He already signed with byu. And he told me this after I didn't know. Cause I was pitching and my dad said that they turned left byu. And I'm like, now looking back, I'm like, man, again, I love. I love my teammates, I love my coach, I love my experience. But it's true, like, BYU is not a nationally recognized. We're starting to become better. Our current coach, I love. Super proud of what he's doing. And BYU baseball is the only BYU sport that I'm, like, proud of. You know, I'm like, BYU baseball, BYU football. I'm like, I love that you lost to Coastal Carolina and BYU basketball, like ucla. Sorry, you know, like. But BYU baseball, defend. Because I'm super proud of them and all of my experiences. But that was hard for me to realize. Wow, I was going to be the stud in LA to being like, well, I guess I'll just be the best player in Utah and be the best player. We were in the Mountain West Conference at the time, and so I guess I would do that. I ended up getting drafted that year by the Kansas City Royals. So I had Kansas City Royals, Miami Marlins, Cincinnati Reds. I had their scouts come, come to my home, say, hey, we want to draft you. And I was. I mean, that's. That's. That's the dream, right? And I remember telling them, because what do you do as a good Mormon person? You go on a mission. I said, every time they came by, I said, I'm going to byu. And I'm going to go on my mission. They're like, okay. And so it was. I felt like I was, you know, defending the truth. This is what we'll do. I'm standing for truth and righteousness. And again, what would have happened? So we're going to the Senior All Star Game. I'm the starting pitcher. I'm like, playing, like, Madden on Xbox with my friend before. And I get a call from one of my teammates who's also in the game, like, hey, what's up? He's like, dude, you just got drafted. I'm like, shut up, man. No, I didn't. I hung up the phone and my friend was like, hey, what was that? He's like, oh. He said, I got drafted. He's like, oh, yeah, good one. And the next call is from the Kansas City Royal scout that had been my home. He's like, hey, Mark, I just want to let you know we drafted you in the 42nd round. I know that you said you were going to go on a mission. We would have drafted you way earlier, but we thought, hey, if there's any chance this guy might sign with somebody, we want to make sure we have his rights. It's like, we'll be having papers coming out. And I'm like, I just got drafted. Like, my dream, I was going to play pro ball, man. And they sent over the papers, and the contrast of the two different papers you had to choose to sign. The first one was a beautiful color document with the Kansas City Royals logo declaring, giving your rights to the Kansas City Royals. You're going to sign your contract. Mine would have been, like 1600 bucks. Like, it would have sucked. You know, I would have been living in Arizona and making no money. And then there's another paper is like, yellow, just kind of like photocopied crap. Like, hey, I'm not going to sign, but the Royals have my rights for a year. Nobody else can draft me. And I remember this moment of holding them both in my hands, literally my dream of playing a professional sport in my hands, putting the paper down, picking up the yellow one, and thinking, God will make it worth it in the end.

John Dehlin [01:22:35] Okay, tell me what the two papers were again.

Marc Oslund [01:22:36] One was to. One was to say, I'm gonna. I'm gonna play pro ball.

John Dehlin [01:22:39] Pro ball.

Marc Oslund [01:22:40] The other one was, I'm not gonna play pro ball. Thanks for drafting me, but I'm declining.

John Dehlin [01:22:44] Declining.

Marc Oslund [01:22:45] Yep, yep. Okay. And I signed the declining one because I was going on a mission. And of course, I was going to go to BYU because The Sabbath, you know. And again, my thought was, I'm going. God will make this worth it for me in the end. And so I was kind of holding on hope for that.

John Dehlin [01:23:07] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:23:07] Hard moment for me. And finished up the year, go on to BYU.

John Dehlin [01:23:11] And it was religion, that. It was religion 100%. Oh, wow.

Marc Oslund [01:23:14] If it wasn't. If it wasn't for that moment in Highland, if it wasn't for me joining the church, I would have. First off, I would have been drafted way higher. They don't even have 40. Second round anymore. They only have 40. I'm confident I would have been in the top 20 based on what they're telling me. And I would have made a lot more money, probably would have had a signing bonus, et cetera, et cetera. And I would have done it, like, if. Like, I really think I would have.

John Dehlin [01:23:36] I remember that. I remember being in that mindset. Yeah, I had that mindset.

Marc Oslund [01:23:40] It's. It's heartbreaking. I remember thinking like, there. You know, there's BYU players. You have Steve Young who didn't go on a mission, and then you have other BYU players. And the BYU players that did go on missions had LDS living articles written about them and how they're good examples. And I thought, well, this is it. Remember the Ensign? I'm reading these. Ensign or wherever else I read it. And I'm seeing these people are idolized, so therefore, this is the right thing. There's just so much of this subtle culture stuff that I'm not. I didn't realize I was getting myself into or that it was even happening to me while it was happening.

John Dehlin [01:24:11] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:24:11] You know?

John Dehlin [01:24:12] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:24:12] So. Yeah. I mean, and then I come up to byu, and truthfully, I love byu.

John Dehlin [01:24:17] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:24:17] So I. It's amazing. School and Provo. Provo in the spring and Provo in the fall on campus. I think it's beautiful. It's pristine. My dad said it's always like Disneyland. Like, there's no trash anywhere, and it's super beautiful. And look, I came up here and, like, I had my past of being a Mormon or being non Mormon, and, you know, I did my. My sexual escapades and I had my non. Word of wisdom, living days. And. And I came up to BYU thinking, like, okay, I'm gonna be a good person. And then I see, like, just so many beautiful people. I'm like, oh, crap. Like, how do I. How do I do this? But I enrolled in, like, three religion classes my first year. Two of them with Randy Bot. Right. And.

John Dehlin [01:24:55] Yeah. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:24:57] And so I Immediately begin. I don't know where this message came from exactly. I think it's just in the air. But this message of shame for or disgust or just negativity towards people who are breaking the law of chastity, people who have broken the law of chastity, people who have done things like drink or whatever else. I can't pinpoint a moment, but I internalized that message, that because I had done that in my past, even if I was baptized, I was a terrible person. And I said, I will never let anyone, anyone know that I did these things. And I thought, how can I justify this? Like, how am I able to. If a girl were to ask me, some sweet girl from Provo or Orem Mormon their whole life, like, tell me about your life. I'm like, I can't tell her what I've done because immediately, nope, you're cut. You're not. Nope. You. You're tainted. And so in Randy Bott's class in mission prep, I remember this. This hit me like, let's spell this out.

John Dehlin [01:26:01] So we. We have a ton of Never Mormons.

Marc Oslund [01:26:03] Oh, thank you.

John Dehlin [01:26:05] I'm surprised. I get emails every day from people that have never been Mormon, who love Mormon stories and watch every episode. What were the types of teachings that would make you feel so horrible about yourself?

Marc Oslund [01:26:17] Man, it's just like, I remember being at church stake presidency lessons, like, so much at byu, especially for young, unmarried people, is get married. But along with that, stay clean. Stay clean. Stay clean. That's the phrase, right? Clean. As if anything else is dirty, bad, wrong. And it's, like, constant. I mean, we have a chastity lesson once a month in our ward, right? Our young. Our young adult ward. And, like, we get in state conference talks, we get it in sacrament meetings, we get it in testimonies. I did this wrong and I repented, and now I'm clean.

John Dehlin [01:26:53] Stay clean means what?

Marc Oslund [01:26:54] Stay clean means no sex. No. No masturbation, no pornography, no drugs. No.

John Dehlin [01:27:00] Those things are likened unto what, like the.

Marc Oslund [01:27:03] The sin next to murder.

John Dehlin [01:27:05] You're not exaggerating.

Marc Oslund [01:27:06] Like, literally, it's that, like, it. It's like it's interpreted completely wrong, which I found out as a seminary teacher. I'm like, oh, crap, right? But I was told that is the sin next to murder because it says it.

John Dehlin [01:27:18] Premarital sex.

Marc Oslund [01:27:19] Premarital sex.

John Dehlin [01:27:19] You look of Mormon.

Marc Oslund [01:27:20] Exactly. So you have murdered sex and, like, denying the Holy Ghost, and then, like, I don't know, everything else.

John Dehlin [01:27:28] Nothing else matters.

Marc Oslund [01:27:29] Seriously. I'm like, wait, so murder and sex. Like how? Like, so you can imagine the internalized shame that I'm getting if you take that seriously. Absolutely. Which I did. Because there's other people that are like, meh.

John Dehlin [01:27:42] But you were highly conscientious.

Marc Oslund [01:27:43] 100%. And the reason why, John, is because I come up to BYU thinking I've never been around real Mormon. Like, I was around my ward. And in California, they do have a general sense, a little bit more ease. I think in general, they're happier when people come because they're like, thank you. You could have done anything.

John Dehlin [01:27:58] It's called the mission field.

Marc Oslund [01:27:59] Exactly. And so I've definitely felt more supported there. Whereas. And by the way, do you remember I told you, like, all the, the community members that, like, they knew we were drinking and whatnot?

John Dehlin [01:28:09] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:28:09] As soon as they found out that I was Mormon, the weird looks I got, it's, it was like I had done something horrid. I could drink and do all of those bad things for Mormons and they'd be like, yeah, no problem. And as soon as I said, I'm going to church on Sunday, they're like, who's this weird guy? And so, yes, the Mormons are saying that. No, no, no, sorry. My neighbors, like, my people, like, my friends, they're like, dude, you're a freak. And I'm like, yeah, you would think it would be the opposite. You think that maybe people would be more like, hey, maybe don't drink when you're 16. Like, you know, don't get blackout drunk. It's not very good. You know?

John Dehlin [01:28:41] But being weird wasn't trying drugs or alcohol. Being weird was joining the Mormon Church. Right.

Marc Oslund [01:28:48] That's exactly it. Which is again, there's all these things that I like. I'm like, people telling me it's a cult, or even me knowing or thinking it's a call or Quakers or whatever. I'm like, you don't know. You've never been. Wait for the temple. But anyway, like, I, I, I felt that. And, and I came to BYU thinking this is the epicenter of Mormonism.

John Dehlin [01:29:08] It's Oz.

Marc Oslund [01:29:08] Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:29:09] Right.

Marc Oslund [01:29:09] Yes. You're offset the wizard 100%. And so if these people. Whatever. Yes. If they believe it, if they think this way, I should think that way too, because they. This is it. So they've been Mormon their whole lives. Wow. They've been to seminary release time. Seminary. Right. They've had all of these things. And so I think whatever they're doing or saying or thinking. That's right. Well, I mean, we know that's not true. We know that so much of it is culture that has just been passed on that is so harmful. But I couldn't. I didn't have anyone to coach me through it. And I thought, I'm just going to be like everybody else and internalize all of these harmful things, like sex being the next murder, like, repentance. Like, if you. If you make a mistake, like if you. If you masturbate or if you go have sex or if you make out with somebody and you do that, after you've repented, all of your former sins come back. So now I'm thinking, crap. Like, yeah, I was baptized in 2007,

John Dehlin [01:30:02] but, like, it should have cleaned you,

Marc Oslund [01:30:04] but dang it, I. I made out with a girl.

John Dehlin [01:30:07] Oh, crap.

Marc Oslund [01:30:07] Like, I went with a girl somewhere else.

John Dehlin [01:30:09] Like, uh, oh, now it undoes your baptism.

Marc Oslund [01:30:14] Correct.

John Dehlin [01:30:14] It's like this waterfall of shame.

Marc Oslund [01:30:16] Exactly. It's just shame on, shame on, shame on shame. And I didn't have a word for it other than that's what God wanted. That's the Holy Ghost. That's the spirit leaving you. And I'm like, oh, crap. Like, how do I get it back? Well, you go to sacrament meeting and you repent with a sincere heart. I'm like, please, God, take away this desire from me. Take away. I don't want to be attracted to girls because I knew if I was attracted that I want to kiss him. If I want to kiss him, I would do more.

John Dehlin [01:30:39] And he'd already had sex. So genie's out of the bottle.

Marc Oslund [01:30:42] Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:30:43] I didn't have to deal with that until after I was married, for sure.

Marc Oslund [01:30:45] And so I'm like, oh, crap. Extra sins. Like, the sin next to murder is back. I'm a murderer. So it's like, you know, me and Judas are hanging out because I had sex and Judas, like, had Jesus killed. And so I'm like, I'm just gonna be with Judas, you know?

John Dehlin [01:30:58] Like, it's like the Book of Mormon musical with, like, Jeffrey Dahmer and Johnny Cochran and. Yep. I gotta tell you, Starbucks coffee cup. The Spooky Mormon hell dream. Yes. You're basically having a Spooky Mormon hell.

Marc Oslund [01:31:10] Yes. And so, like, we. I actually saw that in London as a seminary teacher. Oh, yeah. They didn't know that. But I'm like, yeah, this is awesome. Like, that's exactly what all of my fellow teachers are teaching people, you know? So, again, foreshadowing. But. But, yeah, man. Like, it's just there was so much internalized shame and so Randy Bott, who's. Who's a famous religion professor at the time.

John Dehlin [01:31:30] Right.

Marc Oslund [01:31:30] He's teaching Doctrine and Covenants. He's teaching mission prep, and he's. He's the one that got in trouble

John Dehlin [01:31:35] for saying some racist stuff.

Marc Oslund [01:31:37] Very racist stuff. Right.

John Dehlin [01:31:39] What did he say?

Marc Oslund [01:31:39] Tell the listeners the curse of Cain, right? That black people come from the. From Cain. That it's a curse. They're sinning. Their premortal existence. They were fence sitters in the premortal existence. And then the Washington Post gets word of it and is like, and let's

John Dehlin [01:31:52] be clear, he didn't teach anything that any of us weren't taught for decades and decades and decades. His only mistake was it becoming public news that he taught these things during Mitt Romney's campaigns for president, which then ended up embarrassing the church. So he becomes, in some ways, the fall guy for just teaching what all of us had been taught for decades.

Marc Oslund [01:32:13] Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:32:14] Am I right?

Marc Oslund [01:32:14] You're 100% right. 100% right. No, you're spot on. And truthfully, I love Randy Bot. Like.

John Dehlin [01:32:20] Oh, you knew him?

Marc Oslund [01:32:21] Yeah, yeah. Cause you were his class. Exactly. I just think that he taught the way that I wanted to teach in seminary, which Passion.

John Dehlin [01:32:28] Charismatic.

Marc Oslund [01:32:29] Yeah, charismatic, fun. He made things applicable and real and down to earth. And he had real conversations. And once I found out about that, I'm like, oh, come on. Because maybe I didn't hear it or maybe I was gone playing baseball and I missed those lessons.

John Dehlin [01:32:42] Did that thing happen while you were like.

Marc Oslund [01:32:44] It happened right around that time. And I mean, obviously he was. Obviously he was teaching that. Like, it didn't just come out of nowhere.

John Dehlin [01:32:49] Right.

Marc Oslund [01:32:50] And so, like, when he's teaching DNC, which I had for him both semesters, and DNC 84 comes around, you know, and then official declaration, whatever, one or two, like, it was brought up. I just don't think I was either there or recognized it.

John Dehlin [01:33:04] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:33:05] I'm kind of going by in this convert, like, new energy, you know?

John Dehlin [01:33:08] Right.

Marc Oslund [01:33:08] And so he. He did teach one thing that stuck with me because the. The hardest thing for me at BYU is my shame about feeling like I had this bad past. And I remember him teaching in mission prep and saying, what do you do if someone asks you while you're on your mission? Have you ever done blank, blank, blank? And his comment was, you tell them you're a new creature in Christ.

John Dehlin [01:33:32] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:33:33] And your former self is washed away.

John Dehlin [01:33:36] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:33:36] And I clung to that, like, yeah,

John Dehlin [01:33:40] I'm new though your sins be as Scarlet, they shall be white as snow.

Marc Oslund [01:33:44] Yeah, right, Exactly. And so I'm like, there it is. Okay, so how do I make sure that I always feel good about myself? I'm always repenting because, look, I would wake up in the morning and think, I'm gonna. I'm gonna be perfect today. I don't want to sin. And then I'd stub my toe on my stupid dorm bed, and I'd swear under my breath, and I'd be like, I ruined it that day. And then I'd be like, God, please forgive me for that. And then I'd be late to class. I'm like, forgive me for being late. And I'm like, well, forgive me for stopping the prayers. Like, I could never catch up.

John Dehlin [01:34:17] You're on the hamster wheel of worthiness with a little bit of scrupulosity thrown in.

Marc Oslund [01:34:21] Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:34:22] And not fun.

Marc Oslund [01:34:23] No. And nobody said that was bad. In fact, I think that was maybe even admired this idea that.

John Dehlin [01:34:29] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:34:29] That if you were. You're so diligent, you're giving your life like that. That's who you should be. People that go off and they listen to bad music with swear words. I don't know. Like, I wanted to be the model Mormon. You know what I'm saying?

John Dehlin [01:34:42] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:34:42] And so, yeah, I would repent, repent, repent. And when I was at byu, I told myself I wouldn't swear. You know, I wouldn't. I wouldn't go too far with girls. Right. We'd make out, we'd do whatever else, but I would never go, like, break the law of chastity, which is no sex, no touching, you know, over. Under the shirt. I wouldn't do any of that. And. But, man, like, I had a lot of girls I was interested in, and my former kind of past, like, came out. I think people are interested in this California. I think I was charismatic way more then than I was now than I am now. And baseball player. I did really well. I was an All American my freshman year.

John Dehlin [01:35:20] What?

Marc Oslund [01:35:20] Yeah, I mean, I. Not like, I was a freshman All American varsity. Yep, yep. Like, I. I led the team in wins. I think I was, like, 7 and 1. My only loss was to Oregon State in. At. In Corvallis. They had won the College World Series, like, two years before. I threw, like, a complete game shutout against New Mexico in the Mountain west tournament. I, like, played. Pitched three games against TCU, who's a top 10 program at the time. Like. And I. I don't. I'm not afraid. I'm, like, Dude, I was gonna go to UCLA or USC or who's New Mexico, who's unlv? Why do I care? Like, I'm not overwhelmed by you. And so I had a great season. I got offered to play summer ball, which is like, for serious baseball players. You are always playing baseball. Summer ball is what you do for college athletes to kind of get looks by pro teams. And the. One of the premier leagues at the time was called the Cape Cod League and it's out there in Cape Cod. And I got offered to play there again, turned it down so I could go on my mission. And yeah, got my mission call in April, got called to the North Carolina Raleigh Mission. I called it Rally because I didn't do very well, I guess on my state capitals and was kind of bummed. I wanted to go to either South Africa and teach the sister missionaries family who had taught me or Samoa, where Faith and her family were from. And I got North Carolina and I'm like, north Carolina, like, that sucks. You know, and it didn't. I still have super fond memories of people in that state. But yeah, so during this time I actually opened my mission call on BYUtv, not live, but it ended up becoming a feature called the Mark Oslin Story. And I read my mission call and they talked about my conversion experience and I was kind of like a darling, you know, and there was a Mormon Times article that was written about me and my conversion. And then of course, I mean, right, yeah, I'm the golden child and look like I'm also a talented baseball player. And you know, Mormonism will maximize their popular people as much as possible for good pr. And I was proud of it. I'm like, yeah, like if I'm going to be Mormon, I might as well be popular too, you know. But yeah, yeah, a mess.

Mission Preparation, Temple, and the MTC

John Dehlin [01:37:33] You were celebrated.

Marc Oslund [01:37:34] Oh yeah. And it just, that celebration, John, I think only served to confirm what was already happening. Yeah, so I'm like, I, for example, I, I remember being at University of Utah playing against some of these heathens, you know, at the U with beards. Like, how could they. And I remember we had a double header and I, I had a pocket sized copy of the Book of Mormon I got from the BYU bookstore. And in between games I'd be eating lunch and reading the Book of Mormon. And I remember one of my religion professors said like, you need, as I think is Ezra Benson who's like, read the Book of Mormon for 30 minutes every day if you do this, blah, blah, blah. And then Marion Romney who says, if you Read the Book of Mormon. I promise you that not one of your kids will ever be lost. And I'm like, well, if it works that way, maybe it works in reverse so that the kid will bring the parents back. So there's so many of these reinforced things that I was picking up that were reinforced, and I think unintentionally, but also I think I was the model. I think what I was doing was exactly what you should be doing as a convert. You've given up your old life, and you're brand new. And I was all in, man. And at the cost of losing my friends, separating myself from my family, losing college scholarships, losing, you know, top programs, baseball, professional baseball offers, I would give. At that point, I would give anything up for Mormonism. And so it was really. It was hard because it kept being affirmed, and I kept getting. And I was doing well, right? I was 7 and 1. For some reason, I forgot that I had always been good at baseball, and I had always been successful. But now Mormonism gets the credit. I'd be in on my head, on the mound, in my head, I would be saying prayers, God, please, please help me. Like, my arm would hurt, but please help my arm to hurt, just silently. And so anytime I did well, God got the credit, which is fine, except it just reinforced all of the internalized shame, you know, that I only was succeeding because I was repenting, and I had to repent because I was bad. And so that wound just got deeper and deeper, and with shame, it gets more and more silent, and shame grows in the dark. And so I told nobody. Nobody knew anything. The more I did bad things. You know, if I hooked up with girls or, you know, got angry at somebody when they cut me off on the road, I would just tug it down. Nobody knew. And I do remember talking to my bishop, like, about my past life before I was baptized, because I still felt guilty about it. And he's like, well, you were baptized. And I'm like, I know, but I'm still guilty. He's like, have you done anything else? And I begin searching and plumbing the depths every day. I'm like, what could I have possibly done? And, you know, even anything remotely close, kissing for too long or being like whatever, like, just all of it. I just felt like I always needed to get it off my chest. And again, from mission prep with Randy Bott, he's like, hey, you know, you have these. These interviews so that when you're on your mission and these thoughts come back into your mind, you say, I've met with my bishop and my stake president, and I am clean. So I'm just, like, you know, constantly trying to get these things off my chest, whether it be through prayer. And once it wouldn't work with prayer, I would go back to my bishop, my stake president, and I. I didn't. Wasn't doing anything wrong. So therefore, I shouldn't have any, like, restrictions. But I was still so afraid because I didn't want to miss out on a mission or, you know, be shamed or. Or not take the sacrament, have girls look at it and be like, oh, my gosh, like, what's gonna happen here? You know? And so all of that goes to say, I. I'm.

John Dehlin [01:41:13] We're.

Marc Oslund [01:41:14] We're in Kansas. Um, my mission call arrives at Faith's family's house in Highland, and we're flying all the way back from Kansas. It's this long, miserable day with multiple flights and trips, and we go all the way to high. To Provo, and then I have to go back to highland, wait for BYUtv cameras to get there, open up my. My mission call. And it's just this whirlwind day, and, you know, my mom and dad are on the phone, and I think, you know, looking back, my mom's probably hurting because it's like, why is he there? Why is he doing this? And I don't. I. I don't register what, like, where I got called till later that night. And then I immediately start Temple Prep class. At this point, I'm living with Faith's brother and a couple other of. Of her brother's friends in Provo, going to a family ward up in Grandview, and had Temple Prep class, and Temple Prep prepared me for nothing. You know,

John Dehlin [01:42:07] I just have to say, your parents had to have felt like they were losing you, like they had. I can't. It's hard to imagine, from what you've told me, of two parents that were more dedicated to their sons.

Marc Oslund [01:42:21] Yeah. Son, son, daughter, son.

John Dehlin [01:42:23] So three kids.

Marc Oslund [01:42:23] Yep.

John Dehlin [01:42:24] Loving. Gave everything. And from their perspective, and I guess especially. And you've already said this, but from your mom's perspective, it's like I've given everything, and they're just taking. They're taking my. My golden child. Yeah. They're taking him away, losing him for sure.

Marc Oslund [01:42:42] And it was like. Even you mentioning that, just, like, it makes me sad. What I didn't know.

John Dehlin [01:42:47] Are you getting emotional?

Marc Oslund [01:42:48] Yeah, for sure. Like, I. Like I. I feel that the tears welling up just because I didn't even know what I was doing. I Obviously we're self centered when we're young and I think that's, you know, intentional and good. But like. And my mom who still like, even if they like pushed back my mom and dad, it was never out of. They were just like, we don't want you to lose who you are. They loved my personality. They loved that I was fun and gregarious and they didn't want me to become a robot. They didn't want me to be upt about what I wore on Sundays. They didn't want me to stress out if I drank like a Snapple, you know, with tea. They just wanted me to be happy. And I was telling them this is what will make me happy. And at the time I really believed it. And they wanted to. I think they wanted to believe it for me, especially my mom. But I think they also had the wisdom of being older and saying I don't think so. And even like we'll, we'll get to it later. But like eventually I, you know, leave seminary and I am telling my mom about what I'm going through and I still had a hard time admitting that she was right because I think there's some sadness. I'm like, crap. I just like, we'll come back to that. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. So.

John Dehlin [01:44:01] So your dad, your dad didn't like reactivate and your mom didn't join.

Marc Oslund [01:44:05] No, my. Yeah, yeah, none of that. So like my. I went to the temple.

John Dehlin [01:44:10] But they supported you by letting you do it.

Marc Oslund [01:44:12] For sure. For sure. My. My dad started coming back to church after I went on my mission because we'll get there.

John Dehlin [01:44:18] Let's go follow the calendar.

Marc Oslund [01:44:19] So yeah, perfect. So my. So I go to the temple in May. I go to the Draper temple because it was the first open house. So it was the first one I'd ever actually been through. I'm like, wow, this is gorgeous. And to be honest, I think temples are really pretty. I think they're.

John Dehlin [01:44:28] Of course they are.

Marc Oslund [01:44:29] I think they're goddess.

John Dehlin [01:44:30] They're multi million dollar edifices. Exactly.

Marc Oslund [01:44:33] And like man, we just know like conference just happened. Why are there 20 freaking temples announced?

John Dehlin [01:44:39] Don't get ahead of yourself.

Marc Oslund [01:44:40] Sorry.

John Dehlin [01:44:40] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:44:41] Burley. And I'm just still mad. But anyway, like, like. And it's. And it's beautiful. And so I. I'm floored. And they don't tell you what's going on. I'm in temple prep. They don't. They talk about very abstract, like read about the Garden of Eden. Like none of this prepared me not a Word about what covenants were gonna be made. Just covenants will be made, you know, and, like, you will have blessings and promises and all of those things. Remember? I. The ideals of it sound really good. Then I show up and I, like. I go to, you know, LDS distribution. I buy, like, the temple clothes. I'm like, what is this green freaking thing? Like, what am I going to be doing with this apron? What is. I didn't even know it was called the apron at the time. I'm just. I just bought what they told me to. And I, like, knew about garments, but I'm like, look, I'm like, dude, I wear, like, a white shirt underneath and, like, boxers. Like, what's different? You know? And I remember getting there with Faith family, and I felt so loved and supported by them.

John Dehlin [01:45:32] This is.

Marc Oslund [01:45:32] None of this is a critique on them, but I remember getting there and doing, like, the washing and anointing and being like, this is getting really culty, really quick. And. And Faith's mom said, just focus on the words of the. Of the anointing. And. And to be honest, I still think they're, like, they're powerful. I don't believe them, but I still think that there's There. It's a powerful idea, but I. I'm focusing on that. And then we get into the room, and it gets really, really quick, really culty, really quick, where I'm like, okay, like, why are we separated? God will not be mocked. I'm like, like, very, very. Mormons don't show emotion, really, other than just like, hi, brother. Like, really chipper and happy in the temple, where it's like, God will not be mocked. I'm like, what on earth?

John Dehlin [01:46:15] Or you will be in my power.

Marc Oslund [01:46:17] Exactly. Exactly. And so I'm like, what is gonna happen? Like, they. They said that we're gonna hear about the Garden of Eden story. I didn't know we're gonna be watching a movie. And that movie was bad. I mean, it's bad. It's bad acting. It's bad. There's a lot of bad about it. And just like, all of a sudden, I'm, like, raising my hands and I'm doing stuff. And they're like, once. They're like, okay, now you will put on the robes of the priesthood. And I'm seeing people get dressed, and in my mind, it was like, red alert. Cult. Cult. Cult. Cult. Cult. Cult.

John Dehlin [01:46:48] Cult.

Marc Oslund [01:46:49] It freaked me out. I'm like, this is exactly what people were warning me about. Like, immediately, I'm like, oh. And I. I hated it. I hated it. I hated the whole experience. I absolutely.

John Dehlin [01:47:04] But.

Marc Oslund [01:47:04] But here's the thing. The temple is supposed to be the pinnacle of our Mormonism.

John Dehlin [01:47:08] Yeah. The most sacred thing.

Marc Oslund [01:47:10] Yes. And the closest we can get to God. And so instead of saying, honoring my own feeling that was leading me. Right. I'm saying, well, must be me. Exactly. I better figure this out, because it's not the temple, it's me. I'm the problem. So I'm just sitting there, like, I'm not even thinking about what I'm saying, man. And all of a sudden, I'm making covenants. I'm like, give my whole life. Like what?

John Dehlin [01:47:34] Like.

Marc Oslund [01:47:36] But it's like, if. Oh. And beforehand they're like, if you want to leave, leave now. I'm like, I don't even know what I'm going to do at that point. I was like, I guess it's probably

John Dehlin [01:47:42] going to be fine.

Marc Oslund [01:47:43] We're just wearing white clothes. That's cool. We're all united, you know. And then all of a sudden, I'm like, now I'm in. Where do I get out?

John Dehlin [01:47:48] Yeah. For those who don't know, we're talking about when you go to the temple for the first time right before everything starts, they give you a chance to get up and leave, but, like, you're surrounded by your loved ones and where are you going to go? And are you going to make a big dramatic scene? So that's kind of the way for them to say, well, you know, you chose to be here, but you have no idea what you're about to experience. And it's like this roller coaster ride of weirdness.

Marc Oslund [01:48:14] Yeah. And you've been mentioning a lot recently, which I totally love, about informed consent. There is no informed consent with the temple. And recently there's been books like Rosie Card, who wrote, like, House of Light, you know, and it's about being explicit about the temple with the covenants early and, like, good on her. You know, I'll talk about this. In seminary, I taught very clearly, as clearly as I could from quotes about. About the temple, because I didn't want people to be blindsided. And then David Bennar gets up and says, hey, let's make sure that we are explicit about this. So my traumatic experience there, by the

John Dehlin [01:48:45] way, that's only because we pummeled them for over a decade, you know, to where we kind of forced them to make changes.

Marc Oslund [01:48:53] Yep. And only, you know, somewhat recently, like, I mean, within the last three, four years have I found out, oh, crap, like, they changed it dramatically. From the 90s.

John Dehlin [01:49:02] Yeah. That's what I went through. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:49:05] Truly. And we'll have to talk about. I don't know how you. Like, I was freaked out.

John Dehlin [01:49:08] Same thing, same thing. I mean, you're doing things. You're making these hand motions of slitting your own throat, of literally cutting out your own heart and then disemboweling yourself. And you're. You're. You're told that's what you're doing, and you make the. These motions and you're feeling like, this is the most violent, scary thing I've ever been involved in. And immediately it's like, but it's the most righteous. It's the pinnacle of Mormon righteousness, so it must be good. So I must be exact same thing.

Marc Oslund [01:49:42] That's crazy, because for me, that makes total sense. And I just can't believe, man, people were that in. You were that in. You were that committed.

John Dehlin [01:49:51] Oh, yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:49:51] And then how insulting when people are like, oh, you just didn't want to commit. I'm like, do you know what we had to do to stay? Anyway, it's just. I get heated about that. Lazy learners and lax disciples just conference. Anyway, so I'm still like, the whole rest of the experience. And then we start, you know. You know, a prayer circle where there's, like, hand motions and, like, repeating words. I'm like, this is straight up a cult.

John Dehlin [01:50:14] Like, kind of chanting.

Marc Oslund [01:50:15] Yes, yes.

John Dehlin [01:50:16] Yeah, yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:50:17] I'm lit. Like, literally, I'm thinking, this is a cult. Like, just red alarms. I. I don't hear a single word of what's going on, because all it is is red alarm. Like, danger, danger, danger. Get out. Get out, get out. And by the time we get to the Celestial Room, which, truthfully, I still. I would never go back there, I still think there could be repurposed uses for that, of meditative places. Think of Notre Dame in Paris and how just therapeutic and beautiful these beautiful spaces could be. But, like, seeing everybody wearing temple robes there takes the whole thing away from me, you know? Like, it's not that, but it's this beautiful room. It's quiet. It's one of the few places at the time for me where I could make, you know, just quiet in my own life. And I sat there with Faith's family, and I'm just trying to justify and justify and justify, and finally it hits me. I'm thinking of the leadership of the church and how they're branded as very smart doctors and PhDs and theologians, Harvard MBAs.

John Dehlin [01:51:14] Yep.

Marc Oslund [01:51:15] And I'm like, Chicago Law school.

John Dehlin [01:51:16] Yes.

Marc Oslund [01:51:18] You know, Supreme Court justice, they Utah state supreme court justice. And I'm like, if they are smart, if they can take. Keep doing it, I can keep doing it.

John Dehlin [01:51:25] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:51:26] So my anchor was prophets.

John Dehlin [01:51:29] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:51:29] My anchor wasn't myself. My anchor wasn't even Jesus. It wasn't. This is from Jesus. Because where does it ever say any about this in scripture? None. I mean, the Garden of Eden. I'm like, the Garden of Eden, that's not the temple. Like, you know. And so like for me, I clung to. We know this from my experience reading ensigns clinging to prophets at byu. Loving living prophets class. Clinging to prophets, Temple prophets. It's all about prophets. My whole faith truly was built on what they were saying and their interpretation of Scripture. Right. Because I didn't know how to read this. What Mark Twain calls chloroform in print. I don't know how to read this. So I need, you know, my, my book from my religion professor that has all these quotes to explain why these verses matter. And so it was prophets that I, without realizing that I was really like clinging to.

John Dehlin [01:52:17] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:52:18] Which ends up setting up a massive fall later because we find out, oh, they're not what they claim to be. But I, that that's what I felt. I thought, prophets can do this. And then what does everyone say? Just keep going back, keep going back, keep going back, keep going back. It will get better. So I like once a week at least I'm in the temple with a full class load. Baseball. I mean, we're gone literally half 22 days of school. Not days. Days of school. We missed in one semester. And I'm still in the temple at least once a week before I'd pitch, I would go to the temple. Like I was always trying to make it work. It never got better. It just got more. I'm more used to it every time. Those freaking green aprons. Every time I'm like, why? It's so weird. And the hats. I'm like, what is this? And then I would hate it. And I get to the celestroom like, okay, finally peace.

John Dehlin [01:53:08] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:53:10] And so. Yeah, but just so much self distortion and the sadness of not trusting my own authority, man. Like I, I'm. I'm proud that I'm getting that back. I think that's a focus of what I hope to do with my friends and others. Hey, you, you trust yourself. You know what's right. Trust yourself. And definitely was with my students. And so we'll obviously get to that. But yeah, but you knew you Knew

John Dehlin [01:53:34] there was something wrong.

Marc Oslund [01:53:35] Oh, totally, totally. And the literally the only thing was, these guys are smart. They can't be deceived.

John Dehlin [01:53:40] And you had that feeling that one time. Absolutely.

Marc Oslund [01:53:43] Absolutely deny that. Yep. Well, if I feel that, then I guess everything else has to be true too.

John Dehlin [01:53:48] Right? If you had that feeling that one time.

Marc Oslund [01:53:51] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:53:51] The rest has to be true.

Marc Oslund [01:53:53] Correct.

John Dehlin [01:53:53] And they have you for life. For life. Because you had that feeling that one time. Right.

Marc Oslund [01:53:59] And if you get back then, then you're bad because God spoke to you.

John Dehlin [01:54:03] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:54:03] And like, obviously they tell us, like, hey, keep getting more. And so I can justify and say, yeah, yeah, I'm getting spiritual experiences where, you know, I read a verse about being angry and then I had an opportunity to practice it later. I'm like, that was divine, you know, Or I'm feeling crappy about myself and someone says, God loves me. I'm like, wow, that's the spirit. And so there's more and more of that. Like, yeah, look, it's just piling up. The evidences are piling up. And none of it was really doctrinal evidence that I was worried about or historical evidence. I truly didn't know anything. I just wanted it to feel good.

John Dehlin [01:54:34] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:54:34] And so, yeah, I get my, you know, I get my mission to the temple, keep going to the temple. I go back home to LA for a couple. Couple weeks before going on my mission. There's obviously family tension there. My mom and I kind of had like a big falling out where she was really getting on me and my grandma, not my Mormon grandma, my mom's mom. We were out to dinner and my. My grandma was like, shell, stop, do not talk anymore. And I've never heard my grandma, like, kind of talk that way because it was. It was getting heated. But now looking back, it's just my mom want be protective of her baby, you know, and, yeah, so I go to North Carolina or I go to the mtc. You know, I'm. I forget what. I'm a zone. I'm a zone leader, a district leader, one of the two, you know. Yeah, yeah, one of those. And like, again, I feel like I was charismatic, talented, convert, whatever else. And so I. I was kind of like the golden child. And I loved it, man. I was in. I was in, I was in. But, man, I was home sick. Even though I was right there in Provo, I had lived just a couple miles down the road at the dorms, and it just hit me bad, bad, bad. It just was the worst. Like, so, so rough. My companion is really sweet, but he was. He actually was on the autism spectrum. Got honorably excused from serving a mission, got a second opinion, came back, and I'm a jerk, cocky kid. I don't know how to. How to cope with somebody who is not. I speak really fast, I think really fast. I move really fast. Somebody who's not like that. I felt tethered, I felt bound. It was just. Just so much, you know, and, you know, the MTC is just like a water hose of indoctrination and all of these things. And I was just pumped to get out to North Carolina. All I wanted to do was to tell people they were loved. And I thought that the best way for that to be done was for them to join the Mormon Church. But truthfully, I just wanted people to feel that sense of security and safety the way that I had craved since I was a seventh grader, you know? So I get out to North Carolina, meet my mission president. He's a great. He's a good man, very strict. You know how mission presidents can kind of fluctuate. You'll get some that are very loose and understanding and others that are, like, by the book. The mission president before, very loose. Our mission president comes a transfer right before us. So he's. He's new and he, like, cleans house, sends a bunch of missionaries home, like, gets rid of missionaries in a lot of areas and is like, elders, you're going to be doing this, this, this, this, this. Read the missionary handbook every day, have it memorized, like, buy the book. Here's the problem. It wasn't so much. I mean, there are problems with that approach, but it's the person that I was, I was already that. Yeah, I needed somebody to be like, hey, Elder Oslin, just relax. You're doing good. You've given up your life. God is happy with you.

John Dehlin [01:57:28] You know, you were already high strung. Yes. You didn't need to be strung more tightly.

Marc Oslund [01:57:32] Dude. I read my. The most heartbreaking things. I read my first couple months of my missionary emails to my mission president and, like, trying so hard to be happy and just being like, I'm working really hard. Nobody wants to hear from us, but we're biking 17 miles a day and knocking on thousands of doors. And, like, I'm hurting a little bit. And he's like, well, if you don't feel like you're doing good, then you're not doing good and the Lord will tell you. And, like, I had a moment like, a couple years ago where I just read these journals and I Just like I just said like to my former self, I'm like, all you needed was somebody to say that you're doing good. I never got that from anyone in Mormonism. I got it from the people I love, from my, you know, my in laws, I got it from faith family. I never ever got it from the leaders that I had. And so I'm so sorry. Hey, thanks John. I. But the problem was I kept going deeper and deeper to earn love. And I bought into conditional God and I bought into all of these things and my mission president was very big on personal revelation. Read the Book of Mormon every day with a question in mind, you'll get an answer and write in your journal. And I did it diligently. And so I got really big on that idea of getting guidance, revelation, what have you. And I truly felt like I was inspired but I was so worked up. Like there was days that I would just be. Here's I think the best example of how high strung I was. There's a day I was in my third era, I'd been out 18 months and I was just so, I felt so guilty if I wasn't out the door at 10am and back at 9 or 9:30, hopefully we were teaching so 9:30. But then I was guilty if I was back at 8:59 or 9:31, you know, it was just non stop and we woke up and it was like a rainy day in North Carolina. Windy, miserable, gray, just horrible. I just knew it was going to be a terrible day. We had literally nothing on our schedules. We had go bike 16 miles to a place we've never gone. Hopefully we'll knock some doors, find somebody we've never found. And the weather just kept getting worse and worse. We were living with members again who I love and I just, I had this internal battle where I'm like, I'm the zone leader, I'm the senior, like a senior zone leader. I'm the one that needs to make sure that we're doing what's right. I just like, we can't knock doors. It never works. Who wants to see two? I'm six foot five. Most of my companions were around six foot in dark clothes. Knocking who wants to open the door? You're a single mom, like you're gonna open up the door. It's creepy, it's scary. Like I hated knocking doors but I did it because that's how you get the spirit of missionary work. And I never had a single person, not one person. I don't even. We barely taught anybody that we knocked on doors with. But definitely nobody got baptized from tracting, you know, so I'm working myself up. I know it's not successful, but I feel this pressure and oh man, like the weather keeps getting worse. So I think, okay, what could we do? Okay, we can call members and just say, hey, we're thinking about you. Which to be honest, I think is really good. We care about you. How can we help you? I felt guilty for it because it's not missionary work. We're supposed to be finding new people. And you know, it's noon, we took an early lunch because I'm like, I still don't want to go and I'm beating myself up. And then the weather gets really dark and the power goes out and the members come home and they're like, elders, there's going to be a tornado, you know, And I'm like, okay, well I guess we're not going now. And sure enough, tornado hits. And it's North Carolina doesn't really get tornadoes too often, but it hits literally in the area that we were supposed to go. We were going to be only on bikes 16 miles away from where we were. We would have been destroyed. I still felt guilty that night that I didn't knock doors. I'm glad I didn't die, but I'm like, God, please forgive me that I wasn't out doing missionary work that day. That's the type of high strung missionary I was. And I had nobody that would ever tell me that I was doing good enough. And all I needed was, was just my mission president to be like, Elder Ozen, you're a hard working missionary, you're a good man. I think I was successful. In North Carolina we don't get a lot of baptism. I had 40 baptisms or 24. 24 families, you know. And so like I feel like that's successful. One a month.

Mission Challenges and Early Confessions

John Dehlin [02:02:00] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:02:01] In the South.

John Dehlin [02:02:02] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:02:02] And yeah, I still didn't feel good. So it's just, it's just shame on, shame on shame. My mission president was very driven. We met Elder Richard Scott when he was there and he was very loving. But I had this aura about prophets, right? Like they're just, they see into our soul. I believe that. And then David Bednar comes, man, he is, he's just like my mission president. He's high strung, stand up when we're there. We were, we had this whole thing and he's like, hey, we'll have dinner. And then we got too loud and he's like, and you wonder why we're not baptizing. The spirit has left. We had such a sacred moment. Like, you see what I'm saying? And I'm just thinking it's just reinforced over and over. My mission president's getting. He's a businessman. He's all about numbers, which I get. And he's getting pressure from his leaders, so he's passing it on. And my mission president, only towards the end, started finally saying he would say, I trust you, which I knew meant a lot to him to say that only towards the end of my two years and his last 12 months did he start saying I love you to the elders. And, like, it totally meant a lot. And we're always supposed to follow our mission president, so it's so hard to even talk badly about him because I messaged him recently. Like, he doesn't know a lot of what's going on, but, like, I still have internalized affinity for them, and I believe in the goodness of every person, but it's still hard for me to even convey a sense of dislike for them, you know, or for him or for anyone.

John Dehlin [02:03:38] Totally.

Marc Oslund [02:03:39] And so my mission was an experience. My first. Oh, another example of strictness. My. My first Christmas. Zoom had. Or what was it at the time? Not FaceTime. Skype was a thing. And missionaries were getting to Skype. I didn't have that opportunity. One hour call and you're done. And I felt guilty because my call went, like, 102. You know, I was praying, like, forgive me for talking to my family, you know, so it's just so sad. Like, it's so sad, man.

John Dehlin [02:04:05] Like, and they've changed a lot of this.

Marc Oslund [02:04:07] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [02:04:08] Made huge stinks about all this.

Marc Oslund [02:04:09] And that's. And that's the thing. And then. And then now people are like, see, we're good. And I'm like, dude, but the people you've run over in your wake without an apology. Like, an apology. Like, we're not just. I'm glad for the missionaries. I don't want them having to not talk to their families every week. I want them to be able to call whenever they want. But, man, wouldn't it have been nice? We are so sorry for all of the strictness we provided to our missionaries before and the harm we've caused. We are so excited to announce these following changes. That statement would have done so much for me, but it's just the no, we're moving on revelation, you know? Anyway, So I had 102. I called my mom, and my mom was like, so you're not having a Good time, huh? Interesting. And she was like, kind of making digs. I think she was, again, just trying to help me tap into my own, trusting myself. But I was like, mom, I'm not leaving. And she backed off. And from that point on, like, I was committed. And that homesickness went away. And I don't know why, what that was, but that was kind of the moment where I'm like, I'm here. My mom knows I'm here. I'm staying here. And ended up having a really good experience, meeting good people. Well, fairly good. Right. Like, I didn't realize the internalized pain trauma that happened from that, you know? Yeah. So then go home and had to

John Dehlin [02:05:20] again, succeed was the stuff with Elder Gonzalez. Oh, crap.

Marc Oslund [02:05:22] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:05:23] Ah, okay.

Marc Oslund [02:05:24] Thank you. Geez. Can't believe I forgot.

John Dehlin [02:05:26] And there's also something about questions inviting revelation.

Marc Oslund [02:05:28] Yeah. So a big one was keep asking questions. Keep asking questions of my mission president, which is going to be a huge foreshadowing of just, it's okay to ask. What's the matter with asking? Well, I mean, we know what the matter with asking is, because if you're honest in your search, you're going to come across things that will not mesh with the predominant narrative.

John Dehlin [02:05:50] So you were having questions as a missionary?

Marc Oslund [02:05:52] A little bit, but. But more presented from me, like, from others, like, oh, do you know that Joseph Smith had multiple wives? I'm like, no, he didn't. Truly. No. Did you know that, like, black people couldn't have the priesthood? So I'm like, yeah, yeah, yeah. But that was just. That wasn't doctrine, you know, but people in North Carolina were smart, right. They are biblically savvy. They're like, where does it say this in the Bible? Where does it say that? And I'm like, I don't know. I just joined the church a year ago. Please stop. You know, so enough. Yeah, enough. Where I could, like, the seed was planted. But even just the idea that it's okay to ask questions, we don't need to be afraid of questions. That was planted very strongly. I don't think the intent was ever. Yeah. But go look it up on these sites or see these things. And I definitely think the intent was always remain faithful to Scripture, which I was my entire time teaching seminary and forward. But I feel like it allowed me to say, questions are good. David Bednar, Same thing. Our whole thing was ask questions and get guidance from the spirit. And so it was instilled in me that questions are acceptable. Not just acceptable, but a good thing. A Necessary thing to growth.

John Dehlin [02:06:58] That's good.

Marc Oslund [02:06:58] Yeah. And that will be passed on to my seminary students. That eventually will lead me towards other directions. My experience with Elder Gonzalez. So we had one of those. I don't know what was going on, but I think my mission president was getting some belated confessions from people. And in between the time I was at byu, they had, you know, had sex, masturbated, you know, any number of things. You know, drank, smoked, touched a girl

John Dehlin [02:07:20] or touched a girl's breasts or whatever.

Marc Oslund [02:07:22] Correct.

John Dehlin [02:07:22] Didn't repent.

Marc Oslund [02:07:23] Correct.

John Dehlin [02:07:24] And then they get out to the mission field, feel guilty and then confess.

Marc Oslund [02:07:28] Exactly.

John Dehlin [02:07:28] And he was not liking that people were waiting until Correct. Getting out to the mission to repent and confess for things that they should have taken care of. Yep. Back home.

Marc Oslund [02:07:38] Spot on, spot on.

John Dehlin [02:07:39] So.

Marc Oslund [02:07:39] And I felt, I know I always, like, it's so weird because I consider, you know, I've been on the non Mormon side, I've been on the super Mormon side now the post Mormon side. And I remember, I forget how even like words like steak center. I literally thought we were going to have steak. Like just all of those things. It's so much so. I think he was getting tired of having so much so he taught a very, like, he went around zone conferences and did like a very repent, repent, repent lesson. Like, now search your soul. Find the sins. You need to dig up whatever's there. And you know, that was already a problem for me. But in between the time I was at BYU and went on my mission, there were a couple girls that I had possibly gone maybe a little bit too far with. And my memory's hazy. John, I have to tell you, my wife, if she was here, she would tell you the same thing. I have the worst memory now. And I truly think it's because I forced myself to forget. Every time I was reminded of the bad things I did before I was Mormon, I just, nope, I don't want to remember. And like, my memory sucks now. Bad. And so I'm making up stories of, I know that this happened, but did this happen here? And et cetera, et cetera. And I just, I had a couple incidents with girls that I could think of and I'm like, is this pre mission, like preby win? Did I confess to a bishop? I don't remember. So I told my mission president very seriously, he's like, okay, I will need to have a conversation. I'll let you know how this goes. And so I'm in limbo, fearing what so afraid that I'm gonna get sent home.

John Dehlin [02:09:13] Sent home early.

Marc Oslund [02:09:14] Yeah. And I mean, look at that time. I was probably 20 something months in and like, I was a good missionary. Yeah. And like, and so I just felt so worried because we know what happens in Mormon culture, especially at byu, if you're an early return missionary. It's changing a little bit now, but if you're an early return missionary, girls are like, he's, he's defected. Nope, not marrying him. And so I was like, my life will be ruined if I go home early. And even if it's only four months. So my mission president calls his area, you know, supervisor or whatever, who's Elder Marco Gonzalez of the 70, and explains the whole thing. He says, hey, I just had a talk with Elder Gonzalez. He's gonna have to go to his supervisor. I don't know who he goes to, to see if you can stay. And I'm like, oh, my gosh. He's like, here's what I want you to do. In the meantime, you need to hand write letters to all of these girls. You need to call your. Or you need to email your parents and tell them what you've done. Like, another thing was a friend stole an ipod and he left it in my car and I kept it. And it's like, you need to give back all of those things. So my daughter, my dad, who, you know how good like, he is. My dad can't find this stupid ipod. He buys an iPod for $400, gives it to this friend and says, hey, Mark took this from you. And he's like, I don't even remember that, but thanks. My dad goes to Sports Chalet and gives him 50 bucks for glasses that one of my friends sold. My dad's going around doing all of this work. Like, I remember calling him because my mission, like, we never get to call him, like, dad, this. Or I was actually via email and told him what might happen. He's like, I'm so sorry. How can I help? What's going on? And then I was like, sorry, dad, like, the hour of email's over. And like, I couldn't even break that, you know? So anyway, Elder Gonzalez comes back and says, tells my mission president, I can stay. My mission president says, cool, I need you to write letters now to your baseball coach, to Tom Homo, who's the athletic director at byu. Let them know what you've done. Because it was right around the time of Brandon Davies, who had broken the honor code, you know, had sex with a girl and left out of the sweet 16 or whatever. Jim or Fredette era, Right, Yeah, I remember. And everyone in North Carolina, right? Big basketball place like you're byu, you know, Jimmer. I'm like, yeah, no Jim. And we're in the same weight room. Yeah, for sure. Like, is he good? And they're like, yeah, he's amazing. Because Jimmer, our freshman year wasn't anything. And then all of a sudden Jimmermania, you know, and I missed it all, so of course I did, but. But I got to stay. And I was like, instead of feeling abused and violated, I felt grateful. Thank you, church. Thank you for being merciful to me for these things that I may or may not have done or may or may not have already repented for. And on top of all of that, that aren't even bad, right? Like I'm a 19 year old dude who made out with a girl and maybe went too far. That bad. But the internalized shame and trauma that came from that man, it was just so deep. And

John Dehlin [02:12:10] yeah, I just have to say I. My master's thesis was on. For my psychology degree, it was on scrupulosity, which includes hyper confessing. It also includes making up memories about possible sins you committed because you're so desperate to be viewed as clean and righteous. And it sounds like you were experiencing some like, this is obsessive compulsive disorder. 100% diagnosable. Major. 100 major anxiety disorder.

Marc Oslund [02:12:40] Yeah, no question about that. And, and like I.

John Dehlin [02:12:42] There's a church is kind of exacerbating it.

Marc Oslund [02:12:44] Exactly. They are not only the cause because previous to doing this, there was nothing wrong. Yeah, it's normal. Yeah, you go smoke weed or you go smoke. Like I don't think necessarily. Like I'm not. I never would tell somebody.

John Dehlin [02:12:54] Like, no, no, it's just high school stuff.

Marc Oslund [02:12:55] Exactly, exactly. And so like. But now all of a sudden it's bad. So now they've created the problem and they're the cure. But by being the cure, it's also creating more harm.

John Dehlin [02:13:04] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:13:05] And so yeah, it's a, it's so true. And I, I've had a couple students that. And that's a huge part of my story. Seeing their trauma, similar things to me and me wanting to protect them. Like you're not doing what I had to go through. And so that, that shapes me as a teacher. But yeah, I get to stay. My mission president moves me to another area, which was, which was fine for the last six weeks. I also have to tell you, I was so strict that I got an email from The Detroit Tigers, while I was on my mission. Hey, we want to draft you. Just reply to this email, say you're interested. But we had a rule, no emailing people outside of your family or mission president. So I let the email sit deleted at my inbox. Never got drafted.

John Dehlin [02:13:45] Holy moly. Drafted twice. Yep.

Marc Oslund [02:13:49] So, yep. They. Man, this is why there's so much hurt where I'm like, I gave up everything for you. And it's left and right from the beginning to the end, just constant abuse and not feeling good enough. The limited praise I got or the reward of baptism or seeing people find joy. I'm like, I'll suffer all of that. Like, I'll suffer all the pain I have so I can see those. That little bit of joy so that maybe my family can be together. Like my patriarchal blessing says, one day, your family will be an eternal family, as you have anticipated, as long as you remain faithful. So I'm like, well, I want my family forever. Therefore, I will endure whatever the church does to me so that I can ensure families not just can be, but will be forever. That conditional man, the conditional nature of God in Mormonism was internalized in ways that I couldn't realize at the time, you know, and it's. And it's toxic, and it's so far. It's so far from who God is or should be, you know? So anyway, that's. That's my experience.

John Dehlin [02:14:58] Detroit down.

Marc Oslund [02:15:00] Detroit Tigers just deleted the email. Didn't even say a word. I think I might have emailed my mission president, said, hey, can I email them back? And I didn't maybe hear back. And so that just went by the wayside, you know. Oh, yeah, great. My coach writes me a letter after I confessed my sins to him for some reason, and he's totally understanding. Mark, I'm really proud of you. Love him. Vance Law, 1 the of 1 of the best people I know. He's just truly a good, good, good man. I think I got a letter back from Tom Homo, too. That was like, Mark, right?

John Dehlin [02:15:29] So weird. You're, like, writing the athletic director of BYU to confess sins from high school that you may or may not have committed. What a grueling, inhumane process, for sure.

Marc Oslund [02:15:41] And even my weird. Yes. The girls I wrote to, they're probably

John Dehlin [02:15:44] getting these letters saying, why? Why is he writing these letters? Yes. What are they doing?

Marc Oslund [02:15:49] Like, what? I. Yeah, I don't know what the rationale was. And that's not a normal thing. Like, people don't confess to their athletic directors.

John Dehlin [02:15:58] Like, you Know, at Division one University.

Marc Oslund [02:16:01] Exactly. I'm like, dude, if I would have gone to Irvine, man, I would have been fine. Like, I wouldn't have to write letters about having, like, touching a girl's boob over, like, you know, like, over their shirt, you know? But anyway, it's just. It's just so sad. And so did you tell us what

John Dehlin [02:16:14] the final Gonzalez verdict was?

Marc Oslund [02:16:16] Yeah, I could stay.

John Dehlin [02:16:17] Okay.

Marc Oslund [02:16:17] And I think it was largely because I had four months left.

John Dehlin [02:16:20] Okay.

Marc Oslund [02:16:20] He's so close. He's like.

John Dehlin [02:16:22] Just like.

Marc Oslund [02:16:23] I didn't talk to him. My mission president heard it. Yeah, my mission president was very direct. He's like, all I knew was, basically, you should feel so lucky that you're staying and write these letters, write these girls, confess, don't do anything again, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Like, I mean, oh, he took my recommend. I forgot.

John Dehlin [02:16:41] What?

Marc Oslund [02:16:41] He took my recommend. That's. Holy God. He took my recommend. And because I remember on my exit interview, he gave it back. He's like, you can now have a. Or he signed it, actually. He's like, I will now give you a recommend. But I'm like, how in the world am I going to be a missionary and not be able to go to the temple? How does that make sense? How am I. So now I'm, like, asked to give a priesthood blessing. I'm like, wait, but I can't go to the temple? He didn't restrict that. He just said, no, you can't have your recommend. I didn't miss a temple trick. But he was just like, nope, you. Nope. You have to. Basically, you have to earn it again. And I'm thinking, like, what in the world? What? What. What more can I do? I can't work harder. I can't read more scripture. I can't. Like, I literally am spending every minute, like, repenting, confessing, reading like you. I wish. Maybe we'll have my. My mission trainer who's a part of the story because he gets fired from freaking seminary. But, like, you could ask him. I am the strictest human in the world. Especially on my mission. Nobody worked harder than me. Maybe people worked equally as hard. But I'm telling you, like, I was so in. I literally couldn't do more. And so all that does is I will never be good enough. I physically cannot give up more. I can't work harder. I can't be more. So if it's still not good, I'm not good. I will never be good. And that was the message that just kept getting perpetuated. Perpetuated and eventually I get my recommend back as I go home and I'm clean again and. Oh, and I have to email my stake president and all that crap, too. So.

John Dehlin [02:18:08] So, you know, we. When you study, like, Scientology and you learn about their auditing and how they use stuff against you later, you think, oh, well, that's just awful. Right. But we've got our own form of that, because these confessions and these worthiness standards that no one can really, or few can really ever live up to, then you. You. You add the guilt and the shame and kind of this. Weeks or months of, like, we may send you home. You're really lucky. What does that do to your psychology? What does that do to your commitment to the church when they've got you on this worthiness hamster wheel where you're always feeling terrible about yourself? What is that? What type of bond does that create for you to the Church? I'm asking.

Marc Oslund [02:18:51] I mean, it's so deeply unhealthy. It's.

John Dehlin [02:18:53] So what does it make you feel?

Marc Oslund [02:18:54] I feel like. Like I can't exist without them. Like I need them.

John Dehlin [02:18:57] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:18:59] It becomes very codependent. Right. Where we fuel each other, and it's this toxic, terrible, terrible relationship. If this was. I eventually start teaching this in seminary, but I say, if God is that. I don't want that God.

John Dehlin [02:19:10] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:19:10] But I didn't. I didn't realize.

John Dehlin [02:19:11] But at the time, you're like, I'm bad.

Marc Oslund [02:19:13] Yep. Because that is God.

John Dehlin [02:19:14] And the only way for me to be. Have a chance is what is.

Marc Oslund [02:19:19] Is I have to keep repenting. I have to keep being Mormon. I have to keep tithing. I have to keep serving. I have to. I have to be perfect as a Mormon person. I have to do everything or I have to repent nonstop. And it's. I mean, it's just. It's psychological torture. And it's slow and it's. It's unseen. And it's. Here's the hardest thing for me to recognize. Cause I. My default is to want to demonize people and be like, no, it's this one man that did it. No, it's not. He's a victim of the system, too.

John Dehlin [02:19:46] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:19:47] And even prophets, where did they get that crap from? I don't know. But I want to blame them more. I'm easier to blame them than anybody.

John Dehlin [02:19:53] But the truth is there's no, like, dude, sinister dude in like a. In like a control center going, let's do this to Mark. It's. It's what the system does to Otherwise pretty, probably really good people.

Marc Oslund [02:20:08] Yeah, absolutely.

John Dehlin [02:20:09] And it's just like, it's like a. It's like a stone cut out of the mountain without hands. It's like a machine that just, just grows and grows and can't be controlled anymore.

Marc Oslund [02:20:18] 100% right. You're spot on.

John Dehlin [02:20:20] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:20:21] And I just. Yeah. So one part of the story that we'll get to is just me recognizing everybody is good at their core. I truly believe everybody. So if that's true, where do bad people get bad things? Oh, it must be bad systems. And then I start, you know, critiquing. But. But yeah, the trauma, man, it's. It's so real and so heavy and so hard. And getting back to LA, I was like, I mean, NC's a lot slower. A couple of the towns I served in were, you know, one stoplight towns or what have you. And even in general the bigger cities like Raleigh compared to downtown la, like, like night and day. And I come back and I feel like I'm just in a. Like the epicenter of sin, you know,

John Dehlin [02:21:00] And I'm driving Goggin magog.

Marc Oslund [02:21:03] Exactly. Like LA's LA and Vegas are being taken first, you know, and maybe San Francisco, because I guess like I was told that I had to hate gays on my mission. People on my mission.

John Dehlin [02:21:12] And.

Marc Oslund [02:21:12] And so it's just so. It was so hard.

John Dehlin [02:21:15] You're in Sodom and Gomorrah when you get off your mission.

Marc Oslund [02:21:17] Yep. And I'm just like, get me out of here. Like my sinning family. And that's the worst. And I knew I didn't want to be that, but I couldn't help it. And the judgment, I don't remember what I said or did, but I know that my sister was like, you sucked when you came home. We did not like being around you. You were so judgmental. You were so mean and yeah, really tragic. I did fail to mention my brother ends up getting baptized while I'm on my mission. About a month in, my dad starts going back to church because my brother can't drive. So that's the thing. My mom now feels very.

John Dehlin [02:21:52] Talk about your brother getting baptized.

Marc Oslund [02:21:55] Yeah. So I, I was super pumped. I'm like, it's happening, right? Like, I'm faithful. I'm on a mission. My first month, my brother gets baptized.

John Dehlin [02:22:02] Well, how did he get baptized?

Marc Oslund [02:22:04] So he, I think just kind of saw me. I. I've kind of been. I think I was a role model. And I think he saw me and was like, I'm Interested in this. And we had a conversation right before I left. We went to this nice, like, resort with my grandparents in Palos Verdes, California. And. And we had a talk about, hey, Tommy, like, you need to read this book. If you can read this and you get a testimony, I want you to get baptized. And so I think he was looking up to me and he said he read it, and then he had his own internalized shame because he joined before high school or like. Yeah, right before high school started for him. Then he did a lot of the similar things I did, but he was Mormon at the time, so he had same internalized shame, but he was actually Mormon. Mine was. I was washed clean. I got all the bad out, you know, and so my dad was watching him, and my dad started coming back to church, and my dad got reactivated.

John Dehlin [02:22:56] Wow.

Marc Oslund [02:22:57] Crazy, right? He ends up doing really good. He stops drinking. He's able to get a temple recommend before I go to byu. I'm my dad's escort at the temple and at. In the LA temple. And I feel so vulnerable because I know how much I hate the temple. And seeing my dad, like, very kind of childlike, like, I don't really know what's going on here, and me feeling, like, responsible for that and being like, I'm so, like, wanting to soften the blow of, like, this is weird crap, man. But, yeah, so my dad, he'd wear garments, but then I think they just got uncomfortable. He was a bigger dude, so he was hot. And anyway, my mom felt very alienated. It became very divided in my family. It's the. It's the three guys versus the two girls, and the three guys are Mormon and the two girls are not. And there's a lot of division and a lot of frustration, I think, with my mom feeling like my dad betrayed her. Like, I thought you were going to take my side, and now you've taken their side, which will play out significantly when I get married in the temple, because that was a big, big, big deal for a lot of. So, yeah, then I go to go back to byu, play baseball.

John Dehlin [02:24:07] So your mom didn't succumb to the peer pressure.

Marc Oslund [02:24:10] No.

John Dehlin [02:24:10] Her husband reactivates her two sons. Not. Your sister didn't get baptized, but. But you. But the lady. The. The women held out.

Marc Oslund [02:24:17] Yeah. Which is interesting because I. I mean, my experience has been that especially on my mission and in seminary, more typically, females have been receptive to spiritual things, whereas guys are kind of like, I don't want to talk about it, you know, and so it Was interesting. I actually think my mom and sister are very wise and hard headed and I think they're able to see through some of the crap that perhaps me, my dad and brother, who are very, I think, shame prone, I think we succumb to it because we found an idea of hope and healing and peace and all of those things that perhaps my mom and sister were more resistant to. In a good way. Yeah. So. And my sister is at Texas Christian University. Like, like she's not going to be Mormon. Like that's not going to happen there. And then goes to grad school at University of North Carolina and like it's just, she's not surrounded by it, you know.

John Dehlin [02:25:03] That's Lubbock, right?

Marc Oslund [02:25:04] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:25:05] Okay.

Marc Oslund [02:25:05] No, it's in Fort Worth. Yeah. Yeah. So the rich, the rich girl, they always said like the oil. The oil family school, you know.

John Dehlin [02:25:12] Okay.

Marc Oslund [02:25:12] But yeah, so she loved it and yeah.

John Dehlin [02:25:16] Okay.

Marc Oslund [02:25:17] Fun.

Post-Mission Life, Marriage, and Baseball Draft

John Dehlin [02:25:18] So you, so you're. You get off your mission. Yep. And what do you do then?

Marc Oslund [02:25:27] Go back to byu. Okay. After sophomore. Sophomore, Yep. So after going to the temple with my dad, go back to BYU immediately. Man, I wish I would just love like some of my teammates to be in here. I was so judgmental of some of them who, you know, were non members or less active members and being like, this is the Lord's school. Like, how could you swear?

John Dehlin [02:25:48] You're insufferable.

Marc Oslund [02:25:49] I was the worst. And like I'm, I'm very strong in my opinions and so like if they were listening to bed, I'm like, get this off. And I would never swear. Get this crap off. You know, and, and they just hated me and they should have. I was a freaking jerked. Right. Like this guy is so uptight and I'm just ins. I'm literally insufferable. That's. That's the word. And I'm getting, you know, ready. I'm at that time I come back home and I try to meet up with Faith again. And I just didn't feel, I think probably because there's shame associated with our past, I want to separate. And also we didn't have, like, we weren't always happy. We were like, we were 16 year olds dating and we weren't ready. And so, yeah, lots of fights or whatever. So that ship kind of sailed. But I came home and I saw Rachel, who's my wife now, right. Who I'd gone to school with since fifth grade. And now I'm like, I'm a returned missionary, I'm clean, I'm good Maybe now would be a good time. You know, I liked her. I thought she was pretty and all of those things. Now might be the time where I can maybe try. No time's gonna be better than now. I'm only gonna get worse. Right after my mission. So I asked her if she wanted to hang out. I actually went on, like, a date with another girl after my homecoming talk. Cause I was just, like, so spiritual, you know, Like. And I could just tell that she just wanted. And she did want to go on a date with me. And then she married a BYU football. Cause he was way more normal than I was. And so then I asked Rachel to go on that date with us to bring a date. And she was like, that's the weirdest thing I've ever heard. Why would I go on your date? I'm like, no, bring a friend. Cause in my stupid brain, I was thinking, like in the movies, I would be on a date with this girl. She and I'd be on a date with that guy, and we'd switch. Cause I didn't know how to bridge that friend zone gap with her, you know? And so we hung out a couple times. I went up to BYU before she went up to Rexburg. She was at byu, Idaho, which, sad story. We found out I got into BYU and she didn't. She had always wanted to go to byu. Like, Mormon family. Yeah, exactly. So she. Her dad was a bishop, her grandpa's a patriarch. Her uncle was our bishop. Now as the stake president in. In Torrance North. Stake. Like, BYU through and through. Like, the most Mormon family you've ever seen. You know, like, if you watch the south park episode, like, the nice happy blonde, like, that's her family. And. And she didn't get in. We were in ceramics class, and we found out together. And I'm like, I did. I just heard of BYU three months before. Like, so that was tragic. But she. She decides to come up and visit me. She stays with her sister who was at byu Provo. And. And then we hung out. And one day, like, we went up Provo Canyon, and I told her that I had liked her for a long time and kind of revealed that to her. And. And she was just listening and listening, like, hearing me finally share feelings I had had for her. And so we. I said, rachel, I can't come up. I'm playing baseball. If we want to make this work, you're going to have to drive from Rexburg to Provo to visit. And so she was willing to do that. So we became an item I had to break up with, like, another girl that I not break up, but cancel a date. It was very awkward story that Rachel loves to rub in on me. But anyway, and it was great. And I had a great baseball season. My arm really hurt really bad.

John Dehlin [02:29:05] Because you had. You had not played for two years, right?

Marc Oslund [02:29:08] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:29:08] So you were probably out of shape.

Marc Oslund [02:29:09] Totally out of shape. I didn't realize the pain I was in, like, going back, lifting, running, all of those things until my junior year when I realized, wow, you're not supposed to hurt. Just existing, you know, the muscles I hadn't used. Remember, I. I had signed the letter saying, I'm not going to play professional baseball.

John Dehlin [02:29:26] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:29:27] And knowing that the Lord would make up for it. I did the same thing with my. On my mission, where I said, you know what? I'll go. I'll work out for 30 minutes. But I didn't bring a glove. I didn't do. I did nothing. And I thought, God will make up for this. He will make it work. And, like, I was in decent enough shape and I played well, but, like, my arm just hurt. Like, my elbow. And like, my velocity, like, my. My speed, it was typically between 88 and 92. It was down to, like, 84, 85, which is. That's not college baseball. College baseball. At a minute, you gotta be hitting 88. And I would still get people out because I think I was competitive and what have you. But something was. Was lacking, you know, And I. I have an opportunity to get drafted again by the Detroit Tigers. Again. Okay, so a third time. The third time they said, hey, we know you're engaged. So eventually, Rachel and I get engaged. Awesome. Obviously, I love her, but they said, we know you're engaged. You're going to get married in August. We need you to be playing baseball between June, July and August. So if you want to get drafted, you can't get married in August. And I'm like, no, I'm getting married because the temple is the most important thing in a temple marriage. And I love Rachel and all those things. So I turned them down again. So three times now. Once an actual. Like, I actually got drafted. The other two I would have gotten drafted, but I said no, because I wanted to prioritize other things, you know, which. Rachel and I talk all the time like we love each other. I'm so glad we're married. But, like, the reason people get married at age 22 is because they want to have sex and not feel bad about it. I mean, maybe not solely they love each other.

John Dehlin [02:31:09] But also because our mission president says your number one goal now that you're leaving, your mission is to get married as soon as you can and have as much babies as you can. I don't know if you had that experience 100%.

Marc Oslund [02:31:19] Yeah. When I left. So he gave me back my recommended, now go find a wife. And so now I've gone from, hey, I just want to see pretty girls too. I'm gonna marry somebody. And fortunately, like, Rachel is amazing. I think she's been amazing since I've known her. But, like, the rush through it was certainly inspired because of Mormonism.

John Dehlin [02:31:38] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:31:39] And I wouldn't. I don't wish I wasn't with Rachel. That's what makes this story hard, because I love Rachel. I love our life together. I love our son so much. But, man, all the other stuff that came, it's. It's. It's. It's all Mormonism. I took a quiz, like, the life's biggest decisions. And most people, like, did not put religion as number one, but, like, religion is number one, 2, 3, 4, and 5. For me, like, it's. It's everything. Nothing in my life would be what it was if it wasn't for religion. And so I'm really grateful that I'm married to Rachel. But, yeah, we got married.

John Dehlin [02:32:13] Why are you sad? Why you're feeling sad?

Marc Oslund [02:32:15] Yeah, I'm feeling sad because I just. What would my life have been like? Would I have lived in la? I still love la. I feel like an Angeleno at heart. Like, in the winters in Utah, I get Seasonal affective disorder, and I start thinking, what am I doing here? And now I think about our son, where I'm like, are we gonna live in Utah county forever? Which there's nothing wrong inherently with Utah county, but my experience was so good. Like, going to the beach in. In October and seeing the sunset and being around people who were different. Being around my best friend. I had black best friend. I had a Mexican best friend. I had, you know, all of these people in my life from different places, different. I found out later religions. You know, we had Muslim people and. And Hindu people, and we had Japanese people. Like, we just had everyone. And then I look in Utah county, and it's the most homogenous place in the whole world. And I want my son to not be like one of my friends who went to school in Utah county in the 80s and had their first black student show up, and they had to have an assembly of how to treat a black kid in the 80s or 90s. And I'm just like, that was never a thought for me. And so I get sad thinking, what could have been.

John Dehlin [02:33:26] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:33:27] And I'm like, dude, I gave my life to Mormonism. Like, God, where were you? Like, like, why am I not making millions of dollars playing baseball right now?

John Dehlin [02:33:34] Yeah. And so most people, Most people don't make the high school varsity team, but if you do, you usually don't ever get to play college ball, but then if you do, you pretty much almost never go pro, but you certainly don't get three offers to go pro, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you gave that up for something that you believed.

Marc Oslund [02:33:59] What I believe was, right, true, good, necessary. The only way I don't feel like if I would have done anything different, I did want to make, like, wow, look at what I'm giving up. But I also thought if I did something different, I'm going to hell. Like, or I will be punished or whatever else, because I would not be true to my testimony. And that was the most important thing. Just remain faithful at all costs. And I, I. There's certainly some cost. Everybody has cost, right. To be Mormon. There is a cost for every person. And I don't know if it's necessary to weigh them and say, oh, mine or more. Mine were bigger, but they certainly were huge for me. Yeah. And so this is something that, you

John Dehlin [02:34:40] know, I've been talking to. People don't know this yet, but they might by the time this episode comes out. I've been talking to Leah Remini and Mike Rinder a little bit, and one of the things that, you know, they're trying to wrap their brain around, it's like, well, Mormonism doesn't put people in prisons. They don't abduct people's spouses, and then they disappear forever. They don't send out, as far as we know. They don't send out, you know, people to harass you and sue you into oblivion. Like, so Mormonism's. It's okay. Like, it's just this nice, pleasant, good people, friendly. And what I, you know, and I'm not trying to say it's all bad either. There's so much good. Like, we, we had that discussion at the beginning of our, of this episode, for sure. But what it does do is it is persuades you to base your whole life on something that if it's true, then, yeah, give it all up. But what if you give it all up and it's not true?

Marc Oslund [02:35:43] Correct. That's the thing.

John Dehlin [02:35:44] Or it turns out to not be true for you.

Marc Oslund [02:35:46] That's the thing.

John Dehlin [02:35:46] What's that called?

Marc Oslund [02:35:47] Oh, man. Trauma, let down, heartbreak, shatter, like earth shattering. Just, I mean, that's, there's the whole talk, right? It's true, isn't it? It's what else matters.

John Dehlin [02:35:57] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:35:58] And I'm like, I love baseball, but I guess I don't love it as much as I love Mormonism. I love this, but I don't look like man. And then when the, when the, when the rug falls out underneath you. And the irony of, here's the irony of my story and that we're getting to is I would still be Mormon today if I wasn't so abused by seminary leaders. I would still be enduring it. Or maybe, I don't know, 2020 was kind of a beast.

John Dehlin [02:36:22] We'll get there. We'll get there.

Marc Oslund [02:36:23] But yeah, so, so you fall in love. Fall in love, get married. Wait, okay, but this is the hard thing, okay. The hard thing is I have to tell my mom, who's not welcome at the temple. And so wait, you and get, you

John Dehlin [02:36:36] get engaged to Rachel home how many months after your mission?

Marc Oslund [02:36:39] So I get home in August and we're engaged in March.

John Dehlin [02:36:42] Okay.

Marc Oslund [02:36:43] We, I, I justify it by saying, and it's true, we did know each other since fifth grade. We didn't know each other in romantically.

John Dehlin [02:36:49] I mean, it's weird because in my mind I'm thinking, well, it's a little bit late, you know, six months, you know, for sure. For other. But for non Mormons it's like, what age is six months?

Marc Oslund [02:36:59] It's so true. Like my friends now, like, you know, I'm 31. All of my friends, we graduated, you know, high school in 2008. They're like just now, like most of them don't have college degrees. They're not even thinking of settling down. Some of them just barely settling down.

John Dehlin [02:37:11] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:37:12] And I'm like, I've been married since 2012. Like I have a two year old. Like a couple of my friends have kids, but it's not because. Yeah. Anyway, but you know, so. Yeah, it's just, it's, it was so. I love Rachel. I want, and I am so grateful I'm with her, I really am. But having to tell my mom because I knew it was hard when I went on my mission, but I'm the first one to get married. I'm the first grandkid to get married. I'm the first grandkid to leave home, all of those things. So I tell her and I mean, she knows what that means. I said mom, we want to do a ring ceremony for you. And she's like, don't patronize me. I know what you're doing in there.

John Dehlin [02:37:55] Okay.

Marc Oslund [02:37:56] And so anyway, I asked my dad, who's still active at the time. I asked him to be a witness. He's the only member of my family at the temple. In the temple. All of Rachel's. And mercifully, we know the same people because we grew up in the same place. So it did feel like I. I had support. But I will tell you, like, thinking of my family, being outside, thinking of my grandparents. When my brother ends up getting married and had a wedding that wasn't in the temple, my. I was talking to them at the reception, and they were like, our first wedding. And I'm like, I've been married for four years. Like, that wasn't a wedding. I'm like, like, oh, I guess from your perspective, it really wasn't. Like, how would that have been a wedding? So my dad does come. He is our. Our witness, and then we go on our honeymoon.

John Dehlin [02:38:42] Okay, wait. So your parents were not allowed to go in the temple?

Marc Oslund [02:38:45] My dad was. My mom wasn't.

John Dehlin [02:38:46] So your dad got to go, but your mom had to sit outside. And what was that like for her?

Marc Oslund [02:38:51] Horrid. And. And for her parents who were there? Like, it was just horrid and feeling unloved. And my mom, who wants to be kind and supportive, I know she was fighting back bitterness of, who are these random people? Like. Like friends that we knew. My former little league baseball coach was in there, who's Mormon and my mom's not. And just so much like, she ended up telling me later, she's like, I'm not worthy in your God's eyes to go to this building. Not good enough. Because I drink tea, because I wear dresses that don't have sleeves on them. And I'm. How do I answer that? You know? Like, in my mind, I'm like, mom, you're. I want you there. You deserve to be there. And at the same time, I feel like I have to defend the church and say, no, the church's way is right. Like, the word of wisdom. If you drink tea, you're not worthy to go to heaven. What the hell sorry kind of teaching is that? What is that? What is that? How.

John Dehlin [02:39:46] How.

Marc Oslund [02:39:48] How can I. Like, I did believe it, and I taught it, but, like, what would that be like to be my mom and hear that? And, man, I just. It infuriates me. And she ended up, like, she was really hurt, understandably. So. And she basically told my dad, like, you have chosen your son over me. We were supposed to be a team. Why did you go there? How could you be there? That's unacceptable. And my dad was like, I'm not choosing the church over your mom. And so my dad's like, I'm not going to, because my mom. Your mom is so hurt from how this was. And so my dad stopped going at the time. I'm like, but, dad, like, Jesus, what would Jesus want you to do? I had a conversation. He's like, mark, if your family was sick on a Sunday and you had to go to the store and buy medicine, would you do it? I'm like, no. Keep the Sabbath day holy. My dad's like, you're insane. Like, you're crazy. My dad's like, your family, Mark, should always come first. And, like, it's so hard, right? Because now, as a dad, I'm like, yes, dad, you got it right. Family should always come first. But as a son, I'm thinking, dad, you're totally wrong. Look at you. You're being deceived by Satan. Mom is inspired by Satan. Mom is dragging our family down. And, like, the fact that those were even thoughts in my head is so embarrassing. Is not the right word because it's not my fault. But it's so. Like, how could I have ever thought that about two people who. And my whole family who have forever been so good to me, you know, how could a religion that's supposed to be so loving, that's supposed to be all about family, do this to my family? You know, I gave, dude, I gave it all up for Mormonism. And all it gave in return was strained family relationships, heartache, frustration, bitterness between me and my mom. Like, it destroyed our relationships that we're still rebuilding very slowly now. And I can't. Like, I tell my mom, and I'm like, I'm sorry. What's sorry gonna do to sorry? Bring us back to 2012 in the temple. Does sorry, you know, bring back the judgment that I passed on her? No, it doesn't. And she doesn't get it completely because she was never in. So from their perspective, it was my choice to be this way. And for me, I'm like, mom, I would never have, like, just chosen this freely. Like, I didn't. I was just doing what I thought I was supposed to do, you know? So, yeah, a lot of freaking anger there, for sure. And sadness, obviously.

Temple Marriage, Family Dynamics, and Informed Consent

John Dehlin [02:42:21] So your mom was left out of the temple. You said your dad did or didn't. My dad did go, okay, because you said he had. Said he wasn't gonna. But he ended up. I. I'm wondering if he was really worthy or if they kind of pulled

Marc Oslund [02:42:32] some strings he might have or. Or if he was. He didn't. Didn't tell anyone because I think my dad's always been like, why do I have to tell this guy, like, some random bishop, you know?

John Dehlin [02:42:39] Yeah, yeah. Not to judge him.

Marc Oslund [02:42:41] No, no, no, no, no. Like, he. He definitely. I don't. Like, he wasn't wearing his garments. Like, I know that, you know, which is funny. But, like. And he wasn't drinking. He hasn't. He hasn't had a drink of alcohol since, you know, my brother gets baptized or whatever. So, like, awesome for him because it's mainly a health thing. Like, it helps him. It helps. But, yeah. So I don't think you. My dad has never been. Like, I was in. Mentally. Like, I. I knew the doctor back and forwards. Like, I was a freaking seminary teacher. My dad was never that way. Like, he knew the bare bones of Mormonism, and so therefore, yeah, worthiness was not a thing for him.

John Dehlin [02:43:11] And that's another thing. Like, we talk about Scientologists or Joe's witnesses that, like, ostracized, you know, that, like, shun, shun. And, you know, you can't ever talk to your family member again kind of thing. We don't do that. But look at the stress and division that. Look at the wedge that the Church was putting between you and your mom and between your mom and your dad. For sure. For sure. That's real.

Marc Oslund [02:43:37] It's so real. I think the word that has come to me, as I've thought about that is the Church allows plausible deniability. No, we're not Scientologists.

John Dehlin [02:43:47] We don't have that kind of shunning.

Marc Oslund [02:43:48] Correct.

John Dehlin [02:43:48] No.

Marc Oslund [02:43:49] Look, we're happy. We love family. They have just enough to be like, we're not like them, therefore, we're not doing those things. And that's not true. But they have the right language and the right ways and their PR team and enough to be like, again, plausible deniability. No, no, no, no, that's not. You've interpreted that wrong. That's not what we intended. But we know. Look, I. I really, truly think I was the epitome of the golden convert doing exactly what I was supposed to do. Join the Church, give up my whole life, go to byu, go on a mission, come back, teach seminary. Like, is that not the dream? If you had a convert like that, wouldn't you Be like, wow, like, so I'm doing this.

John Dehlin [02:44:24] Be an all American athlete. Don't forget that.

Marc Oslund [02:44:26] Yeah, thanks. You're nice. Yeah, I.

John Dehlin [02:44:29] It's no small thing.

Marc Oslund [02:44:30] You're nice.

John Dehlin [02:44:30] You're nice.

Marc Oslund [02:44:31] I like. And so that's the thing, though. Like, they're like, no, but that was just you. You didn't have to interpret it that way. I'm like, what do you mean? Like, I didn't want to, but you told me. Or quotes from prophets. There's some culture, some talk that got ingrained. And so that plausible deniability gives them enough leeway to be like, I don't think Mormonism is a cult, but there's cult like behavior. The plausible deniability allows them to say, we're not a cult, we're a religion. But the plausible deniability also for me says that's cult like behavior.

John Dehlin [02:45:01] Yeah, for sure.

Marc Oslund [02:45:01] And we can't call you out, so there's the stress of that, you know? Yeah, I. It was so hard. And like, so Rachel and I come back to Provo and happy, you know, but my mom and our relationship is strained.

John Dehlin [02:45:13] Wait, you. You also got to mention Rachel's experience at the temple. Oh, and. And the reading the Book of Mormon.

Marc Oslund [02:45:23] Thank you. Okay, I'm. So you're.

John Dehlin [02:45:25] I got your outline here. Good. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:45:26] You're like, for everyone that's watching, like, I have to draft this because I literally forget things. I don't know if it's trauma response or just because I taught myself to have a bad memory because I didn't want to remember my past self. So I. I literally have to write things down or I forget. So before we get married, I know that Rachel's not reading the Book of Mormon every day, which is, you know, again, my mission president made a promise twice in our mission newsletter. Said from Marion Romney, if you read the Book of Mormon every day, not one child will ever permanently go astray. You know, he said, I promise you in the name of the Lord, my mission president, multiple times. So I'm holding this as doctrine, you know, and so I'm dating Rachel and realizing she's not reading the Book of Mormon every day. Like, Rachel, you need to read every day.

John Dehlin [02:46:10] And she comes from this awesome family. Right, Exactly.

Marc Oslund [02:46:13] So this is what I've always said about Rachel. Rachel is what Mormonism should be without having to do any of the steps to do it. She is just. She is good and kind and loving and funny and all of those things. I had to force it into myself. Rachel's like, what do I need to read scripture for? Like, you know? And I couldn't compute. I couldn't compute. I'm like, no, but this is mandatory. And she's like, I try. They're boring. I'm like, the scriptures are not boring.

John Dehlin [02:46:37] You know what I mean?

Marc Oslund [02:46:39] Like, how dare you? It's like, so insulting, you know? And. And I mean, she's just, like, looking at me like, dude, you are weird. But she's putting up with it because she remembers that I'm normal because my high school, she's like, I know that this guy's normal in here somewhere.

John Dehlin [02:46:51] You know?

Marc Oslund [02:46:51] So I think that gave me some benefit of the doubt with her. But poor Rachel, I just kept hounding her and hounding her and hounding her about reading, reading, reading, and eventually said, mark, you need to stop. I am not going to read the Scriptures. And I remember saying, this is a deal breaker, Rich. I don't think we can do this. And, like, I go on a drive around the Provo Temple and I'm talking to my dad and I tell him what I'm worried about. And my dad, his response was, mark, are you an idiot? He's like, are you stupid? You're gonna break up with Rachel because she's not reading the Book of Mormon every day? I'm like, dad, this is. He's like, mark, you will be making the biggest decision of your life if you do this. And I'm like, well, my dad's never said that before. So I, you know, I eventually, I start praying desperately, desperately, like, God, help me, like, I want my family to be forever. But Rachel's not reading, and I love her. And, ah. And I remember having the thought like, it was. It was shocking to me. It was. It was not what I was expecting. But the thought that I had was, yeah, and she's loved anyway. And it was literally a foreign concept to me that you could not be doing all of the Mormon things and still be loved. I like it. I believed it when I had that realization, but I didn't believe it from. I didn't believe it because I didn't believe it for myself, because I wasn't loved right by anyone. Nobody showed any love for me, and I was doing everything. So how could Rachel still be loved and not even be reading the basic. The Book of Mormon? The Keystone, you know? And that was like, groundbreaking for me to think about the fact that she was just loved perfectly.

John Dehlin [02:48:30] So you kind of got that revelation, so to speak.

Marc Oslund [02:48:32] For sure, for sure. And. And like, I. Again, there's There's a lot of recontextualization that I know. Like, if, you know, seminary teachers that I have, that are friends, that are listening, be like, look at that. Justifying. I'm like, no, but we have. We have revelation that comes. That we interpret in certain ways because we've been told to interpret it in those ways. I think that with further understanding, we can look at the same experience and say, no, no, I don't think that was God. That was the name I gave for it then, and that's fine. But that moment, I don't. That doesn't have to be a divine being speaking into my ears, which I don't even understand the mechanics. I never understood the mechanics of how that worked. But, like, I truly sensed my, like, subconscious was saying, everybody's loved, Mark. You're love. It was trying to, like, bring that back out of me. So that's how I've reinterpreted it. And the hard thing is in telling the story is that I know that there's judgment of, like, look at that. Like, he just gave up on his testimony. He just. He. He's denying his testimony from God. And I'm like, that's.

John Dehlin [02:49:26] But.

Marc Oslund [02:49:26] But man, with all the other information, you know, so, like, it. It's hard. It's hard to be open about that.

John Dehlin [02:49:31] But the other thing that's weird is that Rachel's this good human, and you're, like, having to do all this work just to get to the point where you can think she's a decent human because she doesn't read a book that's, like, super hard to read and not always helpful when you do read it. You know what I mean?

Marc Oslund [02:49:48] Yeah. Like, Mark Twain says chloroform in print. And, like, it wasn't until I saw that, like, a couple years into teaching seminary, I'm like, dang it, Rachel.

John Dehlin [02:49:54] She knew it.

Marc Oslund [02:49:54] You know, Mark Twain. But no, what you just conveyed is exactly what she would say if she was here. Like, and what she told me, she's like, mark, do you know how hurtful that is, that I'm not loved as I am by you, that I have to be doing this in order to be loved fully? And I'm like, no. But she's like, no, you don't get it. And she hung up, and I was like. She held my feet to the fire. And what am I supposed to say, like. Because she's right. That is how I thought. It's not what I, deep down felt, but it's what I felt. Like, I Had to feel. And there's also an element of patriarchy

John Dehlin [02:50:29] to it where you're like this returned missionary and you're like, getting all righteous and she's not living it like she could. So it's. There's a power dynamic there where you're kind of making. And I'm not saying you're trying to do this, but the system is leading you as the returned missionary, as the guy who's doing all the things that you should be doing to make her inferior to you 100% in the relationship.

Marc Oslund [02:50:52] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [02:50:52] I don't know, I'm just. No, no, no.

Marc Oslund [02:50:54] You're a spot on. You're spot on. And like, for me, it was like, how do I. How do I not manipulate? That was never a word I would ever use. But how do I, like, convince her? How do I show her? And I'm like, well, the doctrine of covenant says with an increase of love and da, da, da, da, da. But I'm like, do I do it with anger? Do I do it by withholding affection? Like, none of that is healthy. And that's totally patriarchal. That I can't just listen to my wife or my future wife and say, yeah, for sure. The way that you feel is the way you feel. And I'm just gonna let it. You do do it because you have your own agency and your own thought process. Like, I absolutely was not on board with that. And so it was. It created a lot of tension. Eventually I got over it, which I'm glad for.

John Dehlin [02:51:31] But I just want to make the point that, like, even when you're on your mission, like, if we're thinking about, like, just general humans on this planet trying to do what's right. Compare you to, like, all these high school buddies, right? Or Rachel, like, not reading the book. Compare her and, like, what type of life she's living with, like, so many other humans on the planet at that age. These are like some high quality humans. And you're all feeling like you're worthless and terrible and there's all these manufactured crises that are literally just like, made up and causing all this sadness and trauma when it's two really good people that should be like, feeling like you're on cloud on top of the world, doing all this good stuff and everybody feels awful.

Marc Oslund [02:52:24] Yeah. And it's so, like, it's so, like, it's seriously the irony. I remember at one point it hit me when I was teaching seminary, like, what in the world? Like, I literally, I told my cause I felt guilty one day when I was teaching and I told my students about my friends. I'm like, dude, they didn't. I don't even think they went to college. Like, I don't even think they have a job right now. Like, and how on earth am I being like, oh, my gosh. Like, I didn't read the. The scriptures. I read it for 22 minutes and not 40.

John Dehlin [02:52:50] Like, like, literally, I got home at 9:35. It's 9:30. Yes.

Marc Oslund [02:52:55] Like, how on earth is that a

John Dehlin [02:52:56] healthy thought on a volunteer mission, but this you're paying for. Yes.

Marc Oslund [02:53:00] Like, man, like, how on earth. Like, it's just that perspective was. It's just not there. And it really. Yes, yes, yes. Like, oh, man. Like, how. How can we think that about ourselves? And like, absolutely. This internalized, this misappropriated. Like, there's just no perspective that I'm gonna somehow be going to. Like, God was stricter with somebody who was Mormon and not reading scripture than he was with somebody who never heard about Mormonism. And I'm like, that is backwards, man. Like, why on earth would God hold me to a higher standard? Doesn't he love all of us equally? And yes, I'm so glad you pointed out the sick irony of it. It's just so bad, you know?

John Dehlin [02:53:43] So what I want to do, I don't want to rush your story. And so what I want to do is for today's segment, it's going to be something like, you know, giving up major league space, giving up a major league baseball career for Mormonism or whatever. But I don't. I want. Next episode, we'll have you come back and I want you to talk about, like, seminary institute and that. And then maybe a third thing will be, like, faith crisis stuff.

Marc Oslund [02:54:09] Love it.

John Dehlin [02:54:09] But I want. But let's definitely get in Rachel's temple experience and everything up. And the dissolution of your baseball career.

Marc Oslund [02:54:17] Cool.

John Dehlin [02:54:18] Right? We'll start next time with your. Your seminar.

Marc Oslund [02:54:22] Perfect.

John Dehlin [02:54:22] So take us to the end.

Marc Oslund [02:54:23] Yeah. So Rachel's experience in the temple is just like. It was exactly what I felt, except for she was.

John Dehlin [02:54:29] Did you warn her? Were you like, hey, this is. I didn't love this.

Marc Oslund [02:54:32] Or were you afraid to. It was so hard.

John Dehlin [02:54:34] Supposed to ever talk bad about or you're not supposed to talk about it at all outside the temple, so you can't warn her necessarily. Or if you do, you'll feel bad and dirty.

Marc Oslund [02:54:43] Yep. And I was kind of trying to hope, like, I was thinking if maybe

John Dehlin [02:54:45] she'll have a good experience.

Marc Oslund [02:54:46] Exactly. If I could be positive with her, like, maybe she'll have a good experience and just really front loaded with. It's really good, like some weird things, but we're going to be okay. I had it. It was kind of weird, you know what I'm saying? Like, really trying to soften it in advance. And like her mom and dad talked to her about it and what would happen. So they were much more open than I had. I didn't have anyone, you know, and I had to do it myself. And I think that prepped her. I think she was probably even more prepared than I was. And we're in the LA temple and it's huge. It's like on a Saturday. I did tell her, I was like, don't go on a day. There's a lot of people go on like a Thursday afternoon in LA when there's like two people in this giant freaking temple. But she wanted to go on a Saturday because she wanted family to come. And I'm like, I wouldn't invite a lot of family if I were you. And she's like, but it's my family. I'm like, okay, you know, like. Cause I like, there's no way out, you know, like. And everyone's gonna come up to you and be like, it's so good, right? And hug you and you just like get away, you know.

John Dehlin [02:55:38] What did I just do?

Marc Oslund [02:55:39] Exactly. And so like in the LA temple, the only day it's ever busy, which is the irony of them building more temples, is just so thick. Because the only day the LA temple is ever busy is Saturday morning. And so we go then, and there's a ton of people and Rachel's doing. I'm kind of watching her because, you know, she's on the other side. Cause of. For some reason we have to be separated. And I'm just kind of watching this like, like sink in for her. And I'm just like, she's not liking it. We get to the celestial room and you know, her family comes up and gives her hugs. And I could. I know her well enough to know this isn't. She's not happy. You know, she's smiling, but she's not. She's usually very effusive, very kind, very outgoing, bubbly, even more than me. Like, I'm bubbly right now because I'm talking about deep things. Rachel is just a joyful person all the time. And. And I saw that and I'm like, oh, crap. But she didn't cry. She was all good. We go to the car, she has her garments on everything's done. And she just starts sobbing. Like, among the hardest I've ever seen her cry. And I am just like, what is happening? And so I'm comforting her. I'm like, what's going on? She's not talking. And she, like. I mean, it's like, I don't even know how it felt. Like an eternity that she's crying. She's like, I hate these garments. I don't want to wear them. I hate them. I feel. And she's just like. She can't even get, like, her full sentence out. She's just like, I hate that. I hate this. I hate what I'm wearing.

John Dehlin [02:57:09] She didn't love the temple.

Marc Oslund [02:57:10] No, no. And she, like. And. And I don't know what it was. I think I especially. I think for females, the garment sucks. Like, the way that it's cut, the way that it feels. It's not flattering. It's so, like. Like, it makes you feel so unattractive. And I think she was feeling all of those things, and it's hot, like, all of that. And I think she's just feeling like, oh, crap, I'm in this. I'm in this for good. I can't get out either. And I'm thinking, john, this is where I was. And this is what I hate so much about what Mormonism does. I want to comfort at first, but then I'm like, rachel, this is God's house. This is God's way.

John Dehlin [02:57:42] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You become the enforcer.

Marc Oslund [02:57:44] Yep. And I'm.

John Dehlin [02:57:45] Even if you feel the same way, even if you felt the exact same awful things, you become the enforcer.

Marc Oslund [02:57:51] Yep. And that makes me feel, like, disgusted, because I'm hearing what she's saying, and I totally agree with what she's saying. And I'm telling her she shouldn't feel that or that we should justify it or rationalize it, and that just, like, I hate that that was a thing that ever happened, and it happened multiple times and all of those things. And so I'm really sad about that. And that obviously put a strain on, like, crap. Like, this girl's not reading the Book of Mormon and she's struggling with the temple. And. But then the irony of I'm not even thinking about how much I hate the temple, I'm like, but she's not gonna go. I hate it, but I'll go. And so I'm just thinking, oh, my gosh. Like, is this our marriage? And I know from her perspective, she's thinking, oh, crap, look at this guy that I'm marrying, he's a religious zealot, and we are gonna have a terrible marriage. And so right off the bat, this strain from both sides, it's just. And it was not a great way

John Dehlin [02:58:40] to start a no marriage.

Marc Oslund [02:58:42] No, not at all. And mercifully, my experience where I realized that Rachel's love, no matter what she does, won over. And my love for her, like, she's so good that it's really hard for me to. How could I. How could I continue to believe this about her, that she wasn't doing good or she wasn't. Like, she is good.

John Dehlin [02:59:02] She.

Marc Oslund [02:59:02] She's always been good. Everybody that knows her knows this about Rachel. Everybody that knows both of us loves Rachel. My students, when they met Rachel, loved Rachel more than me. Like, everybody loves her. And so for me to be the one person being like, no, I don't think you're doing good enough. I refuse to be that person. At some point, it took a while, and I know Rachel blessed her for just waiting and being as patient as she was. I feel sad and sorry for the trauma that I caused her that I didn't help with. You know, I didn't want to be that person. I was just perpetuating, I think the harm that was perpetuated on me. Right now we see how systems do it. Right now we see how my mission president perpetuated harm because he had a mission president like that, and where did he get it from? From? So we see exactly how it happens. And it's. It's tragic. And we. We don't have the freedom to break out of that cycle. We. We think we do. We think we have the mental freedom to be like, oh, yeah, we're good. We're not good. We're. We're. We're not. We're not free to do that. It's the plausible deniability. There is no real way to break out of it without being labeled and branded and all of those things. You. You have to be this. And it's. It's just tragic for what it does. I. It destroys and harms and. And mercifully, my mom and dad loved me so much. They endure it. My sister loves me so much. My brother, Rachel, they loved me enough to continue to put up with the person that I had become their religious zealot. Just the letter of the law. Just intense, judgmental, Judgmental, insufferable.

John Dehlin [03:00:23] Yep. That wasn't your personality in high school, right?

Marc Oslund [03:00:26] Dude, I was the most laid back, like, other than feeling, like, not good Enough. Like, I was so laid back, and that's what my mom said.

John Dehlin [03:00:31] Having fun?

Marc Oslund [03:00:32] Yeah, dude. I love laughed all the time. I did stupid stuff. Like, I mean, we did. Like, we would just go egg things. I mean, we were exactly who you would hope a high school boy to be. Like, you know, you think of just boys getting dirty and rolling around and doing all that stuff when they're little kids, like, that's. I had the freedom and the privilege because of my family taking care of me to just be the most carefree, taken care of youth in the history of the world, it feels like. And Mormonism changed who I was because. And I just. I hate it. And my mom predicted it, and I. I hate that I was wrong. I hate that I didn't listen. I hate that I didn't see it, but I absolutely became a different human. And I'm still overcoming that.

John Dehlin [03:01:18] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [03:01:18] You know, let me ask.

John Dehlin [03:01:20] Let me ask really quickly. So in the spirit of informed consent, and I had a really cool listener reach out to me during one of my interviews with Chelsea, Nick, Homer. I asked about sexuality stuff. And they're like, you need to be more careful about asking people about sexuality and make sure you get their informed consent. So I'm gonna. I'm gonna invite you to say no or not answer anything that I say for sure. But I do want to ask a question that, again, I only want you to answer if you want to. Sure. And that's this. You had been sexually active, and I have no idea. And I'm not even asking you to disclose Rachel's past. But what I do know is that if. If in. In Mormonism, if one has been sexually active and one hasn't been, that can be a huge thing.

Marc Oslund [03:02:05] Huge.

John Dehlin [03:02:06] Not just because, you know, you may have had experience, but they hadn't, but they can also be resentful that you. They waited, but you didn't. And there's just the whole worthiness thing. Do you disclose or not? Do you hide it? And I want to just say I'll pass on that if you want to, or if there's any part of that you want to discuss, only talk about. And there's also the wedding night of, like, you know, for some, it's wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. And then it's your first time. But then for others, it may not be your first time for sure. Is there anything that you want that is relevant to your story that you want to share about any of that?

Marc Oslund [03:02:39] Yeah, definitely. I'm glad you asked. And yes, for all the listeners Yes, I accept a consent. Absolutely. Thank you for the disclaimer. I'm glad to share some of this is Rachel's story. Exactly. Yeah. And for sure. So. So I. And I. Yeah, she. It'll come up later because it's a part of seminary, but the truth is that she knew who and what cause she had been to the same parties. She knew the rumors. That's so the pros of meeting somebody who is a part of your high school.

John Dehlin [03:03:06] She knew.

Marc Oslund [03:03:07] Exactly. And that's also the con. She knew everything. So when she asked, I'm like, no.

John Dehlin [03:03:11] No what?

Marc Oslund [03:03:12] No, I didn't do anything.

John Dehlin [03:03:13] Oh, you.

Marc Oslund [03:03:14] Oh, I denied.

John Dehlin [03:03:15] You lied.

Marc Oslund [03:03:15] Oh, I for sure lied.

John Dehlin [03:03:16] So super righteous, self righteous, insufferable returned missionary who's like scrupulously trying to be righteous, flat out lies to his fiance.

Marc Oslund [03:03:27] Yeah. According to Randy Bot. I wasn't lying because I was a new creature. Right. So do you see what I'm saying?

John Dehlin [03:03:32] Right?

Marc Oslund [03:03:32] Like, you see what I mean? So I clung to it. I'm like, no, I'm new. It wasn't me.

John Dehlin [03:03:36] You were a virgin. You had been made a virgin in Christ Jesus through righteousness.

Marc Oslund [03:03:43] Correct. And so, no, I didn't do it. Old Mark did, but I didn't tell her that either. So I was like. And she's just like, looking at me like. Like she. She didn't say it this way, but eventually we talked about it and she was like, mark, I was at the party. I watched you with this person. Like, how could you look at me and say no? And I'm like. And that's what I did. I'm like, and. And I. There was two things.

John Dehlin [03:04:06] Learned to lie. Sometimes lie.

Marc Oslund [03:04:08] Yep. Lie for. Maybe this wasn't lying for the Lord, but, you know, kind of a little

John Dehlin [03:04:12] bit lying for the system for sure.

Marc Oslund [03:04:14] To. To continue it. And I. Yeah, it eventually comes out because I'll get to it with therapy after I've been harmed by sedan. But it's important, though.

John Dehlin [03:04:23] But at the moment, just to what happened at the moment?

Marc Oslund [03:04:25] Yeah, in the moment, like, she. She asked. And I was like, no, I never did. And she literally looked at me like I was just like, nuts. And I got very defensive because it's shame. Now looking back, I'm like, I don't think it's a bad thing, but at the time, I did. And so the internalized shame made the ego put up a ton of walls. And I'm like, nope, you're not getting in. I'm not letting you in here. And obviously she is Thinking, well, I can't be close to you. How can I be close to you? Because I literally know you're lying. But she didn't call me out word for word on that. And so.

John Dehlin [03:04:58] Not a great way. If emotional intimacy is the key to a healthy, happy marriage. And I believe it is not a great way to start a marriage. Lying to your wife and feeling like you have to hide who you have been and really are, and pressuring them because you're looking down on them because they're not living up to you. Not a great way to start a love affair.

Marc Oslund [03:05:19] Nope, it's not. And it's so real. And again, for Rachel to be able to deal with it and all, like, man, she tells me a lot because I'm very passionate. I can get very heated. And she's like, if only you knew what it was like to live with you. I'm like, well, I do have to live with myself. And that's a struggle. But she has been. It's different when it's. She doesn't see all the internal workings. And so she puts up with the law. And I. That was it right off the bat. Starting that way with the scrupulosity, with the patriarchy. Even if she didn't have the name for that. I didn't have a name for it at the time. And definitely with just the lying. I mean, that's what it was. And then, yeah, like, I have expectations from my experience of what. What it's like to have sex and what that's like. And she's never had it, so I'm understanding. And I've always been very kind. I really. And maybe she. I hope she would agree. I think I've always been about consent. I've never, ever, ever wanted to pressure her, but she, you know, has the good girl syndrome. Right. It's still a thing, and it's still hard. And it definitely was way bigger when we first got married. Right. Right off the bat in the honeymoon, it just was. How can you flip a switch? Yeah, how can you flip a switch from. This is literally the sync to murder, which she got way longer than I did. Right. For her whole life. And in Rexburg, which is like. I mean, Provo. Byu Provo on steroids. Right. And then. And then she also has this, like, this message that we get sealed, and the sealer says, like, I now command you to multiply and replenish. So it's not just. It's not just, oh, it's okay now. It's. It was the worst thing you could have done to. This is now what you have to do. And that distance for her, I know, was difficult, and in a lot of ways, we're still working through it. It's just so hard to overcome, you

John Dehlin [03:06:59] know, it's just not a great way to start.

Marc Oslund [03:07:00] Absolutely. And then. And I know. I think we'll talk more about this, but definitely, like, when I finally was clear with her, I think for her it was like, not just the betrayal that I lied, but also, like, I think she ended up saying. I know she ended up saying, she's like, what if you had an std? Like, I knew you were sexually active. What if you did and you didn't tell me? And she continued to put up with it, so bless her. But, yeah, it's just tragic, you know?

John Dehlin [03:07:25] So to end, there's the meeting with Bednar and a Catholic teammate, and then I just want to hear what happened to the end the of. I mean, this episode is going to be about the giving up your baseball career. So how did that all end?

Marc Oslund [03:07:38] Yeah, good question. So I end up my sophomore year. I do really well. I turn down the draft my junior year. I get a new set of coaches because we just weren't performing right. So we get a new set, and they take over and they see that my velocity is at 84 miles an hour. Yeah. Way low. Way low. So it should be. It should be no less than 88. Right.

John Dehlin [03:07:56] It's only four miles an hour, though.

Marc Oslund [03:07:58] It makes a huge difference in terms of the reaction time. And like, even from 88 to 92, and then you have guys in the major leagues are throwing 95 plus. And so, like, I grew up with Nolan Ryan. 100 miles an hour.

John Dehlin [03:08:10] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [03:08:10] And so the reaction time just. It changes things so much. And so, like, when I played against University of San Diego and Chris Bryant, who's one of the best players in baseball and rookie of the year, National League MVP, and I'm throwing 84 miles an hour. I mean, he absolutely obliterated. He was the only player that was just straight up better than me. And I was at my worst. But, like, I just wasn't getting it done. So the coaches had a conversation, so.

John Dehlin [03:08:34] So he got a home run off.

Marc Oslund [03:08:35] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [03:08:36] Not many people can say, you know, that. That they played against major league players. They got home runs off for sure. That's still cool.

Marc Oslund [03:08:42] It makes me feel a lot better, I'll tell you. So, like, when he. When he gets home runs off, Clayton Kershaw, who's, like my favorite player for the Dodgers, a Hall of Famer, and Clayton Kershaw gives up a bomb to Chris Bryant. I'm like, hey, me too, man. You know, I'm not as bad as you think, you know? So, like, it totally is my justification of I'm not that bad. So, yeah, I do take pride when he does well. And Trevor Bauer, who's another one who just overpowered me when I was hitting, when he does well, I'm just super pumped. So it justifies Validating.

John Dehlin [03:09:05] Exactly.

Marc Oslund [03:09:06] Validating. Exactly. Yeah. So he. So, yeah, I tell my coaches, they ask, what's up? And I'm like, my arm has hurt for, like, two years. Like, maybe you should get it looked at. And so I go get an mri. It reveals a tear, and that's just, like, the worst. I mean, there's a surgery that baseball players often get called Tommy John. It was named after the person who's named Tommy John who got the surgery to allow him to keep pitching. There's this little ligament in your elbow called the ulnar collateral ligament. And basically, the amount of pressure that is put on that ligament while you're throwing is. I think they said it's like, the equivalent to, like, raising your body weight like, 50 times or something. Like, it's just so much on this little tiny thing. And so I go get this mri. It shows that it has a tear. We go back to LA at, like, the top. The people that invented Tommy John surgery at Curland Jobe, the Angels team doctor, he is the best in the world at this surgery. And he says, I don't know. I don't see enough of a tear. Maybe we shouldn't do it. And I'm like. But I know it hurts. Something's wrong. And I'll just. I'll. I'll grin and bear it, right?

John Dehlin [03:10:10] But.

Marc Oslund [03:10:10] But I know it's not right. He ends up dying of cancer, which is tragic. Um, but I have to go see another doctor who's the University of Southern California team doctor. And he sees it, and he's like, look, you have two options. You can either do this thing called PRP that allows you to get some fluid injected into your elbow and hopefully it heals it, or you can get surgery. And I'm like, I just don't think it's gonna work. I think. I think I need to get surgery. So they opened me up in la, and they find out that it. The mri, the way that it located it, it was actually torn almost all the way through. It had, like, just a millimeter left. And, like, at any Pitch. It could have just gone. So I'm glad I did it. They moved my. My funny bone nerve from down in that little well up to my forearm. So, like, when I hit my elbow now it actually hurts worse because it doesn't send the tingle and, like, a nice scar. And anyway, I started rehabbing, and with baseball and I. I tried to get back into it, they had to take a piece out of long story.

John Dehlin [03:11:07] It's like, who pays for the surgery?

Marc Oslund [03:11:09] So my BYU was going to pay for the one in Utah, but since I went to a different person, they paid for whatever my dad's insurance wouldn't cover.

John Dehlin [03:11:16] Okay.

Marc Oslund [03:11:17] So ours was extra expensive. Eventually, they didn't pay the bill. And when I tried to take out a mortgage, I had a credit, like, hit on my thing because BYU didn't pay my bill. And I was so pissed because we had to pay, like, an extra, like, $30,000. They forgot.

John Dehlin [03:11:31] So it's like, did they end up paying it?

Marc Oslund [03:11:32] They did.

John Dehlin [03:11:32] Okay.

Marc Oslund [03:11:33] But I mean, I had the credit hit. So, like, when we bought a house, I think it was like $10,000 that we ended up losing because of it. I'm like, dang it, byu. But anyway, I started rehabbing. They take a piece out of my hamstring because they have to wrap it around. It's just this crazy procedure. You can look it up. It's really fascinating. And as I'm rehabbing my first time back on the mound, so it takes a while. It's a long process. If I were to be a first baseman, typically about six months, months for a pitcher. It's shortening now, but it's about a year to get back to full speed where you can pitch again. And the first day back on the mound, it was like tryouts. And we had this. This kid try out, and his last pitch he threw in, his arm literally snapped. Like, it snapped in half. Like I've never seen. My stomach just sunk. And I thought, I'm not getting on that mound. Like, I'm not ready for that. So my rehab was delayed because mental fear of getting hurt. Eventually, I started rehabbing. As I pitched on the mound, I felt another thing. It felt in that elbow, but not in the same spot. So I went back to the doctor, and they're like, they did an ultrasound, not an mri, but they saw a little tear in a different, like, tendon or ligament or something in there. And so I did this whole PRP treatment. It was miserable. And at that time, I was in a bishopric. Young, married bishopric. So I wasn't a high priest, but I was, like, the first counselor in the bishopric. And I'm thinking, baseball is falling apart. I'm not probably ever going to play again. If I will, I'm never going to be the same. What on earth am I going to do? And I talked to a couple people, and somebody said, you know, you can get paid to teach seminary. I'm like, no, you can't. Seminary teachers, that's a calling. Like, no, you can get paid. I'm like, really? You know, and so that was, in my mind, talked to another person in our ward. Our elders quorum president actually was a seminary teacher or was a student teacher. And I remember sitting on, like, the stand one day and being like, God, what do I do? I trusted that you would take me through this. And all that's happening is my life is falling apart in terms of baseball. Right. Everything else was pretty decent. Help me. And I had the thought, like, go talk to the seminary people. And a couple days later, I go on campus and meet with the seminary people, and we can leave that for next time and pick up. Up where? How that picks up. But I. I was ready to move forward.

John Dehlin [03:13:49] Was it hard to give that up?

Marc Oslund [03:13:51] Oh, tragic, tragic. I mean, I. I still ended up technically playing. I was on the team. I redshirted that year. I was on the team my senior year, but I was also teaching seminary at the time. And I just. My coach knew, and I walked in one day and I was like, coach, this is what's going on. I've been teaching seminary for the last however long, and. And I just. I think I have to quit. And I was sobbing. I lost football. Now I'm losing baseball. And my coach in tears is like, mark, we love you so much. They made it. They made me a captain on the team, even though I never played for this coach. This coach got me the job that I currently have after I quit seminary. This coach was so good to me. Took me on trips when I wasn't playing, like. And he said, we love you here. We're going to honor your scholarship. You'll graduate this year. We're going to keep your scholarship and go do seminary. Whenever doors close, I found in my life, that's what he said. Whenever doors close, other ones open. I want you to go run through this door and be the best you can be. And, like, I'm just bawling. And I go to a BYU devotionals on a Tuesday. And. Gary Stevenson speaking. Apostle. You know, I sit up at the top. I'm just wailing like, as not wailing because I'm not loud, but I'm just sobbing, you know, and he gives a talk on, trust in the Lord with all your heart. Lean not to your own understanding. And that was, like, my confirmation that I was doing the right thing and that things would work out great for me in seminary. And fast forward to nope.

John Dehlin [03:15:13] And I have to ask, like, if you had gone to the majors, would your elbow still have probably unraveled?

Marc Oslund [03:15:19] It's a good question. I mean, I've thought about that. So I definitely think I had some pain from high school. But here's what would have been different. I. I threw like a quarterback. Like, I pitched. I pitched like a quarterback. And the way that my arm was short instead of being, like, nice and long, and it's supposed to be very smooth, I was very, like. They called it herky jerky, and I'm just kind of moving and fidget. And they would have tweaked all of my mechanics to make them as streamlined as possible. And it's likely it would have alleviated a lot of it. I do think there's still some. And to be honest, like, a large percentage of major league baseball players get Tommy John, but being in a system, they would have tweaked my mechanics, made it better, and I would have had all the resources. BYU had great ones, but that would have been my sole focus. Right. Is just getting this thing right. So I do believe it probably would have happened. Rachel says that all the time, like, Mark, you probably wouldn't have been a pro baseball player, but I refuse to believe that. I'm like, no, I would have been a Hall of Famer, you know, not a Hall of Famer. I. I wasn't ever that good, but I definitely think I could have been.

John Dehlin [03:16:13] Yeah. Made a couple million.

Marc Oslund [03:16:15] Exactly. Exactly.

John Dehlin [03:16:16] And lived the dream for a little bit.

Marc Oslund [03:16:17] Exactly. Yep. For sure.

John Dehlin [03:16:20] Do we save the bed in our story for later, or does it.

Marc Oslund [03:16:22] Yeah, I mean. And we don't even have to get there. But here's. But the main. The main point is it was just another experience with Bednar. I'll tell it. It's fun. My coach, Bednar, comes to our baseball team and comes to our locker room. Same setup as before. Questions about revelation. Super intense. And we're going through all of this, and it's just super orthodox. I don't know how else to describe Bednar. You know, it's just very intense. And the thought of him being, you know, future prophet is extremely worrisome. And anyway, very intense. And we're doing a question and answer session and everyone's like on pins and needles and we're just feeling of kind, I mean, loved, but also anxious about like getting called out. And he was very firm about, I don't remember all the questions that were asked. At the very end, one of my Catholic teammates, who I just loved, he raised his hand and was going to ask a question. And right when he did that, Elder Ben, I was like, I'm really sorry, I have to leave. Like, let me bear my testimony. And my teammate kind of put his head down and was like, oh. Another one of our teammates saw that, told our coach, and our coach contacted Elder Bednar and said, hey, I have a non member teammate who would like to have a question, ask a question. He says, cool, can he be up in Salt Lake to meet with me on Thursday or whatever. And it just so happens that I was walking down from the big stairs at BYU by the Joseph Smith building, and I was standing next to this friend and my coach had just pulled into the only available spot for a parking for the athletic people and popped out and. And I'm right there. And he says, hey, can you be tells one of my teammate, what are you doing on Thursday? Uh, nothing, coach, just practice. Nope, you're not going to practice. And he's like, what? He's like, you're gonna go meet with Elder Bednar. He's like, what'd I do? You know, like, did I do something wrong? Which I thought is very telling, you know, but he's like, coach, I don't have a car. I was like, I have a car, you know, like, I want to go meet in the office of an apostle. And then I just.

John Dehlin [03:18:13] With a prospective convert.

Marc Oslund [03:18:14] Exactly.

John Dehlin [03:18:15] Catholic.

Marc Oslund [03:18:15] Yes. And so we get there and I bring Rachel uninvited. And so I didn't tell Rachel she was uninvited. But the secretary lets us in and says, elder Bednar, you have three guests. And Rachel's like, you didn't tell Bednar were you coming? I'm like, I thought he'd want to see you, you know. And it was interesting how it felt different. The reason I added it in here is because it felt different. For me, the approach was much warmer from the previous two times I'd been with Elder Bednar. And then there will be a third time that we meet with Elder Bednar. It's interesting that I've had him so many times, you know, but the approach was much warmer and it was much more inviting and it was much more understanding and Empathetic. And the reason I say that is because I felt like it was what was happening to me when I was getting my missionary lessons, where I'm like, wait, but you didn't talk to me that way in North Carolina. And I'm. It was a cruel experience, because how often do you get to meet with an apostle in their office? But I'm also like, wait, that. That doesn't seem real. Like, it felt. It felt way more open and genuine. He gives him a card, and just the. I think for me, it was also kind of presumptuous. Like, the card, it said, like, david Bednar, apostle of Jesus Christ. Like, that's all it said. I'm like.

John Dehlin [03:19:33] Like.

Marc Oslund [03:19:34] Like, that's kind of bold. Like, it. At the time, I was, like, smitten and starstruck.

John Dehlin [03:19:38] Right.

Marc Oslund [03:19:38] But looking back, and the reason I added it is because I'm like, that did not. It does not mesh with all the other things we know. And it doesn't mesh with the Bednar who makes people stand when he walks in. And. And it doesn't mesh with the Bednar. He says there's no gay Latter Day Saints. It didn't feel that way. It felt very, like, minus what he

John Dehlin [03:19:54] had said on your mission.

Marc Oslund [03:19:55] Yeah. So I'm.

John Dehlin [03:19:56] He.

Marc Oslund [03:19:57] He was just like. When we were in. In. In the cultural hall, and he was like, like, oh, right, yeah, you lost the spirit. That's why you're not baptizing.

John Dehlin [03:20:03] Oh, yeah.

Marc Oslund [03:20:04] And I'm like, geez, like that. It. It just felt very different. It felt very salesy. But I was obviously happy, right? Because this is a freaking apostle.

John Dehlin [03:20:14] And.

Marc Oslund [03:20:14] And I asked my teammate if he was com. Converted. And this was. This was huge for me later with seminary, and I was like, are you gonna read the book more? He's like, nah, probably not. And I'm like, wait. But an apostle sat down with love compared to maybe other things that have been used, sat down, looked you in the eyes, bore his perfect witness of Jesus Christ and the truthfulness of the church, and you weren't swayed at all. And I thought, like, maybe the power of, like. I know, right? I used to use that all the time. I used to think, if I said, I know powerfully enough, I know beyond the shadow of a doubt, that it would just, like, magically compel somebody to be like, oh, I believe. And so listening to Elder Bednar do that and having my teammate be not swayed at all, he's like, I'm still Catholic. Like, it was like, how could this be like. And I had just taught Preach my Gospel like Elder Benner. It was like he was reciting the lessons as perfectly as you would ever hope, and nothing. And so these are just little seeds that are planted that I'm not owning until I start kind of evaluating saying, what the heck. Like, things start lining up real quick.

John Dehlin [03:21:22] Go on your shelf.

Marc Oslund [03:21:24] Shelf. Exactly. Yep.

John Dehlin [03:21:25] Thanks for that story.

Marc Oslund [03:21:26] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:21:27] All right, listeners, so we're going to stop this episode, and we're going to have him back. So there's, like, way more ahead of us than is behind us, because we're going to talk about how Mark goes from being convert to potential professional athlete to, you know, a seminary teacher and what that was like. But then we're going to talk about what it's like to be a seminary teacher as the church is confronting the Internet age with me and Kate Kelly and CES Letter and the gospel topics essays and how they're, you know, the church is teaching their seminary institute teachers to deal with the problems. And then we're going to talk about how a CES teacher, Mark, ends up questioning his faith and dealing with that, knowing that if he loses his job, he can do what can he do? And then, you know, what does he do? What does the seminary teacher do when they lose their faith? Faith. And if they end up leaving ces, how do they rebuild a life when they have a young family and a wife who doesn't work? This is like, more cool stuff ahead. This is part one. Stay for parts two and three. I'm sure there's going to be a part two and a part three. But, Mark, this has been awesome, and thank you so much for being willing to tell us your cool story so far.

Marc Oslund [03:22:40] Thanks. And thanks for listening. I came here because I wanted people to know they're not alone, and I'm honored that I can be here. And for anyone listening, I often listen to podcasts all night, like two Speed or I judge people on it.

John Dehlin [03:22:52] That's so rude.

Marc Oslund [03:22:53] Yeah, I'm like, it helps me.

John Dehlin [03:22:55] Like, I'm slow.

Marc Oslund [03:22:55] No, no, no, no. Because I'm busy. Because I'm busy and my brain works fast. I have adhd, but I. But, like, I thank you for listening and continue. Like, it's. It's humbling that you would think of my story worth any time of. Of yours. So thanks for being here.

John Dehlin [03:23:08] All right. You're awesome, Mark. All right, stay tuned. Come right back. By the time you watch this, the next episode is there. So just go to YouTube or go to your podcast app and just click on the next episode. Episode. And we'll hear part two. Thanks, everybody. Thanks, Mark. You're awesome. Thanks.

Becoming a Seminary Teacher

Part 2 of 3 · Ep. 1424

John Dehlin [00:00:00] Hello everyone and welcome back to my epic interview with Mark Osland. For those of you who didn't catch the first, I don't know, three and a half, four hours, however long it was. In the first part of this interview with Mark we talk about how Mark grew up in la, grew up as kind of an all American baseball player and football player or at least that level of performance in, you know, top notch California athletic programs. How he always wanted to play professional baseball and or football, but also how he was raised kind of in a non religious environment. But when he fell in love with a Mormon girl named Faith from his high school, he ended up converting to Mormonism and his football career was cut short. But he was, he was offered three different, he was, he was drafted three different times in the the majors as a star baseball player, ended up going on a mission, ended up choosing BYU other over other better schools, ended up declining those major league baseball drafts, played against in high school, several really famous successful major league baseball players ended up going on a mission and was all American at BYU as a baseball player. But everything was kind of cut short because of injuries. You could even argue that some of those injuries were at least partially tied to his taking two years off and then coming right back and pitching. But long story short, he had the chance to play in the majors, turned it down for Mormonism, then got injured and, and then was never able to play. But also what I think is, you know, really fascinating about his story is how he went from kind of this fun loving, casual, you know, teenager, engaged in normative, healthy teenage activities to this hyper scrupulous, hyper conscientious, kind of insufferable, judgmental Mormon, always feeling ashamed, always feeling unworthy, and even judging his parents and others in ways that really drove wedges between him and his important family members. For me, I think the most heart wrenching of that was his own mother who was not able to attend his wedding to his wife and who he just wasn't as close to as he would have been if he hadn't wouldn't have gone down the road of orthodox Mormonism. So that was all part one. We kind of ended part one with kind of the unraveling of his career as a baseball player. But we're just getting started because that's not even why I really wanted to interview Mark. What we're now going to talk about is how Mark became an employee of the LDS Church of the Mormon Church's Seminary and Institute program or CES Church education system, how he became a seminary teacher and became. Became a seminary teacher in some of the most pivotal years of the history of church education. Because as I understand it, around 2013, 2014, he's. He's becoming a CES teacher. And that's just from the time when the church is starting to come out with its essays. It's just around the time that the CES letter comes out. And then it's just around the time that Kate Kelly gets excommunicated, that I get excommunicated. And then just this flurry of Mormon and ex Mormon Internet activity and podcasts between kind of 2015 and 2018, 2019. So we're going to cover what it's like to be in ces, what his career was like, how he was trained, what he experiences simultaneously as a CES employee for the Mormon Church and as someone that started to have doubts and questions. And that's going to be maybe part two. We'll see how long it goes. And if we extend into a part three, we're going to then cover what happens when you lose your faith. And as an employee of CES, when you've given 5, 10, 15 years of your life to an organization where you really don't have viable job opportunities, if you choose to leave it, you give up retirement, you give up benefits, and you have to face all the social and familial pressures and judgments that come along with that, you know, and kind of where, you know, where he's landed and where he goes. Now, there may have been a few sneak peeks. We're going to try to stay with the timeline this time and not give any more sneak peeks. But today's episode is all about what it's like to be a teacher in the digital ace for the Mormon Church when the Mormon Church is coming undone. And then what do you do when you lose your faith and have to figure out what to do with your life, when your whole family and your income and your career has been based on being a church educator? So, Mark, how was that for a summary of part one?

Marc Oslund [00:04:35] Spot on. I mean, it was so good. And honestly, like, for me personally, the exciting part of my story, especially for this audience, is this portion.

John Dehlin [00:04:42] Right.

Marc Oslund [00:04:42] Like the first part, I think, you know, it's interesting. It gives depth, nuance, what have you. But what I'm most excited about is this, and talking about seminary and talking about what it's like. I think one of my biggest things right now is just how people are thinking, oh, church is changing. And I'm like, you don't know. So that's what we're going to talk about. I'm really pumped.

John Dehlin [00:05:02] And you know, that's saying something like, not many people get a chance to play in the major leagues. And the fact that you're saying that's nothing compared to my experiences with seminary, I mean, that's fascinating. So without any further ado, let's jump back or jump forward wherever, and let's just talk about when you first started becoming interested in CES or teaching seminary, and then what that process is, like, how it was for you and then how it unfolded.

Marc Oslund [00:05:30] Awesome. Yeah. So I, I realized really quick after I, when I started getting hurt with baseball, I'm like, I probably should have a better backup plan than, you know, a humanities degree. At the time at byu, they were telling us, hey, what do you do with that? That was our big motto in the humanities college. What do you do with that? And I'm like, I have no clue. Like I, I genuinely, in my brain, I was going to play pro baseball. I didn't think I would finish a degree. Not because I couldn't. Felt smart, but I didn't finish. I didn't think I would finish because I'd be drafted before my junior year. And so now my junior year comes around. In fact, my senior academic year comes around and I'm hurt and I'm rehabbing. I'm thinking, what do I do? So I'm, I'm. I had an opportunity where I was just desperate. I remember fasting and thinking, you know, fasting is where we get answers to, from, for prayers, extra benefits, which is such a weird thought. Like that God needs us to suffer. Right. It's just another example of things that I didn't pick up on, that God needs me to suffer in order for him to speak to me.

John Dehlin [00:06:25] Like, meaning deprive yourself of food.

Marc Oslund [00:06:26] Exactly. Deprive myself of food, of money. Right. Cause fast offerings. So if I give up something, then God will then answer me, right? I'm praying and I'm not getting answers, so I have to sacrifice something more. And to me, that was like a yeah, for sure, but I didn't recognize. It's all of these insidious little things of self denial, self betrayal in order to make God care about me. Right. And so I'm up on the stand because I'm in.

John Dehlin [00:06:50] And I just. For listeners, that's a really important theme. You know, if, if you haven't listened to part one, pause it and go back and listen. Because Mark tells this really heart wrenching story of. In middle school Being judged and feeling unworthy and how from that point of his life, probably until now, has been this hustle to feel worthy. Yep. So he's now just talking about having a fast and pray to be worthy of communication from God. There's so much behind that. And so if you haven't listened to part one, go listen to it and then come back, because that's. That's a really powerful part of the first part.

Marc Oslund [00:07:24] Yeah. Thanks, John. And that, to me, that feels like the theme of so much. And then. And really, you know, it's just. It's just a big deal for me, realizing my own worth and what it ends up doing to change my life. And so as I'm fasting and praying and begging God to give me an answer, I'm up on the stand because I'm in a married student. Bishop R. And somebody was just talking, and I had this thought, like, go talk to the seminary people. And I'm like, what does that mean? Go talk to the seminary people. You know, And I. I remembered, like, in that moment, oh, we have somebody in our ward that's going through the seminary, like, whole process.

John Dehlin [00:07:57] You. You converted your senior year?

Marc Oslund [00:07:59] Yes. Never went.

John Dehlin [00:07:59] So you never went to seminaries?

Marc Oslund [00:08:01] Never went. Yeah, I. All I knew was from my. My wife at the time who was like, hey, do you want to. Do you want to go to 6, 5, 30 in the morning and go read Scripture? I'm like, no, I would never want to do that. Right. So, like, and. And then. And then on my mission, people said, do you know seminary teachers get paid? I'm like, no, they don't. And they're like, yeah, they do. And I'm like, okay. And I get home and I realize, wait, they really do. And so my first thought was, crap. I was lied to. And then the second thought, like, you know, unpaid ministry or whatever. And then the second thought was, that sounds kind of nice. Because the only time I was truly, like, happy on my mission, like, genuinely just, like, back kind of to my joyful self when I was in high school was when I was eating with members, just talking to them about their lives, just being a normal human again and kind of letting the missionary badge go away a little bit. And then when I was teaching people, which was more rare than not. Right. In North Carolina, we don't have that opportunity. And so the knocking on doors and trying to convince, I hated it. But I loved teaching, and I especially loved the youth that I would get to teach. I just. There's something about them. I loved high School, I had a good high school experience. And when I joined the church, I kind of had this self realization that I had, you know, obviously been hurt as a, as a kid in middle school. But, but in. So like, by being hurt, I also wanted to go back and fix the ways that I had hurt other people, to try to hide my own hurt.

John Dehlin [00:09:21] Right.

Marc Oslund [00:09:22] As the, the quarterback on the football team and the freshman, you know, starter on varsity baseball, I had a lot of influence and I never, I didn't use it the way I could have, which was caring for people, reaching out to people who were eating alone at lunch. And it wasn't until I joined the church, you know, halfway through my senior year that I realized, oh, crap, I wish I would have done better. So it's kind of all of those thoughts that were already in my subconscious and I thought, I think I'd be good at it. I was talented as a missionary. And so a couple of days later I go up on campus at byu, the Joseph Smith building, the religion building. And like, I looked it up on Google, you know, seminary, how to become a seminary teacher. And it gave a couple different spots, like Rexburg, and I think they maybe had one in Arizona and definitely at byu. And so I went and knocked on the door. A secretary, super nice, greeted me. I said, hey, I'm Mark Osland. Like, I am interested in teaching seminary. And she says, great, yeah, why don't you come in here? And it just so happened that one of the two instructors was there, and that's more rare than not. They're not often there. They're either watching teachers or in meetings or doing whatever else. And so I walked in and I introduced myself and he said, tell me a little bit about you. And I told my conversion story and I told my experience as a missionary. And he said, you know, Mark, at the end of this, he says, you know, we don't typically do this, but I just. We had an opening. We just turned down all the student teachers that we didn't like, and one just randomly came up that we weren't prepared for. And we don't want to call those people and tell them, hey, you got a shot. After we said no, because we didn't think they were going to be good enough. Would you come back tomorrow with your wife and meet with my partner and we can, you know, figure out if you want to be a student teacher. And in my mind I'm like, yes, of course. Like, I don't have to go through this whole process.

John Dehlin [00:11:08] And totally the process is pretty Intense, right?

Marc Oslund [00:11:11] It's totally intense. It used to be like three classes. Now it's just one University classes. Three university classes, right. So I don't even know what the other two were because it was before my time, but now it's like Religion 471, which is like preparing to teach seminary. And you go through this class and you like, truthfully, it didn't. My preparation for teaching was on a mission. That class did not prepare me to be a teacher. Right. It was, here's a couple of the intricacies, but it was not a class that really helps prepare. And then you get an opportunity to do like a one day class. And if you do okay with that, then a couple of weeks later you do one more one class. And then if you do okay with that, then you get two weeks. And then if you do okay with that, then you become a student teacher. And while you're doing a student teacher, there's other process that I'll explain. And as you're going through this process, it's just constant, like, am I good enough? And you're comparing and wondering and, and I didn't want to have to go through that. I, I feel like, you know, I, I had enough self confidence from other things in my life where I'm like, yeah, I think I'm talented and good. But then there's that subtle doubt that kicks in, right. And so we come back, my wife and I on like, let's say I meet up with them on a Tuesday, we come back on a Thursday and meet with both of them, explain my story to the other person that was there, and they kind of confer and they say, mark, we'd love to give you an opportunity to be a student teacher. And I'm like, without taking the class? Yeah. We love for you to teach. You're gonna teach down in Provo at a charter school called Freedom Academy. Like, that's awesome. When do I start? Well, you start in a couple days. You'll go and you'll shadow and you'll start preparing and getting your lessons ready. And I'm thinking, holy crap. Like I've never been in a seminary class other than like on my mission to talk about missionary work. I've never been the teacher. You know, I just want to jump

John Dehlin [00:12:55] in and say that you, you know, you were kind of the church's PR dream, you know, you're all American athlete, convert, like charismatic, you know. And I think you mentioned last episode that like, was it your, the opening of your mission call that was like on BYUtv. So like, who, who wouldn't. What, what church? Just like John Travolta or Leah Remini or Tom Cruise, like, or, or Donnie Marie Osmond or, you know, Steve Young. What church wouldn't want to like, trumpet and herald an all American athlete that literally gave up playing in the major leagues to follow their love for the church and the gospel? So I mean it, as I hear about how hard it is to become a seminary and teacher and how many people are turned down and how competitive it is and then hear that you just kind of like, do, you know, pass, go. Do not, you know, don't you have to go to the class? Like, I, I don't know, but, but I wonder if your story is just like a dream story for church pr.

Marc Oslund [00:14:02] I mean, I'm sure, right? Because when you think about what I'm able to offer a class, I'm able to reach kids that are unreachable a lot of times with like the cool baseball players, the cool jocks, like, I'm able to speak their language. It's like Paul Dunn. Yes, exactly. I'm able to talk about, hey, you want to know why somebody would join? Let me tell you all the reasons, you know, and it's very.

John Dehlin [00:14:20] Because I joined.

Marc Oslund [00:14:21] Correct. I am, I am that like, hey, you're doing bad things. Me too. I was doing bad things. Come back, you know, and so I think I really, it makes sense now looking back why they would want that. And I do think, you know, I, I want to clear, like, I, I do think I'm a talented, good person, but I don't think I'm overwhelmingly so. And so I, I, it was really cool and flattering. I found out later that you're right. I think percentage wise, it's really close for people. With all the numbers of people who apply to be a seminary teacher and actually become one, it's like a major league baseball thing, right? In terms of percentages, like, it's just so few seminary teachers get hired every year. I don't know, 50, maybe out of however many thousand that apply. And then you think about professional baseball and, you know, there's 40 rounds of a draft and there's, you know, 26 teams and it goes all the way down. So percentage, it becomes about very similar. Where now I'm thinking, okay, I'm not going to be a professional baseball player, but look, I kind of hit the jackpot with this for the Lord.

John Dehlin [00:15:23] You're going to be a teacher for the Lord. Exactly, yes.

Marc Oslund [00:15:26] And I'm like, look, that's what I thought on my mission, right. That I'm going to give up my life and God is going to make it right for me. And now I think, okay, it's seminary. That's how it's going to be. And I was really hoping it would be a. Like, I would be confident the whole time because these two, like, trainers, I think they called them, were so supportive and right off the bat I felt very much like they liked me. And so I got ready that summer I kind of went to Provo High just to. Cause there was no space at this tiny little school that I was at. It was like me and another person who actually just had a podcast I listened to today that he just came out as gay, which is really interesting. The seminary principal.

John Dehlin [00:16:05] What?

Marc Oslund [00:16:05] Yeah. Yep.

John Dehlin [00:16:06] Okay.

Marc Oslund [00:16:07] Yeah, so we, it's. It was something to listen to. It was on like Richard Osler's podcast.

John Dehlin [00:16:11] So one of your former seminary principals has just come out as gay? Yep. Okay.

Marc Oslund [00:16:16] Yeah, it's, it's. It was definitely something. And we'll get to my experience with talking about being that. But my, my point is, I just, I felt like it was going to work out really great for me. And so I started teaching right around the beginning of my senior academic year, which was my red shirt, junior baseball year. So technically I saw two more years where I could play baseball. Um, but I was going to finish my degree that year. And like I mentioned in the last episode, I kept getting hurt. It was just not working out for me. The more I got hurt, the less I was able to be with my teammates. In terms of weightlifting, I would have other requirements. And so fortunately that allowed me to focus on teaching.

John Dehlin [00:16:58] And you had the surgeries, right?

Marc Oslund [00:16:59] Yep, I had the surgery. And then I had another thing that came on and I got this injection and it was just like thing after thing after thing that just continued to pile up for me. And the rehab was just not going the way that it should have. Like, I, I should have been pitching. I had my surgery in, let's see, September of 20, you know, 2012. And I should be done by September of 2013. And. And I wasn't. It just wasn't even close. So I did start, um, I remember couple lessons. Like I had never been in a seminary class. I. I don't understand the distinction between church and state, especially in Utah. I know an early morning setting, hey, this is just purely religion, but I think is. Am I. I know I'm paid by the church, but how does it work? Am I allowed to pray? Like, I had no idea. So I didn't even pray in my first couple lessons with my students because I didn't know I could. I. I just never seen it. It sounds stupid, but I'm like, I thought that I was some. I just didn't get it. And so a teacher might. One of those trainers came and watched me and at the end he's like, you know, you can pray, right? I'm like, uh, now I do. I just had no clue. And we were teaching the Book of Mormon and these kids are really sweet and I really like them. Um, eventually one of the trainers said, you know, you are a very, you know, you're athletic person. These kids are maybe more into, you know, video games or they're, they're really smart chatter school kids. He's like, I just don't know if this is the best fit for you. We really want to give you a chance to teach at American Fork High, which is, you know, a great baseball program in Utah Valley. And we want you to connect. And so I got the opportunity to go to American Fork High School. And I do have to note that in this process, we also had one person who goes around and he is the one who sees every single student teacher in seminary and his job is to say, okay, you and at BYU, you guys only know the people you have at BYU. I know the people we have in St. George and in Arizona and in Rexburg. And so I'm the one that sees the overarching vision of who's coming down the pipeline. And so if there's like a debate on if this person's good enough, I'm kind of going to be the tiebreaker because I've actually seen everybody teach. So he came and most of my lessons were, you know, 60 Minutes. I felt like I'd get in, get out. I really like that. But one day a week it would be 90 minutes, which is more the norm here in Utah. And so I taught a 90 minute lesson. It was the first time I was teaching Isaiah in the Book of Mormon. And we all know it just feels like just trudging through molasses, like it's just torture. I'm teaching freshmen for 90 minutes the book of Isa or, you know, the deutero Isaiah that's in the Book of Mormon, right? And I remember thinking, I'm so bored while I was teaching. And I thought, well, that's it. And we get done and we go into this office and the coordinator person comes and asks, he says, how do you think that went? And we Know from previous experience, I am the hardest person on myself. And I just start sobbing. Right? That was the worst. It was so terrible. Blah, blah, blah. And no comfort. Like, again, there was just nothing. I was like, well, if you feel that way, you know, like, yeah, I feel that way. Can you help me? And eventually they said, mark, we know you're a good teacher. We want to give you another opportunity. And. But it was just another way of there. I just felt like there was no empathy at first. It was kind of like, you can cope and then we're going to come through and provide the solution of we're so merciful by giving you another chance, you know? And so I go.

Teaching Early Morning Seminary and Student Relationships

John Dehlin [00:20:25] I just have to say, please. Having never. Like, I went through four years of early morning seminary and I was raised in the church. So, like, by the time I'm graduating from BYU, I've got 24 years of indoctrination and four years of early morning seminary and four years of religious instruction of BYU. Imagining converting at age 17 or 18, never going to seminary, going to, you know, BYU, but then trying to teach early morning seminary without that, without family, home evenings, without, you know, lifetime of scripture study. I cannot imagine how difficult, like, I, I could not have reached the level that they expected as a convert with that, Short of. With that minimal preparation. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:21:11] Thank you. And I appreciate your kindness because even hearing that, I'm like, thank you. Like, somebody hears me, you know, like, all I've, All I've wanted for so long and, And a huge reason why I'm here is like, like, I want to be seen. Like, I feel like I've done so much, I've given so much. And then she's like, hey, just shut up and stay in the corner. And so thank you for seeing it. It just, yeah, and, and I, I mean, look in their minds, they were merciful by letting me have another chance. And so I, you know, I get to go teach again. But it just. That would have been so kind. Like, Mark, you're doing great. Like, wow, you're so, you know, you're charismatic or you're smart or you. The kid's really engaged. And, you know, the more we did these, these meetings, I'm kind of gauging how I'm doing based on the feedback that others are getting. And others are getting really good feedback, or at least they're saying they are. I feel like in my mind, I'm really, I'm like a catch. Kind of like, hey, please. Like, I think I should be a good teacher, but my Feedback is not good. And so that's what you're constantly doing and you're measuring, measuring it. And seminary is always saying, hey, make sure you have a backup plan. Make sure you have a backup plan because we can't promise. And so I'm, you know, going through this. I just quit baseball. Now I'm like, I'm invested, like, and you're telling me maybe like have a backup plan. I lit. I had no backup plan, even though I wanted to. And so, you know, I teach at American Fork High and I really loved it a lot more. They were much more my experience in high school, you know, I met with one of my students was ended up becoming a BYU basketball player. And so I'm able to kind of relate on ways that I couldn't with charter school kids who again, who I, who I really loved, but non ones that just didn't, you know, speak to me personally. And so in this process, we end up meeting. You have to meet with a general authority to have basically an ecclesiastical endorsement that you would typically with your bishop or stake president. But it's like, no, we need to whoever's in the classroom influencing our youth, like we need to make sure they're good. And so I'm hearing from a couple of my friends and they get their scheduled. It means that, hey, you're progressing down this path we're interested in. You were like so happy and good and joyful. And she's like, yeah, we just talked for a while and talked about how good seminary is and how our lives are and blah, blah, blah. And I get scheduled with David Baxter from Scotland. He's a big bald. Like this is not a dehumanizing comment, but he reminded me of Shrek. Like, I wouldn't say like he is green or an ogre. That's not what I mean. But he was just very big, bald, Scottish accent and frankly kind of mean. So it was all of those things. And I'm like, crap. Like everybody else got these really nice general authorities and of course me, right where I have have people in my life that have just consistently kind of been cold to me. And now I get, you know, Elder Baxter. And so we have our meeting in the church office building, the big tall one. And he's like in charge of, I think like the temple department or something. So we go up to whatever floor we're waiting. His secretary tells him we're here, me and my wife, and we go in. He says, mark, Rachel, nice to be with you. We're trying to make some small Talk. Rachel's like, oh, you're from Scotland. Yes, I'm from Scotland. Rachel's like, I just did an internship in London. I spent time in Scotland.

John Dehlin [00:24:13] I loved.

Marc Oslund [00:24:14] He's like, nice. Thank you. Mark, do you know why you're here? Yes, Elder Baxter. I'm here because you need to make sure that I am, like, qualified, whatever else I said. And he says, mark, I'm here to tell you that if you are not worthy of the spirit, we do not want you in seminary. With that being said, would you please bear your testimony to me? And I'm like, like, oh, crap.

John Dehlin [00:24:34] Like, who's worthy and who defines it and how would you know and exactly. Ever be fully worthy?

Marc Oslund [00:24:40] Exactly. And so I'm start. I'm going back to the same thing I did right on my mission. I'm like, crap, did I not repent of this and this thought and just immediately back to all of the crap that I felt like I had, you know, been I had repented of probably four times or five times or seven. And so Elder Baxter, and then when he says, bear your testimony, I'm thinking, well, he's going to judge my worthiness based on how powerful my testimony is. And so I'm like, I gotta make

John Dehlin [00:25:05] sure this is good.

Marc Oslund [00:25:05] You know? Like, I know beyond a shadow of doubt and all of those things. And I'm just constantly doubting. No affirmation, just kind of looks. Yes. Mark, do you love your wife? Yeah, I do. I love her so much. I tell her every day that I love her. He turns to Rachel. Rachel, does he love you? Yes. Like, he does. He tells me, does he show you? And she's like, uh huh. Like. And there's one more question he asked where it was just so painful to me to. It just felt like unnecessary praying at that point. We both kind of like almost blanked out where it's just like, okay, we're just being berated here. Are there any sins in your life that you have not yet repented of? Like, yes, I'm good. And the way that I said it though, is so tentative, where I'm just like, crap. I don't know. Like, this is a 70. I've been taught to. That these people can see through my soul, right? That the spirit of discernment allows them to tell things that even I can't see. I wish I would have known then what I knew now. Because it would have been like, the only authority I give you is the authority I give, I give to you, right? You have no authority over me. It's just if I believe that you do. And so anyway, he had all the authority and at the end he says, okay, I will be, you know, talking about this with the Lord and we'll determine if you are ready for, you know, approval from ecclesiastical side of seminary. And so me and my wife, we get out of the church office building. Her, her parents are randomly in town from California and we meet up at City Creek and she just starts sobbing. And her mom's like, what's wrong? Like didn't you just meet with the general authority? And she's like, I was just like, I felt like I was being berated. And I'm like, Rachel, he wasn't even asking you questions. And she's like, I know, that's why it's so bad. Like she felt so ashamed for me and worried for me and also worried for herself. Like I don't, I'm think, I think she's thinking, I don't like the temple. I don't want to be in the temple. Am I ready to be a seminary wife? In fact, when I told her I wanted to be a seminary teacher, she said two things. She said, mark, are we going to be poor? I said, I don't think so. I think we'll be okay. And she says, are you going to be weird? I'm like,

John Dehlin [00:27:13] I hope not. She knew.

Marc Oslund [00:27:16] I mean, she could tell the direction my life was heading. And mercifully she snapped me back, right? Like, like having a spouse in seminary who says the scriptures are boring is extremely rare when seminary spouses are in it with their spouses. Rachel being like, nah, I don't want to read. No, I don't want to do home evening. No, I don't like the temple. I'm thinking crap, like we're going to get exposed really quick, you know. But I, I appreciated her because she kept me normal. And I also think she's why I was able to connect with students. I could have gone really far, as we know, on the scrupulous side, on the really intense side. She brought me back to reality. Hey, Mark, don't shove this down kids throats. And I'm just, I was very appreciative of that. Also appreciative. Elder Baxter gave me the approval and so abused in the inexperience. But then mercifully, look how good we are. We gave you approval. So this is the constant theme, right, of what's going on.

John Dehlin [00:28:07] And I just have to. As I'm reflecting on that whole process, one thing that comes to mind is just Auditing from Scientology. Just this. We know things about you, and we're going to use them against you, because you had confessed to bishops in the past, and you had confessed to your mission president. You had had all this stuff happen on your mission. And so, like. And, you know, you'd been taught that though your sins be scarred, they shall be white as snow, but yet they keep coming back, and they keep coming back, and it's clear that. I mean, they. They obviously do that to keep you in your place, to keep you down, to keep you afraid. And whether they're doing that or not, but it's certainly having that effect, for sure. And then the second thing that comes to mind is just how cheesy it is to have it be on the conviction of your testimony, because people can make that up. People can make all sorts of testimonies that are. Mark Hoffman, how many people did he fool? George Lee or Paul H. Dunn. It's not a good way to measure goodness of someone's character to. To decide how to hire an employee. And it was clearly traumatizing for you and your wife, for sure. And, you know, I. I guess every organization has got to figure out how to qualify someone for employment, but that feels really problematic and kind of abusive.

Marc Oslund [00:29:28] Yeah, most definitely. And. And, I mean, if my experience is like that 85 or plus percent, I. I'm the only one that I knew of that had that experience. Everybody else was like, yeah, we just shot the breeze. It was all good, and just feels. So now for me, you think of how my brain has worked throughout my time in Mormonism. I'm thinking, well, that was God. God sent me to him. And so I'm racking my brain for all the things that I must have done wrong to have earned a conversation with Elder Baxter that was very firm. Or what am I giving off? Or what have I not repented of that would make him be not cordial and joyful the way that other people are cordial and joyful. And we know that it's just personality and other things that play in. But I just. I kept getting kind of the short straw on all of these people I was meeting with.

John Dehlin [00:30:09] With. And the other thing that comes to mind when a. When a church leader says, is there anything in your life that you've ever done that you haven't repented of? What are some of the. I mean, I can think of, like, one thing that comes to your mind. What comes to your mind?

Marc Oslund [00:30:20] Oh, my. Sex. Any masturbation, Pornography. Like, where did I.

John Dehlin [00:30:23] And what are the Chances that all the other candidates were. You know, we know that it's like 90 to 95% of men at that age masturbate. That's just a fact. So what is most likely about all the other people you're competing with when they're asked that question? What are they doing?

Marc Oslund [00:30:40] Yeah. The answer is they're either lying or they're. Or they're confessing it. But they're lying. Right. Because nobody would confess that, especially in that situation. And so they have this opportunity and they say, no, not me.

John Dehlin [00:30:51] So you're learning to what?

Marc Oslund [00:30:52] Lie for the Lord.

John Dehlin [00:30:53] You're learning to lie. And then what do we know? Probably about Elder Baxter himself.

Marc Oslund [00:30:56] Right, exactly right. I mean, it's part of his life.

John Dehlin [00:30:59] Every bishop I've ever. I mean, I've been trying to ask every bishop I've interviewed, you, Mormon bishop, did you masturbate while you're Mormon bishop? And it's always an awkward question, but it's. It's pretty much yes. It's always yes. And it's not because I have some fascination or obsession with this subject. I didn't masturbate before I got married, and I don't get derived sexual gratification from these interviews. What the. You know, some people are like, why do you always ask people that? I will tell you why I asked that. It's because I have found that. That sexual shame is the main way that the Mormon Church humiliates and humbles and gains power over its youth and its young adults. That is like the leash. It's. It's the sexual shame is the leash that they can always jerk you by and have power and control because you always, you know, you always are unworthy. You're always having bad thoughts you shouldn't have, and you're sometimes, you know, touching yourself in ways you shouldn't. And so you're always unworthy. And so you need Jesus, but Jesus isn't enough. You need the church and the bishop and the sacrament, and then you got to pay your money and, you know. Am I overstating?

Marc Oslund [00:32:11] No, no, you're 100% right. And. And for me, it feels like they're taking something that is one of the, if not the most natural parts of our human nature and saying that's wrong. So if that's natural and it's wrong, you now have every person that is feeling terrible. You are now this the cure for something that is not a problem, but that everybody is doing. And so it's a way totally to gain power. And. Yeah. And I Mean, we'll see this in my. With my experience with my students, how often they're talking about their guilt and how I refuse to perpetuate that and how eventually that gets me in trouble. And so I just. It's absolutely 100%.

John Dehlin [00:32:46] It's traumatizing.

Marc Oslund [00:32:47] Oh, so traumatizing. Because you're always feeling like you are the problem. Problem.

John Dehlin [00:32:51] It's actually abusive. I. I think it's. It's abusive, and it's abusive to our children, it's abusive to our youth, and it's abusive to our adults.

Marc Oslund [00:33:00] I couldn't. I couldn't agree more. In fact, one day, I was like. As I'm going through, you know, some of the things we'll talk about, and I just. I was like, God, like, what is going on? This word came to me. Like, you have been abused. And I'm like, yep. As soon as I named it that, I'm like, holy crap. Like, so much power. So abuse is absolutely the right word.

John Dehlin [00:33:22] And you're. I felt it, too.

Marc Oslund [00:33:23] Oh, for sure. And without me, even, like, again, even though I felt it, I see her crying. I'm like, no, but this is the Lord.

John Dehlin [00:33:29] And this.

Marc Oslund [00:33:30] So you defended it.

John Dehlin [00:33:32] You defended it. She was right. And you defended it even though you felt it, too?

Marc Oslund [00:33:37] Yep. It's so. It's, like, so tragic. And I'm sure she's thinking, like, what is wrong with you? Like, how, Mark, we were just in this. You just got berated. I'm feeling terrible, and you're telling me the problem's on me, and that's exactly the issue. And so I couldn't agree more. And, you know, mercifully, I get through this process, and I'm successful. I teach better. The second time this, like, main guy comes, and I. I really knocked it out of the park. And the kids at American Fork, I'm really connected to. And it's just as it. I could tell that it was going well, but nobody would, you know, kind of open up. A couple of the people that I was, you know, talking to were feeling much more confident, like, hey, you. When it comes around, you're in. Like, you're good. You know, I never got that. And so I had quit baseball. I was actually doing some broadcasting for the baseball team, like, just color commentary every once in a while. And one night, I get a call from this person, like, the person in charge of hiring. And, you know, I answer off or I ignore it, answer off the air. He's like, hey, are you with your wife? I'm like, no, I'm doing broadcasting. He says, well, wait till you get to your. With your wife. I'm like, crap. You know. And so I. Rachel's at work at the time, after the baseball game's done, and so I'm just waiting, waiting, waiting. And we call and he doesn't answer. And back and forth. Eventually it's like, you know, 11 o' clock at night and we hear that, hey, I got hired and. And I was going to be placed in the Utah. Utah Valley area, which are. I told Rachel, I was like, I'm not going to Idaho. I'm going to Salt Lake or Utah Valley. And so I said, if you, if you don't move me there, I'm not doing. I'm not going to Beaver. I'm not going. You know, I just. I'm from la. I can't. Like, Utah county was the smallest place I could ever be permanently, you know. And so when he said that, I was ecstatic, you know, that I would. We'd be in Utah Valley. And I actually found out that I got the job. So he told me where we were going to be, but I found out that I. I got the job earlier that day. I had taken my last final and I popped out and one of my friends was like, did you get the email? I'm like, what email? Like, oh, crap, I didn't get hired. And the freaking email is so bad. It's like, letter from Seminary. You know, the subject line. And then the second or third paragraph is when it finally says congratulations. The first two paragraphs are like, thank you for your service. You've given. And I'm reading this, I'm like, I didn't get hired. It's my second last final. I got one, like, freaking. One more to take. I don't have a job. I'm getting fired. And then finally, after all these, like, these nerves, I'm like, oh, no, no, no. Oh, congratulations. Like we were offering. It was just even. That is like, rephrase that. Stop being so abusive. Just say congratulations in the freaking title, you know. But gosh, you know. And so I get this job, I'm in Utah Valley, I graduate, super happy. Everything works out really well. Rachel and I are doing great. We have a meeting for new hires up in Salt Lake. They take us around, you know, the Joseph Smith Memorial Building, and, and we meet our area directors who are the people in charge of the area we're gonna be. And they're gonna tell us what school that we're gonna be teaching at. And so we were hoping it would either be Tippanoga's High and Orem or Pleasant Grove High School. And something about the name Pleasant Grove. I mean, it's Pleasant, right? I really wanted to be at Pleasant Grove. And when this person told me, hey, we're going to put you, mark, to the Pleasant Grove area, I was just ecstatic. You know, here's our dream. It's happening. I've put up with all the crap. My elbow's broken. I can't throw. Hey, I'm going to teach seminary at a school that I love, you know, And I thought I'd be there for years and years and years. And I was just, you know, Rachel, on the other hand, was kind of like, crap. Like, this is all working out too well. Like, I want to be. I want to make money, man. I want you to be a seminary teacher. And so what can you.

John Dehlin [00:37:02] What? And I want you to only answer whatever you're comfortable. What can you tell us about the starting salary?

Marc Oslund [00:37:08] Yeah, so we, we started. I think we started at 40,000. Okay, 40,000. And. Oh, and that's important they tell us, don't talk about your salary with other people, you know, because I think some people start. There's like a range that they tell you, and they're like, hey, some people start higher and some people start lower. And then every, every year you get an increased paycheck. So let's say I was in the bottom third of this tier that I was in. Say 40,000 was the very bottom. Somebody else might actually have started at 45,000, but their yearly raise is only like $200, whereas mine would be $3,000 to catch up. And so they made. And we literally. I never talked to a single person directly about their salary or I tried to. And it was like, we don't, you know, we don't talk about that. Which is so. It's so typical for, you know, the Mormon Church. I did know that eventually, if you have master's degree, PhD and two things they call certifications, and you've been teaching for, like, 20 years, you could probably get up in six figures, right? And so I'm thinking, Rachel, just hold on. You know, we're making 40k right now.

John Dehlin [00:38:05] I just have to say, I, I, you know, I started out at Bain and Company. I think I was making 36 or 38,000 a year. And that was, you know, a few decades ago, went to work at Arthur Anderson. I was making 32,000. Like, 40,000 is not awful.

Marc Oslund [00:38:19] No, it's not.

John Dehlin [00:38:19] Terrible start.

Marc Oslund [00:38:20] Yeah. And they tell us Master's degree. Exactly.

John Dehlin [00:38:22] No graduate school.

Marc Oslund [00:38:23] Exactly. And on, frankly, no teaching. Like, I was a humanities grad and my experience was in on a mission. That's my teaching experience. I'm not qualified to be a teacher. Now I have a master's of education and I definitely feel like I could walk into a history class at, and I could teach. You know, I'd still need some training. But I absolutely do feel way more qualified now. But at the time, I'm like, what do I know? I'm not a, I'm not a teacher. Like, I've taught one subject for six years, you know, or four years, however long it's been. And so it was a good starting salary. I knew that we would be okay. They told us they paid us like business professionals and, you know, looking to see where, you know, I've eventually left that teaching profession. Now I'm like, yeah, I guess you kind of pay us like some business professionals. But, but, but please don't act like you're paying us like we are salesmen or like we're actually bringing money because I, you know, we leave, friends leave, they make six figures right off the bat. We are making 40K. And you know, slowly, by the time I left after teaching six years, it was like 52,000. So that's not great. Yeah, exactly.

John Dehlin [00:39:23] And so benefits at the end are great. The benefits are probably good and the retirement's probably really good.

Marc Oslund [00:39:28] You know, employer match up to like 5%. And I think it was maybe 4 or 5%. And then DMBA.

John Dehlin [00:39:33] Right.

Marc Oslund [00:39:33] Which is the church run at insurance program. We don't have a, any deductible and the premiums are really low for health insurance. Exactly. So I mean, that does that, that is a factor. Like it is a factor in terms of all the, the benefits that we get. The downside was they said, hey, we're paying you like this because now you're teaching. You have to be there all year. You're not just school teachers where you get, you know, two. I mean, they're, they never really get time off. But, you know, two months without kids teaching and you can kind of come in and work. They're like, no, you must work year round. Even doing random crap, which ends up getting me in trouble later. Right. Because you got to be at the building at 7am in the summer. I'm like, for what? There's no kids here. So it just kind of sets up a club. And truthfully, the lack of trust that they had, like you were getting paid by the Lord and Then realizing, yeah, sure. But also like people are stealing time or you know, you guys have 130 billion or whatever else. Like why are you pressuring me to be here at 7:30am in the summer? It's just, just kind of.

John Dehlin [00:40:31] And you did pay 10 tithing on your 40. On your 40.

Marc Oslund [00:40:34] 100. Okay, no doubt, no question. So yeah, that's a part. And see you later. You know, $4,000 or however much it was. Plus, plus what's the.

John Dehlin [00:40:41] That's interesting. Yeah, so that, that's actually not quite as good.

Marc Oslund [00:40:45] Yeah, Exactly.

John Dehlin [00:40:45] Give it 10 back.

Marc Oslund [00:40:46] Exactly. It's like, okay, well here's. Now you got a $36,000 salary or what have you, you know, and so, and then fast offerings when you're supposed to give a generous fast offering and yeah, yeah. So yeah, I, Rachel was not as happy, but I was just like, good, I got a job. It's going to be consistent. My big thing has always been I want to just have, you know, consistency, safety. I mean, in my mind I'm thinking church is not going anywhere, right. It's only going to grow. Seminary teachers, you'll never, you'll never leave, you'll never be out of a job unless you do something really bad. Right. Like Mitchell. Mitch. No, not Mitchell. Pratt. Mark something.

John Dehlin [00:41:21] Pratt. Right.

Marc Oslund [00:41:21] At Lone Peak had just gotten in trouble. Just gone to jail for having sex with minors at, at Lone Peak Seminary.

John Dehlin [00:41:27] This was a seminary teacher.

Marc Oslund [00:41:28] Exactly, yeah. And so he had just gotten in trouble. I'm like, well I'm never gonna do that. And so therefore I'm never gonna lose my job. And yeah. So anyway, super pumped to get hired that summer. You know, I move into my office and in Pleasant Grove and it's like this awesome corner office where my office is connected to the class and my mentor is just like somebody who I still really like, I mean it today is a friend of mine. I talk to him, love him. A lot of the people that are in that faculty are, I truly like, I may not agree with them on everything now, but I enjoy as people. And it felt very much like my baseball locker room where kind of like, hey, we can kind of joke around and we'll rib each other and you know, we'll teach, we'll do something good. And I just felt very loved and accepted and valued and you know, we, again, we'd be able to joke around and talk and it was just so good. That year was the Doctrine and Covenants. So that's what we were teaching that school year, which meant it's also Doctrine and Covenants in church history. And so this is right. Again, right around the time when you. Your podcast is really, like, in the Spotlight. Right. So 2014 is my first school year. 2015 is when you get excommunicated. But you're doing Mormon Stories, right? You're doing all this right at this time.

John Dehlin [00:42:40] Yeah, no, 2014. So I started Mormon Stories in 2005. So this is eight years. Eight. Nine. This is nine years into Mormon stories. But Kate, Kelly and I, I received the letter within the same week we received the letters, our letters, that we would be having a disciplinary council. Let's just say mid. Mid 2014.

Marc Oslund [00:43:02] Okay.

John Dehlin [00:43:02] So.

Marc Oslund [00:43:02] Right, right.

John Dehlin [00:43:03] Kate would have been excommunicated. You know, summer. Ish. Or early fall. 2014. Yeah. And then mine was delayed until early 2015.

Marc Oslund [00:43:13] Got it. So it's literally the same time. Right. Thanks for clarifying. Because. Because this matters. Right. Because in the. In the conscience of what we're talking about in our trainings and is the things that you're bringing up, the things that Kate's bringing up, we're talking about the struggles that kids have, feeling like women should have the priesthood or truth claims. And so these are conversations that we're having on a regular basis.

Confronting Difficult Church History as a Teacher

John Dehlin [00:43:31] So let's. Let's back up just a tiny bit. How are you trained to deal? Like, tell us a little bit about the training. And then, like, how do you learn about the Book of Mormon? What do they teach you about Doctrine and Covenants, about Joseph Smith, about church history? What is the training? Like, what is the curriculum of the training? And then. And I'm sure it's changed between then and now, but then how did they train you then regarding handling of problematic questions? And then. And then I definitely want to cover how that changed over the multiple years you were there.

Marc Oslund [00:44:04] Cool. Yeah. And so definitely, to start with, I would just say that there was a, especially when I first started, a general discomfort with being open. It was. Some teachers felt more confident. Yeah, for sure. Oh, 100%. Among CES in general, it was way worse than even it was at my school where I felt like we. We truly had some of the most dynamic teachers in the system at the time who are now going on, and they're all leader, all in leadership, and they're all doing really amazing things because they were dynamic and they were confident, which meant this unique kind of cluster of teachers, like, you know, 12, 14 of us in a school. Yeah, we. We. We had a huge faculty.

John Dehlin [00:44:42] Where.

Marc Oslund [00:44:42] Pleasant Grove.

John Dehlin [00:44:43] Pleased Grove had 12.

Marc Oslund [00:44:44] Yeah, 12 full time teachers. Yep. And. And amazing, amazing teachers, with the exception of maybe two at the time, like really good teachers who were very confident, which meant they felt comfortable going into these things in ways that other teachers wouldn't. Which meant at the time when I first got hired, the conversation around doubts and struggles was very. Not like what they would call struggles was very kind of tiptoeing around it. Much more so than at the end. And definitely even after Elder Ballard's talk that he gave in 2016.

John Dehlin [00:45:16] Which we'll get to.

Marc Oslund [00:45:16] Exactly. And so at the time, it was very closed off.

John Dehlin [00:45:19] So would you guys all meet as a faculty and have training meetings or weekly meetings? Would you train each other? Would you have like, brown bags and

Marc Oslund [00:45:27] how to handle issues in the summer? We. We spend a lot of time doing what they call in service. So we have like a huge week of in service where it's like we have, you know, different keynote speakers and whatnot. Most of the time it would just be seminary leaders, people that are telling us the vision for the area and what we hope to do, seminary priorities. We'd also have a day where they would basically have the church, the administrator of ces, whose name is Chad Webb and still is there. He would speak and we'd have our. The 70 that's in charge of church education, who at the time was Elder Johnson, and then he wasn't. It was Kim Clark and then it was Elder Johnson now. And so he would speak and we'd have training from different general authorities that would be a part of that. All online broadcast to us. And we'd also have like, breakout groups where we'd be able to choose a topic that we really cared about. So one of them, I. If not the first year, definitely the second year. You know, women in the priesthood. How do we handle this? Always taught by a woman. Right. Women in the scriptures. And it was always very much affirming, kind of the patriarchy. It was always very much affirming the church. There was never, ever, ever any talk, especially in those early years, about questioning leaders about, hey, this is a policy and not a doctrine. It was my first few years were like, as, you know, typical as you can imagine in seminary. Right. Without any openness or desire to really expose.

John Dehlin [00:46:52] Just kind of read the manuals and teach from the manuals. Yep. Okay, so like, like in your first couple years of seminary, would you have known about anachronisms in the Book of. Would you have known about anachronisms in the Book of Mormon? Would you have known about Book of Abraham. And the problems with the translation from your trainings in seminary institute, would it have ever been addressed? Hey, Joseph Smith was a polygamist. And. And. And he did practice polyandry. And here's all the many wives, and here's all the ones that he, you know, all the other, you know, all the women that were married to other men that he also married, you know, was. Were any of the, you know, the temple ceremony, and it came from the Masonic Lodge. Were you ever educated on any of the problems so that you could A, know them and then B, address them? No.

Marc Oslund [00:47:42] And I mean, we have.

John Dehlin [00:47:43] You didn't know.

Marc Oslund [00:47:44] You didn't know that we had the gospel topics essays and. Well, those came out in.

John Dehlin [00:47:48] Started in 2013.

Marc Oslund [00:47:49] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:47:50] Right.

Marc Oslund [00:47:50] Yep. And so just start.

John Dehlin [00:47:51] But like, at the end of 2000, I think.

Marc Oslund [00:47:54] Yeah, right around that time. And so we. I mean, we didn't have training on them. We had. Hey, these are the resources. So our. Our new seminary manual that had just come out had links to it or references to it where we basically say, go read the gospel topics essays. But the. Most of our. Our study and a lot of the teachers that had trained me. So that was our broad, like, kind of our area thing and definitely didn't come from there. I'm confident in that. By the time, you know, a couple years later, we end up do having way more, you know, kind of bold stuff with Paul Reeve and Terrell Givens that I'll talk about, because that became fundamental for me. But at the time. Absolutely not.

John Dehlin [00:48:27] So when those essays came out, what was it like for you?

Marc Oslund [00:48:29] Oh, I mean, for me, I read through it and I was kind of like, huh? Joseph Smith really did have multiple wives. Because I was in North Carolina and these Baptist ministers are telling me, you know, no, Joseph Smith had multiple wives. He's a fallen prophet. I'm like, no, he didn't. Like, what are you talking about? It's just Emma, you know, because the freaking video that I watched a thousand times.

John Dehlin [00:48:47] Just Emma. What do you mean?

Marc Oslund [00:48:47] Yeah, Just Emma was the only wife. No one else. It was just Emma, you know.

John Dehlin [00:48:51] And that's what you told people. Exactly. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:48:54] And he, like, read the plates, you know, line by line. I'm like, rocking a hat, like. And so I'm reading through these essays and kind of like, oh, crap, like, what they said was right, which. Which to me made me feel like, well, it's. It's no big deal, because, you know what happened for me, I had teachers when I was learning this for the first Time that could recontextualize it for me. And they could say, well, what about this? And. And do it. And look at it this way, a big one for us was. And this came from the Gospel topics essays on polygamy, where it says, like. Like it's about its participants. We see through a glass darkly, and we don't have all the information. And that was our big pitch. Like, we don't know everything. So just trust, have faith. And because I had them literally right there, I would go, hey, I just read this, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah, here's how you. Here's how you spin it. It wasn't as disconcerting for me as I think. My gut was like, red alert, red alert. But I immediately had it squelched because they were in the office right there next to me, and I'm like, you guys are. Who were the seminary teachers?

John Dehlin [00:49:52] All these charismatic, experienced, lifelong members, you know, born in the Covenant, six year six, generation pioneer ancestry. If they're all saying, oh, these are not the droids you're looking for, this is everything's fine.

Marc Oslund [00:50:08] Correct.

John Dehlin [00:50:08] Then what's it like for. For brand new convert, you know?

Marc Oslund [00:50:12] Yep.

John Dehlin [00:50:13] So what was your reaction?

Marc Oslund [00:50:14] Well, my reaction was just like, okay, well that's okay. Deep breath. I guess it's okay then, you know, and like, it's just I didn't have the. Even if it was as small as, let's say I'm on a vacation. Cause we didn't have a lot of vacation days. So I didn't take vacation days for my first couple months. If I would have been like in California at home reading these without them right next to me, it probably would have done more damage. But I'm talking about, like a matter of two minutes between the time when I read the content and I had an answer that I felt was brilliant to squelch the dissonance. That's how much time I had to sit with the cognitive dissonance that I felt. And I immediately said, this is a beautiful, brilliant answer. So I'm not stressed, I'm not worried. Cool. I can go teach this with confidence. Church is still true, right? Because the immediate thought every time you have one of these happen is, oh, crap, church isn't true, or this isn't true, or they lied, or, wait, that's not what I know about Joseph. Or, you know. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:51:09] The other thing that I'm sure will come up more and more is once you. Once you have a job and you've graduated and you've got a spouse and Maybe kids are going to be coming on the way, like, what are the incentives to really dig into problems versus just like, oh, man, like, what are the. The stakes are super high.

Marc Oslund [00:51:31] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:51:31] I even want to go there 100.

Marc Oslund [00:51:33] And like, eventually I find this quote, and I think it was maybe you that introduced it to me, or somehow I found it where it's like, it's difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon him not understanding that thing. And so while I still consider all of these people very brilliant, I also know from personal experience when your salary and your whole livelihood is attached, there is a limit to how far you are willing to go. There's just a limit. And I know that these are good people, and I know from experience that a couple of them have real questions, you know, but they are maybe not as bold in their boundary pushing as I am, or, you know, they are more willing to kind of sit with it because there's, there's higher stakes. They're older than me. I was the youngest. I look, I didn't have yet a family. I didn't have five, six kids.

John Dehlin [00:52:16] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:52:17] And so if they start doubting, the stakes are getting even higher and higher and higher. The longer you go, the harder it is to leave. And so I was mercy. Mercifully, I was kind of still at the beginning, and I felt like these brilliant teachers were helping me. And so fascinating experience. I also, that was the year I read Rough Stone Rolling by Richard Bushman, which one of the teachers was reading. Somebody who I really admired, who later becomes a principal. That really takes care of me. But he, you know, he was reading this thing. I'm like, I've heard about this. I want to read it. And I remember reading it and reading about what Bushman talked about with Joseph and how he approached translation and the peep stone and the treasure digging. I'm like, what the hell, right? I didn't think, I didn't think that at the time because I would never swear. But, like, I'm just thinking, this is not Joseph.

John Dehlin [00:53:00] You said that reading roughs and rolling,

Marc Oslund [00:53:02] it was so shocking to me. Like, I. This is not. Not who Joseph's supposed to be. Because, I mean, the rhetoric around Russell and Rolling is, oh, that's a, you know, that's an anti Mormon book in ces. Oh, for sure. What, it's changing now, right?

John Dehlin [00:53:16] Back then, for sure, there's a couple

Marc Oslund [00:53:17] that were more brave, that were more brave. Like, no, no, no, it's not anti Mormon. He's still faithful, but absolutely That's a. There are still so many people that are very afraid of that book, even though they know Bushman's still active at all of those things. That is an anti Mormon book, you know.

John Dehlin [00:53:32] So just to be clear, there were CS employees saying, stay away from Roughstone Rolling because it's anti Mormon.

Marc Oslund [00:53:38] For sure. Still now. Still now.

John Dehlin [00:53:39] Still are.

Marc Oslund [00:53:40] Absolutely. Absolutely. And mercifully in my faculty. Again, I felt very fortunate because there were a lot of very, very charismatic, talented, smart, unafraid. Like, I felt like they trained me in ways that I wouldn't have gotten at any other faculty in the area. Sincerely. Like, I admire everyone but two of the people on that faculty, you know, and so it was a really interesting time for me. As I read Rough Zone Rolling, I wonder, I just.

John Dehlin [00:54:06] I wonder how a CES teacher can know that Rough Stone Rolling is sold a deseret book written by a patriarch and a stake president and still think it's anti Mormon. Do you do. Maybe we. You don't know?

Marc Oslund [00:54:20] No, I mean, I don't know, but my insight here is like anything that causes people to doubt the institution is evil.

John Dehlin [00:54:26] Like, I mean, I shouldn't say that because I know there are apostles.

Marc Oslund [00:54:29] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:54:29] Who view Rough Stone Rolling as anti Mormon. So if there are apostles that believe that, certainly there's going to be cs.

Marc Oslund [00:54:37] Yeah. And I just think it's like the best good is the church. Like, they view. Hey, people staying active in Mormonism is the ultimate good. This is where lying for the Lord comes in. You know, it's all about whatever we have to do to keep people in. So therefore, anything, even if it's truth, even if it's real history, is bad because it changes the way that people feel about the predominant narrative. And so I think for me, that's where it comes from. I also think there's a huge fear that these teachers have. Even if their rhetoric says they're not of losing their faith, I think that that's a real thing for them. I think they mask it or cover it by being like, I have a rock solid testimony you'll never doubt. I think they know that there are possibilities and cracks that they don't want to explore for further or that they have and it's made them scared. And so I don't think they want to wade into really what I believe is in their core. They sense, hey, this is. This is probably not right, but I'm just going to leave it there. The church, it doesn't have the church's name on it, therefore it's not approved.

John Dehlin [00:55:33] Yeah, it's basic confirmation bias and cognitive dissonance management. If you're. If the information you receive doesn't jive with how you feel, you have to either, you know, selectively think new thoughts or obtain the information you need to. To sort of readjust so you don't feel bad, or you need to pursue the information and then make a bunch of really uncomfortable decisions. For sure. But we use confirmation bias to ignore the stuff that's. That's inconvenient and to grasp the stuff that's convenient so that we don't have to be made super uncomfortable or do super hard things.

Marc Oslund [00:56:07] Exactly. And like your brain, it's literally making you feel feelings of pain. It's like, nope, I don't like this. So you will find, try to get back to. To that stasis however you can. And most of the time, the church does really good at being like, wow, there are problems here in the Book of Mormon DNA. And there are issues we just can't know. So we can have faith in God. And everyone's like, ah, thank you. That's how every essay ends. Right? It's always like, yeah, there's some messy things, but today you can pray and gain a testimony. Literally everyone ends that way. I know that because Ballard said, know the essays like the back of your freaking hand. And so he didn't say freaking, but like, the idea being, I know those essays and I know the agenda. They'll present it in ways and they'll be clear in ways, but then they'll kind of obfuscate things like a few months shy of her 15th birthday regarding. Right. Fainting Algeria and so things like that.

John Dehlin [00:56:54] I'm not picking up on that was someone else, actually.

Marc Oslund [00:56:56] Yeah, right. Oh, sorry. Sorry. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. You would have thought, like, I would.

John Dehlin [00:57:00] Helen Markimbell.

Marc Oslund [00:57:01] Yeah, There you go. Helen Markimbell.

John Dehlin [00:57:02] Thank you.

Marc Oslund [00:57:02] I'm just like. But yes, like the back of my hand. I just totally like, yeah, I know,

John Dehlin [00:57:06] like the back of my hand.

Marc Oslund [00:57:07] And I get it wrong. But anyway, the point is, is that, like, I know these essays and I'm reading them and I'm. I'm feeling the dissonance, but they're masterful at weaving it so that it feels good and faith promoting at the end, which is exactly what seminary manuals do too. Hey, here's a couple messy things. By the end, it's continue to have faith in the Lord. Um, Rough stone rolling ends. Basically, my interpretation was Joseph is a mess, but I. I love it because it shows God's power. Bushman highlights. I think it's DNC, you know, something 124, 123, where basically he says, like, the Lord called Joseph Smith out of his weak to highlight his God's strength. And for me at the time, I'm like, that's a beautiful message. Yes, Joseph is way worse than I ever thought he was and way creepier and way more strange. But look at how good God is, because God can do amazing things through a man who does horrible wrong things. The Kirtland Safety Society. How can he be so wrong about that? It's just God's strength, you know. And so that was the message that I ended up taking. And that was the thing I ended up teaching that year over and over and over. We started really strongly with, hey, prophets are gonna get things wrong. Have patience and faith and make sure that like, you just continue to stay faithful. It's okay to have questions. It comes back to first episode. I talked a lot about my mission president, Elder Bednar. Questions, questions, questions. Keep asking questions. Get revelation. That was my entire theme that whole year. Ask questions. I wanna know your questions. Um, write in your questions on a piece of paper, put it in this bowl. We'll read them during class or I, I found a tool that would allow people to text in their questions. Hey, text in your questions. I want it. We'll see em on the screen. But here's what it did for me, John. It becomes this thing where I, I have my own questions that are assuaged by the teachers that I'm around. But then I start hearing and seeing the questions of these kids, kids who I truly admired. Like, when I think about my first couple years in seminary, like, we adored the kids in Pleasant Grove, like so much. We just, my wife and I both just fell in love with them. And these kids who I thought were bright and brilliant and doing everything that they should be doing in Mormonism, every single thing. Writing in questions like, how come I feel depressed every day when I wake up, up? How come I don't feel like God loves me? Why isn't God answering my prayers? Why? What about all of this with like, am I not worthy as a woman? Right, because of what's going on? What about this question, you know, of church history, uh, all of these things that I'm seeing, kids presenting, largely them saying, I'm not happy. And I'm thinking, what, what's wrong here? Something's off here. Because these kids are doing everything that we tell them to do in Mormonism, every single Thing. There's not a single thing that we like. They are the best of the best at Pleasant Grove in terms of being Mormon. Like, I couldn't think of better ones. And yet they're so unhappy.

John Dehlin [01:00:11] Or the kids are unhappy.

Marc Oslund [01:00:12] They're unhappy, meaning they tuck it down. They'd smile and put on a front. But if you really got down to it, so many kids are just like, man, I'm miserable. I feel stressed. Like, just the anxiety and the depression.

John Dehlin [01:00:23] Stressed about what?

Marc Oslund [01:00:24] About their religiosity. That they're not good enough. They're not getting answers. They're not faithful enough. They had sex with somebody. Okay, crap. They, like, there's a porn, everything. Yes.

John Dehlin [01:00:32] Touch someone's boob, you know?

Marc Oslund [01:00:34] And now. So this is where my experience and their experience begins to merge. Where I think, holy crap, they feel exactly as I felt. And so what?

John Dehlin [01:00:42] What do you mean, as you felt?

Marc Oslund [01:00:43] As I felt, like, so anxious, so depressed, so crappy, so worthless. So God will never love me. The conditional Jesus. I'm seeing all of them feeling the exact same things, and I'm thinking, I don't want them to feel what I felt.

John Dehlin [01:00:56] How did you know they were feeling these things?

Marc Oslund [01:00:57] They would respond and they would share, right? They'd share their. I think one of my strengths as a teacher was I genuinely wanted to listen to the kids. Rachel taught me this, right? This is how she kept me normal in seminary, where she says, mark, they don't care about what you have to say. Just listen to them, Mark, don't worry about grades. It's seminary. Nobody cares. Just make it a safe place for them. Just things like that. Mark, they don't want to read Scripture. Ask them their opinions. So, like, my class was a very open. Been like, please share. Please tell me your thoughts. Stop me if I go on too long. I just want to hear from you, basically. And then I ended up telling teachers, I think, like, our job is to, you know, tweak our classes so that they work for them, not tweak the kids so that they work for our classes.

John Dehlin [01:01:45] So what types of things would the kids say that gave you the sense that they were in hep?

Marc Oslund [01:01:49] I mean, they would come into my class and be like, I'm depressed. I want to. I want to commit suicide. They would come into my class and say, my mom and dad are pressuring me to go on a mission. I don't want to go. They'd say, I, you know, just had sex with this boy, and I don't want to talk to my bishop. I mean, it's. It's.

John Dehlin [01:02:02] They would say this in front of the whole class.

Marc Oslund [01:02:04] No, they would come in afterwards. Right. Because they. They had this development. Or sometimes they would text anonymously. Right. They would absolutely share those things anonymously. They wouldn't raise their hands openly and share that. They would either text in anonymously, and it would show it on the screen that I would have, like, our projector screen.

John Dehlin [01:02:19] Okay, so you'd have. You would. You had an instructional technology system that would allow students to text in anonymously. Questions or concerns that then would show up on the overhead, and then you would. You would have to talk about those, correct?

Marc Oslund [01:02:38] Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:02:39] Okay.

Marc Oslund [01:02:39] So. So that became fundamental for me. Right. I felt like that was my unique strength as a teacher. I would greet kids when they came into the door. My. My classroom was the first one. Classroom and office, first one as they walked in. And remember, I was. I feel like I'm a. I was pretty happy person until, like, I started thinking about all the sins I did. So when they came in, I was just so happy to see them. I wanted them to feel so loved. And it was very authentic. It was not saccharine. It wasn't this overly sweet fake thing. I genuinely enjoyed seeing them. Like, look, we're only a couple years separated, right. I had been at BYU, so a senior who's 18. I'm 23, 24. That's. That's not that long of a distance. Right. Like, they're older than my brother, some of them, or right around my brother's age. And so, like, I felt like they were my younger siblings. I wanted to make sure that they felt seen. And then as part of that, I wanted to make sure their voice got heard. So I had to ask questions. And I realized the more direct my questions were, understandably, the less people would raise their hand. And so I would always provide venue via texting. The technology I used to have them text in or say, if you have other questions, please come talk to me after. I don't want you to leave feeling any burden, any weight.

John Dehlin [01:03:52] So were our seminary teachers set up to be kind of mental health counselors for students? And are you meeting alone with students? Yeah, as a counselor in a counseling role.

Marc Oslund [01:04:04] I mean, the truth is, is that, like, I'm. So. I'm getting msw. I'm going to be a counselor. The.

John Dehlin [01:04:09] The.

Marc Oslund [01:04:09] The parallels are extremely similar. And I had no training. My. My humanities degree is not training. My experience as a missionary is not training. My experience in seminary is not training to deal with mental health. But I, they felt like I, like

John Dehlin [01:04:22] they're part of the job. Is that do they, do they expect you to have no office hours where you're counseling students? Or do they tell you never counsel students? Or is there just an informal unspoken culture of teachers being spiritual or counsel spiritual guides and or counselors for all these seminars?

Marc Oslund [01:04:46] Yeah, definitely. Definitely the latter for sure. Where it's like, hey, this is kind of what we do. But also the second thing you said, which is the kind of thing we do is what the kind of thing we do is. Hey, people come in, they have their questions, make sure you help them feel loved, and then refer them to their bishop and their bishop will help them, which I mean, again, they're not qualified either. But the truth is, is that we shouldn't be like doing like these mental health experiences. We should be there for support, for a little bit of guidance and then give them scripture or give them verses, kind of like a prescription, say, hey, go read this and then go talk to your bishop, or hey, do you need me to make a call and talk to your bishop for you? Or you know, do I need to talk to your parents or whatever else? And so no, it was never intended to be a long term type counseling thing. And I also.

John Dehlin [01:05:30] But you're in a confessional role 100% where kids are confessing sexual behaviors to you. Yep. In a one on one setting.

Marc Oslund [01:05:38] 100%. Right. And so one of the major things because you mentioned like, is this never intended to be. Well, my principal at the time was like a just a really squirrely dude who just was hyper sensitive and hyper freaked out about anything. So he was teaching at somewhere else in the valley and we found out later there's kind of a mutiny that the teachers didn't really like him. So for some reason he gets promoted to a bigger faculty in a place closer to his home. So that's how seminary deals with their problems. When people are faithful, they're like, cool. That didn't work out, but we like you. So here's the promotion. Basically this is in ces. In ces. Exactly. And then. But he also was really freaked out about what had just happened at Lone Peak, maybe a year or two before, where the teacher. Yep. And he was in jail or sexual.

John Dehlin [01:06:24] Had had sex with students.

Marc Oslund [01:06:25] Yeah. Like on the roof of the freaking seminary building. He was the prisoner principal. Right. He would sing songs to a student in, in his, in his office. And people were kind of like, what's going on there? And it was a big. It rocked seminary. You Know, and that was before my time teaching. But this. This dude was there, and he was freaked out. He was hyper, hyper, hypersensitive to anything that could even remotely look like that. Which, looking back, that's. I think that's a good thing, right? I wish he would have turned that same thing on. Bishop's interviews and all of that. But we want people to be alerted to a minor talking to an adult. Like, I totally get that. Like, I think that makes sense. A big difference in seminary is a couple things. Seminary has all. On every door, there's a glass window, so you can always see in. And this teacher, which I agree with, said, never cover your window, ever. And I'm like, I never will. When you're talking to somebody, leave your door open. So my office was, like, directly across from another office. So anytime I was talking to somebody, somebody would help, would be right there, like, in the other office. My office was also the very first one in the building. So if we have kids coming to or from class, they're all walking by. So the kid wouldn't be seen. I would always be seen. People would always walk by the window, see me, I'd wave, hey, how you doing? They wouldn't know who was in there, but they, like, they would see everything that I was doing. Which matters, right? It matters. And I feel like that's a good thing. But the truth is, the more people started feeling safe with what I was teaching, which was I refused to teach a God of vengeance or God of anger or God of, You know. And I refused to be strict. I just didn't think it was what the purpose of seminary was. My mind, these kids are volunteering to come, right? They want to come to seminary. And even if their parents fought them on it, I'm thinking, yeah, but they could fight back hard. I fought back with my parents when I didn't want to do something. And so obviously they want to be here enough. I tried to channel that, and I think the kids really picked up that I genuinely cared. And so there became more and more people that would talk. They would talk about real things. There became a good reputation about me. And so more students would request to be put in my class. And I didn't know this was happening at the time. But my principal continued to be more and more and more worried at seeing the impact that I was having on students, which I always thought was a good thing. You want to be impactful. You want to make sure that you're connecting with kids. You want to have kids be excited to be in seminary, like that's, that's what you want. And my little did I know my principal was taking notes, right? And so that year, you know, we finished the school year, we started getting the church history. I remember vividly teaching polygamy and being so worried about what was going to happen. So we were going to do a question and answer type thing. My first class, first period, this very smart, very outspoken girl raises her hand and says, is it true that Joe Smith had sex with a 14 year old? And I'm like, oh boy, we're in it, you know. But I will tell you what that did for me. It taught me these kids aren't afraid. The way that the rhetoric, especially my first year of how we should talk to kids. J. They make us read the chartered course of the church and education of J. Ruben Clark. The kids went the doctrine straight, undiluted. And then I see it happening. They're like, yeah, we want. Give us everything, tell us everything. And so my whole lesson plan that was like we see through a glass darkly scrapped it. And I just said, okay, let's go, let's talk. What do you want to talk about? Did Joseph Smith have sex with a young kid? Did Joseph, like, did Joseph tell Emma? Did Joseph. And I'm like answering all of them as honestly as I could that I, because I didn't know it all, I'm like, hey, I'll get, I'll get back to you. I'll get you answers.

John Dehlin [01:10:03] You hadn't been trained.

Marc Oslund [01:10:04] No.

John Dehlin [01:10:04] On those questions.

Marc Oslund [01:10:05] No, I read, I read rough stone roll. But then, I mean, it's however many

John Dehlin [01:10:08] page book and, and, and Bushman doesn't

Marc Oslund [01:10:11] really go into a lot of the details. Exactly. And like, so then I end up, you know, saying, hey, we answer it very directly for the next six classes. We're just like, I, I tell my next class, hey, you don't wanna know how this started. Somebody asked me this. Did you have this question? 80% of the class raised their hand. Yeah, I heard about that. Can we talk? Sure. And it was a very informal, very direct, let's talk like we need to talk about this. Because my feeling about the youth was these kids are doing everything wrong. Right? They're not liking what's happening to them in Mormonism. Meaning they don't feel like it's working. They're not getting the fruits, the happiness that they're supposed to be feeling. And they're having questions. Let's, let's be honest with them. Because that's what I would have wanted. I Didn't want to go on my mission and get blindsided or lie and say, yeah, we didn't. We, yeah, we banned black people. But it wasn't, you know, it was just one guy. It wasn't, you know, passed on. It was just random. I wanted them to have information I wanted. Elder Ballard later uses the word inoculate. I wanted to inoculate them and help them feel like, oh, yeah, I've heard that before, no problem, I'm still Mormon. And so I was very open at lunchtime. We ended up talking like, you know, we have our lunch and we are talking to the teachers and said, hey, this is what we talk about. Like, did you talk about this? They're like, no.

John Dehlin [01:11:27] So the other teachers weren't talking about pleading?

Marc Oslund [01:11:29] Yeah, I mean, they were, but maybe not as like, my kid was open. Like, like I said, hey, did Joseph Smith have a relationship with a 14 year old first period? Nobody else brought that up. It was very much more scripted. And hey, let's not let this get too out of the way. Even though I feel like the majority of the teachers would have been very kind and helpful. A couple would have shut it down. A couple did shut it down and they didn't want to go there, but the majority would have. Would have handled it, I think, very well. I wouldn't. I, I want to be clear, especially about this faculty, because I really like them, right. And I as people, and I'm really proud of them. And I. If of all the teachers in seminary, the, the people there, other than two, would be ones I would still want people to have. If you have to be Mormon, you have to go to seminary. This is who I want. I don't necessarily think it's right, but they would have done it. They would have done a really good job or decently good job. Right.

John Dehlin [01:12:19] So how would you have helped your students feel okay about polygamy in those early years as a teacher, what would you have said to them?

Marc Oslund [01:12:28] That's a good question. My way was to be empathetic. I started learning really quick about the baptismal covenant that I had made, which was to mourn with those that mourn and comfort those that stand in need of comfort. My job was to say, me too. That was my answer, which, yeah, I have these worries, but you know what? I have a testimony. So. So it was acknowledging, understanding and then always coming back with, but. But I know, I know that this is true. And so having that testimony was kind of like the, the game changer, the sealer. You know, I didn't know all the details the way that some other teachers would. But I had a testimony. I would make sure that they knew it. They felt seen, they felt heard. But hey, the church is still what it claims to be. And that I think that was enough for them. Kind of similar to how I felt in the summer. Hey, I don't like this. And we'd recontextualize it a little bit and give a little context that made it feel better. And then they'd be like, we, I love this church.

John Dehlin [01:13:25] You know, and what's hard about that is that you were basically. And this isn't criticism, this is just it. It's an observation. It seems like you were doing to them what the essays were trying to do, which is, everything's okay. You don't need to worry about this. We don't understand everything. And I mean, you came by it honestly. Yeah, that's kind of what you were doing for sure.

Marc Oslund [01:13:48] Which is why now I feel very obligated to speak out where I'm like, hey, I taught 2,000 plus kids this. Let me tell you what I know now. Yeah, I'm gonna be very clear because that was always a big theme for me, where I'm like, I'm going to share my life with you the way I want you to share it with me. I'm going to share where I'm at. I'm going to be very open about. About the things I'm learning, the things I'm feeling. And that works when you're in, but when you're not, oh, crap. Because now you become a virus. And so, yeah, I definitely did the best I could. I didn't know it all. I would also say mercifully. I know I've heard people talk like, I feel guilty about that. I actually don't, which is weird for me because I'm so guilt prone. Or was. I don't feel guilty because I've always done the best I could with the knowledge I had when I had it and. But absolutely, I totally did the same thing because that's how I was trained. Right.

John Dehlin [01:14:40] And it kind of makes you wonder. And there's. I don't want to get ahead of ourselves. That it makes you wonder if the church had just for 100 years said about book of Abraham, about DNA, about book of Mormon historicity, about polygamy. Yeah, it's stone in a hat. Yeah, it's messy and we don't understand everything, but the Lord is wise. And I've had that emotional confirmation. I wonder if the Church would be in less of a pickle now. And if generations would have just gone, oh, yeah, this is what I was taught. And it's, it's part of the deal. And the church is still true versus the epidemic that the church ended up facing in the 2000s, which is generations and generations of members feeling like they had been lied to and like a fraud had been perpetrated upon them or what. All those generations have gone, wait, that's really what happened with Joseph Smith? Joseph really lied to emma and married 14 year olds and looked at a stone in a hat. I'm out of here. I don't know the answer.

Marc Oslund [01:15:37] Yeah, I don't know either. But I totally agree. That feeling of betrayal was a huge one. And I mean, that's been talked about so many times by so many people of just like the rug falls out from underneath you. Not even because, look, I was willing to endure a lot of emotional pain because of. For Mormonism, I would have endured this pain too. But it was unnecessary pain that was inflicted. Just be honest. I can. Look, man. Yes, I can. In fact, for years coming up, I started to say, yeah, I know all this stuff and I think it's wrong, but it's okay because I think a majority of people would probably do that.

John Dehlin [01:16:14] That's what they're doing now.

Marc Oslund [01:16:15] Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:16:16] A lot of them. Not all of them, but a lot. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:16:18] And people being like, oh, I know, I know all about it. And you know what? They probably knew more people that say things like that probably do know more than I did when I started teaching seminary. But that doesn't to me, make it feel like you know, everything right. And it doesn't make it okay, and it doesn't make it acceptable to. To move forward without apologizing. At a minimum. At a minimum, you need to apologize Mormon church for what you've done. Apologize and say we did all of this wrong, and then you can move forward. But moving forward without apologizing is just gaslighting. It's just gaslighting. And that makes you even more insane, right? It makes you feel more insane. It's like, what, Wait, what do you mean? Now all these other people that are saying, oh, I can make Mormonism work, I'm like, that's not like, it's almost not fair. It's like, how can you say that? Right? And so I absolutely feel that it's not right and definitely not the way they should have done it.

Kate Kelly, LGBTQ Issues, and Becoming a Progressive Mormon

John Dehlin [01:17:10] So you mentioned, you mentioned in 2014, hearing about Kate Kelly and me, I get some criticism from Listeners. Whenever I kind of reference myself in my story, I just want to be really clear. I don't. This isn't about me. It's not about drawing attention to me. It's not about making about me. What I'm always just dumbfounded about is the bubble. I call it the bubble. It's just like, how can so many people in the Internet age, so many Mormons, never hear about the CES letter, never hear about Mormon stories, never hear about me, never hear about, you know, all the excommunications, all the problematic issues. And for those who do hear about this stuff, and I would have expected seminary institute teachers to hear about it, and I'm Mormon think, and all the other podcasts, Mormon Expression, Year of Polygamy. Like, for those who did hear about all this stuff, how does it not make a difference? How does it not penetrate and cause more people? Because it's not, you know, I, on the one hand, I've had several seminary institute teachers and bishops and stake presidents reach out to me and tell me they're listening to Mormon stories or tell me that they've lost their faith and they can't listen leave. But very few have been willing to speak out about it. But most importantly, I am just continually perplexed by how much of a lock the church has on information and on its members and on member general, member awareness of things. So I want you just to talk about 2014. I kind of. We strayed from that. When you're hearing about Kate Kelly and me, how are you processing that?

Marc Oslund [01:18:48] It's such a good question. Because the truth is. So I was hearing about it on Facebook. So I'm a millennial.

John Dehlin [01:18:52] Millennial.

Marc Oslund [01:18:52] You know, we are, you know, not digital natives, but really close. Like, we're, we're on social media. Like, we were the ones that were really a part of that. And so we're hearing about news and we're getting things that are posted and, and commentary, and none of it's good. I think the way that, that I, I was hearing and reading the Role of Excommunication is huge because the minute you are excommunicated, you are now branded as evil, vile, wrong. The church is completely separated, therefore, it's completely off, out of bounds. So, for example, with Kate Kelly, I remember thinking while, like, in my mind, especially my convert brain, I'm like, why don't women have the priesthood? Like, I know that they don't, and I know that I've been told that they don't. And I know I've been Told that they shouldn't. But, like, why? There's no reason why. In my mind, even if I'm reading, I'm like, that's not a reason. That, like, these scriptures aren't reasons why women don't have the priesthood. It's just. They just don't have. Have it. And so when Kate Kelly starts her protest right outside of the conference center and trying to get into priesthood session, my gut says I'm sympathetic to that. But then my brain says, yeah, but they're doing it the wrong way. You don't fight the church. You trust the leaders. It comes from the leaders. The leaders will get revelation, and then people will get revelation. Right. Then we'll get the benefit. You don't tell the leaders what to do. They're talking to God. It's all in God's timing. It's all in God's will. Will. So for you, John, or for a Kate to get out in front of church leaders, that was the problem, wasn't the critique. The problem was the fact that, hey, you're doing it before church leaders say it's okay. And then the minute you get excommunicated, I'm like, well, they should have just fallen in line. Why didn't they fall in line? Why couldn't they just trust their leaders? And. And that. And it just helped it to separate so clearly in my brain that it's your fault. Fault. You're the one who's the problem. You're the one that did the wrong thing. Because the church says, well, they are. Look, they're cut off from heaven. That's how bad they are. You are now freaking Judas. You know? And so that does the role of saying, okay, well, I don't have to worry about what they said. The critiques, they're invalid because they are invalid. So even if I felt it, the excommunication, the role of excommunication and getting out in front of prophets causing the excommunication, that was enough for me.

John Dehlin [01:21:04] And what did you process? What did you know about or process about? What I was trying to speak up for. And. And what? I was excommunicated.

Marc Oslund [01:21:12] Yeah. At the time, I was. I was very clear that it was about LGBTQ issues. That's. That's what I. I didn't know a

John Dehlin [01:21:18] lot of your thoughts about that.

Marc Oslund [01:21:19] And I was like, again, sympathetic. Like, I don't know why we say this, but that's what we say. And we've built the foundation in Mormonism on the family instead of on Jesus. And we know what happens? Jesus has a whole parable when you build on something that's not him, and the rains come, what happens? It starts to cr. And you know what I mean? Like, it's right there in Scripture. If you build on the, you know, the 1950s nuclear family, guess what's going to happen? Your church is going to fall apart. And so I didn't know a lot of what you were doing in terms of, like, the history. I didn't know about, like, your conversation. I didn't know if you'd had them yet about the second anointing or about the Swedish rescue. Like, I didn't know if that was that time. I knew that you were really. It felt like women in the priesthood, LGBTQ issues. Those were the two. Basically, that's how I label both of you. Right. You're lgbtq. Kate's women in the priesthood.

John Dehlin [01:22:05] You know, how did you. At the time, how did you feel about LGBTQ issues?

Marc Oslund [01:22:08] I didn't know. Like, I didn't care. I was like. I basically, I was like, why? I don't think we should be taking a stance, but since prophets say we're taking a stance, we should.

John Dehlin [01:22:17] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:22:18] In my own mind, I'm like, just let him alone. Like, for what? Why do we care? Why does this matter? The idea of. It's destroying marriage. Marriage. And I thought, look, I've been married now for a couple years. All of a sudden, a gay person gets married. I'm like, my marriage is crumbling. Like, that's how I felt. It's just so. It's so stupid to me. It's so stupid. But. But because church leaders cared so much, I thought maybe I should care, too, or. This is a big deal.

John Dehlin [01:22:47] They must know things we don't know.

Marc Oslund [01:22:48] Same thing with the temple. Right. They know what I can't know. Therefore, I should trust them instead of their big.

John Dehlin [01:22:52] Their biggest bigots or racists or sexist.

Marc Oslund [01:22:55] Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:22:56] They must know something we don't.

Marc Oslund [01:22:58] Correct. Correct. And so now looking back, I'm like, oh, man, I'm so sympathetic to what you're going through and, like, freaking amazing that you've done what you've done and being outspoken and put up with the critiques, and we're excited about the advocacy. As a future social worker, it's a huge thing to advocate on behalf of marginalized population. Both what you and Kate did are. It's absolutely remarkable. And the fact that it was shut down as something that was evil because it was before profits or because it was wrong. It just that looking back now, that sucks that I ever felt that about you, about Kate, because the work that you're doing is so necessary. The people that you're saving is so. There's. There's. I'm talking about students, people in my family, people in my wife's family that are listening to you. They're finding I have a safe space. Right. And to be excommunicated in that moment, to say, nope, we don't want any part of this. That also would mean we don't want any part of the lives that you're saving. Nope. We are. Nope. We don't take ownership over that. You're. Nope. We don't care. We'd rather have people die than have. Than. Or allow gay people to go to the temple. We'd rather have people die than have women have the priesthood. And to me, it just That I actually feel worse about that than I do about what I taught, because it was my judgment. And that judgment on you and on Kate kept me in too. It keeps me in line where I'm like, I don't want to be judged. I don't want to be excommunicated. Therefore, I shouldn't even go down that path.

John Dehlin [01:24:31] Thank you. And just. I just have to say, not like I have to defend us, but decades and decades and decades, people were trying to talk to the brethren. They were trying to. To speak honestly and openly, trying to advocate for women, and it was just. They would be mowed down, excommunicated, marginalized, silenced, ignored. So, like, it's. It's. It's kind of circular that. That. That you have this thought of, they didn't do it the right way, but there was no right way to do it.

Marc Oslund [01:25:00] Yep.

John Dehlin [01:25:01] And all those who had tried to do it the right way got mowed down. Yep.

Marc Oslund [01:25:04] And in fact, now, like I tell people, because I. I have people that are coming to me a lot, lot and talking about this stuff, and I tell them, you want the church to change. Yeah. I'm saying leave it. That's how you get the church changed. They don't care about your feedback. They don't care about any. They don't want to hear it. They care about butts and seats.

John Dehlin [01:25:22] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:25:23] They care about their tithing dollars. So you want them to listen, take your butt out of the seat, stop paying tithing, start speaking up.

John Dehlin [01:25:29] Right.

Marc Oslund [01:25:29] That's how 1978 gets you excommunicated. Exactly. Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:25:32] I mean, today. Today, Natasha over Parker, Natasha Helfer announced that she. She's being excommunicated and she's Never spoken anything about the brethren in terms of like or the truth claims. All she's ever advocated for is mental health principles, healthy sexuality, pro lgbt, you know, and, and she faced. She received her disciplinary council letter on Easter. That's when she received her, her notification of excommunication was on Easter Sunday. She receives it, literally Easter Sunday. Jeremy Reynolds was on Valentine's Day, you know, Heartless Natasha Helpers was on. Was on Easter Sunday. And then, yeah, she. Next week she's going to be excommunicated for. And it has nothing to do with DNA or polygamy or truth claims or anything. It's all because she's advocated for healthy sexuality and pro LGBT and stuff like that. And there's just no way to win, you know, if you're on the side of truth. They'll make changes after they excommunicate you and, and, and change all the, the things that you were advocating for. But they'll, but they'll excommunicate you first.

Marc Oslund [01:26:43] Yeah. Which I, I'm. My heart starts. It's gone out to people that have been excommunicator, have gone through this process. I think about Jeremy, who resigned his membership. I think about you, about Kate. I think about Bill, Real. I, I think about, I'm sure, Radio Free Mormon, all these. That's down the line. Right, Right. Like, and I had my own mini version that we'll. We'll get to in seminary. Yeah, I, I had my own version

John Dehlin [01:27:04] of we'll get to it. We'll get to it.

Marc Oslund [01:27:06] But I do want to mention, though, because this is important. Like, I feel so strong. My dad said, hey, Mark, like, you're going on Mormon stories. That's the end of your church membership.

John Dehlin [01:27:14] Oh, you're still a member.

Marc Oslund [01:27:16] Oh, yeah. I'm on the records. Oh, and I'm. And here's the thing. Like, I've already had, like, my stake president got contacted by the Strengthening Church Members Committee, and he said all these things, we'll get to it. But my point is, is I'm content with that because I refuse to ever be silent. And you and others have been those people. So I just thank you in my heart for thinking about Natasha, especially her. All people. Look, Bill, I was listening to the letter that started it all as I was driving here. I'm like, well, yeah, of course you're going to excommunicated, but Natasha.

John Dehlin [01:27:44] Yeah, for what?

Marc Oslund [01:27:45] And so. Yeah, just terrible.

John Dehlin [01:27:47] Yeah. Okay, so I guess we can go to 2015.

Marc Oslund [01:27:52] I'm telling you, this is what I meant. Like, this is the juicy point. And it truly does, like, especially for Mormon stories listeners, it only gets more juicy at this point. So I had this whole great experience my first year. Very supportive, very loved. I remember going to my principal and saying, like, there was a study that said for most people, their most miserable part of their day is meeting with their boss. And I walked in and I said, I'm so glad that's not you. And then he changed my mentor from a friend who I still have, who I really love, to a guy who was new, is a little bit more craft ass. He definitely had a following. Like, people really liked him. A teacher a little bit older, maybe a 10. 10 years older or so than me, and he made him my mentor. And I was like, dang it. Like, I don't want to be with that guy. He made a sex joke his first day. You know, he was too normal, and I was, you know, insufferable, uptight with everyone else except for the teenagers. And because he was my mentor, we had to have some meetings. And he's. He's truly become my best friend and friends with my wife. And he's like, we call him the godfather of our kid. And. But at the time, I hated him. And so. And he knows that. So I. I walked into his office, we had some discussions, and one of the big discussions we had was something that I had thought about for a long time, but he just kind of started the discussion and said, have you ever thought about the phrase I know? And I'm like, yeah, I think about that all the time. Like, it's weird. Why do we say, you know, I remember the sister missionary saying that and being like, I know. And they looked at me like, I know. You know what I mean? And I'm like, okay, like, why are you talking to me that way? And so he said, and then I did it the same thing on my mission. And he. He's like, I've lately really been thinking, it's really okay not to know.

John Dehlin [01:29:28] Whoa.

Marc Oslund [01:29:28] Yeah. Come to find out, like, this. This teacher who's, you know, my best friend now, he had a very similar path to me where he was disciplined and he was in trouble with seminary, and he almost lost his job. And, you know, all of this, I didn't know at the time.

John Dehlin [01:29:44] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:29:44] But he had been through it, you know, years before when he had just started out like me. And so, um, he and I also started talking. We. We went to different meetings, and I'm thinking about my students. And this was right around the time that Terrell and Fiona Givens wrote the Crucible of Doubt and they had written the God who Weeps. And I, you know, it was eh. For me. I, I didn't really connect the, the, the chapters were too long, but. The Crucible of Doubt, right? Cause we're talking now about what's happening with John deland and Kate Kelly and others. Okay, let's talk. That's a real thing. I hear it from my students all of last year. I don't know if the church is true. I don't feel good. When I go to church, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. This is speaking my language. So I started reading it and I loved it. I loved what they were talking about. I loved their version of Mormonism. And I remember my wife and I, we went on a trip to San Francisco. And San Francisco is like just like LA or Vegas, like the heathen capital of the world, you know, like so many gay people. I remember walking in, in the Castro and being like, look at all of these gay people. Like, there are so many. And two things happened. I thought, thought that's weird because I'm not seeing it, but also, why do I think that's weird? That shouldn't be weird. What's, what's the matter with this? There's nothing wrong with this. So I'm kind of going through all of this at the time. And we go right across the street from the Ferry Building, just down on the way to Fisherman's Wharf, right by the Bay Bridge, and we're sitting on a bench and my wife's listening to like an Amy Poehler book, like a comedy book, because she couldn't care less about, you know, reading spiritual things. And I'm reading the Crucible of Doubt and I'm just pondering about how it's okay not to know. And what about Mormonism and what do we really know and what's true and what's not? And what about all these people who aren't going to go to heaven? What about my family? And I remember sitting on this bench and looking, and I saw a, like a Hindu couple behind me. And then I saw a group of like, potheads over in the corner. And then like I saw a skinhead looking dude ride a skateboard bike. And then I saw a gay couple from England because they had British accents behind me and like the full spectrum of humanity on this freaking bench in San Francisco. And as I read that, I was thinking, what's going to happen with them? And I get to the portion of the Givens book where they quote Brigham Young, who says he has so many terrible, terrible quotes. But a quote that just I loved so much was when he said, like, cast your mind over the thousand and millions of them that have lived, the Methodists and the Roman Catholics, and what will happen of them? Will they be saved? Yes. Says they will have as great a heaven as they ever anticipated in this life and far greater. And I'm sobbing like, oh, my gosh. Like, it's okay not to know. Maybe Mormons don't have it. All right? We're all going to be saved. Like, at that moment, I finally experienced God being merciful in ways that I had never experienced for myself. It happened with Rachel when I thought about God loving her anyway, even though she doesn't read Scripture. And then all of a sudden, it was this feeling where. Where I'm like, humanity is beautiful, Humanity is good, Humanity is saved. Humanity is all of these things that I have ever hoped they're going to be okay. And the byproduct of that was Mormonism didn't need to be the only truth anymore. It didn't need to be. If they're all going to be saved, Mormon prophets is. They're all going to be saved. Mormonism may be the best way, but it doesn't have to be the way.

John Dehlin [01:32:55] And that you become a progressive Mormon 100% in 2015, you become a progressive Mormon.

Marc Oslund [01:33:01] Yep, exactly. And so that year was the Old Testament. And, yeah, Joy. And so now I'm wrestling with how do I reconcile this experience I have of God being a God of love with God murdering Canaanites? How do I reconcile that with God saying, hey, you need to put the blood of people or else I'll like, I will murder them or I will murder the Egyptians, or how do I reconcile that? And the only way I could do it was to say, I don't think that's God. And so in seminary, when we're talking about this, I'm like, it would never. Because I was about questions. I say, tell me what you think about this, teenagers. Their response was exactly like mine. I don't like this. This doesn't feel like God to me. Okay, who is God to you? And they. Because they're scripturally brilliant or. And they're good Mormon people. God is. Is the God of love, the God who goes to the woman taken in adultery and says, go and sin no more. And as I'm listening to these responses from these kids, I just am like, yep, they get it. And then I go to our seminary like meetings. And I think these freaking people have no idea. They are. So their version of God sucks.

John Dehlin [01:34:11] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:34:11] Their version of God is small. Their version of God is vindictive and vengeful. And frankly, I don't want to have any part in it. So me and my students, we are going to make the church basically what we've always hoped it would be. Not changing it. Right. Because the church was still good. But just saying, like, we're just going to scrap all the old crap. We're going to forget the miracle of forgiveness God. Right. And we're going to focus on this God of love. And so things changed really quickly in my own heart at that time. But right around then, here's the chapter.

John Dehlin [01:34:42] And I've always wondered, are there CES employees that are progressive, liberal, even non literal or non believing Mormons? I've always wondered that. How could there not be? You know, if they're in the general population, there are.

Marc Oslund [01:34:55] And they are either quiet or pushed out or really lucky.

John Dehlin [01:35:01] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:35:02] So, for example, the. My best friend who's still teaching seminary, who I just admire.

John Dehlin [01:35:07] Don't get him in trouble.

Marc Oslund [01:35:08] I won't.

John Dehlin [01:35:09] I won't.

Marc Oslund [01:35:10] But he's definitely, like. He and I have had some really good discussions and. And I'm really the God that he believes and the God that he and I talk about. I love that God.

John Dehlin [01:35:19] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:35:19] You know, or I want to love that God. I don't know if I believe in that God, but I. That's a compelling vision to me. And a couple others are kind of following suit, but they do it in much more subtle or small or not pushing the issue like I would. I was very clear. It's always been that way for me. If I believe it or don't believe it, I'm gonna make it very known.

John Dehlin [01:35:39] Which.

Marc Oslund [01:35:40] I trusted my faculty.

John Dehlin [01:35:42] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:35:42] I trusted my principal. But looking back, I really shouldn't have.

John Dehlin [01:35:46] Well, let's tell the story.

Marc Oslund [01:35:47] Yeah. So, yeah, it's brutal. But he. I gotten in a couple arguments with different teachers.

John Dehlin [01:35:53] Over what?

Marc Oslund [01:35:54] Well, one was about, like, cell phones. Right. So it's 2015, 2016, school year, and kids are on their cell phones. And this teacher's like, they shouldn't be on cell phones. And I'm like, dude, it's 2016, phones are going nowhere. Nowhere. We need to learn how to help them. Like, don't get mad at kids. And anyway, you know, he was a bishop and he ends up saying like, well, all of these people in my ward are addicted to their phones. They're addicted to porn. And so he has this fear. I'm like, that doesn't mean they are. And so we kind of had a little blow up and we separated. And all the teachers remember anger is the sin, like just the biggest, other than freaking sex. Anger is like the next biggest issue for seminary teachers, it feels like. And so, you know, you lose the spirit. And the spirit of contention is not of me. And so they all kind of look around like anger. And so he goes back to his office, which was right across from mine, and I go back to my office and he, I'm like, I, I was used to arguing. I've always been one who debates. So I walked into his office and he kind of like, what? I'm like, dude, I'm really sorry, man. I, I really, I appreciate your passion. Like, so we ended up talking for like, you know, 20 minutes. Our students walk into our office while we're talking and they're like, are you going to teach? Like, just, just hold on, you know, and we're, we, we kind of reconcile and we both give like this mutual lesson on like understanding and forgiveness. And we're in tears. It was like this beautiful, beautiful moment. And that matters for a reason because it's going to be brought up against me. Another teacher gets mad because I. There's a student who like, I knew since they were like, you know, their first year in seminary. And I said, hey, you're going to have the opportunity to be in my class at the end, like as a senior. And so another teacher and I kind of put this student in my class and this teacher was pissed and like started kind of yelling down the hallways. And so, you know, the secretary, the principal come out like, what's going on? And kind of exposed me that way. And so we're like, crap, right? Another one was our principal's kind of a nut job a little bit. And he like had a concealed weapon, but you can't have it on church property. So he had it in his freaking van in the parking lot. And he like loved Jason Bourne born. And so for an in service training, we watch like the Bourne Identity, the first part of it or some part where he's like fighting people. And then we watch this active shooter freaking video and he tells us, like, this could happen. So we need you to go back in your classroom and get prepared. And I'm like, what on earth? Like, I don't want to be thinking. And I was freaked out. I called my grandpa. I'm like, grandpa, like, is he owns his own business? I'm I'm quitting. I'm gonna get a job with you. I was so freaked out by what this guy was perpetuating, and I made it clear. I'm like, nope. I like. In the meeting, he's like, does everyone feel good? I'm like, no, I hate this.

John Dehlin [01:38:26] What were you concerned about?

Marc Oslund [01:38:27] I was concerned about getting freaking shot. Like, something that I had never thought of previously. I'm thinking I'm the first. The first office in the seminary, I was the one who's in charge of closing the door. So if there's an active shooter, then I'm the one who's on the line. I have to go out and close the door.

John Dehlin [01:38:43] Scaring you?

Marc Oslund [01:38:43] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [01:38:44] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:38:44] But then my response to it wasn't one of calmness. And he was like, hmm, it's these mental notes. And I knew that they weren't mental because what's gonna end up happening to me?

John Dehlin [01:38:54] Okay. And really quick, you know, in your defense, again, not only did you not grow up learning Mormon history and doctrine, you didn't grow up learning Mormon history and culture. And Mormon history and culture is. Is at its core, passive aggressive. You don't get mad. You're always nice. You always have a smile on your face.

Marc Oslund [01:39:15] Face.

John Dehlin [01:39:16] But you have a smile on your face sometimes as you're sticking the knife in someone's back. And to. To have direct confrontations with. And I'm dealing with this. Like, I. I've had to work over the past 10 or 15 or 20 years with emotion regulation because I can say super mean things with a smile on my face. And I can be super passive aggressive and insulting and demeaning. Never getting angry. Like, I'm super good at not getting angry if I don't want to get angry. Angry and being vicious. But never with the swear word. Right. And never with insulting words, but with questions or with undertone or with insinuation. And you didn't have the benefit of learning all that culture. So you're like this LA kid athlete, All American athlete coming in where they've got these weapons pointed at you. You can't even see.

Marc Oslund [01:40:09] I literally had no idea.

John Dehlin [01:40:10] You can't even see the weapons.

Marc Oslund [01:40:11] Yep. No idea.

John Dehlin [01:40:12] That are pointed at your head.

Marc Oslund [01:40:13] Yeah, Seriously. And, and thank you for noticing that, because I had no clue. Like, even my experience at byu, my. My friend group, right. Was the baseball team. And how do we handle things? We are manly men and we call each other out and we talk crap and then we're friends after. And I felt very similarly at my Faculty, but I never should have. And so all of these things go to the ultimate one, which was, I think, the absolute worst. Well, I guess two more. One was. I just thought, look, this is. You talk about this being a family employee, and I wanted to go home for Christmas to la. And we would have spent, like, an extra couple hundred dollars on a flight if we would have waited the day after seminary got done. And I thought, look, man, I have. I have all these vacation dues I haven't taken. I'm gonna leave a day early and go to LA and save 300 a seat. And I told my principal, and he was like, you can't leave. And I'm like, we're writing Christmas cards. Like, we're not even teaching. Teaching. He's like, you can't leave. And I'm like, I already have the ticket. He's like, you should not have done that. You know? And so eventually, like, same thing like we had in service meetings in. In June of every year, and we ended up spending, like, an extra $3,000 because I had to wait one week to go on trips to Europe. And it ended up costing, like, all this money because I had to be at this mandatory meeting in the summer.

John Dehlin [01:41:27] The dumb rules.

Marc Oslund [01:41:28] Stupid rules. Right. And. And I am not one to just follow rules, because if you give me. Which is another sin, it's a horrible thing in Mormonism. Just shut up and do it. Yeah, but for me, I'm like, no. Well, tell me why. If you tell me why, I'll do it.

John Dehlin [01:41:40] No, no, no, it doesn't work that way. No, no, it's obey.

Marc Oslund [01:41:43] Yeah, exactly.

John Dehlin [01:41:43] And don't ask questions.

Marc Oslund [01:41:44] And I refuse to do that. So an example being, hey, like, when you're. When, like, keep your shirt tucked in, even up until the point where you walk out the building. And for me, I'm walking to, like, the bathroom to change, to go to the gym. My shirt would be untucked, and I wouldn't have shoes. Shoes on. Because I'm like, why? There's nobody in the building. It's 3:15. There's nobody here. We've been done for an hour. I'm just gonna change. But that was another thing. It's like, can you do this, please? You know, And I'm like, okay. Like, I just had no idea of all the things that were going on.

John Dehlin [01:42:11] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:42:12] So thank you for pointing that out. And. And then here was the worst one. And maybe I'll save it because I want to reveal it the way that it was revealed to me.

The 2015 Exclusion Policy and Its Impact

John Dehlin [01:42:20] Okay. I want to go back because we missed the. The exclusion policy.

Marc Oslund [01:42:24] Yeah. Ah.

John Dehlin [01:42:25] And. And there's also some stuff you have in early 2016 that I want to make sure.

Marc Oslund [01:42:29] Thank you.

John Dehlin [01:42:30] So. So we talked about my excommunication early 2015. By the end of 2015, well, same sex marriage is legalized in mid 2015 nationwide. And then the church is really hurt about that. And so in November 2015, the church releases its, what's infamously now known as the exclusion policy, where it basically says that getting same sex married is equivalent to apostasy, which made it worse than pedophilia, made it worse. That you can, you can sodomize a child, you can cheat on your spouse, you can murder somebody, you can sexually abuse someone, rape someone. You can rape someone and not necessarily be excommunicated. But same sex marriage was mandatorily mandatory excommunication. That was the exclusion policy. And then, then they added insult to injury by saying that if a kid whose parent was same sex married wanted to get baptized, wanted to be a member of the church, wanted to get the priesthood, they couldn't until they were 18, and then only after they denounced their parents marriage. Believe it or not, I'm not making this up. This is literally what the exclusion policy was. That drops in November 2015.

Marc Oslund [01:43:48] I'm so glad you did that because we were at lunch, we come back and when we come back and start teaching our last class of the day, it was a. I'm sorry, this was right before lunch. It was a flurry of kids walking in, being like, what is going on? And we're look, we had just taught our classes. We had no idea.

John Dehlin [01:44:08] Like, we weren't on our phones.

Marc Oslund [01:44:08] We were teaching. We're like, what are you talking about? They're like this. And they all like, I'm talking about dozens and dozens. It felt like they stormed our building. Our stories, students. And we're like, I.

John Dehlin [01:44:18] And what were they showing you?

Marc Oslund [01:44:19] They were showing us like the news articles that have been leaked or the, the leaked policies and the commentary on Twitter or Instagram and other things. I'm like, we literally, we were blindsided. We just like, what were they saying about it? They're just like, what is this? This is not acceptable. Why is the church doing this? Why is the church banning. Why is the church banning gay people? Why is the church calling their kids apostates? Why are they do. Like, they were pissed off, right? And so these are good pg. Like, I'm talking about faithful, faithful kids who don't make a State. They do not make a state stink. And they were mad. Like, I have never. I still to this day have never seen a whole horde of kids, which I think is so revealing.

John Dehlin [01:44:55] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:44:55] Of where they want the church to be and how immediately they know it's wrong and how immediately they don't want it to be like this. But where do they go? They come to seminary and what do we do? We soften the blow.

John Dehlin [01:45:05] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:45:06] Even though we had no idea what the heck was going on. Hey, can you show it to us? Our first question was, what's the source? Because we're trying to model it. They're all like, it comes from the church. The church said it. It was leaked. And we're like, well, who leaked it? You know? And we're.

John Dehlin [01:45:18] And what they say?

Marc Oslund [01:45:19] And they're like, I don't know. I don't. Somebody leaked this on Twitter. Like, Twitter. You can't trust Twitter. Like, you know what I mean? Like, it was all those techniques.

John Dehlin [01:45:26] I helped leak it.

Marc Oslund [01:45:27] Hey, good man. Look, the truth is, is that it was a key moment. I'm so glad you did that, because it was so telling to me of where that student population was, where they. They just lost it. They were so livid. And I thought, why do I not like why I want to be like that? You know? And so how do you tone down their passion? I didn't want them to not feel passionate or loving because they were. They were like, we're keeping our covenants to love people. And they're. The church is saying they're apostates. And we're like, well, and here's what I clung to. I don't know what the other teachers did. It felt like we were just blindsided, you know? And what I. We weren't warned. We weren't at all.

John Dehlin [01:46:06] And.

Marc Oslund [01:46:07] And the kids knew more about it than we did, which was, how often does that happen? You know? And so they came to us. And my. I read through it. We read through it. We talked about it in class. And when I was reading for the first time in class, and we got to the part where it said, like, you know, the church is doing this to make sure that they care for their. The kids of gay families. And I'm like, I guess that. And I have, like, this light bulb of justification where it was, well, I had to go to church alone. And that was really hard. And so maybe they are being merciful. So that's what we clung to. My experience as a convert was, see, it really is merciful. And they're like, but what about apostate? I'm like, honestly, guys, I don't know. Because I just had that thought of it's okay not to know. So I said, I don't know. That doesn't feel good to me. But I do believe the church is looking out for kids.

John Dehlin [01:46:53] All the brethren, correct Trust. Yep. Exactly. Yep.

Marc Oslund [01:46:56] But it was a big deal. And the reason I talk about this is because of how. How passionate the students were. Again, I changed everything about my teaching because I was listening to kids, because I was trusting kids. And I would have just been the obnoxious self that I always was, but because as a Mormon, I mean, but I listened to them. I heard their concerns and I heard their problems, and I wanted to hear them and I wanted to change, to make it work for them because I admired them. And so when they were adamant about the policy of exclusion, it was a big deal for me because I thought, wow, this is a generation of kids who is not going to like this moving forward. And I started thinking, in order to save a church that I loved, even though it maybe was Stockholm syndrome, in order to save this church, we need to be very open because these kids see through it. So it was kind of all of these things at once where I thought, I don't know if I like that, but who cares? Just focus on the kids. Let's make the church the givens they're talking about, which that church doesn't exist. That church is the church that could exist. Exist in theory. They've taken enough doctrine and they've twisted it and they've used quotes that could exist. But that is the church that first off, doesn't exist and might exist in the future, but the church at present is not the church that Terrell and Fiona Gibbons talk about, you know, and so I wanted to make that church a reality. And I thought, I'm a freaking seminary teacher. I have as much influence as anybody.

John Dehlin [01:48:17] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:48:17] And then Elder Ballard comes out, and Elder Ballard in February of 2016 says, here's what we need to do. No longer can you just bear your testimony. As a response to kids question. Gone are the days when teachers say, don't worry about it when coming to questions. Know the church essays like the back of your hand, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

John Dehlin [01:48:35] What was that like?

Marc Oslund [01:48:36] I was like, heck, yeah. Sweet. Let's do some transparency. Because for me, I had always freaking wanted it, but I felt like I couldn't because why people like John Dehlin and Kate Kelly get excommunicated for doing that. And so I'm like, yes, the kids need it, I need it. Let's be honest. And I was so on board. I'm like, yes, the church has changed. Look at the church the Givens are talking about. Look at the church Ballard wants us to perpetuate. And I bought in. I'm like, yep, Elder Ballard said it. That's all I need. There we go. Anytime someone questions why I'm doing something, Elder Ballard said I could never run away from a question ever again. He says, okay, done, let's do it. Let's talk. You, you're comfortable talking, let's do it. And I don't think anyone else felt comfortable about talking. I think he said it. I don't know why he said said it, because I don't think that's happened. I don't.

John Dehlin [01:49:24] So you. You. That meant a lot to you, but you didn't get the sense that your peers. Nope. Felt.

Marc Oslund [01:49:30] Felt the same way. Like, we started. I started doing every Monday. We're short, like, early out days, so classes were shorter. Said, okay, every Monday we're going to do question answers. I have no lesson planned. Write your questions down. Put it in a bowl. One of my students called it the Gos bowl, like gospel. And they put it down. And all we did was talk openly about a. Our questions. And teachers are like, but you're not in the word. You're not in the scriptures. And I'm like, Elder Ballard, a living prophet, said, we need to be open. So I'm going to be open.

John Dehlin [01:49:58] Okay.

Marc Oslund [01:49:58] And everybody else is kind of like, I don't know, man. Like, you know what I'm saying?

John Dehlin [01:50:02] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:50:02] The kids loved it, though. They felt open. They felt happy. They felt, like, cool. I have doubts, too. They felt very seen. And then Rachel starts being more open right where. Where she tells our bishop, I don't want to go to the temple. I don't like it.

John Dehlin [01:50:16] Your wife?

Marc Oslund [01:50:17] Yeah, my wife. And our bishop says, you don't have to go to the temple. Not as much as Mark does, definitely, because I'm still forcing myself to go. And so there's this wave of people that felt like being more authentic, the church being more open, the given saying, yeah, there's problems and these are men and they're making mistakes. And Elder Ballard saying, don't run from it. And the church essays. And we've really turned a corner from a year ago when John de Lane and Kate Kelly get excited, excommunicated. Right. Like we're in a whole new era. And I totally bought It. And also in seminary, they gave a couple initiatives, which is see the 1, right and reach the 1. And so I'm like, okay, so if 99% of these people, which, by the way, is a parable of Jesus, are good in the church, but one is struggling, what should I be doing? I should be reaching out to the One. And so my teaching that year transformed because of my friendship with this person, because of. Of my openness, my comfort with the church being more open. Everything changed. Even Rachel being different.

John Dehlin [01:51:14] How was that conversation with Rachel? Because I met in a patriarchy. So often the men pressure the women to be a certain way. Well, sometimes the women pressure the men to live up to their priesthood colleagues, and then sometimes the men demean the woman and use power over them to say, you're not living up to the way you should. So what were you feeling about. About Rachel deciding she didn't want to go to the temple? Did you pressure her? Did you make her feel bad? Were you supportive?

Marc Oslund [01:51:41] I mean, I wasn't supportive until the bishop said I could be, right? Until the bishop told her that. Because all the way she went to the bishop, maybe for a recommend or something, I don't even remember what it was for, but I know that she was basically in tears because of the pressure that I had put on her to go to the temple. Because that's what you do. You go to. The temple is the house of the Lord. And so I'm pressuring, pressuring, pressuring. And she's like, what's she saying? She's like, I don't want to go. I don't like, like it. I don't like it. And I'm thinking in my gut, without revealing it, like, I don't like it either, but we got to force this thing to work. We got to fit this freaking square peg in that round hole. And so instead of validating her and saying, me, too, I would be like, no, we have to. And she, again, just dutifully did it. But also, she was. She's strong, man. Like, she was working. She. She has never been just like, kind of like the. I. I would say the typical Mormon wife in terms of just falling in line. Although she, for her, yeah. Oh, hell, it's so good. I'm so. She pushes back all the time, and I'm so proud of that. And I've never worried about her working. We weren't having kids. We weren't trying to have kids. Like, yeah, what? Like, again, I'm 20. What, 25 at the time. She's 25. My friends are just like. It feels like they just got their high school diploma, you know, like, we're from high school.

John Dehlin [01:52:52] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:52:52] I'm like, we're so far ahead, so, like, who cares? Like, yeah, Rachel, you do your thing. But also, I saw this as, like, a way to dab out. And so I'm like, nope, we can't, we can't, we can't. And eventually, I think it got to a point where she had to bring it up to a bishop who she doesn't like talking to bishops who does. But she brought it up and was like, I can't do this. And I can't believe that he said this. Knowing our conservative American fork freaking ward. He turns to her and is like, you don't have to go as much as he does. You go when you want to go. And she came back with, like, this confidence, like, mark, I'm not to going going if I don't want to go. And my mind thinks, oh, my gosh, my family were lost. But then I'm like, why? She's like. The bishop said, I'm like, freaking bishop, you know, like, why are you doing this? You know?

John Dehlin [01:53:40] So you were. You were mad at the bishop for sure. Oh, for sure.

Marc Oslund [01:53:43] And then eventually I felt, like, jealous. Then I'm like, why do you not have to go? And why do I have to go?

John Dehlin [01:53:49] You know? Like, I wanted that I would.

Marc Oslund [01:53:52] I was like, dang, can the bishop say that's me? So just freaking a mess, you know, just bad.

John Dehlin [01:53:59] It's just so weird. You're giving her such a hard time while you're feeling all the same things she's feeling, and it's driving this huge wedge in your marriage, and. And you feel the same way as she does, but you're. You're perpetuating the patriarchy on her.

Marc Oslund [01:54:12] Oh, and it. The. Here's. Here's another brutal thing. Every time we try to do a family home meeting, it was just me and her. She like, why? It's just us. What do we need? I just have Sunday school, you know, or like, whatever else. And like. And like, it was so many of these things that were trying to work. And I will tell you confidently, every time we tried to do it, it made it worse for our family. We got angry at each other. We didn't see eye to eye. We had strained relationships. We got frustrated. I'm mad. I'm like, you're never going to take us to the celestial kingdom. Like, just so much crap. And as soon as I'm like, Fine, we're not going to read. Guess what happened? Our relationship started getting better. And that's a huge crack for me where I'm thinking, wait, the scriptures are supposed to bring us together? Every time I try to do something very Mormon, it makes it worse. The temple made it worse. Reading made it worse. Praying made it worse. Family home evening made it worse. And so when I stopped the pressure, we now had a better relationship. And so this is where I feel this dissonance where I'm like, probably lashing out because I'm thinking, what the h. Like, I've been told all of these things are going to make things better. You're telling me they do don't, and then we don't do them and they actually are better. And I'm thinking, what the hell?

John Dehlin [01:55:23] Like, you know, also, you're teaching all your students to do all these things that you and your wife, or at least your wife don't want to do. And then in some sense, that makes you and your family hypocrites a little bit for sure.

Marc Oslund [01:55:33] And so because I refuse to do that when kids are like, I don't want to read the Scriptures, guess what I would say? I'd be like, well, my wife doesn't want to either. I get it.

John Dehlin [01:55:41] Oh, no, you threw under the bus. For sure.

Marc Oslund [01:55:44] For sure. And then eventually, that's not good for intimacy. It sucks.

John Dehlin [01:55:49] That's not good.

Marc Oslund [01:55:49] It sucks. She's like, why would you do that? And then eventually I started hearing their responses like, hey, that's cool. And then because the kids thought it was like, oh, that's good. I'm like, I guess this is okay.

John Dehlin [01:55:59] Yeah. And so isn't it tragic how we as Mormon men just ignore and disrespect our wives? It is. And I, for so many years, when Margi would say something, I'd be like, ah, you know, I mean, not always, but like, way too much touch. It'd be like, ah, you know?

Marc Oslund [01:56:17] Yep.

John Dehlin [01:56:17] I just, I. I would not listen to her.

Marc Oslund [01:56:20] Yep.

John Dehlin [01:56:21] And I still. I'm still having to retrain my brain to be. Wait, wait, what did you say back then? Because I blew it off. And almost now everything you say is golden to me and wise and right. But I. For way too long, my brain was trained to just not take things she said seriously. Because I'm a man and because she's a woman. And patriarchy hurts everyone. You know what I mean?

Marc Oslund [01:56:42] Yep. And to view it as a problem or even like our. Our last day of our new higher orientation back in 2014. They asked Rachel to say the prayer. And she's like, why do I have to say the freaking prayer? I'm like, rachel, it's just a prayer. Like, just say it. She's like, I don't want to say the prayer.

John Dehlin [01:56:56] Yes.

Marc Oslund [01:56:57] And I'm just like, just say the prayer. Like, you know, and she gets up and she says like this. It's like, it's a good prayer because it's genuine. Rachel would never be someone she wasn't. She's like, hey, thanks for this. Like, we're grateful for this day. Thanks for letting us be here in the name of Jesus. Like, super short. And I'm comparing her to all the other seminary wives that are like, return. I thought I wanted to marry a return missionary because they're so spiritual. And this flowery, extravagant prayer. Thank you for, you know, and they list every apostle with their middle initial and all of that crap. And Rachel just wouldn't do it. And I'm like, dude, she's. She's not going to be the person that's going to take me to this next level, which is such a. Such a horrible thought.

John Dehlin [01:57:33] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:57:34] And now looking back, I mean, so cool. She's. Dude, she's the best. Like, she, like I said, everybody that knows her loves her way more than me, and they. She should. And I just. It sucks that I did that. And it sucks that I needed a bishop to say that for me to even hear it.

John Dehlin [01:57:48] Yeah. And, like, to make it okay.

Marc Oslund [01:57:50] Yep. Patriarchy. The bishop said, okay, fine, even though I hated it, and then was jealous, like, he said it. So therefore, it's good, you know, and. And bless her, you know, And. And my best friend, his wife was very similar. So she's the only other one that I know that is, like, that outspoken. Like, no, that's weird. I don't want to do that. And so, like, it was. It was interesting he and I would get to talk about that experience of having wives like that. And he's like, dude, you're. She knows better than we do. Seminary. Seminary is off. You need to listen to your wife. She knows better, you know? And so that was a. That was a hard experience, but it was really. It was really useful and really important, I think, for me and Rachel to be able to see each other eye to eye. So, yeah, that's where we were at. And, I mean, we're thriving. Right. With kids.

Warning Letters and Growing Tensions with CES

John Dehlin [01:58:33] And you've got a bullet on here. The church wasn't working for the kids. Did you already. Is that what you already addressed he's just, we're miserable. You. You felt like, overall, they were miserable. I. I was way too many miserable,

Marc Oslund [01:58:45] way too many miserable. There were a lot of people that we ended up teaching or I taught every year from my second year on about the concept of masks. We put on masks in Mormonism of happiness. Now I call it, like, I text my friends, I do Mormon joy, and I do the little TM and emoji because it's like, it's manufactured joy. It's not real joy. It's Mormon joy. You have to always be smiling. And the kids picked up on that very strongly. And so every person had masks. That's without a question. And I knew that because of the things that they would talk to me either after class or in different messages on the screen when we did text or the questions, I knew that they were, but they would never reveal it to each other. And so because of that, I am like, the church isn't working. What can we do to make this work, work? And then when I hear the givens, I'm like, that church would work. In theory, that church works. It's a happy church. It's about love. It's about openness.

John Dehlin [01:59:37] If it was the whole church.

Marc Oslund [01:59:38] If it was the whole church, and if we apologize for all the bull crap and all those other things and, you know, like, if we did that, for sure, that church is great. But right now, the church is just trying to move on and say, yeah, that's the church. We can do that. And they don't apologize. Nelson's saying, like, root out all racism. Like you root out racism. How are you going to tell the members to root it out and not apologize for the racism? Racism perpetuated by your office, you know,

John Dehlin [02:00:00] getting ahead of ourselves.

Marc Oslund [02:00:01] Sorry, I get fired up, man.

John Dehlin [02:00:02] Anyway, okay, so letter, letter, letter one.

Marc Oslund [02:00:05] So this is the big one. This is. I'm gonna read this because it's, It's. It adds the. The richness to how blindsided I was and how they viewed me when I was so confident I was doing good, I was following profits. I. I had. In fact, this is how I was told about it is. It's fourth period, which is typically like our athletes, and they're kind of, like, distant and they don't care as much. And I. It had taken a while. Right. So this letter comes in January of 2016. But it, it. It's very direct. And I was teaching a class, and the principal walked in right after, and he's like, hey, how you doing? Passive aggressive. I'm like, good. How are you doing? Like, so open and happy.

John Dehlin [02:00:49] And he knows what's coming.

Marc Oslund [02:00:52] And I'm like putting something up on my wall, you know, like taping it up there. And he says, hey, what are you doing after school? I'm like, just going to the gym. He's like, okay, can you meet with me and our like our boss after? I'm like, sure. For what? He's like, I can't tell you that right now. I'm like, you can't tell me? He's like, I just, I can't tell you that right now, but can you please read this talk? And I'm like, okay. And he gives me a talk and it's called Counsel and Correction by. By Elder. Who's the. The elder. Elder Johnson of the, the church education system. Right. The, the. The main guy. And it's a whole talk and I, and I'm like, okay. He's like, just be there at 3:30 and yeah, see you there. He walks out. Okay.

John Dehlin [02:01:35] With a smile.

Marc Oslund [02:01:36] With a smile. Let's see you, buddy. You know. How's your family doing? I'm like, geez, man. And eventually one of my friends and I, we, we were remember a Neil Anderson talk where he says, beware the evil behind the smiling eyes.

John Dehlin [02:01:47] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:01:48] And that became a theme for the rest of my time in seminary. Beware the evil behind the smiling eyes. And they. I'm like looking at this talk and I go to my two mentors because their office is sandwiched mine, and I say, what is going on? And they're like, wait, he told you he's going to meet with you and our area director. And I'm like, yeah. And they both get very serious and they're like, you're in trouble, man.

John Dehlin [02:02:12] Ooh.

Marc Oslund [02:02:13] Like, did you do something? I'm like. And you know how that feeling is. I'm like, maybe like I talked to a student. Like, I got mad. Exactly.

John Dehlin [02:02:21] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:02:22] Like, yeah, we got in a fight about phones. Like, was that it? Like, you know, or. He wanted to do prayer meeting was another one. Like the. Which was something the church had gotten rid of before sacrament. They would say prayers like to get ready for the meeting, you know, and we were still doing that in seminary and he was. The principal was mad that we didn't come and sing hymns. I'm like, I don't have time to sing hymns. You know, I got kicked out of the freaking choir on my mission. Like it's traumatic for me to have to sing. And you guys always talk and I'm teaching first period and blah, blah, blah. And one of the bishops who was there is like, the church got rid of prayer meeting. We don't need to do prayer meeting. And the principal got really defensive and he's like, just. Just talk to me after. Just talk to me after. Talk to me about it. After talk to me. I'm like, okay, this is strange, but okay. So we get done with our in service and I walk in and I'm like, hey, do you have a sec? He's like, yeah, for sure. I'm like, I just want to tell you my thoughts on prayer meeting. I don't personally like it. I. I am kind of busy. I don't like singing. I'll. If you need me to, I'll do it. I'd be fine. Um, and then literally the next I heard was him walking into my office a couple weeks later with this council and correction talk. And so I'm thinking, is that it? Like, I'm racking my brain and my friends are like, just, I don't. Good luck, you know?

John Dehlin [02:03:32] Know.

Marc Oslund [02:03:32] And they were so kind, and I felt super supportive from both of them. 3:15, you know, or 3:00 clock comes around and the principal's walking out, like, see you there, like, all chipper, you know. And I'm like, okay. Like, still feeling weird. I tell Rachel, hey, I'm. I'm going to be home later. I guess I have a meeting. She's like, about what? I'm like, I don't know. She's like, what do you mean, you don't know? Like, I don't know. I think I'm in trouble. She's like, that's weird. So the area office is at Utah Valley University, and we park at uvu, go up to the institute. I'm walking by myself, just kind of like, you know, a lamb to the slaughter, like, not knowing what's going to happen. I walk in and the. One of the trainers at BYU who had helped hire me was there. He would. He was like an assistant area director at the time. And he like, mark, good to see you. He gives me a hug and he kind of had this look like, sorry, man. I'm just like, what? Like, I don't know what's coming. I just don't. No. And I sit in and they. The principal and the area director both give me hugs. And I'm just. I'm feeling weird. I'm like, what are we here for? Like, we'll get to that. Can we pray? I'm like, sure. And I'm Like, I, at this point, I'm keeping my eyes open because I'm just like, what is going on? Like, I feel so bad. And they're like, mark, we're here to, to issue you a formal warning. I'm like, like I'm blindsided. Like, I knew something was coming, but I'm just thinking what and why. I'm literally racking my brain for things that I've done wrong. And I can't think of anything that would have been deserving of a formal warning or anything that would have, would have been more than just, hey, Mark, I'm noticing this. Can we talk about this? From my principal? And they're like, here, we're gonna hand you this piece of paper and we're gonna have, we're gonna read it. I'm gonna have your principal read it, and if you have any questions, just let us us know, okay? And at the end, we'll sign it, we'll. We'll send it up to HR and blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, okay. So then we start reading it. And I, I want to read it because I think it conveys the hurt and hypocrisy. This is like what I imagine to be your ex. Like, hey, we're gonna have a disciplinary council soon. Or we're thinking about it, let's have your first meeting.

John Dehlin [02:05:39] We love you and your family.

Marc Oslund [02:05:40] That's exactly that phrase. And that's always what it is. Look at, look at how it starts. Dear Mark, you are a good teacher demonstrating a powerful personal conviction of the Savior and his gospel. And off the bat, I'm. I'm weeping. Cause I feel so blind, blindsided. I have no protection. I have nobody there for me. I have, I have nothing. I'm all alone. I don't even know what's happening or what I did. And I'm sobbing and I literally stopped them. I'm like, if that's true, and I'm a good teacher demonstrating a powerful personal conviction. Why are we having this? Like, we'll get to it. And they say, it's obvious that you love the youth of the church. You diligently study the word of God and prepare meaningful student centered lessons. I'm like, and I stopped again. I'm like, why are we doing this? Like, if this is true, why are we doing this? He says, we'll get to it. He says, as your friend and supervisor, I sincerely appreciate you and the positive impact you are having on the youth. And again, I stopped him. The third time. I'm like, why are we doing this just here you go. He said in our professional growth conversations, meaning in conversations I had with my princess, just like we're supposed to have plans about how we're going to improve. And because I felt open, I was like, yeah, I know that I get sometimes frustrated about meetings like prayer meeting, or sometimes I think in services are kind of boring, or sometimes I wish that we could leave early. Um, or sometimes I. Whatever else. Like I've. I've been open with him cuz I felt like I could trust him. He says in our conversations. So immediately I feel betrayed where he's like, using that as ammo against me in conversations I thought were in confidence and ways that we could grow supervisor to employee, he was making mental notes of, hey, these are ways he's not checking the seminary box. He says, you have shared with me your inspired goals and the resulting impact of those efforts. In addition to the goals you have set, there are items needing correction, and there's that talk, counsel and correction. The following are three areas of professional development in which you must make rapid and sustained improvement. 1. Interpersonal interactions. You've expressed and I've observed that you experience difficulties in interpersonal interactions. Difficulties in. I asked him what he's like, well, when you got frustrated about the phone thing or when you were mad because this teacher was jealous of you or whatever else. And I'm like, wait, but why? Like, I'm so blindsided. What do you mean? There's not difficulties. I'm just being human. I'm just. He's like, I'll just finish. For example, I note that participating in morning faculty prayer and other area and cluster meetings associated with your assignment is very difficult for you. So now that conversation that I thought, oh, crap, I'm going to just talk to my boss and tell him how I feel and it's going to be okay. He's now using it as, oh, you don't like prayer meeting. Cool. You're. You're in trouble. You're not one of us, right? This career requires consistent interpersonal interactions in and out of the classroom with students, colleagues, parents, priesthood leaders and high school officials. And I stopped him. I'm like, in tears. Is this about the argument I had with this teacher? He's like, yep. And I said, but we, we. That day we hugged and like, we're crying and taught a whole lesson on seeing people and forgiveness. And he's like, that's beautiful. That's great. But still, there's. There's issues. There's issues here that we need to Talk about. And I'm like, what do you mean? He's like, well, just. I'll just have. You know, I was talking to our area director about this and he thought it would be a good idea to make this a formal warning. And I'm like, but you could have told me. You could have just come to me and if that was a problem, we could have talked about this. He's like, I know, I know. But he thought it was important to make it formal. And the area director jumps in. He's like, mark, this is. We don't want you to get too far down this career and then eventually be left in the dust because you're not prepared, you don't have skills. If this is not a right fit. Now, we want to make sure, we want to make sure we get you. Now, that's the whole purpose of your first two years, your apprentice program, to see if it's a good mutual fit. I'm like, but I love this more than anything. And you just said how good of a teacher I am. They're like, we, you make a tremendous impact, but we, we want to make sure that you really fit. Now, looking back, I'm like, we'll fit with the culture. I'm not a seminary teacher. I don't talk like one. I don't look like one. My story isn't like one.

John Dehlin [02:09:46] You're not passive aggressive like one. Exactly.

Marc Oslund [02:09:48] I'm not. I'm not a seminary. My wife isn't like a seminary wife. Like, nothing about me is seminary. And that's what they were seeing.

John Dehlin [02:09:54] And that should be the value of you. Not, not. You shouldn't be deemed for that. You should be valued for that. They should want diversity. They should be glad you're not in the mold and want a convert's perspective. Someone who wasn't raised in the church, someone who can connect with the youth. They should have seen your differences as assets, not as liabilities, I think. I mean, you weren't punching people, you weren't slashing people's tires. You were showing normal emotions, having healthy reactions. Yeah. Not being passive, you know, not suppressing your emotions, not packing them down, not stabbing people in the back in passive aggressive ways, speaking to people directly about your issues. Those things. Talk about anti Mormon. Yeah, that's being anti Mormon is being open and direct with your emotions. It's so true. But you're being punished for that.

Marc Oslund [02:10:42] I'm so glad you said that. That is so anti Mormon. I've actually thought that same thing. I'm like, yeah, for sure. That is anti Mormon. It's just feeling emotion like a normal being, you know? And like, again, I know that there's people that are good at Mormon. I get it, and I know you get it.

John Dehlin [02:10:54] But.

Marc Oslund [02:10:54] But like the stereotype of the. The most unhealthy Mormon. That is the most unhealthy Mormon, you know. So number two, attitude. Avoid patterns of negativity and criticism. There you go. Right. John During. And he. He's quoting. He then cites like, gospel teaching and learning or seminary teacher manual. I'm like, why are you citing this? He's like, I know you like to always see sources and reasons why. And so I put reasons and I read it later, and it's like, there's. That's not justified in the. There. But anyway, he says, during this school year, there has been a pattern of negativity and criticism and attitude and conversation regarding trainings, leaders, church culture. Think of that.

John Dehlin [02:11:31] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:11:31] There's negativity of church culture.

John Dehlin [02:11:34] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:11:34] Not church doctrine. Church culture.

John Dehlin [02:11:37] Well, there's two things about that. You shouldn't get dinged for talking about culture. Yep. But also, our culture is fraught. Like, our culture is messed up. It's so true. So if there's anything worth being critical of, it's church culture.

Marc Oslund [02:11:51] That's exactly what I'm thinking. I'm like, wait, why is that in there? Eventually I'll get one with church doctrine, and that's different. But. But this one is church culture.

John Dehlin [02:11:58] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:11:58] And I'm thinking, yes. Not only is it wrong and should be called out, but also, why is that a thing to be worried about? I'm not criticizing the brethren, you know,

John Dehlin [02:12:05] why is that putting your job in jeopardy.

Marc Oslund [02:12:06] That's exactly it.

John Dehlin [02:12:07] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:12:08] Classes and in casual conversations with faculty. You were just negative today. You just had a bad day and you told us that's literally what that meant.

John Dehlin [02:12:14] Yeah. Just pack it down.

Marc Oslund [02:12:15] Pack it all the way down. Yep. Which is what? Both this principal and this area director, that is their. Their specialty. And I like, I. How about this? There's. There's maybe three people in all of my experience with Mormonism that I still have. Like, I don't like them. I believe they're worthy of love. They're good humans. They are. They're, you know, been led astray by a system that's flawed and they perpetuate it. I don't demonize them. I think they're worthy of love. Love. I. I don't hate them. And that's important because people are like, you're just so Angry. I'm like, anger is, I think, the appropriate response to being abused or an appropriate response. How about that? I. The. There are three people I still don't ever really want to see or interact with. And two of them were a part of this letter. Right. The rest, everybody else who hears this, like, wow, Mark hates Mormons. That's not true. Yeah, I really don't. I. I want that clear because I'm sure my, you know, other people will see it and be like, wow, Mark doesn't like me. And that's not the case. Case. Um, let's see. Number three. Professionalism and actions. Dress and vocabulary. Maintain professional appearance the entire workday. Remember what I told you about changing at the gym? For example, wear a suit coat when teaching? Oh, that was one thing. Uh, the policy manual said, remember, I'm an expert at. At knowing all the rules because my mission president and the missionary handbook seminary policy manual said, if it's due to temperature, you can take off your suit coat. And I'm hot. I sweat. It's pacing in class. I literally will walk five miles because I pace so much. And I wouldn't wear a suit coat. And I didn't know that was a problem until this formal letter.

John Dehlin [02:13:42] Right.

Marc Oslund [02:13:42] Never said a word because the rules said, if it's hot, take it off.

John Dehlin [02:13:46] Okay. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:13:47] And I'm like, wait, that's a problem. And he's like, it's part of the rules. I'm like. And I told him, like, but it says if it's hot. He's like, I know, but it's part of the rules. I'm like, what? Like, I don't understand. Not wearing flip flops at work. For example, when I'm walking to the bathroom to change to go to the gym. That wasn't acceptable at all. Always seminary. Always tucked in, shirt, suit coat. Always wearing dress shoes, no matter what.

John Dehlin [02:14:07] Flip flops.

Marc Oslund [02:14:08] Yep. My. My feet get hot. So I'm like, yeah, I'm gonna take my shoes off and put my feet up on my desk during my prep period. Second period. No, the door's closed. Nobody's in there. Who cares? You know? He didn't like that. I didn't know that until he said that. In maintaining proper teacher student relations, the policy manual states, a friendly atmosphere can be fostered without a teacher or administrator trying to become a member of a student's peer group in action, dress or vocabulary. And I was like, stop. Before I had been hurt and crying. At that point, I got really direct. I'm like, do you think I'M trying to fit in with students. Do you think I'm trying to suck up to them? Do you think I'm just trying to be cool? And he's like, no, no, no, no. I don't think that. I'm like, why'd you write it? And he's like, well, because you. You want to see it. I quoted the policy manual. I'm like, no. Do you think I'm trying to fit in with a student's peer group? He's like, no, no. I'm like, that shouldn't be in there then. And then he's like, well, let me keep going. He says, avoid using slang phrases. I'm like, stop. Like, what? He's like, well, you say dude a lot. I'm like, I'm from California. I literally call my wife dude. And she gets mad when I do that. I get it. But, like, it's just natural. Hey, what's up, dude? How you doing? And he's like, I know, I know, but seminary teachers. And then the area director jumps in, like, we are to represent the first presidency and all the. We do. And I'm like, guys, like, what is this? Like, what is this? You know, I'm just so blind. So now I'm. I went from being very blindsided and hurt to being very angry here. And then he adds this. And I'm like, my gut drops. We caution you to ensure that students, particularly female students, understand appropriate relationships. And I'm like, explain. Stop. What do you mean? He's like, well, we see that a lot of students will ask you questions and you'll talk to them. And I'm like, is there a problem with that? He's like, no, no. Just make sure. And I'm like, make sure what? Like, of course they wouldn't say it. But he's thinking. He's like, are we gonna have another lone peak teacher on our hands?

John Dehlin [02:16:00] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:16:01] And that moment, I start getting really defensive. I'm like, what evidence do you have that I've ever done anything with any female students? Like, nothing. You've always kept your door open. You've always made sure you're walking down the hallway so that you're closer to where other teachers are. If there's a student. A female student, alone. You've never been alone. You've kept your. I'm like, so then what's the problem? Problem? And I don't find out until the day I get transferred from pg. And I'll tell you about that. And it's pretty sick to me. He says, mark, we recognize the wonderful talents that you have in the many contributions you are making. What the sandwich method of. You're doing so good. We hate you. You're doing so good. It's so sick to me. It's so. At this point, I'm like, this is all a lie. You know, I have counseled with our area director about these comment concerns and sincere. And our sincere desire that these improvements take place as you make these positive changes. You will be inv. To continue teaching in seminaries and institutes after the season of apprenticeship. However, if there is not significant and sustained improvement in the areas outlined, then you will not be. Then you will not be approved for continued employment with sni. And I'm like, oh, this isn't just like a, hey, let's talk. This is a. If you don't fix this, you're fired. 90% of these things I had never heard of before this letter. Not one. And I told him. I'm like, I would have. I said, said, I. It's already done. You don't want. You want me to wear a suit coat? Done. I'll wear a suit coat every day. You want me to not say anything negative? Done. Okay. I'll go at prayer like you. We don't have to even have this letter because it's. It's done. I've already made the changes in my mind. And then I said, dude. Yeah, exactly. And I'm like, I'll try. I said, I will try not to say dude. And he's like, we'll be understanding. Like, yeah, real understanding.

John Dehlin [02:17:38] Like, you know, and I won't wear my flip tops.

Marc Oslund [02:17:42] Exactly.

John Dehlin [02:17:43] To the bathroom when I'm changing for the gym.

Marc Oslund [02:17:45] Exactly. And. And. And, like, I just. It's so hurtful. And then I told him, like, you could have just told me this. Like, you could have just walked up to me, man, and you could have just said, mark, can you just wear a suit coat? Mark, can you wear. He never told me. Why do I have a formal letter? The first time I've ever been. It's so backwards how the church is run. This is what happens when you have people that aren't businessmen, who are in business roles. This is what happens when you have people who aren't educators being educators. These are people who are. They just love the church, and they're defenders of the church, and this is the only. The career that they could have. Some teachers I know are very talented and they'd be successful anywhere. Most of the teachers that are there would not be successful anywhere outside of SNI. And this is what happens when you have leadership like that. And so anyway, he says, I will meet with you periodically to discuss your performance. We. So sick. We love you and are committed to doing everything we can to assist you in this process. It is our sincere hope that you will make these changes and continue to bless the lives of seminary students.

John Dehlin [02:18:41] And that doesn't feel like love to you? What?

Marc Oslund [02:18:43] That's the most abusive thing in the world. We hate everything about you and you're doing everything wrong. And we, we love you. Cool. So basically I told him, I'm like, you picked apart every part of my teaching or, sorry, any not involving my teaching's good. You picked apart every part of my life outside of teaching. And that's what's gonna get me fired. Not because I'm a bad teacher or teaching bad things, but because I'm not wearing a suit coat, you know, flip

John Dehlin [02:19:07] flops or flip flops.

Marc Oslund [02:19:08] Or saying dude. Saying dude. And then the female one, I'm like, what is this about? You know? And then afterwards, like, we say a prayer and they give me a hug and I'm just like, it feels slow, slimy, it feels sick. I'm like, why are you doing this? You're going to rip me apart, threaten my family with losing a job, threaten my family with losing insurance, and then be like, we love you, brother, and give me a hug? It felt so disgusting to me. And I just want to say, first

John Dehlin [02:19:35] of all, it's exactly how Margi and I felt during my excommunication. Margi resigned the day after my excommunication because it felt so violent. But they were smiling the whole time. Yeah, but you know, you think about like Scientology. I've been thinking a lot about the comparisons between Mormonism and Scientology. David Miscavige would punch you in the face. Right. Or, you know, put you in prison. So, I mean, on the one hand, that's more awful, but is there an argument, argument to be made that it's better to be yelled at or even physically hurt, that somehow some of the psychological passive aggressive treatment can in some instances be more damaging or more violent? Or am I just being dramatic?

Marc Oslund [02:20:20] No, I don't think you are. And first off, it's so validating to hear that because I, you know, I don't know what's going to happen with my own personal life if I get excommunicated or whatever. But I told a friend before coming on, I'm like, I've already been, I've already been through similar things. I've Already know the pain of being, you know, called out and having a trial that's not really a trial and all those things. And so I absolutely feel. It feels like. It feels crazy making. Because if somebody punched me in the face, I know that that's wrong, and that's obviously terrible. I would never want anyone to punch another person. Like, I don't think that's right. But like I said, someone yells at you, for example. Exactly. I'm like, okay, cool. I know that guy's a dick. And I can be like, whatever. But, like, if I. If I go home after this experience and I have to sit with it and be like, I guess it's all me.

John Dehlin [02:21:03] Because they said, I love you.

Marc Oslund [02:21:04] Exactly.

John Dehlin [02:21:04] They must love me.

Marc Oslund [02:21:05] Exactly. And it's inspired. They prayed about it, and it's from the God, so it's crazy. It makes me feel insane. And then. And then they're like, and by the way, please don't tell anyone about this. And I'm like, what? So now I. Now I have all of this trauma, and I'm like, well, I already told two people, like, okay, you can. You can do that. I'm like, okay. And it's just. It literally is. It made me feel insane. I felt like I was just nuts. I'm like, are they seeing things? I'm not like. Like, I couldn't sleep. I was. I was hurt. I was angry. When I walked out, I felt so like this. This was God's will. And this abusive idea, the Hubie Brown idea. Thank you so much for loving me enough to cut me down, for loving me enough to hurt me. That this is seen as an act of love. That is so disgustingly Mormon to me, that the idea of God or priesthood leaders hurting you is a gift, that it's actually something to appreciate. Thank you, God, for hurting me. Thank you, priesthood leader, for saying this and that. My frustration at this is actually, again, seen by them as, oh, oh, you don't handle this well. Counsel and correction. The whole talk was just take it submissively and meekly, like Jesus did. Just like, God beat the crap out of Jesus. We're gonna beat the crap out of you. And. And it sucks. And it's so lonely and it's so, like, scary.

John Dehlin [02:22:26] Talk about it.

Marc Oslund [02:22:27] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:22:27] With anyone?

Marc Oslund [02:22:28] No one.

John Dehlin [02:22:28] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:22:29] And I'm just. I'm a wreck. I'm a wreck. I'm a wreck. And I walk out of the building knowing that this is God's will and unsolicited, without saying a prayer, without. This thought comes of that wasn't from God. And I'm in a. Now I'm in a whirlwind. What does that mean? They said they. In fact, at the end of the whole thing, after they said, hey, we need you to sign this and say you got it, he said, mark, I want you to know we wouldn't have proceeded in doing this without getting confirmation directly from God that this was what he wanted for you.

John Dehlin [02:22:59] Oh, that's abusive.

Marc Oslund [02:23:01] So.

John Dehlin [02:23:02] So abuse abusive because they know God's mind and will.

Marc Oslund [02:23:04] Exactly. And you don't. And we know it for you, even though you're not my priesthood leaders, even though you have no keys or.

John Dehlin [02:23:09] And they can't. They can't say, we see through a glass darkly. We could be wrong. Now all of a sudden, they. They have crystal clear vision on the mind and will of God, which is abusive.

Marc Oslund [02:23:19] Totally abusive. Oh, yeah, we. We see through a glass darkly and polygamy, but not when it comes to telling you that you're doing all these things wrong. Then we speak directly for God.

John Dehlin [02:23:26] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:23:27] And so it's just disgusting. And so that unsolicited thought of this wasn't from God, but was, holy crap. What. What's real? What's real?

John Dehlin [02:23:34] Who.

Marc Oslund [02:23:34] Where's God in this? Who's God? Where is God? What's happening? Was that God? Was this God? Is there no God? Like, immediately, I'm just like, oh, crap. And I call Rachel and I'm in tears telling her, because it's the shame of, like, seminary. Who's supposed to be this? Nobody gets fired from seminary except for people who have sex with teenagers on the freaking roof of a seminary building. And here I am about to get fired. And the shame that I feel telling Rachel, and she starts crying. Cause she's like, are we gonna lose our. Are we gonna lose our house?

John Dehlin [02:24:02] House, Health insurance?

Marc Oslund [02:24:03] Yeah. And I'm like, yeah, I. I don't know, Rich. I don't know. And she's like, do you want to talk? I'm like, no. And I go home and I start, like, I, I, like, finally allow myself to feel like I, I turned off. I never listened to rap music. I didn't do any of that because it was bad. Right. And so that one day I go in the basement and I just, like. The only thing that I felt like I could do is just crank, like, rap music and just allow myself to feel something. Something that I, I. That allowed me to feel what other people are feeling. Hurt, pain, whatever. It's the first time I let myself listen to music that swear words since I come back from my mission, like, and I'm just. I'm devastated. I go on a walk just because I was going to just lose it, and I was just going to yell. And Rachel was like, are you okay? I'm like, no. And I just walk and I, like, it's three hours later. I'm like, however many miles away. I'm just. I'm just blinded by hurt and anger and rage. And I'm just like, why seminary is going to do this? This is supposed to be God's profession. So I'm going through all the stages of grief, and, man, like, I made the changes, but never again were. Were things ever going to be the same in seminary, ever. Because here's what happened. I immediately thought, oh, I'm going to get in trouble for being the perfect seminary teacher, doing everything that I was told to do. Cool. Now I'm going to be authentic with myself, and I'm going to let myself start seeing the things that I didn't see before. And I'm going to be more bold in things where I try to, like, you know, cover the church's back or whatever. I'm like, no, I'm going to be direct because if I'm already going to get in trouble, I might as well do it the way that I want to do it and the way that I know is right. I've been shoving myself down and putting myself in a box and making myself be everything that Mormon said I should be for years and years and years. I gave up so much. And I'm still going to get this. And you're still going to take away my job, possibly. Cool. Screw you guys. I'm done. Like, and I'm. And then I go back to, you know, and then I get softer where I'm like, okay, well, this. I still love the kid, you know, and so we go through that, too. But something switched that day, where now my teammates, we used to always have this phrase, be the person you love to play with, but hate to play against. I'm like, you're going to be my enemy. I will make your life hell. And now. I didn't want to tear down Faith. I actually wanted to continue to grow the church. But I would never again do it in a way that they want, wanted. I just wouldn't. I refused. I refused. I refused to allow them to dictate my life if they were going to hurt me that bad. You know, it was a. It was a. I hate that that happened. And truthfully, John, if. If that letter never got sent. I would still be Mormon, I'm guessing. But it just sent me down a course where I'm like, fine, I'm going to start looking in all this stuff. CES letter, all this thing I push away. I'm like, yeah, I want to read it. I want to see what happens. And so I read the CES letter, and my, My. My first thought is your response to this. Yeah, it's a part of it. Because I'm like, I'm hurting, so I need to hear other people who are hurting. And the fact that seminary caused my faith. I would never call it a faith crisis. Bill Real had an amazing podcast on how faith crisis serves the church, where it makes people feel afraid, and they're like, oh, my gosh, it's the crisis. It's bad. I'm like, it was not a crisis. Although, for what it's worth, it does feel like, you know, your world's turned upside down. So that's why it's valid. But I don't use it because I refuse to help the church make people feel afraid of it, even though it really is scary and hard or whatever. So the seminary caused my faith crisis. It was them. It was. It was the leadership of seminary. It was approved by prophets. Right. Because all these people are passed down and they all get approved and blah, blah, blah by revelation. And so I'm like, cool. I'm going to start allowing myself to hear more things that my students who are talking about the CES letter, my friends who are starting to hear about the CS letter. I'm. I'll read it. But it wasn't. This is the irony, though. It wasn't to tear down the church yet. It was. I'm just gonna let myself feel what I'm feeling. And it wasn't. I wanted to read it so I could help people with it, but I'm not afraid of it now. That's the difference. But when I read it, I'm like, oh, this is weird. And first I thought it was really long. I'm like, this is long. And then I'm like, this is weird. And then I felt really off. And. Yeah. So I kind of put it aside. I'm like, I don't like that. It's the anti Mormon thing. Right? It's anti Mormon. I don't feel the spirit, AKA I. There's cognitive dissonance. Right.

Personal Faith Crisis, Miscarriage, and Emotional Breaking Points

John Dehlin [02:28:13] It's making me feel uncomfortable.

Marc Oslund [02:28:14] Exactly.

John Dehlin [02:28:14] This truth, these facts, this evidence is making me feel uncomfortable.

Marc Oslund [02:28:18] Exactly. Which is what it was.

John Dehlin [02:28:19] Must be Satan.

Marc Oslund [02:28:20] Yeah, exactly. So that was the easy route. This isn't good. Okay, maybe, maybe this is too far. And so I, yeah, I finished that

John Dehlin [02:28:26] year and a couple personal things happen and.

Marc Oslund [02:28:30] Yeah. And then, then the waves started hitting. Um, you know, we're teaching the Old Testament and we're talking about like people that are 100 something years old getting pregnant, you know, and having babies and you know, fathers in law sleeping with their, his daughters in law and all of a sudden them getting pregnant. And we're talking all. It's so much about this lineage thing in the Old Testament. And me and Rachel are trying to have kids and we are like, we have infertility things where we can't have a kid, we can't get, get pregnant. And then by like some miracle at the end of the year, we end up getting pregnant and we're so ecstatic and so giddy and like, we're the only ones in seminary that don't have kids, which is another reason people look down on me. And man, I, I was so pumped. We were, we were, I think, I don't know, 10 weeks pregnant, which is not far along. And Rachel started feeling bad, she had some bleeding. And um, we went to, you know, the, the, the gynecologist and said what was happening and I left. I actually was teaching a, A se summer seminary lesson. And by the way, I'm keeping all this like that's been going on. I, I do get. I finished the year and I'm able to keep teaching. We're, we're proud to offer you the job for the, for forever. I'm like, oh, good. You know, and I'm still feeling betrayed and I can never trust them again.

John Dehlin [02:29:51] Wait, offer you a job forever?

Marc Oslund [02:29:52] Yeah. Meaning like you're going to be a seminary teacher. Like this warning letter that he made, all the improvements. Your seminary.

John Dehlin [02:29:58] Oh, so. Okay, so that's undone.

Marc Oslund [02:29:59] Yep.

John Dehlin [02:30:00] So after the warning letter, you clean up and then you get another letter

Marc Oslund [02:30:04] way, way down the road that says a couple. It's. They told me by words. They're like, we're proud to offer you extend your, you know, past your apprenticeship. You are now this year. This, that school year. It's that school. So 2015, 2016 school year. But it happened in 2016.

John Dehlin [02:30:18] Okay, that's fine.

Marc Oslund [02:30:19] And then the summer of 2016, right after I, I got, you know, re like said, hey, you're going to be able to teach. We have this, this miscarriage and, and it just, it just shatters me and in ways that I wasn't expecting and It. The betrayal of what happened in seminary had. Had still been there. We had a miscarriage that just broke me. I mean, why.

John Dehlin [02:30:41] What was hard about the miscarriage?

Marc Oslund [02:30:42] And you know what? This moment where I looked at Rachel and I'll never forget, man. Like, I'm in. I'm. I'm watching this happen. Her, and she's. You know, she's bleeding, she's having cramps, and it's just, like, heartbreaking that I can't help her, right? I'm. I'm literally helpless. I'm sitting in a chair away from her, and the doctor, you know, comes and does an ultrasound. And I'm watching her face, like, look at the ultrasound screen. And I see the hope in her face, like, still there, right? Like, the baby's still there that we've been trying to have for years.

John Dehlin [02:31:18] And so you had been trying for.

Marc Oslund [02:31:19] Yeah, we've been trying, and we couldn't. And then I'm reading the Old Testament. It's pissing me off. And it was just hurting my faith because I'm like, why is this not happening for me? Am I not doing something right? And I'm getting ripped apart by seminary, and it's. It's just. It's just crack after crack after crack.

John Dehlin [02:31:31] You gave up your career.

Marc Oslund [02:31:32] Yeah, exactly. I've given up my whole. Yes. It's all of these things. My family. It's like, what? Like, God, when are you gonna help me out, man? Because I thought seminary was the help. And then all of a sudden, I'm getting blindsided by that, too. And I'm looking at Rachel's face, though. I'm looking at the ultrasound, and I see the moment. It's just gone on too long. The doctor's been searching for too long and for that heartbeat. And I see her the moment her face drops, and it, like. It just shatters me, man. Like the hurt and sadness. And the doctor's so kind, and he's like, hey, okay, we'll have a different conversation. And so, you know, she. They wipe the ultrasound gel off, and she gets ready, and she just starts crying. And Rachel doesn't cry very often, right? She just doesn't. And so we go to the doctor, and he says, hey, you know, this happens. It happens often. This is body's way of rejecting something that isn't healthy and that wasn't going to work. And she then says, was this my fault? And I'm just like, no. Like, in my mind, no. And then I'm. I'm so. In that moment, I see this Pain that's happening to Rachel. And I'm just like, where are you, God? Where have you been? Where have you been? And she hates needles. That's the thing. Like, she hates more than almost anything else in the world is getting, like, shots or veins. She can't talk about it. She'll, like, almost faint. And the doctor. Doctor's like, do you know what blood type you are? And she said, no. And she's like, well, just because, like, I don't even understand still to this day, because it was. It was so bad. But they needed to get a shot if she had a certain blood type to help, I guess, with this miscarriage. And so we have to walk across the street, and she gets the shot, and she's crying, and the phlebotomist is like, did I do something wrong? She's like, no, you're a great doctor. And she's just sobbing, and I'm just watching it all. Like, I wish in that moment I could have taken that pain from her and been like, no, you don't have to do this. Like, I'll get the shot for you. Like, why does she have to have all of it happened to her? Because I had come there from seminary, and I just taught a lesson about hope and all this stuff. And I parked right in front of Rachel's car. She came separately from her. Her job. And so I'm like, rachel, I'll. I'll drive you home. I'll walk back to the hospital. It's just a couple miles. Like, you don't have to drive. I don't want you to drive when you're sad. She's like, no, I'll drive. I'll drive. And I. I get in my. I'm like, are you sure? I'm like, really fighting her. She's like, I'll drive. I'm like, okay, go in the front seat of my car. Car. Look in the rearview mirror where Rachel was. And I just see, like, her just lose it. Like, that moment when she just lets it all out, you know? And in my heart, I. I was so livid at God. And I. So I drove off, and I just started yelling, where are you, God? Where have you been? Why are you doing this to me? You say you love Rachel. You told me that, right?

John Dehlin [02:34:24] Remember?

Marc Oslund [02:34:24] I love her no matter what she does. Why the hell did you do this to her? And I'm just livid. Like, why are you getting me in trouble with seminary? Why aren't you helping? And there's just. There's just. There's just nothing that comes back. There's just nothing. And all I could tap into at that moment was I love Rachel. I don't know if you do. You say you do, but where are you? Where are you for me? So therefore, I'm gonna take care of Rachel. And so I'm like, I don't know if you're gonna be able to do it or not. Cause you're not doing it for me and you're not doing it for her. And so I'm like, cool. And Rachel gets home and she cries. And so, you know, we have a terrible day. And I say, rachel, you're not going to work tomorrow. We're gonna go hang out. Like, I'm not hoping that God's gonna do this one for us, you know? And we went and we had like an amazing day and her friends gave her flowers and, and we went up to Salt Lake and she went to the spa. And it was like this amazing day where finally I'm, I'm trusting, like, no, this is my job to make sure that Rachel's taken care of. Like, I'm not going to trust God to do this when he hasn't done it ever for me, really. And it was so special. And it was just like this really rewarding moment. But the cracks in my, in my faith were just growing and growing and growing and, and it's from every side at this point.

John Dehlin [02:35:41] Point.

Marc Oslund [02:35:41] It's from scripture, it's from doubts, it's from emotional pain, it's from family relationships, it's from my own career. It's just, it's every side is just beating me up. And knowing that seminary is constantly judging me was like the icing on the cake where I'm like, oh, it's not just God, it's specifically Mormonism. Like, I am doing the most Mormon thing in the world. Can you think of a more Mormon thing than being a freaking release time seminary teacher and Utah County? I can't, you know, and so I'm like, it's not just God. It is Mormonism that is causing this pain. And yeah, church becomes really hard. People talk about family. It's just, it gets really real, really heavy, really miserable, really quick, you know, and it sucks. And I'm, I, I'm, I'm grateful. We ended up having some amazing experiences because we didn't have a kid and we went to Europe a couple times and just really rewarding experience that we wouldn't have had. But that, that was a foundational moment for me where, remember that experience I had Way back when I gained my testimony, I needed that again in a big way. Not just like a little confirmations of somebody said my name during testimony meeting. I needed like, hey, man, show up here. Wasn't there?

John Dehlin [02:36:53] Yeah. In the retreats, I often say that we're converted to Mormonism emotionally, and we're often deconverted from Mormonism them emotionally. It takes an emotional deconversion. It's usually not the evidence that takes you out. It's that big emotional moment where you realize you've been hurt or lied to or something serious is wrong or someone you love is being hurt.

Marc Oslund [02:37:16] Exactly. And people lately have been saying about me, like, oh, he just never believed, or I saw this trajectory coming no matter what. And I'm like, you are so insult. I would have endured. I mean, look at what I did endure for Mormonism. And if it was just one. One of those things at a time, if it was just seminary, I would have done that. If it was just a miscarriage, if it was just infertility, if it was just, you know, family relationship, I would have endured it. It was all of it together. And for people that are going to eventually judge my, you know, critiques or what I say about Mormonism or maybe already have, if the. If they have any response other than absolute heartbreak at how I was treated, they don't have empathy. And for a Mormon person who I know there will be seminary teachers who will listen to this and be like, he's just off the deep end. My challenge to them is, live your covenants. You promised to mourn. Why aren't you mourning with my story? Is this not sad enough for you? I know you've been through stuff, too. Is this not hard enough? And I don't mean to be like a jerk, but that's how I feel for somebody to doubt me or to express that I've never been faithful or that I just didn't have a strong enough testimony. How dare you. Like, it's so deeply insulting for me. And, yeah, my anger masks a lot of my hurt at that too. Because it's like, oh, you're gonna ostracize me even for this? Like, it's just. It's always been, how come you don't want me? It's the. If you've seen the Fresh Prince of Bel Air, there's that scene where Will Smith is, like, looking around at his. Where his. Where his dad is and he's. His dad had just left, and he looks at his Uncle Phil and he's into this empty room and so how come they don't want me, man? He just starts crying. That's how I feel about Mormonism. What more could I have given to you? What more could I have done? God, what more did you want from me? How much more suffering did you want to pass on to me? Right. If you're really there, why would you continue to do this? Well, because you'll grow, Mark. Well, what the hell? Like, why? I don't want to grow this way, you know? Anyway, it's just. Yeah, it's brutal. It's brutal.

John Dehlin [02:39:09] I'm so sorry.

Marc Oslund [02:39:10] Thanks, John. And I will say, when I read the CES letter, that quote from J. Rubin Clark really stood out to me. Where? At the very epigraph where it's like, you know, if we have the truth, it ought to. It ought to be harmed. Yeah. It cannot be harmed. And if we have not the truth, it ought to be harmed.

John Dehlin [02:39:28] It should be harmed.

Marc Oslund [02:39:29] And I'm like, cool. Yep. So, like, that's. So I didn't. I didn't believe the CS later. I thought it was anti Mormon, but that quote, literally with a picture of, you know, who was it? Why did I just forget his name? J. Ruben Clark. Like, his face. That's his quote. A living prophet. He said that. Cool. Okay, let's do it. And Elder Ballard. So now I'm like, I'm not an enemy because I still want to build faith, and I still want people to stay Mormon, but I absolutely will be unyielding in how truthful I am about things. Right. And then ultimately, I. With all of this pain, I express it with anger. Anger. I think that frontline emotion, it's easier to express anger oftentimes for a lot of people, maybe not Mormon people, but for me, I could be angry rather than talk about my pain. And so, so Rachel, who grew up in a very Mormon family, and anger was something that was very taboo, saw my anger and was very worried. Her brother has bipolar disorder, and he has had a lot of really, you know, manic episodes that have been very, very scary. So she started seeing shades of that. You know, I, I. So she's like, you need to go to therapy. So I do.

John Dehlin [02:40:32] So this started bleeding over into your behavior at home.

Marc Oslund [02:40:35] 100%. Like, I, I just. I. How can you separate it? Like, it affects. I go to work, and I just feel like there's. There's spies all around, around me.

John Dehlin [02:40:42] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:40:43] And I just don't feel safe. A kid asked me a question, and they want to talk about, you know, wanting to die. By suicide. And I think, holy crap. Like, I'm gonna die. Like, or I'm not gonna die. I'm gonna. I'm gonna be fired if I talk to this kid. Like, the pressure of that, as I continue to get more and more popular at school, just grew. So I went to, like, LDS Family Services, and. And I. I don't know. I don't. I don't know if it's ever a good idea. Maybe it is. I don't know. I just. I struggle with them. It's so. I didn't want Jesus. Jesus at that time. Like, I didn't want therapy.

John Dehlin [02:41:11] In therapy.

Marc Oslund [02:41:12] Exactly. Exactly. I wanted Jesus in my life bad. I just didn't want therapy. I wanted real healing, right? Which is interesting that I thought that real healing, that Jesus couldn't really provide real healing. But I. I went to my therapist, who's one of my friends, you know, brothers in law. And I just. I loved him. But he. He asked me about my story. I told him I was angry, blah, blah, blah. And at the end, he says, it sounds like you don't have any feelings, like, worth. And I'm like, I. As soon as he said I'm like, I knew. I was like, okay. And he's like, well, come back and see. I'm like, of course you want me to come back. I'm going to pay you. Like, why wouldn't you want me? He's like, just come back. Come back. A couple days later, we do emdr, which is, you know, helping process with trauma. And as we go through this, he asks me, what are you so ashamed about? And I'm not opening up. I'm not opening up. I refuse to open up. Open up. Because I've never told, like, what we talked about, especially in the first episode of my pre Mormon life. Nobody knew, not even Rachel. And I. I said, you really want to know? He's like, yeah, I want to know. And I told him all the bad things I did. The sex, the drugs, the people, all that stuff. And after, it takes like 10 minutes, I just get all off my chest. And he looks at me and he says, that's what you're saying great about. I'm like, yeah. He's like, you think that makes you not loved? Like, yep, I do. He's like, nothing can change your love. You were always loved. Your worth is perfect. It's never ending. And as soon as he said that, like, I told the thing that shamed me the most. And then the reply and response was love and worth. And immediately I Felt this healing that I hadn't felt from God. It felt like it was from inside. It was this realization that I'm a good person. And a light bulb went off. The scrupulosity almost immediately stopped. I'm like, well, if I'm worth everything, then why am I stressed? And why would God even need to send his son to suffer for me? And it's just like, so much came along. So the first part came from anger, but then the real change in my life came from love. And it came from realizing, oh, my gosh. Like, I. At the time, I believed, I'm like, Jesus, God, they love me perfectly. I don't even need to talk to them. I am just loved. I am good. And. And so I began to operate instead of from a place of anger and hurt, from a place of love. And now my approach in seminary was, we don't have to be afraid because we're all worthwhile. We're all going to heaven. The Givens quote or the Brigham Young quote, It's okay now to know if you walk away from Mormonism, you're going to be fine. Your worth is eternal. And so now I'm like, my faith is not only having these chips in it because of problems, but also because of love. Love. Realizing my innate goodness, everyone's innate goodness was the biggest factor in me losing my faith, because I think Mormonism is dependent on fear. And you take away the fear and you replace it with love.

John Dehlin [02:44:14] Love.

Marc Oslund [02:44:15] And why do I need to worry about these rules? And why do I need to worry about repenting? And why do I need. And love was the thing that just changed everything for me. Believing in my own goodness. So What a year. 2016.

John Dehlin [02:44:29] You didn't mention your brother in his mission.

Marc Oslund [02:44:31] Oh, geez. Holy crap. Thanks for reminding me. That's another one. My brother's on a freaking mission. Gosh. So he, you know, he's a convert. I'm not talking about when I'm telling you. It's like, from every single side. Um, he goes to the Philippines. He hasn't. He's, you know, he. He gets reconverted, basically. You know, he joined the church, but then kind of had his, like, less active moment or what have you, and he finally gets back, and he's like, I'm. He's fired up for his mission. He gets called to the Philippines. He's loving it. He's thriving. Like, he's finally gonna, like, basically stick to something. He's kind of been back and forth on a lot of things. And then one Day my dad calls me and he was like, your brother's not doing. Doing okay. I'm like, what? He's like, your brother is currently, like, in a very dangerous place in the Philippines. I'm like, what do you mean? He's like, he's in a hospital. Long story short, I still don't even know all the details. And so if my brother, he's going to listen, he's going to be like, dude, you got that wrong. Sorry, I just. I still don't know. Here's what I do know. My brother was in the Philippines, in a very poor area of the Philippines. He had not been sleeping because he had insomnia. He didn't tell him anybody. Which, when you have insomnia and you're not sleeping, it's not good for your body. He's in this very poor area. He's eating some bad food. That's not healthy. So he gets a little fever. Then there's a typhoon that comes. Adds a ton of stress and adds a ton of sewage into the things they're eating and drinking. So he gets even more sick, and he ends up developing a really high fever. I believe he begins hallucinating. I think he's in this, like, kind of country area in the Philippines. They don't know what to do. They think he's, like, a lunatic. They think he's potentially possessed. And so they. I think they put him, like, more or less in insane asylum, saying, this person is. Is a religious freak, and we aren't going to let him leave our. Our. Our country. And so the church is, like, trying really hard to, like, get him back. Like, no, he's just. He needs help. He needs medicine. So eventually they do. They send a missionary from somewhere to pick him up. They take him from the Philippines, bring him back to Nashville where they were living. It goes to Vanderbilt Hospital. And they say, oh, it's bipolar. And they give him some medicine, and he gets better. My dad said the church kind of dropped him off, said, hey, here he is. And they never followed up. Never. You're a problem now. So the two factors that really played in. Why would you do this to my brother? So now you're hurting me. My brother, my wife, you know, my students, mom, my mom. Everybody is being beat the hell up for Mormonism.

John Dehlin [02:46:57] Him. And.

Marc Oslund [02:47:00] And then. And then you're just going to just leave him? You're just going to leave? My mom and dad are amazing, as we know. But, like, there's no followup. There's no, hey, how's he doing. There's no, we're going to pay for this. There's, it's like, nope, see you.

John Dehlin [02:47:12] So they just let him.

Marc Oslund [02:47:13] Yep. They went back to Vanderbilt and he was taken care of at Vanderbilt Hospital and he got some medicine and he went back with my mom and dad and that was it.

John Dehlin [02:47:20] Set him home.

Marc Oslund [02:47:21] Yep. And my brother, um, he, I mean, he still has. I, I, I don't know even know all the details. I maybe even got some of them wrong. But I got the general story enough right. To know that it affected him deeply because he started asking first, where's God? If God really was alive and he really was speaking to prophets, how did prophets know that I should go to Philippines? If they knew everything, they saw the future, why would they let me go here? He started asking that question and I'm like, well, you just didn't have the same faith that I did. Right. You just, you just didn't have the same feelings that I did, therefore you weren't committed. But like, that question he asked, if they really see the future, why did they get this so wrong? That would, that became the question, you

John Dehlin [02:48:05] know, he started asking.

Marc Oslund [02:48:06] Yeah. Yep.

John Dehlin [02:48:07] So he started having a faith crisis for sure.

Marc Oslund [02:48:09] For sure. He was first. And, and again, my way of writing it off was, oh, you weren't really that committed or as committed as me. He's like, he's a freaking return missionary. Like, how much more committed do you need to, to be? But yeah, so he kind of did his thing. And I know that was hard for him. He was going to school at University of Tennessee in Knoxville, met a girl, her dad was a state clerk at the time, so in the state presidency and he had a faith crisis and their family had a faith crisis. And my sister in law, her and my brother were both going through their, I don't know about this at the same time. And like, I know that my, my, my sister in law's family like showed the temple clothing, like, you sure you want to go? You know what I mean? And she's like, that's weird. And I'm thinking, well, her family's anti Mormon. Isn't this the irony? I hate it. And a lot of the things they've done, but I'll still defend it to the death. And I'm judging my, you know, in laws and worried about them. And my brother's like, hey, I don't think we're gonna get married in the temple. And I'm like, like, what? You know, so, yeah, they, they end up, they're still members of the church. But like they got married and they, they are normal people. They're normal people again.

John Dehlin [02:49:20] But they got married in a normal way. Exactly.

Marc Oslund [02:49:23] You know, like, oh, terrible people. You know, and so just. But genuinely like, my brother is a thousand times kinder by nature than I am. I maybe not as charismatic. And he's gonna be like, you dick. Why'd you say that? But like, but like he's so much nicer. My sister in law is like, she's a, she's has a doctor in occupational therapy. Like amazing, amazing, amazing people. They, they were list. I didn't know they were listening to you. This was like a thing that would really help them was hearing people's stories, not feeling alone. I certainly wasn't that good at. Because I, I wanted to force square pegs into round holes. And so yeah, they ended up leaving the church and getting married and happy. And I'm left kind of being like, oh, well, my dad's not going to church now. My brother's not going to church.

John Dehlin [02:50:02] Mom doesn't, mom doesn't believe.

Marc Oslund [02:50:04] Yeah, my mom hates the church. My sister will never believe in the church. Back to square one. God, you promised me my family would be eternal if I was faithful. How much more faithful do you need me to be? And by the way, not only am I continuing to be more and more faithful and you continue to make this more and more worse. My family is getting less and less close to the church.

John Dehlin [02:50:22] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:50:23] So I'm like, this is like, there's. There's just so many cracks.

John Dehlin [02:50:26] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:50:27] And then somebody says like, oh, you don't believe? And I'm like, dude. I kept. This was, this was my second year teaching.

John Dehlin [02:50:33] Teaching.

Marc Oslund [02:50:33] I taught for six years.

John Dehlin [02:50:34] Like. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:50:35] I ended or you know, three more

John Dehlin [02:50:37] years, four more years ago.

Marc Oslund [02:50:38] Yeah. Crazy.

John Dehlin [02:50:39] What does the edge of inside mean?

Marc Oslund [02:50:41] Yeah. At that time, the only, the only relief I felt and this is, this became my motto. So my first year was Questions. My second year was Masks and Worth. And then the last. Then the theme of my, the I think the rest of my career, well, except for the last year was the edge of the inside. So Richard Rohr, who I don't remember how I come across across. I start reading like Brene Brown, Eckhart Tolle. I start reading just any Richard Rohr, Rob Bell, all these Christians trying to find something that will bring me feelings of love, you know.

John Dehlin [02:51:11] Not exactly seminary approved. No. Not exactly correlated approved. No curriculum.

Marc Oslund [02:51:16] Nope. I'm just like, something. Something's got to. Something's got to fill Me in ways that this isn't. Because right now it's trauma. When I look at seminary manual, my immediate thought is, that letter just read. So I don't want to read. I. I would still do it because it was my job, but it hurt me.

John Dehlin [02:51:29] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:51:30] So I needed to find a source of. Of refuge outside of that.

John Dehlin [02:51:33] Of uplift, of edification.

Marc Oslund [02:51:34] Exactly. So I came across like a David, David Brooks in the New York Times article mentioning Richard Rohr, talking about, we can't just have people on the outside that are lobbing bombs and destroying the, you know, entities from the outside. But we also can't have yes men on the inside. We need to have people at the edge of inside saying, you love the. They quote James Baldwin, basically, who says, like, I love America so much. And that is the reason why I decided to criticize her perpetually. That's how I feel, how I felt about the church. That was my place. I love the church and I'm going to criticize the church. And it's not its doctrine yet, it's culture and policies so that it will change. That's the. My role. I'm going to be that gate, that door. Janice Bangler talked about that, and it infuriated me. I'm like, no, there's no door. Because I know my experience where I'm like, there is no room in the middle ground because I tried to do it and I get kicked out almost. But that idea of middle ground was so endearing to me. I will be that middle ground. So that's what that was.

John Dehlin [02:52:39] And that's, you know, that's what I tried to do. That's what Bill Real tried to do. That's what Natasha Al Fur has tried to do. Do. And you just end up collateral damage.

Marc Oslund [02:52:48] That's it. Yeah, that's it. So, yeah, here's, here's the. If this wasn't enough, this wasn't enough. I mean, there's, there's more and, and there's more letters and all those things. But the thing that was most disgusting to me, they say, hey, we're not going to move you from Pleasant Grove. Whatever. I'm pumped. I would still spend the rest of my career there because I, I loved the kids. We had some amazing experiences, made some really good friends and family, friends, people that would invite us over to their homes and we'd had dinner with them and their. Their kids, friends who I taught. And I love them. I still love them. And we're still friends with a lot of the students I taught, which is Rachel. Rachel was friends. Rachel would be the one that would be, you know, getting to know them in their lives. And we still have pictures of them up on our wall. Like, we still love so many people. Um, but I was teaching a fourth period class, and I saw the two right around the time of we were finding out about transfers. I saw two of them walk in, like, my area director and assistant area director. And I knew immediately that I was getting. Getting moved. I did tell them in our interviews at one point, like, just, if you move me, please never move me to a junior high. And I say that not because I don't love junior high kids, but because I know my tendency is to be more lax. Hey, if you come late, you come late. Like, I'm just happy you're here. If you're on your phone, you're on your phone. And junior high kids need a lot more structure than that. I know that they would just walk all over me.

John Dehlin [02:54:04] Since when was their seminary in middle school?

Marc Oslund [02:54:06] Not crazy. So ninth graders.

John Dehlin [02:54:08] Ninth graders.

Marc Oslund [02:54:09] Seventh, eighth and ninth.

John Dehlin [02:54:10] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:54:11] So, like, I grew up, like, holiday. Exactly. Yeah. So, like, for me, it was 6, 7, 8 in California. And then all of a sudden, it's 7, 8, 9 here.

John Dehlin [02:54:18] And I'm like, okay.

Marc Oslund [02:54:19] So it was just freshmen. I'm like, please don't send me there.

John Dehlin [02:54:21] Ninth graders. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:54:22] Even though they're sweet. I'm just like, I knew it. They walked in, they said, hey, we're going to move you to Ocanny Jr. In Linden. And I'm like. Like, my heart just sunk. Because I love pg. I never. I wanted to spend the rest of my career there. They moved me to O Canyon. And I'm like, not only did you move me against my will, but you move me to a place I specifically said, please, please never move me here.

John Dehlin [02:54:40] And as you're thinking about why they might have done that, I can think of a couple reasons. One is they just had a need.

Marc Oslund [02:54:46] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:54:47] Another is you were causing problems, or someone didn't like you and they wanted to get rid of you. Or even worse, that they wanted you out of the CES program and by giving you the thing you didn't want, it would make you uncomfortable so that you wanted to leave now. Or it could be just they thought you were amazing and that they thought you'd be amazing with the kids. So I.

Marc Oslund [02:55:07] You know, I think it's a little bit of all of it, honestly. And I'll tell you why. So I asked the area because I didn't trust the. The real area. Director because he was the guy that wrote the letter. So how am I ever going to trust? I don't trust anything he says, and I never will. He's. He's a person. I just, I, I, he deserves love.

John Dehlin [02:55:21] And, yeah, we got that.

Marc Oslund [02:55:22] Yeah. So anyway, but, but, yeah, I just. Yeah, Anyway, so he. I asked the assistant. When I don't look at that guy in the eye, but I look at the assistant area director, I'm like, why'd you move me? And he's like, mark, let me tell you, if you taught myself, son, he's, he's going to be a ninth grader. I need somebody like you to teach ninth graders. And I'm like, yeah, but, like, why can't I be here with the other kids? He's like, we just. We're losing. We're losing too many people between 9th and 10th grade. They don't want to keep coming. We need you there to stop the gap, which was an honor, but also, you're losing people in ninth grade. Like, wow, that's like, do you see what I mean? The church is more aware than they want to act. Like they are. Um, and an honor, like, wow, you think I can be that stop gap? But there's more to it. I, I also know that my principal didn't like me. The reason I know that is because they transferred another, the only other millennial teacher that we had, who they also told that he would be there at Pleasant Grove. They moved him to another junior high, and they told him that it was inspired, blah, blah, blah. And he ends up asking around, and he ends up finding out from the principal that he requested a culture adjustment at Pleasant Grove, and so they shipped out me and the other young, dynamic millennial to junior highs. So you'd be separated. Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:56:39] Cultural adjustment. Yep. What does that mean?

Marc Oslund [02:56:41] Means things are too chummy, too happy. Kids like being here too much. They at seminary, at Pleasant Grove High, the senior high school. So we're going to separate you because you're having too much influence. People like being here. They're requesting teachers. We don't want that. We basically want them to. To not have the excitement and passion about seminary that they did.

John Dehlin [02:56:59] Well, I mean, if I'm thinking about that, I'm thinking about Paul Dunn. I'm thinking about, like, anytime a lobster starts to climb out of the pot, the lobster gets pulled back in. But also, like, I remember being told at Microsoft when I was kind of really advancing, don't get your head stuck out too high, because if you do, it'll get chopped up off. In other words, manage your success or you'll breed envy or even, let's just say noble reasons. You don't want students worshiping teachers for sure. You don't want their testimony being rooted. Because what happened with Paul Dunn, what happened with, you know, charismatic leaders, Uchtdorf, whatever. You don't want anybody getting too popular. Like I've often wondered if Uchtdorf was demoted from the first presidency in part heart because he was just like all the old women were loving on him and he was like way too popular. And how is Packer Oaks or Nelson that are kind of curmudgeons? How are they going to feel when everyone's gooing and oozing over, over Ruktorf?

Marc Oslund [02:58:01] Yep.

John Dehlin [02:58:01] So I mean, maybe they just didn't want you being too popular.

Marc Oslund [02:58:04] For sure. And I, and I think that's part of it. I mean, they quote, you know, a couple things where it says like there's a danger in somebody being too influential and blah, blah, blah, but, but then I, I, it's like it's one of some apostles somewhere I could find it. But the idea being we want youth. Like they said, that's a problem. We only hope that we can have that everybody would be so influential. And so I'm like, wait, that's a gift. But that absolutely is a thought process, especially for the principal at the time. He saw that as something to be worried of. And so truthfully, they replaced me and another dynamic teacher and a couple other ones a couple years previous, obviously with very orthodox, very stale, the most. The typical seminary teacher. Exactly. And like just there's no connection. It's just follow the scripture. So it's all of that. And then here's the final piece. I'm moving my, my boxes. I'm brokenhearted. And they do like a final assembly where I'm supposed to be so happy and I'm like, I'm pissed. Like what I'm gonna be like joyful. Like I love seminary. Like I'm angry at what seminar seminary has done to me the last couple years. And so I'm just kind of like bitter and moping in my office and moping is not the right word, but I'm fuming in my office is probably a better word. And one of these teachers who I didn't really talk too much but had the reputation of being very strict and very stodgy. All of those things that you don't want, you know, a teacher to be very literal, very by the book, the type of guy that said to students, hey, don't commit suicide, because if you do, it would be worse for you than if you stayed in this life and were depressed. And I'm like, oh, that's the type of guy you are. Like, you are going to shame somebody into the idea of being depressed. Got it. But he. He said, hey, can I talk to you? I'm like, sure. So I go into his office, and he's like, hey, I got to tell something to you. Cool, man. What's up? And he says, hey, I don't have a lot of friends. I haven't had a lot of friends. I was kind of a dork in high school. And in my mind, I'm like, yeah. I mean, I see it, like, you know, like, okay, we know that enough about you. He's like, mark, you've always been good to me. You've never said a mean thing to me. You've always defended me. And it's true. I always did. And he said, I gotta. I gotta be honest. I gotta get something off my chest. I'm like, okay, like, what? He's like, I gotta tell you, when we first came here. So he came from a different school. He had been teaching only a couple years before me, and I was new teacher. And he's like, I saw your success, and I was so jealous of how much kids loved you and how much kids wanted to be in your class. And I didn't have. Have that. I'm like, oh, dude, that's okay. I don't mind that you felt jealous. He's like, no, let me finish. He's like, I felt so jealous that I made up a story and I told our principal that I was worried that you were going to have sex with a student and that he should watch out for you.

John Dehlin [03:00:45] Oh, my goodness.

Marc Oslund [03:00:46] Yep. And I was like, you did what? He's like, yeah, I told him that I think Mark's going to do something bad with a student and you should watch out for. For him. And so that's where all the little notes and all the little checks and all the. That statement of, like, be careful with females. I'm like, what evidence have I right? It came from that guy who was jealous. Correct. All of this starts. So maybe my principal had his own things, or you would have dealt with it. But that was the final straw for him to be like, okay, this is serious. We got to make it a deal. He conveys that to the area director. This is serious. We got to make this a deal. Which. Good. They should take it seriously. They should. I I don't want. I don't want sex abuse. I don't want those things. But the insult that. That was to me, who had zero evidence of that taking place, it. It was just. It was just infuriating.

John Dehlin [03:01:35] But it's worse because they told you it was from God, and it was a lie made up by a jealous guy, and yet they told you that it was God's will straight from. Straight from God. Yep. Right?

Marc Oslund [03:01:47] Isn't that like. I mean, and, like, be up front. This is. This is what I was trying to do with my students. Like, let's just own it. Just own it. We can work through it easier if we just own it. But if you want to twist and try to say this is from God, when the rug falls out or whatever, the floor falls out, the crash is way, way worse. Because if you would just tell me the crap about Joseph, if you just told me that we could cope, we can handle it. But if you're going to lie and say that was from God and then I find out it was, wasn't. Now, not only did this thing already happen. That hurt. But you lied to me. And you said this and you did this. And so I'm like, what else can I not trust, right? Why should I ever trust a word that any of you say again in seminary? And by the way, you think you have the spirit of discernment. Like, this whole faculty is pissed off. Like, this principal, we all know, he's inept. Like, we're all livid. And eventually we find out. Or, sorry, Our secretary, bless her, calls the area director and is like, you need to know what's happening at pleasure. This principle is ruining everything. Our numbers are dropping. We are the highest attendance. We are doing so great. You need to understand, this is not okay. And they're like, wait, really? Because the area director had said. He said, mark, you should be so grateful that you have this person as your principal. He's one of the best employees we have in seminary. So I'm like, wait, dude, you are. You have no pulse of what's going on. If you think he's the best and we all hate him. Like, so, yeah, it was. Was. And. And they find out. Oh, crap. And so they start making some amends, but it's too late. I'm already wounded. I'm already cut. I'm already at the junior high. It's just. It's a fiasco, you know? Is that a mess?

John Dehlin [03:03:17] Yeah. I'm so sorry.

Marc Oslund [03:03:18] Thanks, John. I appreciate it. So, yeah, man. At that time, like, I am like, okay, I'm gonna start traveling. Rachel and I start going on trips. We, you know, we went to Europe and had an amazing experience. We saw Coldplay in Europe. It was just like a, a life changing thing. And that's fun. It was awesome. It was awesome, man. And like, we're, look, we're, we're married people with two incomes, no kids in seminary. Like, exactly. Nobody else has this. So we're making, we're, we're doing the best we can. We're gonna go traveling. And, and Mark Twain, you know, he says, like, travel is fatal to prejudice and bigotry. And that's exactly how I felt. I could get out of Utah, I could go be in Paris, I could be in London, I could be in la. And I could feel this sense of there's a world outside of Mormonism and the stress of Utah county and the stress of seminary. Mary. And it was just so nice to feel like, oh, there's other people that exist that don't even have a freaking clue or a care about Mormonism. And I see them drinking tea and I'm like, thank you. I'm so glad that you aren't bound by this. And what strange thoughts for a seminary teacher to be having that I'm jealous of people for not being a member of my church, you know? And so we go to, we go all these trips and I start teaching at the junior high. And I just have zero desire to be there because I knew I was going to be lax and what have you. But now I'm starting to say, okay, let's, let's start being open. I really, as I'm reading all of these things and I'm reading about universal goodness, and I'm like, let's start now. If you're, you want me, you're losing kids. That's what you said from 9th to 10th grade. Cool. Let's do the things that I think will keep them. If you think I'm the solution, because that's what you said, that I'm the one that's going to keep people in, then I'm going to do what I think is best, right? And we're having training meetings, John, about, like, here's the retention rates. We have like the Utah Orem Mission president come and teach us, like, here's our retention. This is what's going on. And we need to make sure we're getting more people and youth. And I'm like, cool, let's get them, let's get them. Let's get them in let's get non members. Let's get. Let's rescue these people. And the numbers weren't good. I don't remember what they are, but 50 less. What of retention and meaning of young adults? Meaning they're not going to church, they're not going to seminary, they graduate from high school and they stop going.

John Dehlin [03:05:28] Yeah. So we're talking about at this point, 2016, 2017. And this is when it was becoming really clear that that half. And this is still true to today, over half of people raised Mormon in the United States are leaving, have left or leaving the church. Church. And you know, from Greg Prince and others, we start hearing reports that upwards of 75% of young people have totally fallen inactive within a few years of returning from their missions. If they go on missions at all. Exactly. So a ton aren't going on missions. And the ones that do are falling inactive or leaving the church within a few years. So the church starts to just hemorrhage its youth. And of course, it's tied to. To the revelation of the exclusion policy. Right. And the church's LGBTQ policies, the way the church treats women, and the availability of the Internet and Google and the CES letter for youth to start figuring out that the church has been lying and hiding its history. And so there's this hemorrhage that starts happening. And you're saying that your leaders start telling you guys on the inside that the church is hemorrhaging its youth for sure.

Marc Oslund [03:06:36] Hey, we need to get them back. We need to reach out. We need to find more people. We need to retain people because we're losing them. We need to be more open. Like. Like it felt as. As desperate as they would let on.

John Dehlin [03:06:45] Right.

Marc Oslund [03:06:46] With putting on these. The front. Right. That they. Things are good, things are okay. But, like, why is the Utah War Mission president coming to tell us about retention and all of that? Why is that a thing that's happening? And why are we having meetings about numbers? And why is there so much focus on all of that? And so, I mean, that's not a surprise to me from my conversations with students and how they hate it. Like, they just. They're not liking it. So, of course. But I also. Because I'm listening and this was a huge thing for me. I'm telling my faculty and others, just listen to them. If you just heard what they were saying and then did it, it would make a difference. And an example being just apologize for what we did to Black people in 19 all the way up to 1978. Just say sorry. And like, that's not even a doctrinal ch.

John Dehlin [03:07:35] Change.

Marc Oslund [03:07:35] They don't have to. They don't have to even. We're not even getting into anachronisms in the Book of Mormon. That's just simply like a basic thing. Say sorry. The policy of exclusion back before it wasn't rescinded. Just be like, look, we got it wrong, we messed up. Just say sorry. That to me and to the youth, it's like, that's simple. But we know when you start pulling the string, everything else comes topple. So they can't do it.

John Dehlin [03:08:00] So.

Marc Oslund [03:08:01] So the problem with seminary, and I think it reflects the church at large, is they don't want to change. Right. They have no desire. Sorry, they don't have any desire to listen because they don't want to change. If they listen, then they. They have to change, but they don't want to hear. They'd rather force students to fit the mold and be like, oh, it's not working for you. It's your fault. You're a lazy learner, you're a lax

John Dehlin [03:08:23] disciple, you're masturbating, you don't have the spirit.

Marc Oslund [03:08:26] Yep.

John Dehlin [03:08:27] You're not praying enough, you're not fasting enough, you're not being righteous enough.

Marc Oslund [03:08:30] Yep. So blame the people, blame the members. You're not doing good enough. And that was absolutely the parents.

John Dehlin [03:08:34] You're not being good parents. Right?

Marc Oslund [03:08:35] Yep. Shame, shame, shame, shame, shame all the way. And that's exactly the approach that majority of people took, which is, well, we can't change the church, so therefore we have to do something to change people. And shame is a manipulator. It's not a good one and not a healthy one, but it certainly does something. And the irony is, around the same time, Dieter Uchtdorf gives that to talk where he talks about, like, you know, we may think it's for the best to manipulate by fear and whatnot. And to that I say, not. So how did this, the God of the universe, come? He came with Jesus and Jesus was love. And I'm thinking, yes, Uchtdorf. And so, John, my lessons, like, if you start, you could see the progression. Like, I have all of my lessons saved and you can see it becomes filled with Uchtdorf and Holland. That's it. It's just. And not all their quotes.

John Dehlin [03:09:23] Right.

Marc Oslund [03:09:23] Because of course they're still Mormon and they're still apostles and they still say dumb, wrong things. But I can quote the good, positive parts, just like Terrell and Fiona Givens did. They pick and choose the best parts and make it work, which is exactly what I was doing. And I was doing it now with junior high kids. And for example, here's just one small example I remember teaching. It was the Book of Mormon year now, and I'm teaching these ninth graders for the first time. And I thought, hmm, I want to teach them about writing Revelation, but what's a good way to do that? Okay, Joseph Smith. Well, you know what? How do I help them early know about the different accounts of the first vision? Well, they had a new. That new Joseph Smith video that they put down at the Church History Museum. And it's like the combination of the different accounts all in one. Like, none of them have ever seen that. No seminary teachers are showing that. I'm going to show that. So we watched it, and they're like, I didn't know all about those different accounts. I'm like, interesting. Oh, they're like, yeah, that is interesting. And they move. Moved on. I was doing the exact inoculation that Ballad was talking about, and I was doing it right. Another example would be the Book of Mormon. You know, Nephi, we always want to beat down Laman and Lemuel as our scapegoats of the worst people. And I'm like, wait, but think about being Laman and Lemuel. Think about being the. You know, now they're. I don't believe they're real, but the idea being, think about being them and think about. About how it would feel. You're the older brothers. Your dad is constantly telling you, I'm worried about you. You're a younger brother. You should be like your younger brother. You should be like your younger brother. I'm like. And so I paint this giant picture walking back and forth to get the plates. How long would that take? And I asked the kids, how would you feel if you were Laman and Lemuel? They're like, I'd be pissed. I'm like, me too. What would you do? I don't know. I'd probably beat him up. Interesting. In this verse, what did Laman and Lemuel do? Hmm. They beat up Nephi. Do you have a little bit of empathy for Lamanuel? Millennial? Yeah, I totally get it. So now I'm telling them to take sides with the bad people in Scripture.

John Dehlin [03:11:13] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [03:11:14] So this is still, to me, I think, somewhat innocent. I for sure am trying to throw chips in the predominant narrative. I'm not trying to throw chips in the truthfulness of the church. But they see it as a threat, understandably I guess. And, you know, I get called out by my principal. He's like, I think that every word that's said in scripture is. Is from God. I'm like, well, I. I don't think that's true. I mean, if that's true, then why would there be mistakes? You know, if there's mistakes, there are mistakes of men. He's like, every word that's in there is the word of God, and I'm asking you to teach that. I'm like, but he's like, you, I'm your principal. So now there's the unrighteous dominion. I'm your principal. You have to teach that. Okay, fine. And so with all of the stress going on, I have spies coming from everywhere.

John Dehlin [03:11:57] I'm.

Marc Oslund [03:11:57] I'm getting parents calling because of my layman and Lemuel lesson and whatnot. Or saying that Nephi had a bias. Bias, which was a word. He's like, where would a ninth grader have gotten that phrase, Brother Olin? I'm like, from me. Because Nephi does have a bias, because we all have biases. He's like, nope, it comes directly from God. And so now I'm like, spies everywhere, right? And so it leads to the point where I start feeling overwhelmingly anxious. My stomach starts hurting. I think I have ulcers. I go to a doctor, and the doctor says, I think you have, you know, anxiety. I start taking SSRIs, I start feeling miserable. I am angry and depressed. I have to go back to therapy. Um, it's just a fiasco for my health. I like, my hair starts falling out more rapidly than already it does is, you know, having male pattern baldness and all that. But, like, I just am an absolute wreck. I'm sleeping bad, I'm angry, I'm unhappy, I'm miserable. And eventually I write to my area director right after Pleasant Grove gets exposed. Oh, and I'm also, by the way, an elder scorn, probably president meeting, like, having these meetings. And there's an experience I had with Elder Bednar I want to share because it's important, but I'm having these experiences, and I'm overwhelmed and I'm exhausted, and I'm going to church, and I'm not feeling fed at church. I'm like, this is stale and rote. And why are we talking about the Constitution? And why are we like. I mean, we have. It's a very conservative, Very conservative word where we're at. Which I was conservative at the time, but not like them. You know, I didn't want Politics. I wanted healing, and I never got it. So I'm falling apart. I write a letter to the area director and I say, hey, I. I'm gonna. I'm either gonna quit or something's gonna happen because me and my wife are having a terrible relationship. And they had just found out that Pleasant Grove, the. The principal there was not that good. And I think he felt bad. And I think he's kind of like, okay, we'll throw you a bone, and you're our team teacher that's having increasing numbers, but one of the few that is having increasing numbers. And so we'll move you to Tippanoga's High. And I think that he never said sorry for what they did, but I think his way of saying sorry was. Was going to temp. So then I got moved again mid year.

John Dehlin [03:14:05] What did you mean by PG exposed?

Marc Oslund [03:14:06] PG was exposed by the. By just how crappy that principal was. Like, the. The secretary had a call and was like, do you have any idea what's going on? They're like, no. And she, like, laid it it out of all the crap that he was doing.

John Dehlin [03:14:18] Okay.

Marc Oslund [03:14:19] And so they totally, totally, totally got exposed for how bad they were. He gets demoted. He goes to the institute.

John Dehlin [03:14:28] So, I mean, that's. You know, in the church, if you make a really big mistake as a bishop, they'll call you on a mission. Or, you know, if you make a really big mistake, you know, they'll make you a temple president. Like, the church has a way. You know, many of us have wondered how Matt Holland went from UVU president to general authority. There's talk about that, like, one of the ways the church. Joseph Bishop. Right. There are ways that. One of the weird, strange, abusive things about Mormonism is you get promoted sometimes when there's a scandal.

Marc Oslund [03:15:06] Yep. Which is. Was new. Right. Because I. I'm still a convert, even though I've been around now for a while. And I'm like, what on earth? Like, so, yes, it's absolutely been the case that now I've gone back and seen. I'm like, holy crap, they do this all the time, right? And then I think, how could I be? Why wasn't I a favorite? Like, I would have been nice for me, if I make mistakes, why don't I get promoted? But I just get dumped on, you know? But you didn't know.

John Dehlin [03:15:27] I mean, honestly, like, I know of a. Of a man who was called. Caught in an adulterous affair, but he was a wealthy person of prominence with deep connections in the church. And they literally made him a mission president. But, but the difference is you didn't have money or connection, power or connections in the church.

Marc Oslund [03:15:49] No family ties. I'm like, who is some random convert, right? That's so true. What a fascinating, what a fascinating thing. And yeah, I mean I, I just, there's so much hurt and harm and so something important. So I get moved to Tip Nogus, which is great.

John Dehlin [03:16:04] But wait, do you want to tell the bed nurse?

Marc Oslund [03:16:05] I'm going to right now. Yeah. Which I think is important because, because he validates strangely. So Bednar, who I've already had experiences with on my mission with my, you know, Catholic teammate in Elder Bednar's office, and now once again coming to my stake. And he makes the point. He's like, honestly, the American Fork Central stake is one of the smallest geographical stakes in terms of like, just like how close knit it is in all of the church. He said, with the growing of the church and the likelihood of you guys ever seeing an apostle here is slim. Which again shows I think Bednar's arrogance of being like, I'm here to grace you for the next 30 years. You better get it right. But at the time, I'm like, three times with Elder Bednar. He does the question answer thing that he always does. But I wanted to tell this story because I think it's interesting. Somebody asked, who knows what it was about, you know, the culture of the church. And he says, let me tell you a story. And he says, there was a missionary, a senior couple missionary that came from Utah and got called to act Africa. And they show up with this brand new full of converts. The Stake Relief Society presidency. They're, they're filled with converts and they, they're brand new. They've been members of the church for a month and they're all Stake Relief Society. And this old sweet Utah senior missionary comes over and says, do you have plans for a stake visiting teaching meeting? And they're like, what is that? Like, we don't know what that is. And like, oh, you have to have it. That's mandatory. You have to do a stake visiting teaching coordinating meeting. And they're like, well, tell us more. They're like, okay, what we do for this is we spend a Saturday and we have a meeting and we invite all the people, all the sisters from the stake and we have a nice breakfast and then we have a keynote speaker and then we have breakout groups, and then we have a nice lunch and some more breakout groups and another speaker. And so Elder Benar's Telling us. I'm kind of like, where's he going? You know? And so the sweet African sisters, he says, you know, say, but tell us, like, we're supposed to care for the poor, right? Yes, of course. Why are we spending money on meetings for us? We're all wealthy. Why aren't we spending money for the poor people in our community? They aren't eating. Why would we get a nice breakfast? And also, aren't we supposed to spend time with our families? Why would we have extra meetings that aren't necessary? And also, like, and they just keep picking apart the sweet Utah sisters thing. And Elder Bednar gets up and is basically like, I just want you to know those African sisters have it right. We and Utah aren't doing it right. And for me, this is like the supreme validation for calling out and critiquing culture. This is Elder freaking Bednar, who is the next Dallin Oaks, who's the strict, stringent Kendall hair, you know, like, never, ever, ever going to fluster. And he's saying, hey, in Utah, your culture's jacked up. And so I'm thinking, like, sweet. If I needed even more ammo to call things out, I got it from Elder Bednar in my stake for the third time, like, meeting with him. And, like, and he still did all the same things. But I think that's important for me because even though I'm being beat up, I now feel like, okay, I have even more validation while I go to Tippanogos to call out. To call out culture. Right. And so I just think that's. That's important. And. And, yeah, that's actually true.

John Dehlin [03:19:21] Bednar from. From the people that I know who know Bednar Ednar. I've heard from many people he is critical of. Of church culture.

Marc Oslund [03:19:30] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:19:30] So there's a lot about church culture he doesn't like.

Marc Oslund [03:19:33] So critical and which is a good thing. But his. His doctrinal view is. Is warped. So that's the problem. Right? He'll call out culture, but then the problem will be he'll replace it with some, you know, intense. There are no such thing as gay Mormons. So, like, I like, right. You know what I mean? Like, yikes. But, yeah, and so, yeah, I get to. I get to Tipanogus. And. And I. A lot of the kids that I taught at Oak Canyon, you know, they come. It's half and half. Half go to PG and half go to Oak Canyon. And I realized I was really hurting when I was at Tippanogos. Like, oh, crap, this isn't Just a. A thing that my students aren't liking the church. Like, I don't like the church, right. And how it's making me feel. I don't like these things. I don't like going to church. I'm not having fun. I'm feeling. I'm feeling overwhelmed, and I'm feeling stressed, and I'm feeling un. Unhappy and realizing that I'm like, okay, I want nuance. Like, I want to teach with nuance. But then I'm like, at this point, I need help for myself. Somebody needs to help me. I can't just keep doing this and trying to be the one. It felt like to just make it work and hold it and just be that person in between and kind of taking that shock to make that connection work. I'm like, I'm. I'm being destroyed, mercifully. My principal was one of my coworkers at Pleasant Grove. Super compassionate, really good dude, and he. He trusted me, and he's like, I want you to be the person that we know you are. And he was really willing to, like, kind of go to bat for me and really willing to be very compassionate and kind. And he would be very healing. When I'm like, dude, I'm really hurting. Like, this is really hurting me. And he's like, me too. This hurts me too. He. He wouldn't necessarily call out culture, but he is so filled with, like, love. Love. Not just like, the fake. Like, we love you, brother. Like, he. He gen. He knows where I'm at now and where I'm at with my faith. And he's just still, like, very supportive. And I. I like, will say things, and I'll be like, hey, I want you to push. I want you to do this. And whether or not he does or doesn't is irrelevant. But he was. He was a safe place for me, and I was grateful for that.

John Dehlin [03:21:31] What'd you mean in the outline by

Marc Oslund [03:21:33] I didn't believe, you know, somebody? Because people said, hey, I don't think you. I don't. They said later, I didn't think Mark ever believed when he got here. And so I wanted to call that out and make that very clear. I was still a believer. I didn't believe literally in a lot of things. I believed a lot of things had to change. I believed there was a lot of problems, But I still. In general, right. I still had a testimony that the church was right. I still had a testimony that God speaks to prophets a lot of the time. I still had a belief that the book of Mormon was largely in some

John Dehlin [03:22:06] inspired, just like Janice Bingler. It's, it's in so many, you know, Spencer Fluman, Patrick Mason, Terrell Givens, Fiona Givens, Richard Bushman, Claudia Bushman. You at that point were progressive Mormon. And I just wanted to say I really relate. I had, I. Well, I lost my faith teaching Mormon seminary and it was really hard. And I was trying to teach those progressive lessons too, all while I was having my faith crisis. But even after, when we moved to Logan, I was teaching elders corps for a couple years and I was trying to teach truthful but progressive lessons. And being a moderate, being a middle way, progressive liberal Mormon in the church, I don't think is, is healthy. Yeah, I think that it, it's too much cognitive dissonance because the, the host culture doesn't want that and the, and the brethren don't teach that in general conference. And so you're always going against the grass brain and you're teaching things that makes everyone uncomfortable. No, it's actually confusing because some will like it and reinforce you positively, but then others will be super uncomfortable and turn you in. And so you always feel like there are spies around you, you know, talking about you, gossiping about you, complaining about you, and you're feeling like, like you're trying to do what's right and teach the truth and to help people and to inoculate people. But then you feel like you're a bad person because you're making so many people uncomfortable and you feel like you don't belong and like you're an enemy to something you're trying to help. And that's just too much cognitive. And then you're constantly subjected to people saying things that aren't true or lying or misrepresenting the factual history. But then you have to stuff it down to manage your political capital. And it is, I think it's really bad for your mental health to stay in the church as a vocal progressive Mormon. And I think it leads to anxiety and depression and, and as much as I didn't want to be excommunicated, one of the reasons I was grateful to have been excommunicated was it liberated me from that constant stress because I think I was going crazy. And it liberated me from the constant stress and cognitive dissonance that I was experiencing. And it was really bad in seminary when I was teaching because they'd come and monitor my lessons and they wouldn't always tell me when they were coming. And if I prepared a progressive lesson lesson and if I give a progressive Lesson from my heart. Am I going to be evaluated poorly? And I wasn't even getting paid and it was stressing me out. So, I mean, I can see why you were getting, you know, having anxiety and depression. But also, I still thought, I believed. And so you do still believe. You're just progressive, like the church is moving to now. You were just too early.

Marc Oslund [03:24:48] Yeah, I agree. And. And I see a lot of those things which, which is like, you know, you and so many others that have gone before, you were doing that and bringing the church into a place that it is now. And I look, I'm unknown. Most people are going to listen, like, I've never heard of you and they probably never will again. I don't know. Unless they want to see me for therapy when I'm doing that. But like. Or follow my Instagram when I, like, we'll call out the church, you know, or whatever. But like, I felt like I was doing that for seminary, especially in Utah County. I felt like my ideas were ahead of the curve, even though I felt like I was on harmony with prophets, you know. And so my sympathy for progressive Mormons is real, where I'm like, I remember being there and my takeaway from listening to Jana, because I was so like, no, there is no room. Like, I know from my experience they don't want you here. The church, meaning they don't. They don't want you to have this nuance Mormon. But then I remembered that she's like, I have a place here. And I thought, I remember that feeling of purpose, like I'm helping people. And I. To be honest, I still wish I had that. Right now I feel largely irrelevant or largely like I'm not doing. I used to do. I used to have, you know, 500 kids I would teach a year. And what am I doing now? I'm just some random guy on Instagram, you know, or I'm some random, you know, I work in financial tech. Like, who am I now? And so I totally get that. I'm compassionate. But at the same time, I think you being progressive causes harm to people. Cause it keeps them in. And then lastly, I feel like it harms you. And it makes me sad when I see progressive, you know, influencers on Instagram saying they're burning off nervous energy, hoping they'll get the priesthood and conference as a woman. Because they said, prepare Women by reading DNC84. They're like, we're getting the priesthood now. And all they get is some talk about how women are, you know, subordinate to men. And Then they are let down and have to go to therapy. And I think, why are you putting yourself in a situation, listening to a church that you know you're gonna have to go to therapy to cope with? Why are you doing that? And I know why I. You're in. You're. You're committed, but it just is tragic. And I, I really want to reach out to people that are like, no, I'm making it work. I'm like, just trust yourself. You don't have to force this to work if it doesn't work. I wish somebody would have said that to me, you know, but.

John Dehlin [03:26:58] But just, you know, they might lose their spouse, they might lose their inheritance, they might be disowned from their parents. They might lose the respective love of their siblings. They might lose their friendships. They might get ostracized in their community. Their children may not be invited to play with other people's children. Like, that's soft shunning in Mormonism. Or they'll just be viewed by their parents or their spouse or their children as a lifelong disappointment. And, you know, and they don't, you know, and then if you add on, of course, a salary and a career and your health insurance for your family, you're just. You're locked in.

Marc Oslund [03:27:32] Yeah, you're in. And that's locked in. That's the insidiousness of Mormonism, where we talk about Sea Org or whatever and Scientologists are being forced into this prison, or we talk about Mormons, and you're being forced into a prison because your parents are not going to love you anymore. Like. Like, which one's worse? I mean, seriously, I, It. I feel like there's so much pain and trauma and, and, yeah, it's just. It's real. And so knowing all of this is it. This is what is the. The rhetoric in my mind. And, you know, I, at that point, I had really read the CES letter. Like, so I read it a couple times previously and kind of brush it off. Anti Mormon, whatever. But one time I read it and I. I read through it, and I was really put off by it, right? And I was like, oh, crap. And I remember praying. I was just like, this. The church is a fraud. Like, it made it feel like the church was a fraud. There are too many cracks. And we had talked about this, by the way, at an inservice one one summer. Like, not necessarily the CES letter. They didn't. They wouldn't use that phrase, but definitely talking about, like, predominant things on the Internet. And they would Talk about, like, big listing, meaning they just try to tear it down by having so many things that are wrong. And you just say, wow, there's 500 things, therefore it all must be.

CES Inoculation Training and Discovering Church Problems

John Dehlin [03:28:37] But I'm like, okay, so wait, so this is important. So they would, in ces, they would try and inoculate you for Mormon stories and the CES letter without really ever mentioning Mormon stories of the CES for sure. Is that right?

Marc Oslund [03:28:51] 100.

John Dehlin [03:28:51] Because they didn't, I mean, why do you think they didn't ever mention them?

Marc Oslund [03:28:54] Well, I think it's because people start researching, they're like, oh, crap. I, I, they're gonna, they would never admit that. They would never admit that they were worried. They're like, no, we have the truth.

John Dehlin [03:29:03] Truth.

Marc Oslund [03:29:03] But I think they're worried that people are going to Google and read and be like, oh. Or that they'll pass it on to their kids, like their students. And so I think they were just worried even having that on the lips, on the mind, they would maybe even be sympathetic to kids that said, hey, I don't agree. And they're like, well, me too. There's something, you know, so they would never be explicit and clear about that. But I definitely think that's a huge part of it for sure. Yeah, it's a mess. Yeah, it's a mess. And, and just like you're, when they

John Dehlin [03:29:29] were talking about the CS letter, they were saying what in the training, they

Marc Oslund [03:29:32] were just like, hey, just because somebody big lists something like, oh, what's his name from. And he's a good dude from the church history. He helped write the book. Why do I forget his name? He's like a, he's a pretty dynamic guy. Like, I really like him, but he, Man, I wish I remembered his name now.

John Dehlin [03:29:46] Is it, it's not Mason. It's, no, it's not Flumen.

Marc Oslund [03:29:49] No, it's.

John Dehlin [03:29:50] He works in.

Marc Oslund [03:29:52] I'm gonna remember it. It's gonna hit me like, Jensen, Robin Jensen. No, at midnight, he's like, he's like a tan looking guy. He helped, right? Saints. He was a. I'll rem. It'll come back to me. Dang, I wish I would have remembered that. But he, he's so, he's a good, a good dude. But he's talking about this like, you don't need to be worried by this. We have the truth and we're going to be more open. We're going to have Saints and we're going to have all of this stuff, but at the same time, church historian A church historian. Yep. What's his freaking name? It's going to hit me, I'm telling you. It's going to come back to me.

John Dehlin [03:30:21] But he, he would come out and reassure you.

Marc Oslund [03:30:23] Yeah. So he had. He did the whole training. So we had. Every Tuesday we'd have training and we'd have an hour of this guy. Why am I forgetting his name? And then we'd have an hour of some other guest and we had like, Ty Mansfield come and talk about being gay and Mormon. And we'd have all these things that

John Dehlin [03:30:37] would help reassure was training CES employees.

Marc Oslund [03:30:41] So they're starting to shift really, really a lot at this point. And who else came was. Paul Reeve was another one.

John Dehlin [03:30:47] Who's that?

Marc Oslund [03:30:47] Paul Reeve is the historian at the U who talks about race in the priesthood. He wrote Race. Race. Shoot. What's the name of it? My brain is just frying right now. But basically, he writes about the experience of modern Mormonism and race. And he was amazing. And his whole presentation was, we were wrong about race. We were just wrong. And he was absolutely, like, passionate and dynamic. He says in jest. He was like, look, I know that you guys can't say bad things about Brigham, but I'm a historian at the youth, therefore I can say bad things about Brigham. In fact, I get paid bonuses when I do. And so seminary teachers were very uncomfortable about that.

John Dehlin [03:31:27] You know, what did Ty Mansfield say to you guys about being gay in the church?

Marc Oslund [03:31:32] He was being really cool. I mean, here's the hard thing. He, he did mention. He's like, I don't want to be held up as a role model because he's married in a. In a mixed orientation marriage. But I know from the way that seminary teachers described the experience with him that they all viewed him as the role model. So he was saying we should be compassionate and listen and love and that this is something that is doctrinal, like about people being queer at birth, like, and being wrong. He's like, that's not doctrine. That's okay. It's okay to be gay. And so this is accepted and approved, obviously by seminary. And he says, I still believe in the law of chastity that we shouldn't have sex. And I still believe that, you know, whatever, the church will get wherever they get and its policies and blah, blah, blah. But his main takeaway from every teacher was, look at this ideal gay moment Mormon who married a woman, had kids. That was the takeaway. I know that because I heard the way that people talked. They didn't hear the other stuff.

John Dehlin [03:32:28] So basically a gay man who's married to a woman stands up and says some affirming LGBT things but basically says celibacy or mixed orientation marriage is the way to go. Which we know both of those are toxic and we know from people like before time Mansfield like Dave, Matthew Matheson and so many others, those guys almost all end up, you know, coming out as gay and leaving their spouse and, and of course maybe Taiwan because of whatever reasons. But it, you know, you can't deny the impact of book contracts and jobs and whatever they're paying him and teaching opportunities. It's not to say what his motives are, but people just have to know. They should know that in Judaism, Christianity, Mormonism, there are decades and decades and decades of these spokespeople that come out, you know, and basically teach unhealthy lifestyles like celibacy and like mixed orientation marriages only to end up quietly being put on the shelf because they're either living lies or they end up breaking. And then they just, they bring in a new Thai man. So yep, they bring in a new Dave Matheson and, and they don't ever or you know, Josh and Lolly weed, you know, they, they, they just recycle new spokespeople never acknowledging that the actual spokespeople that, that were used to prop up these unhealthy and in many cases deadly or toxic lifestyles, you know, that it wasn't sustainable for those spokespeople that were, that were advancing those, you know, and this is just like decade after decade. How many times this happen? Was it Matt Grow?

Marc Oslund [03:34:12] No. Gosh. What's his name? I'm going to look this up because

John Dehlin [03:34:14] I want to find him.

Marc Oslund [03:34:15] Gosh, cuz he, I, he was a real, I really like him. Like, I mean I thought he was really good. It wasn't Matt Grow. Church historians. What the heck is his name? He's a tan dude. I, he, look, he reminds me of my baseball coach and so that's how I remembered him. But why do I not remember his name?

John Dehlin [03:34:30] All right, well we're not going to remember.

Marc Oslund [03:34:31] We're going to find.

John Dehlin [03:34:31] Thanks.

Marc Oslund [03:34:32] Well, I, we'll. At midnight tonight, I'll text you and let you know you can put in the notes.

John Dehlin [03:34:35] So by, so I guess by 2017, 2018, the church is sending out its historians and its apologists to train. And were you getting any indication by 201718 that other CES teachers were doubting that there were problems or questions? Were students having more and more problematic questions?

Marc Oslund [03:35:02] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:35:02] What was the reason that these trainings were increasing.

Marc Oslund [03:35:04] Yeah. Students definitely were. You know, seminary teachers are so tight lipped on everything that they, they wouldn't really share. They just want to share their, their real issues. It's always, they always have to be. They always have to know.

John Dehlin [03:35:17] Oh, yeah, you know what I mean? With your peers. Correct. And with leaders.

Marc Oslund [03:35:19] Correct. So I can.

John Dehlin [03:35:20] What happens if you, if you, if

Marc Oslund [03:35:22] you expressed out, you're fired, man, you're out. Or, or you're on the, on, on some blacklist or your warning or whatever.

John Dehlin [03:35:27] Did you, did you ever know of any seminary teachers that lost their faith while you were there?

Marc Oslund [03:35:33] No.

John Dehlin [03:35:33] It had to have happened.

Marc Oslund [03:35:35] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:35:36] You know, but, but, but just like you, I mean, if you can't freaking wear flip flops to the bathroom or say, dude.

Marc Oslund [03:35:42] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:35:43] Or you get like threatened to get fired, who's going to confess that they're questioning the Book of Mormon historicity?

Marc Oslund [03:35:49] For sure. And, and I think so.

John Dehlin [03:35:50] There's probably a bunch of seminary and institute teachers that have lost their faith or losing their, their faith that are just too. Do you think?

Marc Oslund [03:35:57] Yeah. Oh, for sure. And I mean, I can tell you. Look, I can tell you too, from my own friendship circle, like two, One that quit and while part of her story is a, Is a big catalyst for me and my whole process.

John Dehlin [03:36:08] So we should tell that in the.

Marc Oslund [03:36:10] Yeah, but then, and then my, my mission trainer, who also. The same thing. I don't know where he's at with his faith, but the point is it's, it's, it's happening. But those are people in my circle, in terms of people that weren't in my immediate circle. Everybody else is still good. I do know of one, one who mentioned, like, hey, I had, I had my faith crisis and now I'm better.

John Dehlin [03:36:28] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [03:36:29] And another one who's again, just so good in terms of being like, very kind of vague and being a progressive Mormon where in the sense of like, hey, it doesn't really have to be literal for it to be important and whatnot. So that's kind of where he is. But no, nobody that I know of that was teaching that, you know, has stopped going to church other than the two people in my circle. So look at me, the, the cancer and the virus, you know, like, although I, I don't think I'm the reason, but still. Yeah. I mean, we're having these trainings. We're talking about priesthood, we're talking about, we're talking about LGBTQ issues, we're talking about, in generalities about the CES letter and about the questions that are throwing under the guise of, hey, just don't be alarmed on this. When kids present issues. Hey, just because there's a thousand issues that are coming along doesn't mean the church is wrong. So, absolutely, this is something that is very on the mind. Especially right around that time. The, the, the language ends up changing, and we'll, we'll get to this. But the givens end up coming, and they do a whole fireside or a whole training for us in 2019 in the summer. So, like, that's where we're heading. And seminary teachers, by the way, are losing it. They hate it. They. They hate these trainings. I'm eating it up. Cause I'm going through it. I'm going through, hey, why are we like this to queer people? Hey, why don't we apologize to black people? People. I'm in the middle of this. So I am exactly the people that seminary is not reaching. And when I hear Paul Reeve and Ty Mansfield and these other. The other people coming, the church historians coming, and I'm sitting there and I'm thinking, yes, thank you. Every other seminary teacher is pissed. In fact, why are they pissed? Because they're like, why are we teaching this? This is doubt. This is anti Mormon. Why do we need to do this? They're questioning the, the leaders.

John Dehlin [03:38:11] Did you hear them say these things?

Marc Oslund [03:38:13] Oh, for sure. Let me tell you the example. So they, they have a, A formal letter written by the three area directors in Utah Valley, North Central and South area, saying just because they come, whoever they is, who. Just because they come and give us trainings does not mean it's approved by the church. Does not mean that it's accurate. Yep.

John Dehlin [03:38:31] What?

Marc Oslund [03:38:31] Yep. Yep.

John Dehlin [03:38:32] Wait a minute. So they're sending you church historians Paul Reed, Time Mansfield, ultimately Terrell and Fiona Gibbons, and they're simultaneously telling you that you don't have to believe it and that it's not necessarily. I mean, I guess that's okay. Like, you don't want anyone saying. You don't want to put forward anyone saying that they represent the church, because I guess they don't.

Marc Oslund [03:38:56] Sure. Yep.

John Dehlin [03:38:57] And. And also because then there's liability there.

Marc Oslund [03:39:00] Yep.

John Dehlin [03:39:01] So I can. I guess I can kind of see that. But it's also weird. Like, I would think the church should send their official people and tell you whatever the official line is. But the problem is there is no official line because there's no general authority that knows this stuff well enough to kind of say what the official line is. And it's changing all the time. So I guess that's kind of a weird dynamic.

Marc Oslund [03:39:23] Yeah. And for me, it's.

John Dehlin [03:39:24] It.

Marc Oslund [03:39:24] The weirdness isn't in, like, hey, we should question. Like. Because I. I feel like one of the things I've learned as I've kind of stepped away from Mormonism is we should question everything. Who. Why do we put trust in anyone just because they have an authority? So that's good. But that wasn't the reasoning for the messaging. The messaging was, it basically told all of these conservative, orthodox seminary teachers, hey, don't teach this. Because they provided this caveat, only if the Spirit tells you well. So because all of these people feel unsettled, they're like, the spirit told me this is wrong. I'm not teaching it. This is bull crap. That was the reason.

John Dehlin [03:39:54] But that's gotta be weird.

Marc Oslund [03:39:56] You're for sure.

John Dehlin [03:39:57] You're a CES employer employee. You've been doing this for years, maybe decades. The church is sending you training while telling you that the training may or may not be believed, but then also you think it's bull crap. But then you're wondering why the church is sending you bull crap training.

Marc Oslund [03:40:18] Yep.

John Dehlin [03:40:19] That's got to be super weird.

Marc Oslund [03:40:20] It's super. And for me, it was infuriating because everybody else was like, okay, cool. Thank you for that stamp saying, like, hey, this wasn't actually doctrine. Cause that's how they all interpreted it. I heard it as, whatever they taught is not true. We're not allowed to hear it. You shouldn't be liking this. And I'm like, this is the only Mormonism that's gonna work for me and the only Mormonism that's gonna work for my students. And so it's another dagger where it's like, this. Nope, not good. This doesn't belong. So what I'm hearing is all of your other crappy trainings that you're giving the same old rote seminary things. That's doing nothing for me. But Paul Reeve comes in, hey, Brigham Young was racist. Because Orson Pratt is on the steps of the Capitol and says, like, what Brigham Young just said would call the angels, would cause the angels in heaven to blush, saying that black people should be slaves here. And then we say, oh, they're just products of our time. He's like, where? Because Orson Pratt was a product of his time, and he didn't believe that. And I'm like, thank you. And then we get a letter saying, just so you know, just everything that is taught here doesn't make it Doctrine. And what that means is to me, hey, that's not acceptable. You can't teach that or believe that.

John Dehlin [03:41:24] So why would they, why would they give the training and neutralize and castrate the training simultaneously?

Marc Oslund [03:41:31] It's, it's. I think it's because this is the tension they're in right now, where they know it's not working and they want to make changes, but they're afraid of what's going to come. Just like the church. I think seminary is. I mean, this makes so much sense, right? But they're the mic. They are the clearest macrocosm of what's happening in the church. They are the henchmen for the church of what the church is teaching and perpetuating. And people will be like, well, it's just Utah. That's like that. And I think if you're going to change anything, it should be seminary teachers in Utah. Think of the influence and the people that we are reaching and the fact that you are scared to allow this, but you know that you have to is exactly, I think, how the hierarchy feels. Crap. We have to talk about this. But at the same time, if we're too close, if we get too close to this line, dot, dot, dot, we're going to lose people. It's going to be bad. And for me, I just think you sense their ultimate fear of the church as we know it is going away and that's going to cause problems. So we'd rather just blame teenagers or young adults for not believing until prophets get there. And then we say, oh, we got revelation. It's revelation now. Now we're good. I think I truly believe most seminary teachers sense at this time it's not working. It's not working the way that it should. And I think they sense it's going to change. But I. Here's what I'm extremely confident about. They are all afraid to speak out, which is understandable. They're all afraid to say this is wrong. Prophets are wrong. Nelson's wrong about the Mormon thing. Nelson's wrong for doing 20 temples. Like, I think they sense that there's issues because you can't miss it. The students are. It's every day, if you're listening, the students are coming in and they theory are all struggling in some way with Mormonism. And so for them to not embrace it just shows that I think they're afraid of, of what's, what's happening to their church or what they believe their church to be. You know, Interesting. Yeah, Fascinating.

John Dehlin [03:43:27] Wow. Okay, so. So that's super weird. Yep. And so where's your. Where's your faith at this point?

Marc Oslund [03:43:36] I. I mean, I still believe. I still do.

John Dehlin [03:43:39] By 2018, I'm still believing.

Marc Oslund [03:43:41] And more than anything, I want to believe. I think that's the key. I. I wouldn't say the phrase I know anymore in seminary, which is like a key. Right. Because they're always talking about coming back to rock solid doctrine. Like, if I would teach, hey, God's going to save all of his kids, which I taught regularly. I'm like, it's. It's going to happen. I use Brigham Young and others for it. And then teachers would express, I'm really worried that kids are just going to go off and eat, drink, and be married because they feel loved. And I'm like, well, that's weird for a second. I. I want to believe that that's true. Why wouldn't we want to believe that?

John Dehlin [03:44:12] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [03:44:12] And so I refuse to say I know. And they'd be like, well, you're not coming back to rock solid doctrine. Then I'm like, well, I don't know. None of us know. We want to believe and we want to know, but we don't know. And so that's where I was. I'm. I still want to believe in God. I still. I still want to believe in Joseph, but, man, I'm now teaching doctrine covenants once again and listening to Paul Reeve. And I'll tell you what, my faith in the church in terms of God and Jesus and basic truths, fairly strong. My faith in prophets is nil.

John Dehlin [03:44:49] You mentioned at the beginning of your 2018 summer that you're starting to read Mormon think and miss mist and Sunday School school. And you're also starting to read Fair Mormon. You want to talk about that? Yeah, because that's what I've always wondered is, like, at what point do these seminary institute teachers start reading CES letter Googling, listening to Mormon stories, and then what happens?

Marc Oslund [03:45:11] Yep. And so how's that? So, yeah, it's all lesson plan stuff where I'm like, well, I got to know. Like, I want to go in. And. And so I.

John Dehlin [03:45:18] You.

Marc Oslund [03:45:18] You'll just go, this is why they think Google's the enemy. So I'll type in, like, blacks in the priesthood or whatever, or black people in the priesthood, and up will pop, you know, Mormon think or CES letter or whatever. And I'll click on it. And I use it as evidence. I'm like, who cares what the source is? If the source was said, if it was Brigham Young, who Said it. It doesn't matter if I got it from Mormon Think or Fair Mormon. Brigham Young freaking said it. And for me, mist in Sunday school and Mormon Think were the clearest way to find it because they didn't try to obfuscate it or hind it or put ellipses or whatever that Fair Mormon would. So I would use Fair Mormon and I'd be like. Because that's where good sources. I'm like, these answers suck. Like, they're so, so convoluted. I can't send a teenager here. What are they going to find in this? They make no sense. They obfuscate, they change, they shift the arguments, they miss quotes. They. It. It's. It was so bad.

John Dehlin [03:46:08] Wait, so as a believer, you didn't like Fair Mormon answers?

Marc Oslund [03:46:12] Hated it.

John Dehlin [03:46:12] As a believer, yeah.

Marc Oslund [03:46:13] As a seminary teacher, I refused to use Fair Mormon. I thought they were the very. I thought they were so bad. Among the worst. Right? Like, there's another site called, like, Ask Gramps that was better than Fair Mormon. Like, I. Anytime somebody cited Fair Mormon, I'm like, okay, I don't trust what you're gonna say. Like, and I know what they're trying to do, but, man, they were just bad at it because they weren't up front. It's just so far down the line and the list. And for me, I just wanted to see the freaking quotes. Just show me the quotes and let me make my own decision. I don't want your apologetic spin on it. And so I'd read Fair Mormon and I'd get the quote. I'm like, cool. And I'd Google that quote. Boom. Missed in Sunday School. Nice and clear.

John Dehlin [03:46:51] Boom.

Marc Oslund [03:46:51] Mormon think. Nice and clear and say. So I'm like, here we go. I just need the freaking quote. And so, like, for example, as like a stupid joke. Not a joke, but as a lesson, we were talking about prophets. And do prophets ever make mistakes? Well, yeah, of course they do. We should have patience and faith. Well, one example that a teacher and I, we had talked about way back in Pleasant Grove was Joseph Smith saying, men on the moon dressed like Quakers, six feet tall.

John Dehlin [03:47:16] Right?

Marc Oslund [03:47:17] Or who. Who was the one who says, like, we're never gonna. Was that Benson who says, we're never gonna get to the moon is man's orbit to stay in this sphere. And so we showed. Yeah. Fielding Smith. There you go. And so I would put these quotes in. I don't know if. Yeah, I got them from Mormon Think because it's clear and they make it nice. And miss in Sunday school is a nice little visual copy paste put right in the lesson.

John Dehlin [03:47:36] Right? Wait, you're putting missed in Sunday School graphics in your lessons?

Marc Oslund [03:47:40] For sure. Because it's a nice seminary teacher. It's a nice picture of Joseph Fielding Smith right there. Right. And all it is is the quote. It's already highlighted in the style that I would do where I would highlight key parts of talks. And so I would put that in and I'd be like. And if people. So a teacher was like, that's bad. I'm like, what's bad? He's like, well, that site. I'm like, yeah, but did Joseph Fielding Smith say it or did he not? It's like, well he did. But I'm like, so who cares where I got it from? Did he say it? That's the problem. The problem for me wasn't the bad sources. The problem was the fact that the bad freaking teachings. And if we can't be open and upfront, which is what the kids always wanted, then we can't. Couldn't do anything about it. And so for me, I was like, yeah, let's go to these sources. Let's do this. And Google Fair Mormon became a source of Google fodder for me because I knew they weren't going to give me the truth. And so I was able to go to other sources that would just tell me things like they were and allow me to make my own decision rather than Fair Mormon having their, you know, Mormon spin on it. So that was. And I just, I hated. I never ever, ever sent kids to Fair Mormon. It was church essays or I don't even remember what sources I gave them because there's no, not much. There's not much other. Teachers had a lot of other ones, but Fair Mormon was not one I would send kids to cuz it's not trustworthy in my opinion. Um, yeah, and this summer was a hard one for me. So I, I actually started making some connections that I hadn't previously. I felt like I started knowing scripture better. Doesn't sound like it in this interview. Cuz I'm forgetting like names. I feel like the guy's name's Matthew. What's that guy?

John Dehlin [03:49:08] But not grow.

Marc Oslund [03:49:09] Not grow. Maybe that's why. No. What the heck is his name? He's on anyway. But that's my point, like my memory. I'm telling you, like, ask my friends, like my seminary teachers. I knew quotes and scripture like back my hand, but I haven't done anything now. And Ballard would say, look, remember what

John Dehlin [03:49:22] you use exactly what you don't use.

Marc Oslund [03:49:24] Exactly. And they'd bash me and be like, your testimony is just shrinking, going back to nothing. I'm like, shut up. Anyway, I remember, like, Ballard talking a lot about staying in the boat. And I had this realization because I spoke at a Relief Society conference. The theme was stay in. In the boat. And it hit me. I'm like, why do we need to stay in the boat? What did Jesus teach? Jesus literally is walking on water. Peter's like, jesus, let me come to you. Let me leave the boat and come to the water. And what does Jesus say? Jesus says, come. And so now I'm. I. First off, I think that's a beautiful visual of Jesus. Not if you can trust Jesus. You don't have to worry about staying in the boat. Jesus is the source, not the freaking boat. The old ship Zion. Who cares? Jesus is the one. We're going to focus. Keep your eyes on Jesus. But then I also started thinking, like, why are these guys enforcing boundaries with fear? Like. Like Ballard, do you not read the New Testament? Like, you're going to use this? Because I know Brigham Young said, stay in the old ship Zion, but, like, Jesus said, leave the boat. So it. It became very contradictory to me while I'm reading these things and being like, you guys are just. Just own it. You're wrong. You're wrong about things, McConkey. You're wrong. Like, I. I have, like, a. A vehement, vehement feeling of, like, when I was teaching seminary, I'm like, if anyone uses McConkey, I'm like, you're out. Like, do not talk to me about McConkey. He's wrong about everything. I. I was, like, very adamant, and I told teachers that obviously they didn't like this in our faculty meetings, where I'm like, no, he's not true. Like, I. He speaks too boldly. He's wrong about everything. He's the cause. Him and Kimball, like, they're ruining. And then Benson and Joseph Fielding Smith. And Joseph Fielding Smith. I'm like, they are the cause of what's happening to our kids. And everyone's kind of like, okay, they're prophesying. I'm like, yeah, didn't. Didn't. What's his name? Benson. The 14 fundamentals say, trust the living prophet. Why are you guys trying to defend dead prophets? Let's move on. And they didn't. Anyway. They didn't like that. But so I started getting really bold, right? Like, I. Because I felt comfortable. I started thinking, why do we need patience? And faith with prophets. If prophets speak to God, why do I need to have patience with them? Wouldn't they get it all right if they're prophets, seers and revelators, aren't they supposed to be seeing things? Your watchman on the tower. Why are you getting things wrong? Why, why are you wrong? That it doesn't compute? The only way it computes. And I think this is merciful on my part. People thought it was unfaithful. I think it's merciful to say you're wrong. You're, you're. Nelson, you are a sweet, maybe 96 year old man from Salt Lake. You aren't speaking to God. What that by saying that we are now enabled to say, and it's okay, you're trying your best and you're failing. But if you want to have the title of a prophet, seer and revelator and you're going to get things wrong, well, you're going to get blasted. And that's kind of how I, how I felt. Um, by my own voice, it like. Or by the voice of my servants. It's the same. I'm like, that's not what that verse says at all. It's saying if it's fulfilled right by prophets or by God, it doesn't matter who said it, it's just going to be fulfilled by God. So it's all of these little things. Things. And I started thinking, I don't want to have prophets pictures in my class. That's weird. That's cult like to me. Why do I have a picture of the First Presidency in 12 in my classroom? So I took them down not because I didn't believe that they were like good people trying their best or important, but because who's supposed to be the, the most important part of our faith? It's Jesus.

John Dehlin [03:52:43] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [03:52:44] And so I put up more. I took down the picture of the 12 and I put up four or five extra pictures of J. Jesus. I thought beautiful pictures, abstract. So we had a brown Jesus, right? Because Jesus is a Jewish carpenter, right? So you think maybe he'd be brown and not some white dude from Saratoga Springs like you think that this would be important. I put up a picture of J. Kirk Richards Rainbow Jesus, where it's Jesus who has like a rainbow robe and he's looking down. And I'm thinking, Ty Mansfield just came, he said we need to be more affirming. So that's what I'm doing. I had a, I put a picture of, of like Chris Martin from Coldplay has this Thing called love button. And it was like this big flag that just said love. Who knows what that means? But I put that up in my class. I put a. An empty. There's a painting of church seats. Like the folding, horrible metal chairs. A metal chair. A rainbow metal chair, and then a rainbow chair. And I put that up in my class. And my goal being, I want to be affirming. I want to be a safe space for people. And the way we do that is by focusing on a God of love. That's what I thought. And I just got more and more bold. So Monson dies, and Nelson becomes the president of the church. And I was kind of pissed, to be honest, because they say it's not just seniority, even though it's always been seniority. They're like, we could pray and we can get revelation. And so I genuinely thought, Nelson's, like, 94, 3 years old. Why would you choose him? Choose Uchdorf. Uchdorf's the one that's going to take us into the next. Next. And so when Nelson understandably becomes the president of the church and Oaks replaces Uchtdorf, I am visibly angry at Tippanogos. And teachers are like, what's wrong with you? I'm like, I don't believe the Oak should be in the First Presidency. And they are like, dude, you are. You're losing it. So that's. That's all kind of leading up to that year. And then I start getting a little bit more bold. Um, Nelson has his whole Mormon is a. Is a sin and a victory for Satan, and you just do some quick research.

John Dehlin [03:54:48] Say, saying the word Mormon, saying the

Marc Oslund [03:54:49] word Mormon, and you do some quick research.

John Dehlin [03:54:52] So I guess. What. When did. Okay, so. So Thomas S. Monson dies. Russell M. Nelson takes over.

Marc Oslund [03:55:01] Yep.

John Dehlin [03:55:01] And almost immediately, he's says, after. Yeah, after the I'm a Mormon campaign that the church spent millions on, after the movie Meet the Mormons, that the church spent millions on. Some decisions made in Salt Lake headquarters that, like Mormon, you know, people have negative associations with the word Mormon. Mormon Stories, podcast, all the other Mormon things, Think Mormon Expresses podcast. We're losing the SEO, the search engine optimization war with the term Mormon. Let's be witty and smart, and so let's abandon the term Mormon because it's a loser anyway. And then let's pivot towards Jesus, like Community of Christ did 40, 50 years ago, because Jesus is kind of like our last refuge. And so that's when Russell Nelson just blows everyone away by sin, saying to use the word Mormon. To identify the Mormon Church or the Mormon people is a victory for Satan, which his predecessor and multiple predecessors before had all done that.

Marc Oslund [03:56:09] Yep. Yep.

John Dehlin [03:56:10] But never mind, because we follow the living prophet.

Marc Oslund [03:56:13] Yep. And I'm a missionary in 2009 and through 11 when I'm a Mormon's huge. And we're trying to get Everybody to get mormon.org profiles and I have mormon.org pass along cards. And I'm thinking, so you're telling me that while I was serving a mission, I was doing Satan's work. That's. That's how I took that. And then. So just some quick Googling and you find out really quick. So, I mean, I'd be perusing the ex Mormon Reddit for information. Right. Not because I was necessarily believing it, but I'm like, cool, what are they saying?

John Dehlin [03:56:39] Oh, wow. So you're a seminary teacher going to ex Mormon Red, for sure.

Marc Oslund [03:56:43] So I'm seeing all of these things because I want to see. I want the full truth so I can make it work. I can't make decisions unless I'm seeing the whole thing. So I'm going on ex Mormon Reddit. And they're like, well, Nelson had this talk in, you know, 1982, and then Hinckley rebukes him and says, actually, we're just going to say Mormon. Right? We're going to make it more good. And I'm like, oh, he's clearly cared about this. And then Jana Reese does a whole thing where she talks about that. And this has been Nelson's kind of baby for a while. So guess what? When I come to the part of the Doctrine Covenants where it says the name of the church is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, guess what I'm about talking, talking about. And so now I put up Nelson's talk from that he gave in 1986 or two or whatever. And I contrast it with his talk in 2020 or 2018. And it says like, what's different? And it's like, using the word Mormon is bad. And then the other one is using the word Mormon is a victory for Satan. And I'm like, what do you guys see as different? And the kids were like, yeah, that's kind of interesting. And then I literally put up pictures of the London Underground that had I'm a Mormon and Times Square with I, I'm a Mormon. And I asked my students the question, and here's why I even taught this lesson. It was because students messaged me in conference on Instagram and said, I don't agree with that. Can you, can we talk about this? I'm like, yep. And so I said, tell me what you guys think. You tell me what you think about this. And they were very clear where they're like, I don't think that's a victory for Satan or else Monson would have been doing Satan's work. And how does that make sense? I'm like, yep, sounds about right. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen. You know, And a parent called in and I, I mean, more or less understandably so. And a parent called in because at

John Dehlin [03:58:23] this point, you're kind of teaching against the brethren for sure. As a seminary teacher.

Marc Oslund [03:58:27] For sure. And my intent wasn't, See, this is the irony. Now I'm like, oh, I'll teach against the brethren, because I don't really, I'm not on board with Mormon Church. But then I was teaching against the brethren to save the Mormon Church because they're leading us away from Jesus. In my opinion, which I understand that's in front of. Of.

John Dehlin [03:58:43] And you shouldn't have your faith in the, in the leaders.

Marc Oslund [03:58:45] That's exactly how I have your faith

John Dehlin [03:58:46] in God and Jesus. Correct?

Marc Oslund [03:58:47] Yep.

John Dehlin [03:58:48] And the leaders are getting it wrong. They're fallible.

Marc Oslund [03:58:51] Correct.

John Dehlin [03:58:51] So you're trying to, you're trying to get your students to base their testimony on the rock.

Marc Oslund [03:58:56] Correct.

John Dehlin [03:58:57] Of God and Jesus.

Marc Oslund [03:58:58] Correct.

John Dehlin [03:58:58] Not on the sand of these super foul, obviously, blatantly, egregiously fallible church leaders.

Marc Oslund [03:59:06] Which I thought is a noble thing. Right. And I mean, look, I, looking back, I now feel more understanding of why they would be like, hey, this is not good.

John Dehlin [03:59:14] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [03:59:14] But I'm, I still think I'm right. Like, my approach focused on Jesus.

John Dehlin [03:59:18] Their approach wasn't working.

Marc Oslund [03:59:19] Yeah, exactly. And that's another thing. I'm like, cool. So if I do it your way, we lose kids, they don't come to seminary, or we do it my way. And my class is bursting out of the seams. I have 45 people in a class, non member kids coming in, people visiting from other schools. So we either do it my way or your way, where you have 10 people in class.

John Dehlin [03:59:35] You choose.

Marc Oslund [03:59:36] And you were telling me that you wanted more people. So we do it my way. Right. And they're like, well, can we do it our way? But you still keep the people. And I'm like, no, we can't. It doesn't work.

John Dehlin [03:59:45] Like, so there are, there are some seminary teachers that are so bad that there are only 10 or 15 students because all the students ditch yeah, they

Marc Oslund [03:59:52] just don't want to be there. Right?

John Dehlin [03:59:53] That happens.

Marc Oslund [03:59:54] Oh, yeah, for sure. And so they try to balance it. And I kept getting in trouble everywhere I went because kids would request me. And specifically at, you know, a couple school secretaries were really, really uptight. Like, they revoked my access to our. Our little attendance thing because they knew I would, like, go in and maybe move students or. Or mark students present who were in other classes. Because I'm like, yeah, you're getting credit because this guy's got about to teach some really homophobic lesson. I just saw it. So, yeah, you don't come, tell me where you were, and I'll mark you present. And so, yeah, I got my access revoked from that, and some real drama there. But I. I also. And so anyway, I get a parent that calls in about the Mormon thing, right? About Mormon being a victory for Satan and wants to meet with me and the principal. And the principal's my friend, and he gets it, and. And he and I talk, and he totally understands where I'm coming from and. And even might even agree, right? But wouldn't say it. Cause he's, you know, good company, man, and a good person. But this person comes in and says, I have a real issue with what you're talking about. Russell Nelson. I said, well, tell me more. And. And she's like, you said that. That that was his own personal thing that he's cared about. And I'm like, well, I mean, here's the evidence. He talked about it since 1986, 1982. And she's like, yeah, but he's the living prophet who speaks to God. I'm like, okay. Like, I'm not. That's not the argument. And then she keeps kind of hounding me. And I said, before we keep going, can I just ask a couple questions? Sure. Do you think that using the word Mormon is a victory for Satan? She says, yes. Okay. Do you think that Thomas Monson using the word Mormon and doing I'm a Mormon was wrong? She says, yes. Like, okay, do you think that Thomas Monson having millions of dollars going towards his campaign was a victory for Satan? And she says, yes. And at that point, I'm like, I can't talk like, what I can. You're gonna say that a living prophet like Monson, when he was alive, was perpetuating Satan's work? That's. That was your belief. I. I can't talk to you. Like, I. That is. It's an unsustainable thought. And then I. Oh, I did ask, like, did you have a Mormon.org profile. She's like, yeah, I did. And I'm like, interesting. Like, aren't we supposed to be able to tell if something's from Satan or God or not? She's like, well, I was trusting the prophet. I'm like, okay. Like, you know, and so that's where I'm at.

John Dehlin [04:02:13] Which is what she's doing now. Exactly. Exactly.

Marc Oslund [04:02:15] And in 20 years, when it goes back, she's going to trust it then, which bless her for following. But, like, this is the type of crap my students are coming to me. Like, why do I. I don't want to do this. Like, why would I. This makes no sense. I'm like, you're right, it doesn't. Like, I started becoming more and more clear when. When kids would come to me and say, hey, I. I did. I messed up with my boyfriend. You know, we. We went to. We had prom and we had sex. What do we do? And they'd come to me. I'm like, you know, they'd ask that in a. In a class setting, and I'd be like, like, the official seminary policy is go talk to your bishop if you have more questions about this. You know, talk to me about it after. And, you know, maybe every once in a while, someone would come up and I'd be like, don't talk to your bishop. Like, you're okay. You're normal. This is normal sexuality. Bishops are. It's. It's a weird thing. You're okay. Just. Just move on. And nobody knew I did that, but obviously, I'm going against, like, priesthood leaders and keys. And so I understood that, but I. In DNC 18, there was a lesson on the worth of every soul is great, right? And I thought, okay, Ty Mansfield comes. He wants to be. He wants to have us be affirming to queer people. Here's my lesson. I'm gonna teach all about the worth of souls. And we're gonna watch 20 minutes of an episode of the show Queer Eye from Netflix. We're gonna watch 20 minutes, and it's gonna be an episode with a sweet Southern black woman, a Baptist black woman, and all of these wonderful, beautiful queer people just talking about their goodness. And so I got up, and I, like, stood up on my chair to make it clear. I'm like, everybody, can we just be clear? Brother Osland is not fighting against prophets. Brother Oslin is not making a point. Brother Ozland is not this. What is the point of Brother Ozland's lesson? The worth of souls is great. That was what we said. And so we watched the clip and I asked them afterwards, what did you think? And they were in tears. They're like, these are beautiful people. And it was this beautiful lesson where we just saw the humanity and goodness of people who weren't straight white Mormons. And that ends up becoming a major deal where I get a call or my principal gets a call from our area director saying his brother wasn't watching Queer Eye in class. Which I get like, I understand the problem, but at the same time, like what I was doing I think was harmless. Less. But yes, he was. What happened? Basically, long story short, a student came home to his house afterwards, started watching the show with his siblings and it was beautiful. And the parent came home and said, what are you guys watching? It's the gay people, you know. And the kid was like, I'm just, we're watching a show. I saw it in seminary, you know. And the parents like, what? You know, you did what? And she's like, turn that off now. He's like, why? Like, there's nothing wrong. These are just beautiful humans loved by God. She's like, turn it off. This is evil. And he. And then he called her a bigot. And so anyway, they end up, they end up calling my area director and I get another warning, right? Do not show Queer Eye, etc. Etc. So at that point, at this point, I'm just, I'm getting spied on by everybody. I have a teacher who comes in who's supposed to be my friend and comes in and would watch me take teach and we'd have discussions with each other. Like my, my students, we'd talk for 80 minutes just about their concerns and they'd go back and forth and it would be nothing but student participation, which is so rare. And at the end of it, that teacher would be like, you weren't in those scriptures enough. What do you mean I'm not in the scriptures enough? He's like, you didn't get to the scriptures fast enough. I'm like, our kids were talking the whole time like, isn't this what we want? We want students to be sharing. You just didn't get to the scriptures. Scriptures. I'm like, okay, so I'm just feeling judged. I'm like, this guy, our area director is being mean and he's like, I just wish you would see him the way I saw him. Like, okay. The secretary literally came into my class cuz I had non members that, that had a free fourth period. They came into my class. I had a couple kids from American Fork High, where I was, where I was living, I had a couple kids from Pleasant Grove High, a couple kids from all over different classes. I had, at one point, I literally had 45 kids in a 30 seat class. And the secretary comes running in and was like, do we have non members in here? And I'm like, yes. She's like, are you supposed to be here? And they're like, no. And she like screams at them. And I'm just like, what is going on? Like, don't you want us to grow this organization? She's like, anyone that's not supposed to be in brotherhood class, leave. And the seniors are smart and they're like, oh yeah, I'm supposed to be here, you know, but like the sweet non member kids like walk out and they get reamed by her. And I'm, and I, so I go to this teacher and I'm like, can you help me? And he's like, if you. Like, she's, she's just doing her job. Like so much of this gaslighting going on, right? And it's so I just don't have any safe space. I'm being spot on by parents, teachers, secretaries. I found out later our assistant principal was going around because he was charged by our area director to kind of get recon on me. And how teachers felt like, yeah, whenever we get students from Brother Ozen's class, they just, they don't really like being there because they do things differently. And so there's like spies and there's just more notes and I'm not aware of any of this. And we had a student teacher, my principal is great. I taught this beautiful DNC 84 lesson on priesthood and then another one on Official Declaration 1 and 2 and just a beautiful thing. And I thought it was super, super amazing. And the principal sent it out to the teachers and said, hey, everybody should be teaching this. It was clear. It was just. We laid it all out. And the end result is, you know, it's okay to get things wrong. Profits are still good. And eventually.

John Dehlin [04:07:48] So you're doing the hard work of figuring out how to reconcile this stuff to stay faithful. And then you're trying to teach this type of stuff to your students. And you're trying to teach LGBT love and unconditional love and acceptance. Acceptance. You're trying to teach against racism. You're trying to humanize the prophets. You're trying to focus on Jesus. You're basically trying to do everything that the church is moving everyone towards now. And that Terrell and Fiona Givens are, you know, out of the Maxwell Institute and Patrick Mason and Spencer Fluman, all the things those guys are now teaching everyone. You're doing that back in 2018 team sort of leading, right? Kind of on the cutting edge.

Marc Oslund [04:08:31] And what. I felt like I was following prophets. That's the irony, right, where I. I'm listening to what prophets are saying now, thinking about Ballard and other and Uchdorf and others, really trying to get out in front. And I feel like I'm on that cutting edge and I'm leaving behind the old stuff, which I was never attached to because I'm a convert. So I'm like, get. No, forget that. Let's move on. Let's move forward. We. We can do this. And that. That was my belief. We can create this church. The Church of the Givens, although it doesn't exist in reality, is a church that could exist in the future. It's a church that I see as compelling. And so I'm trying to do my part to get us there. And it's just being blocked on almost every turn, other than, like, a couple of my friends who are teachers and my principal at the school at the time who was just a really good friend and appreciated what I was doing. And so it's just. I'm just getting beat up. And one of the teachers said something like, look, the truth is, like, I'm just more faithful to prophets than you are. And my answer was, you are. And why is that a good thing? Like, I'm more faithful to Jesus than you are.

John Dehlin [04:09:36] Right.

Marc Oslund [04:09:37] And I'm thinking, like, that's. That. Isn't that the goal? Like, I'm doing what Jesus did, you're doing what prophets did. Who's right? I'm right. I'm doing Jesus work. And so that's why I feel so maybe frustrated and annoyed at, you know, progressive Mormons now, where I'm like, you guys think you can do this? You absolutely can. I literally did it in seminary. You're doing it on Instagram. Cool. Try to do it in seminary. Try to do it in other settings. You're going to get shut down. That's. That's my opinion. And maybe that's. Maybe that's wrong. But.

John Dehlin [04:10:04] Well, what's hard about that is the church is moving in this direction, but they're. They're. It's going to take a long time. And so you. You are ultimately going to be proven right, just like the September six, just like Eugene England, just like Leonard Arrington, just like, just like Juanita Brooks, like Just like all the people of the past 10, 15 years. We're all going to be proven right. But. But we violated. And you violated the most sacred rule of Mormonism. Do you know what that is?

Marc Oslund [04:10:33] Yeah. Don't ever question prophets.

John Dehlin [04:10:35] Yeah, Authority.

Marc Oslund [04:10:36] Authority.

John Dehlin [04:10:37] Don't ever question authority and follow the authority. And so the church is in this weird position where it, it is only making changes, changes based on the critics and the dissidents. And so that is what inspires the church to change. But they have to excommunicate the critics and the dissidents, including you, so that it can never appear like the prophets sees. The revelators are actually being driven by the critics, but it's actually the critics that are driving the change and they're sacrificed to help get the church to where it needs to be. So the church is going to be where you and I in the September 6th and the feminists and the pro LGBT people and the anti racist. It's going to get to where we all wanted. It will just have destroyed all these lives in the meantime. And, and that's.

Marc Oslund [04:11:26] And then call it revelation.

John Dehlin [04:11:27] Right.

Marc Oslund [04:11:27] And. And not apologize. And so for me, for me, like,

John Dehlin [04:11:30] look, they call it revelation.

Marc Oslund [04:11:32] Exactly. And be like, look.

John Dehlin [04:11:33] And like.

Marc Oslund [04:11:33] And why are you doing research, man? Look, I understand the idea that research is important and all of that, but like, if you're a prophet, you don't need research. You see? You see what I'm saying? I believe that I need research because I don't claim to be a prophet. But if you claim to be a prophet, you can't get this wrong. Right. And so I just. That's my struggle. And ultimately, if I would, I will be grateful. And you've done recent podcasts where you've talked about how good the church is moving. I mean, in baby steps right in there in the ensign and whatnot. But like, my issue is they're going to do this without ever saying sorry. I feel like you can't. I will, I will never, ever, ever say it's okay until the church does a conference full of I'm sorry for our treatment of black people, our treatment of queer people, our treatment of women, our treatment of doubters, our treatment of intellectuals. If the church is.

John Dehlin [04:12:26] And the. And its representation of its history.

Marc Oslund [04:12:28] Absolutely. And lying treatment of.

John Dehlin [04:12:30] Of.

Marc Oslund [04:12:30] Of skeptics, treatment of people who are portraying the truth. You, Kate Kelly, Jeremy Runnels, all of these people, Bill Real. You're never going to apologize for that. And because you're never going to apologize, I am never going to contribute. I'm not giving you credit for the harm that you've done and then claiming you are, you are. Wow, look at our revelation. You're doing it to stay alive and to stay afloat and all of that's fine. That's what you do. But you are claiming to speak for God. And I cannot buy that unless you're willing to apologize. And even then I'm like, and then church is still just freaking boring. And so like, at its, at the most, I will never come back unless you apologize and it stops being boring. And neither of those are going to happen. It's just not going to happen, you know? So. Yeah.

John Dehlin [04:13:17] All right, so we're four hours in and I think this should be around the time where we, where we wrap up. And maybe part three will be a seminar. Mormon seminary teacher loses his faith. What other, what other loose ends do you want to tie up today? Yeah, to, to conclude part two.

Marc Oslund [04:13:34] Yeah, I think, I honestly, I think that's good. And for me, like, I think a catalyst and I have it written down. But about my, my son being born, all of these things kind of start catalyzing. So I'm having my doubts and questions. But then my son gets born and I look at him, I'm like, I can't do this harm to him. What's been happening to me. And so it really starts getting real where my son gets born. I hold this beautiful miracle child that we finally have after, after the miscarriage. After the miscarriage, after the infertility, we, we, because of our miscarriage, we go to Paris and see Coldplay. But we had this crazy experience where like our GPS was off. So we kind of had a, a weird Paris experience. I wanted to have a, a good one. So we went back a second year and France had just. We were in Paris while France won the World cup. And it was like this life changing, like the first time I felt accepted by French people because sometimes they can be, you know, a little standoffish. And it was just like this joyful moment. And then we find out that we're pregnant. And like our sweet little, like this little boy that we have and we, you know, we name him Remy because it's a French name. And we find out that we're pregnant in Paris. And so like everything my dad told me that he felt when he held me is what I felt when I held him. And I'm looking at this baby born on conference weekend, Easter weekend and conference. I tried to watch conference. And I just thought, I don't want to do this to him. I don't want to do this to him. I'm hearing the talks, they're first off either boring and I don't want to hear that, or they're outright hurtful. And I'm looking at this sweet, precious child and I'm thinking of the hurt that has been caused to me in Mormonism. And I'm looking at him and I think, nope, you, nope. This is not going to happen for you. And so, um, again, I think love, obviously I have my own trauma and my own experiences, my own hurt. But the thing that really pushed me out was love. It was love for my son, it was love for my students, it was love for self. And yeah, when we get back to it, we're gonna talk about another warning letter. We're gonna talk about my lessons in adult religion, teaching 70 year old people about prophets. I, I chose teachings of the living prophets and kind of exposing McConkey and all of those. We can talk about that. We'll talk about me teaching institute and you know, talking about heaven and talking about profits being wrong. And we'll talk about my warning letter and my final warning letter. Talk about getting moved one more time and then my final kind of decisions, like walking away from seminary, my friend being discriminated against for a job, also being pushed out of seminary, my trainer getting fired from seminary. So like, there's still, this is the crazy thing, there's still so much more.

John Dehlin [04:16:08] At least four hours more.

Marc Oslund [04:16:09] Yeah.

John Dehlin [04:16:09] That warning at the end of 2018-19, is that the warning you told us about already? Okay, okay. So we did cover that.

Marc Oslund [04:16:14] We did.

John Dehlin [04:16:14] Yeah. Okay. Yeah, yeah. So you're just done with, with part two and there's still a part three, and it's really epic and there's so much more to come. And so this is so good. Like the, the, you know, there are always like people that don't listen and don't support me who are like shorten these episodes, they're too long. But the people who donate, the people who support, the people who care, they want this detail. And where in the world this is historical. Where in the world would we ever get an inside look at being a CES teacher, a CS instructor, and then the experience of a CS instructor losing his faith and then how the church was dealing with it on the inside? So I know that my, the listeners, the ones that I really care about are loving this. They're grateful for the detail and they're grateful for your courage. They're grateful for your stories, your Wisdom and your conviction and your honesty and your integrity. So I'm grateful. I know my listeners are grateful. Thank you, Mark. And I'm super excited for part three.

Marc Oslund [04:17:21] Thank you. Thank you.

John Dehlin [04:17:22] We'll do that in the next few days. Maybe tomorrow.

Marc Oslund [04:17:24] I'm ready tomorrow. No, I just, I really want to say thanks. I didn't expect personally for it to go long, but I'm honored that you would take time to John to talk to me. Mormon Stories listeners to listen to me. I do think it's important because seminary teachers, you never going to hear seminary. And also progressive Mormon people like, who think they can do this. I'm living evidence you can't do it. You're living evidence you can't do it. I'm of the belief if you are a progressive Mormon and you're not actively getting called out by your stake president or by your bishop, you're not progressive enough. You're just Mormon, a nice Mormon to gay people. And so I think I'm that evidence. Like, hey, progressive Mormons, like, either speak out louder or don't call yourself progressive Mormon. And so I'm kind of a jerk. But like, I, I, I don't know. I'm still hurt. So thanks. I'll shut up now.

John Dehlin [04:18:10] All right, thanks everyone for tuning in. Thanks again, Mark. Don't go away. Most of you are going to be listening to this after it's all released. So just go right now to part three and keep listening because you will not be disappointed with what causes a seminary. A Mormon CES instructor. Seminary instructor. To lose his faith and to leave the church and to come out and speak publicly about it. You, you want to stay tuned because so many stay silent and, and take kind of the less, the route of less integrity sometimes, not always, but sometimes. So stay tuned. Come back. Thanks again, Mark. Thanks to all our listeners and we'll see you guys again soon on the next part three of my interview with Mark. Take care.

Marc Oslund [04:18:52] Thanks, John.

Part Three Begins and Seminary Under Scrutiny

Part 3 of 3 · Ep. 1425

John Dehlin [00:00:00] Hello everyone and welcome to part three of my Mormon Stories podcast interview with Mark Osland. I'm John Dehlin and I am just loving. We're about four and a half. I'm sorry, eight and a half. I don't know. Nine hours into this epic interview with Mark, for those who have not listened to parts one and two, you will want to listen to parts one and two. In part one, we talk about Mark growing up in la, becoming an all star, you know, all American athlete in baseball and football, and then how he gives up a major league baseball contract three different times to both convert to the Mormon Church and go on a mission and attend byu. And we answer the question of how and why would a smart, successful kid join Mormonism in the modern era. So it's a fascinating interview. We talk about what it did to his family relationships. We talk about what it did to his mental health, put him on this hamster wheel of worthiness that was not good for him. And of course, without informed consent, without him being told a lot of things caused him to make a lot of life altering decisions that he definitely would not have made probably without all the information. Although love can make people do really strange things. Anyway, part one was super epic. Part two was kind of post baseball career after he had gotten injured and stopped playing baseball and gave up his ambitions to become a major league baseball player. And by the way, he played against many of the greats who are known and super famous today in the California area. Part two was all about his decision to become a seminary teacher. How he went to work for CES full time, how he did that as a convert, as someone who didn't grow up going to seminary, how it really was challenging for him to fit into the culture. But how he became a great teacher, but how he had many culture clashes with kind of the passive aggressive Mormon slash CES culture that can be fatal for so many, metaphorically fatal. At least I'm saying. We talked about him serving as a seminary teacher in Utah county, in American Fork and in Pleasant Grove and, and one other middle school and how he started becoming a progressive seminary teacher. And so, you know, with all the kid Kelly, Jeremy Runnels, John de Lin, gospel topics, essays, stuff, what it was like to be a seminary teacher during that time, how the church did not and did try and train and prepare their seminary teachers. And then as he was going through a metamorphosis of his own faith, he becomes kind of a Terrell and Fiona Givens Mormon as a seminary teacher, which culminates in him Showing queer eye for the straight guy to some of his seminary students and getting a warning for that. He actually got two warnings. One was for trumped up charges by jealous peers, according to the story that we heard, and it seems pretty credible. And then the second one was for being a little bit edgy, which I think is kind of gangster. It's a little bit. That's probably not the right word. Let me.

Marc Oslund [00:02:53] I'll take.

John Dehlin [00:02:54] Retract that.

Marc Oslund [00:02:55] Cool.

John Dehlin [00:02:55] That's kind of cool to think about a Mormon seminary teacher in Utah county showing queer eye for the straight guy to his seminary students. At which high school was it?

Marc Oslund [00:03:07] Was that Tippanoga High at Tippanogosi.

John Dehlin [00:03:09] Anyway, so we've done eight or nine hours so far. What we have left is one final segment where we're gonna talk about kind of the unraveling of his faith as a Mormon seminary teacher in Utah County. What that's like, how it was handled, how he handled it, what that's like on his mental health, on his family, on his relationships. And then we're going to talk about what it's like for a seminary teacher who loses their faith to try and figure out what they're going to do given all the risks and the problems associated with giving your life to a career that kind of leaves you without many options afterwards. And then we're going to talk about what that's been like. And then we're where he and his wife and his son are now in their life. So without any further ado, Mark Osland, welcome back to Mormon Stories.

Marc Oslund [00:03:56] John, thanks for having me. And yeah, I, I'm so grateful that this part, like yesterday, what we were talking about and then right today, these are like the key for me. Like, so much changes right around between, you know, late 2017 to 2019. I mean, I'm go from. It feels like I do a 180, you know, and showing queer. I was a part of that and just reflecting, you know, I went home yesterday and I was reflecting on, like, I want to convey clearly where I was. You mentioned, like being a Terrell and Fiona Givens Mormon. That's exactly who I was. I believed like I was not. I was still having the questions, the doubts, but to be honest, like, I was, I was keeping them inside. So what I'm sharing, especially last episode, was more that internal voice that I silenced and I had to keep down. The voice that I was perpetuating to students was, yeah, it was one of. I don't know about this. I don't like this. I don't agree with this, but it was also, hey, we should stay faithful. We should still be Mormon. Being Mormon's good. Being Mormon has benefits. And so I wanted that clear that up until this point, I was still, definitely trying to make it work and still thinking it could and should work. So that's. That's key for me, that I was still like a believer, at least in basic principles, like Jesus coming down and. And being empathetic towards people, and that that was the main mission and God knowing all of his kids and God loving all of his kids. But the real thing for me was prophets, specifically Russell Nelson coming up and making changes to culture. Elder Bednar making saying, hey, Utah, culture is not right. The people in Africa that are just getting the simple things, they got it right. Elder Ballard saying, teach clearly, don't deny, don't doubt. These were things that were, like, fundamental for me, thinking I'm following prophets in pushing the church to where I think it should be. And so the. That whole vision was key, as well as the thought of my students were the ones who were really driving me to be this way. We're having conversations in seminary about, you know, the exodus of people. We talked about this about never mentioning a CES letter by name, but the tactics of the CES letter of big listing and showing all of the problems and not focusing on faith and not doubting your doubts. And so we, we talked about this, and my students are sharing it. And the Pew research that Patrick, Patrick Mason talked about in his recent fireside, that came out when I was teaching and I presented that in class. I said, tell me about this, students. And I'm like, does this fit you? 85% said yes. I'm wondering why I want to be religious moving forward. I'm asking them questions, and they're not agreeing with what the church is doing. And so for me, I'm saying, how do we reach these kids not just to help them, but to save the church? I feel like I'm being altruistic in terms of my protection of the church. And so I. In order to do that, I have to kind of go out and push and be a little bit further than maybe what other seminary teachers have done. And listening to Stephen Harper, we. I finally figured out his name.

John Dehlin [00:06:58] Right, okay, so that. Tell us who that is.

Marc Oslund [00:07:00] Yeah, Stephen Harper, a church historian. He was the main one in charge of writing the book Saints. He came and presented the entire script to us and talked about what that's going to be and why we're doing it and how we need to be more transparent. And so he does a week. Sorry, every week for an entire summer training for us at Utah Valley and telling us to kind of, hey, this is what's going on. We're seeing this. Oh, I wish I could have a

John Dehlin [00:07:22] recording of that training.

Marc Oslund [00:07:23] Yeah, me too. Me too. I used to have access, but, you know, they revoke your access when they take away your church email. So.

John Dehlin [00:07:28] So they did record that.

Marc Oslund [00:07:29] Oh, yeah, for sure. That's in there. Paul Reeves training was in there. I re. Listened to that. I mean, we had. We have a gold mine of stuff in 2018, summer and then 2019 with Terrell and Fiona Givens. So you can see seminary wanting to take baby steps. And it's feeding my soul as a millennial who's watching his friends walk away, his sibling walk away, his dad walk away. And I'm saying, this is. This is the way. My students say it's the way my friends say this is the way. And then seminary says, this isn't doctrine. I want to teach this bas. And so this is the tension I'm having.

John Dehlin [00:08:04] But it's also, you know, Terrell and Fiona Givens are at the Maxwell Institute. It's not like they're just kind of like rogue.

Marc Oslund [00:08:12] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:08:12] And, you know, people like Stephen Harper and Paul Reeve, they're sent to you by the church, and they're the ones that wrote Saints and the essays. And so, I mean, like, that was one of the weird realizations during part two, when. When. When you shared this idea that they're sending you this progressive, you know, Mormon training and this sort of new Mormon history training. But they're also telling you, you don't have to believe it so that it can, you know, help the people that it needs to help, but then not disturb the people that it doesn't need to disturb. And how kind of confusing that. That. And it shows that the church probably internally is not. Which is. Which is just human. It's normal. You're not going to have everyone on the same page or agreeing. So it probably shows a lot of inner turmoil that the church itself is experiencing 100%.

Marc Oslund [00:09:06] And so the confusion that's. That's perpetuated on me. I'm like, well, what do you want me to do? Like, you're telling me this thing and then telling me not this thing. And then Russell Nelson saying, hey, listen to God and get revelation. And so I'm trying to do that.

John Dehlin [00:09:18] Ballard is saying, learn every, like, know the essays exactly and backwards and forwards

Marc Oslund [00:09:24] saying, there's room for Everybody in the choir and Uchtdorf saying, don't teach with fear. And so I, I, I taught a whole living prophets class. I chose this topic in Pleasant Grove. I taught adult religion to people that were, I don't think we had people younger than, you know, we had a couple people younger than 60, but it was for 60 to 80 year olds. And I'm teaching living the words of living Prophets and how they are basically canceling out the, the words of McConkey and Kimball and Joseph Fielding Smith. And these sweet people are, are first or frustrated. They're like, but, but, but I'm like, just, just trust me on this. And at the end of every lesson we get to the point, so what do we do with this? And the point is we should feel free. Don't be mean to your kids. Don't beat your kids up if they walk away. Be understanding, be kind. If there's gay people, love them. Like. And so these sweet older people in Pleasant Grove became more like, yeah, that's true. And I'm watching the fruit of this. I mean, I'm seeing my students who, you know, I'm, I'm having kids reach out to me via Instagram. Our seminary Instagram accounts that were unofficial had thousands of followers. And we're reaching out and kids are just like, they're messaging me personally and they're contacting me about their questions, their doubts about how their family's treating them, about how their questions about conference. Like, there's so many of these issues and I'm trying to be this stop gap and I feel like I'm the only one. And yes, Brother Ozen, you're not supposed to message students, but hey, also can you message a student and have them come? Because we haven't seen them for a while. So like, I'm getting so many mixed messages with the, this is the only intent I had at the time. And the intent was to help kids make Mormonism work so that they wouldn't be beat up, so they wouldn't feel miserable, so they wouldn't feel anxious. And I was doing that in all different forms. Adult religion, teenagers, whatever, everyone.

John Dehlin [00:11:19] And I was talking to someone just the other day who's part of the US military, and he was saying to me, they kind of take pride in internal critics or internal criticism because they've come to realize that. And I'm sure there are limits to this and I'm sure that there are other people that would disagree. But what he was telling me as, as a member of the US Navy is that they welcome criticism and feedback because they want to be excellent. Yeah, but it's a, it's a less mature organization that just literally has no mechanism for internal feedback or correction. And I think that comes from being a young church, a new church, a high demand religion. And I think Mormonism just to this day, like I, in this example of you telling all these people in the adult religions class that they don't have to worry about what the old prophets have said. Now the new prophets trump the old prophets. That's true. But I think our church would prefer people to trust the new prophets without ever discussing the fact that the old prophets got it right. So the church just, they want everyone to just kind of like whatever the current prophet is saying, follow that and don't ever draw that connection that past prophets got it wrong. Because that makes, I guess that kind of threatens the authority of current prophets to undermine the authority of past prophets 100%.

Marc Oslund [00:12:51] Which is exactly what happened for me when as I continue to look at this, I'm like, well, how many other things have they gotten wrong? Which is why now I'm at the point and I began teaching. Right. With the Queer Eye thing. Hey, I think they're a little worried about this and they probably aren't going to admit it because it means all these other things. And so, like that's exactly what happened. And I think being a convert was a major downfall of mine where I didn't have ties to Kimball, like President, like Thomas Monson was the only prophet I knew until Nelson, like Hinckley died a year like a month after I joined the church. So I never knew Hinckley. And so all of these ties, I'm like, I don't care. I'll throw my conkey under the bus. Like, what does he mean to me if he's hurting kids now in 2019, 2018, I'm going to make sure I do things to, you know, help them. And then Benson, I'll use Benson, I'll say, look, Benson says in the 14 fundamentals, a living prophet is more important than a dead prophet. So there's my backing. And I think that was the irony of what I was doing, which I was using the words of prophets, living prophets. I think in, in a way that was uncomfortable for seminary, they just wanted me to use the living prophets to hold up and prop up the church and not use it to actually call out the church.

John Dehlin [00:14:02] Yeah, yeah. And, and what I experienced with my stake president, he didn't really care what I believed. He didn't care that My beliefs were orthodox as much. He just didn't want me to talk about it. That's the agreement in Mormonism, is you can evolve in your beliefs. Just don't talk about it. Don't say or do anything that would cause anyone else that would cause the virus to spread. I think it's so beautiful, this pandemic. The pandemic's awful, but it's a great metaphor because truth is a virus. And it's a bad metaphor because truth is actually like gold. Truth is a precious gem, but truth acts like a virus. Once one person starts noticing it and sharing it, it spreads. And when truth spreads, like you said last, last part, testimonies built on sand will crumble.

Marc Oslund [00:14:59] Yeah. And that's it. And that's the irony where I'm like. I'm trying to prop up Jesus. Like, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. Literally. Like, I think the. The most apt metaphor for what happened in seminary, especially at that time, is I take the prophets off the wall and I put up Jesus, and then eventually they tell me to take Jesus off and put the prophets up.

John Dehlin [00:15:16] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:15:16] And to me, I think that just perfectly describes what Mormonism is doing, where I'm saying, no, you're building on a foundation of modern prophets who are wrong. We just know that they're wrong. It's okay to say they're wrong. And then you're Building on the 1950s nuclear American family, and those things are not sustainable. And Jesus, I think we have. We can have problems with Jesus about him being a foundation, but Jesus is going to be a better foundation for a religion than those two other things.

John Dehlin [00:15:42] I think if I'm giving you a tiny bit of, like, feedback. Not feedback, let's just say pushback. Trying to, like, think of questions for my audience. I think there's a general understood idea of don't get ahead of the Brethren, for sure, that, you know, like, clearly you or Bill Real or Jenna Spangler or Natasha Helfer or me, you know, we were. We were on the right track, but we got ahead of the Brethren, and the Brethren don't like to be kind of shown up. And so what would you say to that feedback? You're like, you're an employee of the church.

Marc Oslund [00:16:22] You.

John Dehlin [00:16:23] You probably, at some sense, know there's risk here. And what you were clearly doing was, as a church employee, doing what shouldn't be done, which is getting ahead of the Brethren and acting a little bit rogue. I'm guessing you had some instinct that you were doing that and that it could end badly for you. And that it might be. And there are probably other people who are still in CES or just in the church who realize that you don't get ahead of the Brethren and who just wait and are more patient until the brethren lead out. And then you say all the same things you're saying and all the same things you're doing. You just do it after the brethren have led, for sure.

Marc Oslund [00:17:05] And I think.

John Dehlin [00:17:05] Which is gross. Yeah, it's gross.

Marc Oslund [00:17:08] It really is. Because that's the thing. Right. Where I absolutely agree. Like, looking back, I totally disagree with the church and how they treated me in seminary and how they treated me.

John Dehlin [00:17:17] But.

Marc Oslund [00:17:18] But from their warped perspective, they were doing what was best. And so I absolutely think I was getting ahead. And I knew that I was getting ahead, and I. And I. But I saw the trajectory, and I see where they're going, and. And I see, you know, in 5, 10, 15, 20 years, the church is going to be. Or seminary is going to be where I was, and it's going to be better for everyone. So my desire to do that was to protect kids. I just saw so much unnecessary hurt.

John Dehlin [00:17:44] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:17:45] And I felt very, very, very. So I know that you were huge on protecting LGBTQ people, and that was a big, big, big catalyst.

John Dehlin [00:17:52] Divorces and broken families.

Marc Oslund [00:17:54] And mine was teenagers.

John Dehlin [00:17:55] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:17:55] Mine was seeing the harm. And I'm like, I refuse to let the church hurt these kids who I adore, who I just absolutely think the world of, and I still think the world of, and who are coming to me saying, I'm doing everything right, and why am I so anxious? I'm doing everything right, and I don't want to go on a mission. I. I'm doing everything right, and my parents are still mean to me, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I just. I would do anything. I was willing to put myself on the line to protect teenagers. So the feedback's correct. A hundred percent. And I knew. I knew what I was doing, but it was worth the risk because I knew that I was doing what I could to save lives. When kids are reaching out to me with an Instagram saying, hey, I'm feeling suicidal, I could tell them, sorry, I'm not allowed to message you. Or I could message them, and then, you know, contact SafeUT and make sure that they get help. And to me, I figured, well, the choice is clear. I will bite the bullet. I'll get in trouble.

John Dehlin [00:18:45] And frankly, the only way to be an LGBT ally is to be an LGBT ally. And there's. And there's no. It's Hard to do that without getting ahead of the brethren, because they're still not quite there yet.

Marc Oslund [00:18:55] That's exactly right. And so when people are like, I love LGBTQ people, I'm like, cool. Have you been in trouble yet with the church? I'm like, no. Okay. I don't know if you're. If you're. If you're yet where you need to be.

John Dehlin [00:19:05] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:19:05] And so, like, for example, I would teach DNC 109 was our temple lesson, and we talked all about as clearly as I could about the temple rubs. The church comes out with the video, and I'm like, here's the video. What questions do you have? Here's the covenants you're going to make as spelled out by Brigham Young. This is what's going to go on. And everyone. All the teachers are kind of like, are you allowed to say that? And I'm like, there are very few things in the temple we actually say we can't say. And they're still like, I don't know. And then next conference, Bednar gets up and says, we need to be more clear. And then what does everybody else do? They start doing my whole lesson. So that was a closer. A closer. Like, it happened within months. But I just think that was what was going on. I'm doing these things that I see the church needs to do.

John Dehlin [00:19:48] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:19:49] Or else they're gonna lose their youth. It's. It's the old quote, right. That the church has prioritized the grandparents in San Pete county instead of the grandkids in Salt Lake.

John Dehlin [00:19:57] That's. Richard Bushman is quoting.

Marc Oslund [00:19:58] Yep.

John Dehlin [00:19:59] And he's quoting. You know, he's basically. That's a really important quote. I think. I would love to mention it. Every Mormon Stories podcast episode, when Richard Bushman is speaking at a Faith Again fireside in Salt Lake City, and they ask him, you know, is the church going to someday become honest with its historical narrative? Because, you know, it's. It's unsustainable. And he admits that the church has been teaching an untrue narrative. He says that it's unsustainable. And then he says, boyd K. Packer, obscured, helped obscure the history intentionally by his own words, to save the. You know, by saving the grandmothers in Sanpete county, he sacrifices the sons.

Marc Oslund [00:20:44] Salt Lake.

John Dehlin [00:20:45] In Salt Lake, or whatever it is. And that was an acknowledgment that we've been deceived.

Marc Oslund [00:20:49] You know, and I. And I think that's key because I'm. I'm just saying I Taught the adult religion class and they were sweet people. But I'm thinking, you know, as morbid as this sounds, I'm like, you got 10 years left. Like you can keep this, this generation. And I'm teaching literally 500 kids a year and saying, you could keep these 50 old sweet people and lose these 500. And to me, the church is clear. Do you want a church? I mean, we see the growth of the church, the percentage slowing down like crazy. Do you want a church? Because if you do, you need to fix this and you need to reach out to them. And you're telling me that we need to reach them and we need to reach out to them. And so I'm doing these things and I'm, and I'm having kids come to my class and my, my numbers are skyrocketing and kids who never come to seminary come to seminary in my class. And I'm, I'm getting the results that seminary wanted. But my methods in doing it weren't seminary approved. And to me, that was the whole point. Why am I getting results and you're not? You're doing it the seminary church way. And I'm doing it in my own version, the givens version of Mormonism. And it's working. So why would we not adapt? Why would we not change? You have all the evidence. Russell Nelson comes in and blows everything up. He says, no, this is, we're not going to do Mormon. We're not going to do the Tabernacle Choir. We're change this and change that and we're going to do two hour church. And I taught a whole lesson on, look at how, like, if you're paying attention, look at what the church is doing. Bye, bye, Boy Scouts. Hello. Come follow me. All of these things that they're doing, and I'm saying, keep going, keep the trajectory, keep moving, keep, keep going. Don't wait, trust that we're going that direction. And, but I mean, and I'm also very critical of culture. There was a lesson where we were doing repentance and we watched that old really cringy video, Godly Sorrow with Aaron Eckhart, you know.

John Dehlin [00:22:31] Oh yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:22:32] And the, the, the teacher or the, sorry, the bishop is like looking at this girl and they obviously had something sexual and she can't get a recommend. And we watched that in my class and we broke it down and we'd pause and say, is this right? Do you agree with this? How do you feel? Is this what repentance should feel like? Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera and that's just a way that I knew that, look, I'm critiquing the church, but I'm not critiquing the modern church as much, other than not being 100% on board with the family proclamation and certainly not being on board with the Mormon, you know, not saying the word Mormon. But other than that, I'm 100% on board with what the church is doing moving forward. And so to be kind of ostracized and to be called out and to not be trusted in that moment is kind of. It was very telling, and it made me feel very, oh, you really don't mean what you say, right? You want to do this, but you're scared or you're afraid or you're worried or whatever else. So that was a. That was a fundamental point during everything else that's going on.

John Dehlin [00:23:31] I mean, I still relate to that because whether it's my mission experience or the meetings I had with Elder Holland. When you find out that marriage, you know, you. You grow up thinking that Jesus cares about the one, that the church cares about love beyond all things, that the church is all about families. So then when you find out people are literally killing themselves, families are literally being destroyed, and you give notice to the leaders, and then they're like, well, we can't move too quickly. And you're like, okay, people are dying or people are leaving the church. If you believe that salvation's everything, people are leaving in droves. Families are being blown up. And you're. We're going to wait for the gerontocracy 5 or 10 or 15 years to catch up. It's really. It's really hard to hold that tension and just be patient.

Marc Oslund [00:24:22] Absolutely. And I mean, at Tippanogos that year, we had two students take their life by suicide. And, like, I'm watching this happen, and I'm having kids in my class and kids that aren't even a part of the church finding out that, hey, are you the teacher that wants to talk to kids? Are you the teacher that's affirming towards queer people? And I'm like, I guess. And so I'm having kids that I don't know, just wanting somebody to talk to. And at that point, I started thinking, well, I'm not qualified. So I start looking into social work programs because I want to follow Brene Brown's footsteps. I want to be a social worker. I want to be as qualified as I could to make sure I'm reaching out. But, man, watching it happen and feeling like hey, are you guys seeing this? Like, do you not care? They're like, we care. But I'm like, but what? Like, what else is a priority here? Like, why is obedience to prophets, old prophets, more important than saving real lives and real families and real kids and causing the anxiety and depression our students are feeling to go down? Why on earth. Why on earth would anything be a priority over that? I just couldn't wrap my brain around it. Having had no history in Mormonism, thinking, wait, you told me all, like you said, all about reaching the one, all about loving people, all about Jesus taking care of the lost sheep. And I feel like I'm doing that, and then I'm getting shot down and in trouble and knowing, truthfully, knowing, okay, I'm putting myself on the line for these kids. It was a price I was willing to pay up to a point. And then I just, like, I couldn't do it anymore.

John Dehlin [00:25:48] Yeah, you just run out of steam.

Marc Oslund [00:25:50] Exactly.

2019 and Escalating Conflict with Church Leadership

John Dehlin [00:25:51] All right, well, let's talk about 2019.

Marc Oslund [00:25:54] Yeah, it's been great. I mean, I also failed to mention at this time, I had cancer.

John Dehlin [00:25:58] What?

Marc Oslund [00:25:58] Yeah. Crazy. I'm telling what a story, right? Like, all of these things that are going on, it's not even in your nose. I know. That's how crazy it was. So, like, I have all these little cancer scars. So it's a type of cancer called B cell lymphoma. And I have this. I had this massive surgery, and mercifully, it was really slow moving and all of that, but the fact is, is that it's like miscarriage or infertility. Miscarriage, cancer, like seminary warnings. And it's just. It's so my brother leaving the church after having traumatic experience. It's just back to back to back while I'm holding all of this inside and trying to just bottle it up to help the kids. I'm like, I will bite this bullet. I will do what I have to. Because when I talk to them and I hear them, I just want to help them, you know? So, yeah, that's going on. And then 2019 comes around and the givens, right, the Christ who Heals. And we have like a book club on that at Tippanogos because our. Our principal is awesome and he loves the givens. And it'. It's game changing where they're talking about. I mean, they're critiquing Mormonism again. They. They mention in the. In the Christ who Heals, Joseph changing the phrase like a state of awful wickedness. It says now in the Book of Mormon originally was a state of awful woundedness. And they're saying, what. What changes when we begin to view our inherent state as wicked versus our inherent state as wounded? And then they talk about the word healer instead of savior. And why do we need a savior? We don't need a savior. We need a healer. Jesus doesn't save us from a vindictive God. He's one with the Father, right? And this is the type of Mormonism. I'm just like, yes, thank you. And it's speaking to my soul. And I'm just like. I'm riveted by it. And I continue to hear this type of Mormonism and think, this is going to be the future. But then I'm going to church in my own ward, and I'd been released as an elders quorum president, not because of disciplinary. Just because, you know, a different calling. And I'm in the priest quorum, and I'm hearing the talks, and I'm just like, why are we so freaking behind? Like, it's so antiquated what I'm hearing in this ward. It's so far from what I believe. Mormonism, the trajectory of Mormonism. And it's certainly from the givens, Mormonism and Flumen. And, you know, I had read Mason's Planted, and I had read these things, and I'm thinking, this is it. These are. This is the new apologetics, the neo apologetics. We're getting rid of the Truman Madsen. We're getting rid of the. All of that mindset. And we're going to focus moving forward on a pastoral approach which is speaking to not only my heart, but also to my students, right? And then I go to church, and it's the exact opposite. And I'm just thinking, there's a disconnect here. And so I begin to kind of, you know, not want to go to church, which is a problem as a seminary teacher. You know, if I do go to church, which I had to, I'd sit and I'd be holding my phone. I remember days that I would have, like, an airpod in my ear, and I'd have my hand on over my ear, pretending like it wasn't there in the very back. And I'd be watching a soccer game, right? Cause I just got into English. Soccer. I'm like, this is awesome. So I'd be watching soccer and thinking, I don't want to hear this. I don't want to do this. Sunday school was just torture. Like, the way that we talked about Nephi and how he's so good because he's obedient. I just. I couldn't hear it anymore. It was. It was too draining, and it didn't feed my soul. So now I start realizing, oh, crap, it's not just my students that are not liking it. I'm truthfully not liking it either. For the first time, I started thinking those scriptures aren't that fulfilling. I started thinking, I don't like the temple, and, like, I don't actually feel bad about not liking the temple. And that was, like, a big shift for me. I even had a moment when I was driving home from work one day, and I hadn't said a swear word since I joined the freaking church in 2007. This is 2018, and I'm driving home with all of this anger from how I'd been treated, and I just had, like, this mental thought of, like, just let it out. And I just, like, just the whole way home, 20 minutes, just dropping every swear word I hadn't said for years and years and years.

John Dehlin [00:29:47] Like the King's English.

Marc Oslund [00:29:48] Exactly. And I started thinking, like, am I gonna, like, lose the spirit? And you know what I felt after I felt better? And I'm like, wait, but the. And so there's these chips or. I taught DNC89, and I had this whole lesson prepared, and I'm doing the research on it from, you know, researching on Mormon think and other sources and saying, like, well, what about this? And why did it change? The Sunstone podcast had an amazing episode where Lindsay Hanson park. She goes over the history of the Word of Wisdom and how it was part of the temple recommend questions. And I'm thinking, okay, I have adhd. I'm taking Adderall. I can't sleep very well. Maybe coffee's gonna help. So I. In my Prep period between first and third period, I go to 7:11. I grab a coffee for the first time.

John Dehlin [00:30:27] Whoa, wait a minute. So it's CES Seminary teachers drinking coffee to prepare for his CES lecture.

Marc Oslund [00:30:35] Exactly.

John Dehlin [00:30:35] I love it. I love it.

Marc Oslund [00:30:37] And so, like, I, you know, I didn't wear my dress shirt because they would look. So I had, like, my hoodie over, and I zipped it up, and I get my coffee and, like, and it helped. And I'm like, I. And then I taught the next class, and guess what? I thought I had the spirit.

John Dehlin [00:30:50] By the way, coffee is so much more healthy than Diet Coke or Ritalin. Holy crap. Exactly.

Marc Oslund [00:30:55] And so I'm like, this is it. This is going to be better for me. And. But yet. And I don't feel guilty. Maybe I should. But knowing what I know now, I'm starting to learn more about the history and the context and what's been brought up in CES letter and other things where it's kind of depleting my fear of disobeying because I'm like, you're just enforcing this based on fear. And fear has never been a good. It's been a powerful motivator, but it's never been a good enough motivator for me. And so as I'm kind of experimenting and just trying to reevaluate where I'm at, I'm listening to my rap music that I used to love when I was growing up, and I'm. I'm just allowing more things into my life, basically almost reverting back to my former self. If you think of a pendulum where I'm super not Mormon, then ridiculously Mormon, it's shifting back down towards, hey, here's a maybe a neutral ground is what I was thinking. And so it's at this time we have our baby. I mentioned that at the end, and it. And meeting Remy was just a life changing experience. And I looked as I was holding the sweet miracle baby and conference was on the tv, and I just thought, I don't want him to be a part of this. It's not working for me. I don't want him to have the guilt and shame and harm that I've had. That was a big moment where I thought, I don't think I want to raise him in this. I'm still a seminary teacher, man.

John Dehlin [00:32:15] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:32:17] And so these are things that are happening. One moment in particular was huge for me in seminary, and I think this was a big catalyst for what ends up happening next. So we have our area trainings, you know, in June, one. One week where we have to be there for these trainings. And they do different activities and we have different broadcasts and whatnot that we have to watch. But we had this activity that day that was speed friending. Okay. So by the way, I came to seminary with a little rainbow lapel pin. Just look, you say we can reach out. I'm not affirming. I'm just saying I'm here and I love queer people, right? And now they're like, we have a gay seminary teacher right down in. In Utah Valley. And now they're using. I'm like, wait, but why couldn't I have this pin? They. They looked at me like I had. I. I don't know what they thought. They just Looked at me like I was a freak for wearing this little tiny rainbow pin on my lapel to just be like, hey, I see gay people.

John Dehlin [00:33:08] You're saying there was a gay. An openly gay seminary?

Marc Oslund [00:33:11] Not yet, but he was there.

John Dehlin [00:33:13] Oh, okay.

Marc Oslund [00:33:13] And he. He wasn't openly gay.

John Dehlin [00:33:15] Got it.

Marc Oslund [00:33:16] But now he is. And now they're like, we love you and we're so glad you're teaching. And it's like, cool. I listened to his podcast and he. He specifically said, I'm not speaking about any of this. I don't share this with my students. Like, that's. You're. You're kind of like their token person. And you. You don't upend. You don't turn your thing over.

John Dehlin [00:33:31] Positive.

Marc Oslund [00:33:31] Exactly, Exactly. So, you know, I do that. And then we. We have this break for lunch, and then we're gonna do a speed friending activity, meaning think of speed dating, but with awkward small talk with seminary teachers I'm never gonna talk to and don't care about. And my wife, our baby. He still is. He's 2 years old, and he still stinks at sleeping. Like, he's just not a good sleeper. And especially at the beginning, like, just not, not, not a good sleeper. And my wife's ex, and it was up right across from the Tippanogos Temple. I live a couple blocks away from that right by American Fork High School. And she's like, mark, I'm. I'm breaking down. I'm having a hard day. Like, what can you do? And I'm thinking, it's lunchtime. We have a stupid speeds, friendly activity. I can give her, like, a three and a half hour nap if I go home, get the baby, bring him back, and just hold him. Right? And I'm thinking, seminary is a family employer. They mention this all the time as a major perk. We love families. We care about your families. They're always like, how's your family? How's your family? And so I go home and I. And I pick up our little Remy, and I go into a room and I just am holding him, and I'm. I have the speaker turned on, so I'm listening to whatever they're doing. And Rachel's sleeping, and I feel so good. I'm holding my sweet baby and just, like, in tears at the beauty that he is and the miracle he is in front of my life. And one of my friends from my time at Pleasant Grove brings me, like, our food. And he's. He's my. My kid's godfather, and so he he holds Remy, and then I bring Remy to a training, like, with my faculty, and everybody' happy and good. And I just think this is. This was a beautiful moment. I'm so grateful for an employer that allows me to, you know, take time off to hold my kid and take care of my wife. A couple weeks later, we find out that was not kosher, and I'll tell you why. But right after that, maybe a week or two later, we have Terrell and Fiona Givens come, and they are requested by my principal at Tippanogos, and it was just so good. And they're talking about God saving all of his people and how we don't need to be bound by fear.

John Dehlin [00:35:29] And.

Marc Oslund [00:35:30] And the almost immediate backlash in the. In the meeting was shocking to me.

John Dehlin [00:35:37] Givens is speaking. Yep. And you're. And the teachers are rebelling.

Marc Oslund [00:35:42] Yeah, well, they're just like, I don't think we. I think we need to have fear. I want to know that God is mad at me. I'm like, what? And you could see the look on their faces was kind of like, what on earth? Like, okay, like, that's weird. Why would you want God to be mad at you and punish you? And the teachers are like. Like. Like, boom, boom, boom. Just kind of like, no one bought into what they're saying other than, like, the four millennials that were in Utah Valley on the front row that were, like, in tears because it's like, thank you for teaching a God that we love. And guess what happens after that? Another warning letter.

John Dehlin [00:36:12] Oh, no.

Marc Oslund [00:36:13] Seminary saying, hey, just because people teach this does not make it doctrine. And I'm just like, first off, why do you continue to invite people if you're going to continue to say that they're not teaching truth. Truth. And then second.

John Dehlin [00:36:26] Wait, so.

Marc Oslund [00:36:26] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:36:27] What's the warning letter?

Marc Oslund [00:36:28] The warning letters to all seminary teachers basically say, just like before.

John Dehlin [00:36:31] Oh, okay. Not to you.

Marc Oslund [00:36:32] Not to me yet.

John Dehlin [00:36:33] Okay.

Marc Oslund [00:36:33] Nope. Just saying, hey, just so you know, everyone, this isn't doctrine. The Spirit will teach you truth, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Or this. This might be doctrine, but you need to get a testimony. And. And everybody took that as, oh, cool, we don't have to engage with what they're saying.

John Dehlin [00:36:46] I mean, I guess that's.

Marc Oslund [00:36:47] It's healthy.

John Dehlin [00:36:48] I mean, I. I'm torn on that.

Marc Oslund [00:36:50] It's because we want people to question.

John Dehlin [00:36:51] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:36:52] But the rationale for that is, oh, don't question things that are progressive. Just go back to your conservative orthodoxy. Yeah, that was so. I want people to take a Second, and not believe everything as doctrine, because that's what we do too often in Mormonism. But that's not the approach. The approach wasn't study for yourself. It was really like, hey, nope, this isn't good. Listen, we don't. Don't buy into this. You're okay. Just go back to the way we've always done it.

John Dehlin [00:37:15] So how is Terrell.

Marc Oslund [00:37:16] Is it Terrell and Fiona or just Terry and Fiona?

John Dehlin [00:37:19] How are they handling pushback from seminary teachers around fear and.

Marc Oslund [00:37:25] Yeah, so it's really. They were really. They were really loving, especially Fiona. Terrell, I think, prefers writing to speaking. You know, I think he just likes grumpy. Exactly. I think he likes being in his head, and I think he likes the flower writing. Fiona. I felt very pastoral. I met them both. I walked up to them and I said, hey, I just want to tell you, like, you have given me a place in Mormonism that I didn't feel like I had.

John Dehlin [00:37:46] Wow.

Marc Oslund [00:37:46] And Fiona. Yeah, Fiona gives me a hug, like. Like, tell me more about you. And it was very. It was love that I hadn't felt from seminary or really anyone in a while.

John Dehlin [00:37:54] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:37:54] And. And Terrell was. Was kind, but. But in the moment, I could kind of see that the faces as almost one of. Of confusion. I mean, they had answers, and. And they had, I thought, very compelling answers, but it was more like, how is there pushback to this? And eventually, like, because I knew they had this interaction with the Utah Valley Seminary. He and. He and Fiona both did a podcast. I think it was on F. And somebody asked that question, like, how have you been received? And he's like, with the exception of one place, this has been uni. And I'm like, I know what that place was. I know exactly what that place was. And they were kind of. And he was kind of like, yeah, that place was just off. And he. I'm reading between the lines because I know things that the audience doesn't. But clearly it was like, these teachers, man, like, we're trying to help you and your kids, and you just don't want to buy it. Like, how could that be? And this is after they had been appointed at the Maxwell Institute. Like, they have the stamp of approval. In fact, for us as seminary teachers, it's like, you're at byu. Like, that's kind of the dream. They should have had, like, the ultimate trump card on all of us, but yet the teachers just did not want to buy it. And I'm still baffled as to why, because they weren't. They weren't beating up the church, they were just trying to make it bigger. That was what was weird. They could have been a lot firmer and I know they've been firmer, but. Yeah, fascinating, right?

John Dehlin [00:39:15] Yeah, yeah. And it's also just a little bit weird. Growing up the type of Mormonism I grew up in, the Brethren, you know, Packer or McConkey or, you know, they would be instructing everyone on what the doctrine is. And this feels like a transition for me that the church is relying on theologians, mid level managers, authors that don't have any real authority to be instructing on matters as important as the atonement theology. I mean, in some ways that's actually feels like a positive move, but it also feels like an abdication of responsibility

Marc Oslund [00:39:58] a little bit for sure. And that's the, that's the big tension where it's like, oh, cool. Like we're. I'm glad that these voices are out in the world, but by them not coming from profits, it means nobody has to change.

John Dehlin [00:40:08] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:40:08] Like, cool. You can take this if you want. I'm like, I love it. They're like, awesome.

John Dehlin [00:40:11] Good.

Marc Oslund [00:40:12] It worked for you. Oh, it doesn't work for you. They're not prophets. You're good. Right? They're speaking out of both sides of their mouth and a lot and trying to rescue people without being firm and clear.

John Dehlin [00:40:20] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:40:20] And so like I think Renlund, he quotes the givens in, in like one of his footnotes in a conference talk. And for me I'm like, it's a footnote. Look like it's happening and

John Dehlin [00:40:32] exactly.

Marc Oslund [00:40:33] I'm like laughing them up like, thank you for these little crumbs, you know, and, and Uchtdorf quite like he puts the niv instead of the King James version. I'm like, look, see progressiveness. Like we are, we're doing it. And yeah, I think it's extremely intentional because then just like everything else that they've always done to intellectuals, if, if crap hits the fan, then the church can throw these, these apologists under the bus and be like, oh, you're gone.

John Dehlin [00:40:57] Exactly. It's plausible deniability.

Marc Oslund [00:40:59] Exactly.

John Dehlin [00:41:00] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:41:00] Which is tragic because the givens. Mormonism is the future of Mormonism. It, it will get there. It's just, it's going to hurt a lot of people in the meantime. And it's sad that it's not coming from people who say they can see the future. You know, like that's, that's the biggest thing. You see the future, but yet you need Terrell And Fiona Givens, to be able to do this, like, that's messed up.

John Dehlin [00:41:18] What I would say is how many people are going to get hurt in the meantime? 100 while they're waiting and delaying.

Marc Oslund [00:41:23] 100%. Me included.

John Dehlin [00:41:25] Friends.

Marc Oslund [00:41:25] Like, I mean, so many students still reaching out. I have a group of students that are, you know, that followed me on Instagram and they're like, hey, we want to hear more about what's going on. And it's probably like 350 kids and you know, I'll send out polls or whatever. Hey, how you doing? And like, like 98% of them like, I'm not going to church. These are BYU students that are like, yeah, my ecclesiastical endorsements up after I graduate and I am never going back to church. And so I'm like, cool. Like, you can keep your. However, let's say my followers, let's just say I have almost 2000 at the beginning of the year and now it's gone down because I've been posting more anti church stuff and let's just say 1200 of them are faithful and 350 of them are walking away at a minimum. At a minimum. And so it's just been, it's been really interesting. Right around this time too, I have a really good friend who I met in, in the 471 class that I, I had to take concurrently when I was a student teacher. Amazing person. Her, her mom's like a convert and, and she's, you know, from Columbia. She's a really brilliant, awesome, amazing friend of mine and a great teacher. Progressive like I was in a lot of ways. She ended up having a baby and, and, and it was really special. So she became part time. She really grew a Spanish seminary program at Provo High and also at Tipanogos where I was. And at this time she and I kind of brainstormed, hey, what can we do so that you can get your benefits? Because they moved her from full time to part time and she lost benefits and she has a baby and all of that. So we brainstormed this idea of a, of a new. Basically assign a job assignment in seminary. They have things called coordinators where let's say you go out to North Carolina, you teach an institute class and then you, you are in charge of monitoring the called seminary teachers in that area. And I thought, cool, why don't we like, why don't you go and tell our area director about this idea. You can be the Spanish coordinator. You can teach two seminary classes in Spanish and then you can go and Monitor the other Spanish classes that are going around. It was a great idea. She presents it and they're like, we don't know about that yet. We'll have to get feedback and blah, blah, blah. Because again, it can't come from the bottom up. Then top down. We get a new area administrator for Seminary who just got back from a mission to a Spanish speaking country and says, we need to grow the Spanish population, so we should come up with a coordinator. And now all of a sudden revelation, we need a coordinator position. And so my friend applies for this job that she created, but that was basically told she couldn't do it. And in this process, there's another Spanish speaking person. They kind of have some battles about the need of a Spanish class, blah, blah, blah. But eventually this is the key moment for her and it was just another sign for me of where Seminary is. There's a conversation that was held, like off the record between the two principals that were engaged and this area director just talking about this idea of a Spanish class. And the comment was made, I don't know if we should hire her because she's a woman, because she's a mom. And that was conveyed in part to my friend who's like, wait, what? Like, no, you can't. And. And so then I come in. It was. This was a conversation in the lunchroom that we were having at the school. And she's like, hey, you need to listen to this. And I wasn't there to hear it. There was one other teacher and he's like, I don't know. She goes up the chain to HR and says, hey, like, I've been discriminated against because she doesn't get the job.

John Dehlin [00:44:52] Job.

Marc Oslund [00:44:52] I've been discriminated against. The sole reason they provided was because I'm a mom. That's unacceptable. And the church does their, you know, their HR evaluation. They talk to my area director and he denies having anything done. Of course he did. I think, I really think they kind of coached him into what to say. And they're like, give us, just give us a reason, any reason. He's like this person. When they taught, I felt the spirit so strong, like, perfect. Thank you.

John Dehlin [00:45:15] Right.

Marc Oslund [00:45:15] Goes back to my friend, says after a couple weeks, months, says there's no evidence of discrimination, but before they tell her that, they force her to sign an NDA non disclosure agreement and said, if you don't sign this, you won't have the protection of the church in case there's retaliation. And she's like, well, I have to Sign it. She's like, yes, you have to sign it. If you don't sign this, then we're not going to tell you and you don't have protection of the church. So she signs her NDA and they say there's been no evidence of discrimination. It was just a misunderstanding. You haven't been discriminated against. And I mean, obviously she's just brokenhearted. She can't even tell me, right? Because she's worried the church is going to freaking sue her because she signed an NDA. And eventually she's just like, I can't believe this happened to me. So she quit seminary.

John Dehlin [00:46:00] Has she talked publicly about this? Because I think I remember seeing about.

Marc Oslund [00:46:03] She hasn't. She has. I talked about it.

John Dehlin [00:46:06] I wonder if she would tell the story publicly.

Marc Oslund [00:46:08] I think if you asked her. I actually asked her if she would. She's like, if you asked, she would tell her it.

John Dehlin [00:46:12] Okay.

Marc Oslund [00:46:12] She's like, I'm not going to ask, but just one second. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:46:16] Laura, hi, this is John on Mormon Stories, and I want to ask you to come on Mormor Stories and tell your story. Perfect. So we would love to have you

Marc Oslund [00:46:24] the far more request. And she's so good and so brilliant. And honestly, that to me was just such a. Because she was so good and she was so sweet. And then just. I'm seeing the inner workings of the system and being like, this is slimy. There's lies, there's. You know, we know this from my experience before. This is from God. But we really know it's a teacher that's kind of forcing this to happen. And it's just happening over and over and over. And so when they get up and they're like, brothers and sisters, we love you. We're so happy to be here with you. I'm like, you're full of it. You're full of it. You're just lying. And I don't believe a word you're saying. And so at this time, I don't know what. I'm also teaching an institute class. Right. Cause my principal, again, as progressive as I was, he trusts me. And he's like, you're reaching kids. We need a transition class from seminary to institute, because kids don't go to institute. And I made a request to my area director. I said, can you move me to the institute? Because I reach college kids better. The lax rules that I have is going to work better in institute where they don't have to be there because it's a choice that they're making. As an adult. And he looked at me and says, we're going to have to wait for about 20 years. I'm like, 20 years. Like, I. I'm. I'm literally looking at the requirements from seminary. It says five years experience. And I. And P.O. and a master's degree. I just finished my master's in education. I have five years of experience. I'm making it work. And he's like, yeah, typically we want people to have, you know, about 20 years experience. I'm like, but it says. He's like. And I know that other people have been there earlier, but that was kind of an anomaly. And I'm like, can I be the anomaly? Like, it's gonna. It's basically, I'm trying to save my job because I'm not. I'm not gonna change what I'm teaching, but I'm also not going to. I'm not going to just go down without a fight. So I reach out, and he wouldn't let it. So I went to the institute director and I said, hey, you know, I'm a seminary teacher. I'm teaching in the Valley. I really want to teach at the institute. What can I do? He says, well, why don't you just apply to be a coordinator and then go out somewhere, you know, in the mission field, and then come back and then we'll have you at the institute. I'm like, this is not. You're not here. Nobody's listening to me, right? Nobody cares. I'm just some peon, like you mentioned last episode. I don't have money. I don't have a name. I'm just some random guy. And they're happy that I'm getting people in seminary and institute, but they don't care about me as a person. I'm just. I'm easily collateral damage. And so I'm. But I'm teaching this transition class, and, you know, we're talking about things like, hey, are you having a miserable time at church? Yeah. What can we do to make it better? We talk about Heavenly Mother. I quote Rachel Hunt Steenblack and her book Mother's Milk. And. And I. We talk about life. I said, we always talk about life being a test. Where's the word test in Scripture? It's in there. And it says, prove, try, whatever. I'm like, prove and try are not test. I said, if life is a test, it's not like the American educational system. And these kids are eating it up, and they're posting pictures on Instagram and on Twitter and being like, you need to come to this class. My class is growing. I have people that are.

John Dehlin [00:49:25] What are they saying?

Marc Oslund [00:49:26] They're just loving it. They're like, this is exactly the teacher that we need. This is the type of stuff I want to hear. And I'm just like, yep.

John Dehlin [00:49:32] And what would they say? They loved about it.

Marc Oslund [00:49:34] They just loved that it was progressive. They loved that it was talking openly about the challenges. They loved that it was open about Heavenly Mother and calling out church culture and. And providing space. They loved that it was something that gave them hope. And wasn't that typical? Hey, you suck. Here's fear. You need to repent. Mormonism is the only right way. Another one being baptism. I talked. Hey, you were all baptized at 8 in here, right? Yeah. Everybody cool. Did you get baptized for remission of sins? No. Did you have real agency when you did it? No. Then why? What's the point of baptism? And so we had these conversations, and they loved it because I'm answering the questions that they have. And how do I know they're their questions? Because I freaking asked them. I've been asking for years. And now at this point, I'm 100% solid on. I know exactly what kids are struggling with. I know exactly what they need. I know exactly what they want.

John Dehlin [00:50:20] Want.

Marc Oslund [00:50:20] Not because I'm a genius, just because I asked and I listened. Right. And so all of this is going around, which I'm seeing as positive, but it's being picked up on. I don't know.

John Dehlin [00:50:33] Can I. Can I just say, did you ever see the movie Dead Poet Society?

Marc Oslund [00:50:36] Yeah, I loved it.

John Dehlin [00:50:37] I mean, what you what? What? The vibe I'm getting is kind of a Mormon seminary version of Robin Williams's Deadpool.

Marc Oslund [00:50:47] I am so honored you said that, because when I was going to school in California, I had a teacher who was just like that, and. And he made me fall in love with Edgar Allan Poe, and because he. We watched an episode of the Simpsons where they quote the Raven, and then we watched Dead Poet Society, and I fell in love with the passion of Robin Williams in that. And I thought, if I'm ever a teacher, I want to be like that. So you saying that is, like, such an honor. Because I felt like I wanted to be that person. And I'm so humbled that you recognize that, because that was a huge vision of mine. Not for the fame or the glory, because I genuinely love kids.

John Dehlin [00:51:22] Well, we all know how that story ends, right? Well, I mean, there's a couple ways that story ends. In sad ways. Yep.

Marc Oslund [00:51:30] Yep.

John Dehlin [00:51:30] Inspiring ways.

Marc Oslund [00:51:31] Inspiring. And. Yep. Sad and tragic and so. Yes. Thank you. And exactly like. That vision was what. Who I hope to be. And, like, I'm passionate. I'm getting up and I'm pacing and I. And it's just. I wish I could show you videos of what my class was like, because the excitement and engagement that is usually. I mean, you walk into a seminary class now, with the exception of maybe a couple, and the kids are going to be asleep. They're going to be on their phones. They're going to be miserable. And you go into my class and it's like lively and discussion and fun and kids are actually smiling and they walk out feeling better and they want to be Mormon and they talk about wanting to go on missions and it's just. It felt good. Good.

John Dehlin [00:52:06] And it's just human nature that that's going to breed envy and jealousy. And, you know, captain. My captain will always be fired. You know, Robin Williams will always be fired.

Marc Oslund [00:52:17] Yep.

John Dehlin [00:52:18] Not just in Mormonism.

Marc Oslund [00:52:19] Yep.

John Dehlin [00:52:19] You know, in any institution.

Marc Oslund [00:52:21] For sure.

John Dehlin [00:52:21] That's just the way humans work.

Marc Oslund [00:52:22] Exactly.

John Dehlin [00:52:23] And.

Marc Oslund [00:52:23] And I had been so competitive in my prior life as an athlete that I thought, I'm not competitive with these people now because we're on the same team. Right. We're on the same team. But they didn't view me that way.

John Dehlin [00:52:33] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:52:34] And so remember from last time, there's just spies from all different directions. I have parents and fellow teachers.

John Dehlin [00:52:39] Wait, really quick.

Marc Oslund [00:52:40] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:52:40] Were you gonna say something about holding your baby? In addition, were you gonna say something else?

Marc Oslund [00:52:44] Nope. That was it my experience when I was just holding him. And it's gonna come to it because that's gonna be a. Basically, I have an inquisition. And that's a huge catalyst to that.

Inquisition, Final Warnings, and Leaving CES

John Dehlin [00:52:52] So it's a.

Marc Oslund [00:52:54] Holding your baby is holding my baby at that meeting and just being like, hey, buddy, like, I'm here. I'm letting my wife sleep. They were pissed that I, like, left. So that it's a whole inquisition. They're gonna.

John Dehlin [00:53:05] I just want to make sure we didn't miss something you wanted to say. No.

Marc Oslund [00:53:08] Thank you for that. I appreciate it. So, yeah, this is all going on and. And I don't know all the sources, but I do know that I taught a lesson right when the school year is ending on Official Declaration 2 with the priesthood ban being ended. And it was probably man 120 slides, and I had 90 minutes to teach. And we were being very open. And there's quotes from Ms. In Sunday school and there's quotes from Mormon think. And they're cited in there, but, I mean, they're not Mormon think. They're prophets, right? And I changed. I had to change my lesson every time because I can't teach 120 slides in 89 minutes. It's impossible. I just. I mean, I. You can't do it. And so I had. There was a student teacher at the time and an older guy. He was like. He had a previous career and was trying to get into seminary. And I taught one of his kids in, like, my first period class and another one of his kids in my. In my last period class. And the principal came to watch me teach my last period class. And it was this beautiful message. Look, we were very open about the challenges that we had in. In the. With the priesthood and temple ban. And we were very open about that struggle. And my final slide was, hey, we need to, like, what does the church teach about repentance? Confess, forsake, et cetera. And it was, what can we do here? Confess, forsake, et cetera. And honestly, I'm in tears. These freaking athlete 4th period kids are in tears. Like, I love this. This is beautiful. My principal's in tears. It was just this beautiful message. The principal sends out the PowerPoint to our faculty and says, hey, if you need resources of. Of a good lesson for this topic, here you go. And somehow my area director finds out about this. Our guess is it was the student teacher who asked his kids, hey, did you have this lesson? No, you didn't. Why not? To his kid in first period where the principal wasn't there. And so he made the assumption the principal. I changed my lesson so that it wouldn't be filled without. Because the principal is in there. And then he calls, he talks to a couple other parents that had kids in my class, and they're like, oh, I don't like that. So they call the area director, which I don't know how they get the number. I only had my area director's number because he was my area director. If you Google his name, no number comes up. No idea how they get it. So now I'm thinking they get it from the secretary, who also really doesn't like me. So it feels. And maybe all of this is made up, but the truth is, I had been spied on for so long that none of that would be surprising, right? So I get a call after. So sorry, we're having our area summer in service. I'm teaching this institute class. Things are going really well. I. I get a. My area director says, hey, can we come talk? Pulls me into, like, a relief Society room, says, hey, we need to have a meeting. Can you meet me today down in Salem? You know, Salem Hills or whatever.

John Dehlin [00:55:48] Sounding familiar?

Marc Oslund [00:55:48] Exactly. So it's. It's. It's my seminary excommunication. Right. It's another trial. And so I'm like, sure. What's it about? He's like, can't tell you.

John Dehlin [00:55:57] Okay. And you gotta know. It's on the wall.

Marc Oslund [00:55:59] For sure.

John Dehlin [00:55:59] Yeah, for sure.

Marc Oslund [00:56:00] And so this one I'm a little bit more aware of.

John Dehlin [00:56:02] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:56:03] But still, the.

John Dehlin [00:56:04] The.

Marc Oslund [00:56:04] The frustration is I'm. I feel like I'm doing what profits want one. So we go down, and my principal's not there, which he typically would be. And the area director said, well, we just don't want him here. We later find out that the principal, like, they bypassed my principal because they knew he was my team. Like, he was going to take my

John Dehlin [00:56:23] side, so they wanted him.

Marc Oslund [00:56:24] Yep. And so they bring in our area director and our assistant area director. And I like the assistant area director at the time, I obviously didn't like the. The area director. And they begin to ask me some questions. And they're like, so tell me about what's going on with this. What was this tweet about? And they show me a picture of the student who tweeted a picture of me saying, like, and when we. When. When she will come, we will see her as she is. Instead of he, meaning God or teaching Elohim. Elohim meaning the gods. Plural. Who are the gods? A heavenly mother and a heavenly father. What was this critique of the American education system, Et cetera, et cetera? We said. We got a call from a parent that said their kid doesn't want to go on a mission now because. Because they didn't feel like they were ready for it. And I'm like, but how's that bad? It's like, we should never tell kids that they shouldn't go on missions. I'm like, no, but I didn't say that. I said we should go on missions if we're ready for them. Right. Then they said, we also went on your Twitter account, and we were scrolling through your tweets, and we saw some things that we thought were inappropriate. I had tweeted I had a really crappy day. Cause I often did after seminary. Cause I felt so freaking beat up by people. And I went on a bike ride to blow off steam, and my tire popped. And so I tweeted because I'm just. I need some Validation. I'm like, had a terrible day and went to bike ride to blow off scene. Fml, meaning F my life.

John Dehlin [00:57:38] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [00:57:38] And they're like, a seminary teacher should never say fml. I'm like, they're like, we had to look it up. And we were appalled.

John Dehlin [00:57:44] Oh, you know.

Marc Oslund [00:57:45] And then they're like, there's a video from a YouTuber named Cody Ko, who I think millennials just love. And he's funny. He critiques stupid videos. And I said, like, this is the stuff we like back to see. And they clicked on it. They're like, and Brother Ozland, immediately the spirit left. We were just disgusted that any seminary teacher would ever watch this. And so now there's just this inquisition. Like, what about. And then the part where it got really. I was heartbroken and furious. They asked, did you hold your baby during an inservice training? And I said, yeah, I did. Is that a problem? They're like, you missed the in service. I'm like, like, it was speed friending. My wife wasn't sleeping. You have kids? Yeah, I do. Would you have done this? Well, I'm like, no. No. I. I pushed back really strongly. I said, you remember President Monson, who was prophet, like, two years ago, and he told this whole story about he was late to meetings because his wife needed him. That's the type of person I thought I could be in seminary. They're like, well, you can. But I'm like, no, I don't want to hear that.

John Dehlin [00:58:42] Did they put that in writing?

Marc Oslund [00:58:44] They're going to talk about meetings, coming to meetings.

John Dehlin [00:58:46] Okay.

Marc Oslund [00:58:47] And, like, never. Like, you'll see.

John Dehlin [00:58:49] It's.

Marc Oslund [00:58:49] They don't quote the baby, but that's exactly what it is. And I wish I would have recorded this one, because that was the inquisition. Then they come back with all the feedback eventually. And the area director and assistant area director, like, he's taking notes. So the assistant area director is like, oh, here's my way of making sure that your site is fully represented. I'm going to ask you these questions. I'm going to type out your responses, and I'm like, represented for what? They're like, well, we need to go to HR and talk about this. You're. You're. This is serious. I'm like, okay. And is there a warning? Like, we don't know yet. When will we know? Couple weeks. A couple weeks? I might not have a job. They're like, here's the. Here's the situations. Nothing happens. You have a final warning or you're Terminated. And you have a benefits package that comes along, and I'm like, and you're not going to tell me? No, my kid has jaundice right now. We're paying thousands of dollars for this. Like, you're not going to tell me I have cancer? You're not going to tell me? We'll see. We'll see in a couple weeks.

John Dehlin [00:59:44] Thanks.

Marc Oslund [00:59:45] Thanks. Okay. And I now have to go call Rachel and tell her again, hey, guess what? Our job's on the line. Except for now she's not working. So it's just my income. We have a baby, and that's extra money, obviously, diapers and all that. And he has jaundice. And so we're spending lots of money on this. And I have cancer. And I immediately start reaching out to my former baseball coaches and other connections, saying, I need a job.

John Dehlin [01:00:12] Job.

Marc Oslund [01:00:12] Like, I need to know that there's a job. And. And I actually interviewed at a high school in Utah Valley to teach history. And my baseball coach is. Is a coach there, and he talked to the principal, and the principal is going to give me a job to teach history. I had a master in education, and. And it would have been a pay cut, but I would have had a job. I just didn't feel like it was good. It wasn't the right fit at the time. And so me and Rachel are just kind of worried what is going to happen? And a couple weeks later, I get a call from my area director, which. My. Anytime I see his name anywhere, my stomach just drops. And he's like, hey, can you come meet me down in Springville? Or. Not springville, but Salem Jr. Way down south. Cause it's easier for him. Not me, of course. It's always easier for him. And so cool. Can anyone come? Nope, just you. Okay. And so now it's me. And I show up, and there's the head of HR for seminaries and institutes in my.

John Dehlin [01:01:05] Oh, yeah, the big gun.

Marc Oslund [01:01:07] Exactly. So I'm like, oh, crap. And I'm. I'm going to the bathroom. And that's where I see my area director. And he's going to the bathroom. He's like, how you doing, brother? I'm just like, if you know this, like, we love you. How's your family? I'm like, how? I know what you're about to do to me? And I'm just like, fine.

John Dehlin [01:01:24] Good.

Marc Oslund [01:01:24] Like, I can't. I can't open. Be open with him, because I'm either gonna lash out or I'm gonna cry, you know? And I'M so nervous, wondering what's going to happen. And we sit down and we say the stupid prayers because for some reason, it's like, it's a spiritual thing to be called out like this. And he's like, brother Ozland, we're here to tell you we're giving you a final warning. And in that moment, I begin to just lose it because I'm so happy. Again, it's the abuse, and then it's the relief that they provide. And we're gonna read this letter. We have a very detailed letter for you. We're gonna read it in full. And you need to abide by all of it or else. Right? This is it. And I'm like, okay, before we get into this final warning, meaning this goes away after a year or two. They're like, no, final meaning you've been teaching for five years. If you teach for 40, you'll have this final warning forever, meaning if you make one more mistake, you're done.

John Dehlin [01:02:20] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:02:21] And so in my mind, when I'm hearing this, I'm like, yes, I have a job.

John Dehlin [01:02:23] Good.

Marc Oslund [01:02:23] But then I'm thinking, I'm going to make a mistake. Yeah, it's going to happen. And now looking back on 2020, I know I would have, like, I'm not going to call out things Donald Trump saying, I'm going to be teaching about Nephi and not say anything about what's going on with Black Lives Matter. Like, I would have been fired. It just would have happened. But. So here's the letter. I want to read it because I think it reveals. It leads to why I am now no longer practicing Mormon, because I tried to make Mormonism work as orthodox, and it broke me.

John Dehlin [01:02:52] Me.

Marc Oslund [01:02:52] And I got in trouble for it. Then I try to make Mormonism work as a progressive Mormon, and they're saying very clearly, nope, unacceptable. So then I think there literally is no room for me. You don't want me. I'm not going to do this. So here's the letter. Dear Brother Oslin, final warning. Achieving our objective and purpose in seminaries and institutes requires that we live the gospel, teach effectively, and administer appropriately a responsibility to which you are entrusted. Recently, however, we learned that you are teaching in a manner that is not in harmony with the expectations of sni. Just.

John Dehlin [01:03:23] It's.

Marc Oslund [01:03:23] It. Yeah, it's, like, true. And also not because prophets are telling me to do things that I feel like I'm doing. But anyway, although you may view, oh, gosh, this is such a dig. Although you may view your actions as acceptable, they nevertheless harm the organization. Think about that. By creating doubt in the doctrines of the restored gospel and teachings of church leaders. You think you're doing good, you're an idiot. It you're not doing any good, you're actually harming it. I'm like, we'll see. We'll see who ends up harming more people. Was I harming the church more or will you? We'll see. I'm. I can guarantee you that they harm more people. But anyway, the letter serves as an official finding warning.

John Dehlin [01:03:56] Oh, well, let me just say. And I don't want to. I want you to read this, but please. He said you're harming the institution.

Marc Oslund [01:04:01] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:04:01] He didn't say you're harming the students. Right.

Marc Oslund [01:04:05] Yep. It's a huge difference.

John Dehlin [01:04:06] There's a difference.

Marc Oslund [01:04:06] The huge deal.

John Dehlin [01:04:07] And I do think their loyalty is first to the institution, because I think in their minds, if the institution goes away, there's no way to help the people. Yep. So the best way, the number one way to help the people is to protect the institution. And then you help the people as the institution's strong at all costs.

Marc Oslund [01:04:26] Right. So force the institution to work at any cost, including shame, fear, manipulation, guilt, lying, whatever. Because they believe that the institution, the organization is the only way. Whereas I'm literally teaching the opposite and saying, hey, let's be filled with love. And then if they work with the institution. Okay, hopefully they do. If they don't, because God saves them and they're all good. They don't view that.

John Dehlin [01:04:47] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:04:48] So, yes. A key point, that they're saying, you're harming the institution, the organization. And I'm like, cool, I. I'm fine harming the organization because I actually believe I'm living my covenants to mourn, whereas you are just trying to uphold the incident. The, you know, obey prophets at all costs.

John Dehlin [01:05:02] Totally.

Marc Oslund [01:05:03] Yeah. So they go for all of this and they say, you know, you have to abide by the objective and teach students the gospel as found in the standard work and be subject to all the regulations of the church and exemplify the teachings. This was a weird one. Of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, including those regarding marriage and the family. And that has to be a thing about gay.

John Dehlin [01:05:21] Right. About sex marriages.

Marc Oslund [01:05:22] It has to be that and be a positive example of all gospel principles. And then it says, an addendum to the letter has been prepared. It says, giving you this letter demonstrates our continued trust that you will respond appropriately. Meaning, we give this to you because we love You. It's a court of love. We trust you. That's why we gave you this final warning. We remind you that Seminaries Institutes of Religion is an at will employer and may terminate your employment at any time, with or without cause. I'm like, oh, cool. So they really. I mean, that's the truth. I. For any reason, they could just go to one of my coworkers and be like, hey, you're fired today. They don't do that, but they could.

John Dehlin [01:05:54] That's a Utah thing.

Marc Oslund [01:05:55] Totally. Is that. Is that unique to here?

John Dehlin [01:05:57] I think there are plenty of states that are at will.

Marc Oslund [01:05:59] Interesting.

John Dehlin [01:06:00] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:06:00] Interesting. Yeah. Because I know my current employment. It's the same. Right?

John Dehlin [01:06:03] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:06:04] Therefore, please accept this letter as intended and make the immediate and sustained changes as you resolve these issues. We are confident you will successfully help us achieve the objective of seminaries and institutes. Right, but then this is the letter that was drafted by my area director. And it's. It's lengthy, and I think it describes exactly the mentality of where seminary is. So this area director ends up getting promoted. Um, he's now in charge of everywhere from Lehigh all the way down to southern Utah and into Arizona and Nevada. So he just continues to get more and more promoted. Meaning if this was inaccurate or if something was off, like, he should get called out, but he's not. He's becoming more and more of a big deal, which I eventually think he's either gonna get called on a mission, not in like a, you did bad, but like, we need you, general authority, main deal in seminary. Like, he continues to get promoted. So this is. This is a letter to you. This is a second letter. Yeah. This is an addendum to the letter to show exactly what I need to do.

John Dehlin [01:07:00] Okay.

Marc Oslund [01:07:01] So here you go. Dear Mark, the following content has been prepared to help you more deeply understand and respond to concerns regarding your teaching. Dallin wrote Dallin Oaks, and he quotes this thing from Dallin Oaks, and he's quoting the saints in DNC 101. It says, the Lord gave the saints a parable to help them know his will concerning the redemption of Zion. He told of a nobleman who gave his servants certain commandments and then left them in charge of a vineyard for a time. And this is bolded. They followed his directions. But then they began to question the Lord's commandments, and eventually they substituted their own judgment on what would be best for the Lord and his vineyard. As a result, the Lord of the Vineyard called upon his servants and said, why? What is the cause of this Great evil. And he says, after giving his parable, like, will you be guided and trust that I may build them up? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So that's the setting saying, Mark, you used to follow it and now you're not. You think you're doing right now, you're not. You're not trusting the Lord. You're not doing it the Lord's way. So it says, Mark, you need to seek and implement the following principles as you make important changes in your teaching and administering one. Come to a deeper understanding and awareness that God's ways are higher than your ways and God's thoughts are higher than ours. Seek to know his will and his ways in working with students. Right off the bat he's like, you think you know God. You don't know God. You have no idea about God. Also, you don't know his will or his ways. Where I'm like, wait, what do you mean, man? I'm asking kids what they need. He's like, yeah, that's not God's way. God's way is just to do it his way. You don't ask kids. You do it God's way. He said, there are methods that help achieve God's objective. Conversely, there are methods that, when used, cannot achieve God's objective. Unless we are alert, we can easily be deceived by selecting methods that may have been validated by students previously. Basically being like, you have a lot of growth in your class and students like it. But he said, in the end, that falls short in the attainment of God's purposes in God's work. In order to obtain good results and fruits, we must do things his way. Implying you're not doing it his way. We do things his way. I know God's way. I'm your key. He's not a key holder, but he's treating me as if. He said, she's in a state presidency. He thinks that he knows everything about this. Elder Maxwell taught, we may acknowledge his overall plan but criticize his style because he does things his own way. And we would prefer things to be done in our way. Says Mark, as you make the efforts to understand the Lord's mind and will in your teaching. As if I wasn't doing that. You don't think I was trying to get guidance and trust prophets, right? You will be blessed with an increase of spiritual power and impact. I'm like, how much more impact? I'm the most impactful teacher in the valley. I don't understand. Never criticize, correct or disagree with the teachings of prophets. Seers and revelators all capitalized. It's not just seers with the lowercase s, it's seers. In fact, consistently share your love, respect and concern for them. Share that you're concerned about them, right? And he talks about trusting in patience and faith. And in that part he says, take down your pictures of Jesus and re. Put up the pictures of the apostles. And I said, that just hit me so strongly that you want me to take down Jesus and put up apostles. Like, to me, I'm just like, I know what this church is built on, right? Which is now why I fight so hard against prophets where I'm like, dude, you are the foundation. Teach all the truths taught by modern day prophet seers and revelators. Do not substitute their teachings with your own personal philosophies, judgments or opinions. By helping your students understand and align with truth, they will be strengthened in their faith and they will learn how to sustain the prophet. Meaning, Mark, you weren't teaching certain things. You didn't talk about how we oppose gay marriage. Teach all of the truths. Don't just teach some. Don't. Don't just teach the ones that make kids feel loved. Don't just teach the ones saying everyone's gonna be saved. Make sure you teach the ones that say, hey, if you don't repent, you're damned. These were literal conversations that we were having. And I'm, I'm just, you know, shocked and disgusted. He says. He quotes Elder Holland who says, a few scriptures and poems just won't do. Are we really nurturing our youth? And I'm like, wow, that's messed up. For teach with greater clarity. So students slash parents, there we go. Aren't confused or feel you are sowing seeds of doubt or weakening faith. Consult with your supervisor about any content or method that you are considering that may be misunderstood. Teach so clearly that your faith is never difficult to detect. He says, teach with great balance. This is. This part made me disgusted. Inside the master teacher, Jesus Christ loves people and teaches them what they must know, including accountability, commandments, corrections, the need for change, growth, and the quote, hard sayings or truths that are not popular or exalt, are readily accepted by the world, but are essential for us to know and live in order to be exalted. And then we go and he elaborated. I'm like, tell me more about that.

John Dehlin [01:11:47] He's like, exactly.

Marc Oslund [01:11:48] You know, like you, Mark, I know that you don't want to talk about how repentance is painful. You need to talk about repentance. Is painful. It is painful. You need to make sure kids know that this is a painful process. And I'm like, what? You need to make sure they know that if they don't live the gospel that they are threatening their eternal exaltation, which I wasn't teaching. And I'm like, dude, this is. This is warped, man. Like, so remember, I think we. I read the Givens, and I think, yes, look, there's validation for all of this. And he's saying, oh, no, no, no, no. Not only is that wrong, but you have to go the other way, and you better start teaching McConkey and Kimball and Fielding Smith. Right? And I'm just thinking, this is disgusting. He says, these truths may be taught in an environment of understanding and strong faith. Meaning, how do we soften this? Well, we don't soften the teachings. We need the hard teachings. We need the pain. He's like. He ends up using an image of a scalpel. He says, we need to cut the kids. They need to be hurt, but do it cleanly and with love so it's more loving and generous. And I'm just thinking, oh, my gosh. Like, this is disgusting. Center your teachings in the scriptures, the words of living prophets, and the curriculum. And I thought. And I told them I am. I literally have every quote from prophets, more than any other teacher in this valley. And they're like, yeah, but you're not centered in the curriculum. Like, okay, well, fine. Be cautious as you can.

John Dehlin [01:13:08] Just say one thing. It's. It's. Well, I have two comments, but the one I'll make right now is they sent givens to you guys multiple times. So when they introduce those ideas to you, how. It's. It's just so. It's so fraught that you're held. That it's held against you.

Marc Oslund [01:13:31] Yep.

John Dehlin [01:13:31] For incorporating those teachings into your teachings.

Marc Oslund [01:13:34] In fact, in my pre. This letter, like the one I had with my area director and assistant area director, I said literally that thing. And my assistant area director, and this is when I lost trust for him, said, but, Mark, you know that not everything said by them is doctrine. And I'm like, okay. Like, I just. I. It was just so insulting because I felt. Whatever I called the spirit, elevation, emotion, you name it, I call this doctrine. And they're saying, oh, but, you know, that's not all. True. True. And, you know, you can't take their word for it. I'm like, oh, my gosh. So, yes, John, you're exactly. You're exactly right. Um, let's see. Professional administrative concerns. Communicate more clearly to your supervisor any personal needed absence from professional meetings.

John Dehlin [01:14:13] That.

Marc Oslund [01:14:14] And I said, is this about my baby? He said, yes. And I'm like, I. Now I'm weeping. So I'm. I'm simultaneously going through tears of joy for having a job and then immense anger and then tears of, it's my freaking baby. In a speed friending activity, I didn't miss anything substantive. It wasn't Kim Clark coming down. It wasn't Jesus coming down. It was speed friending, which a bunch of dorky seminary teachers I never want to see in my life.

John Dehlin [01:14:38] Right?

Marc Oslund [01:14:38] Like, that's why. That's it. And he said, well, Mark, it wasn't just that the exception. We can't have the exception become the rule. I'm like, I've never done that before because I just had a freaking kid. Like, what do you mean? You know? And he's like, just be clear and be up front. I'm like, we have. It's the summertime. Like, if I take a day off off, because I don't want to wake up and go to work, he's like, I know, I know. I'm like, no, you don't know, man. Like, anyway, so now I'm heartbroken, and I'm just hungry and. And, like, hungry for love and validation, but instead, I'm feeling alone. And. And. And then my HR rep comes over and, like, kind of puts his shoulder on my side, and my. My area director comes over and puts his hand on my shoulder like, it's okay, brother. It's okay. And I'm just like, you are disgusting. Like, I'm just thinking, get off of me. You are so far from God. And at that time, the head HR guy says, mark, you should be so grateful for what brother Linford did for you. Sorry, I just dropped his name. I don't know if I should dox him or not. But, yeah, I don't care. I hate him. But anyway, I mean, I don't hate him as a. I mean, yeah, you get it, but. Sorry, I've been intentionally not saying names. But, yeah, anyway, he. And I was like, let me guess what happened. Like, you had a meeting with Chad Webb and with Russ Bullock and with all of these people and hr. And Steve Linford was. And they were gonna say, let's terminate him. And Linford said, no, let's give him another chance. And they're like, that's exactly what happened. Therefore, they think he's merciful to me. And I'm like, yeah, this isn't Mercy, man, this isn't, this isn't what I need. He said, hold students to a higher degree of accountability. I, I had told students, hey, you know what this is? This is a non mandatory class. If you tell your parents that you're gone, I will mark you present. If you tell them and they know and they're okay with it, show me the text, show me the message, whatever. And so I wouldn't, you know, keep roll accurately or whatever else. Or I'd. If they had makeup work, I'd be like, makeup work's stupid. This is seminary. You don't do makeup work in California if you don't come. So I'm. Just write a half page of what you learned about Jesus this year. There's your 20 days of makeup work. He says, communicate to them your expectation to be in class on time and do their best to complete the elevate learning requirements, which is such a stupid phrase they have right now. Remember that high love and low expectations lead to a fraternal relationship, a buddy, buddy relationship, which is lenient and negatively affects students growth. That's what they said. I'm like, how dare you? Whereas in an environment of high love and high expectations leads to students experiencing miracles. I'm like, dude, I'm. I'm literally seeing miracles. I'm seeing kids who are wanting to be Mormon that never wanted to be Mormon, kids coming to seminary that literally didn't come for years, kids doing all this, this work to go on missions. And you're saying that's not miracles? Because I, I don't care if they're five minutes late to class. Seek to more fully represent the first presidency in your work in other settings. This was my, the Twitter comment, what does this look like with your colleagues? That goes all the way back to my arguments way back in Pleasant Grove with students, meaning talking to them outside of class. Other settings. As you seek to represent the first presidency more fully, your students, colleagues, and others will see you in a straw as a strong spiritual mentor, which will inspire them to become more fully connected to the Savior. And while I don't disagree, I thought, am I not a strong spiritual mentor at this point with, you know, 2,000 people that are following me on Instagram and kids that are coming to my class from other class? Am I not a strong one? Like dozens of kids going on missions, kids getting baptized that weren't Mormon in Utah county from my seminary class? Am I not a strong mentor already? I guess not in the way they wanted. Right? Um, and he says, number four, never communicate Privately with any of your students, electronically. This is SNI policy and is designed to protect you. Fine. Okay. Whatever. I, I, I I don't disagree. But I told him, like, if a kid messaged me and says, hey, I think I might want to die tonight, I'm going to message him. And obviously they didn't like that. But I'm like, do you want me to just ignore it? Do you want me to just ignore this kid reaching out? I can't in good conscience let that happen. I can't allow it to happen. And then he says, this is going to matter because of my seminary training, who has a very similar verbiage. Happened to him. Mark, I would encourage you not just to conform to these requirements, but transform into a servant in the vineyard. Hearkening all the way back to you think you're doing it God's way. You're in. Who does the Lord's will in the Lord's way in caring for those students in your classes. By making this transformation, your impact in leading souls to Christ will increase. Merely conforming to these requirements. Think of this. Will lead to future problems and termination. And I challenged him. I was like, tell me how you'll know if I will conform. He's like, the spirit will tell me. And now I'm thinking, oh, crap. So this guy who thought my my first boss at Pleasant Grove was the best in seminary, this guy who thinks that you know all of these things that are going on, like, you are so lucky to have him, blah, blah, blah, this dude is going to be judging by the spirit to know if I've conformed or transformed. Like, I'm screwed. I'm screwed. We hope that you will make these necessary changes so you can teach with great impact and continue your employment. And then in quotes, find joy therein in seminaries and institutes. The letter ends. And then my final question as I'm being ripped apart is, um, so what's gonna happen next? He's like, well, we're gonna move you to Provo High School. So not only are they separating me from a school that I loved. Without me saying bye to students in the middle of the summer, uh, they're also separating me from the area with my friends. So now I'm completely alone in the Utah south area with a new area director with a new school. Um, and he's like, you are expected to attend all meetings. You have to be doing all the things from your previous warning letter, this letter, et cetera. Moving forward. This will be on your final warning for good or your on Your final record for good. And. Yeah. Make the changes. And I'm like, how. Like, how are we going to check in? Like, we'll. We'll just. We'll be checking in. We'll make sure.

John Dehlin [01:20:18] Like, okay, basically just saying, go find another job.

Marc Oslund [01:20:20] That's exactly it.

John Dehlin [01:20:21] That's what it feels like to me.

Marc Oslund [01:20:23] So eventually, John, I find out that that was exactly the conversation that they had had. The. The conversation was. And again, they think they're merciful, but they're like, this guy is not going to work in seminary. We're going to make it so uncomfortable for him that we're gonna push him out now so that he's not 10 years down the road and even less able to find another career, which in some ways is a merciful thing. But also, they're the reason why I need to find another job. If they were. Just trust what I was doing, because they will be doing the same thing in 10 years.

John Dehlin [01:20:50] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:20:50] You know, but I get it. They can't get out in front.

John Dehlin [01:20:52] So. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:20:53] What a mess, man. So I'm driving home and I'm just in tears and just like, what the heck do I do now? You know? I pack up my stuff at Tippanogos High School. The next day, one of my friends moves with me. I'm just pissed off. And I decide a couple things. I decide I'm not putting any personality into lessons. I'm not walking outside of my classroom until the bell rings, so. Meaning I'm not greeting students. I'm not gonna get to know them. I'm not gonna say a word to them. I'm going to teach them. My lesson plans will not be creative. They will literally be copy and pasted from the curriculum. And what this does to me is it takes away all of my joy and teaching. Teaching, because the two things I love the most were teaching kids, connecting with them on a personal level and helping them see new ways to look at Mormon things. And I just. As soon as I'm driving home, I'm like, this isn't gonna work. I'm gonna get in trouble. Oh, and I also asked, by the way, I'm like, how. How are you gonna know, like, what's gonna be classified as an offense that will. Will terminate this? Like, if somebody calls, a parent calls in, are you gonna corroborate it or are you just gonna say, that was a warning. You're done? They're like, we'll make sure we do our due diligence. Due diligence. I'm like, okay, that's not TR make that decision. This is what I'm going to do. And immediately, a couple days later, I text my. My baseball coach at BYU and I'm like, coach, you've been so good to me for so long. Can you help me? I need a job because I am going to get fired. He's like, yeah, let me call somebody. And mercifully he calls up, you know, somebody who's connected. A former BYU baseball player has. He runs his own business and we're really successful. And I get an interview and they say, hey, yeah, we'd love to have you. And it was so comforting to me to know that there was something there. And so September in Provo High, I start teaching and I just have no personality. But here, here's why I was like, crap, I'm gonna get fired. And why I finally pulled the trigger to quit. Because even though I put no effort in to connect to the kids, zero effort at all, zero effort, they still were coming into my office. They still were like, we love this guy requesting to be in my class. The same patterns were happening where I'm getting spied on by teachers, where they're feeling worried about kids requesting, et cetera, et cetera. And I'm like, it's gonna happen. It's. And I ref. I can't see a kid hurting and not reach out in love. So my last ditch effort, my last ditch effort was reaching out to Dieter Uchtdorf, the only person on the 12 that I felt like I could trust. The only person I felt like would understand. I feel like he's millennials, like only hope progressive Mormon. I know a lot like Holland, but Holland can be very firm. You know, I just heard his like taffy pulling patty ca that leave the church. I'm like, he doesn't get it as much as I hope, you know, Uchdorf would. And so I sent him an email and he didn't respond. But I knew of a person from my adult religion class whose grandma used to be Uchtdorf's secretary. And I said, can your grandma get me Uchtdorf's current secretary's information? And mercifully, I got the information. I drafted an email. I sent him his secretary, this letter or sorry, I called. She called back and said, hey, this is elder Uchdorf secretary. I. I'd love to talk to you. And so I said, hey, this is what's going on. I just need to get a hold of him. I'm a seminary teacher. I have these concerns. And she says, cool, I'll make sure he sees it. Can you send it on? And so I sent on the letter. She responds, this was a beautiful letter. Thank you so much. I put it on his desk so I know for a fact that Dieter Uchtdorf read the letter I wrote to him where I said, I understand the impropriety in sending you this email. I know that I should be talking to my stake president, to my supervisors, and that you are an extremely busy man. I also know the likelihood of you reading this email is slim. However, I have been writing wanting to write you for some time and I felt I should take the chance. I hope you'll forgive me for this intrusion. My name is Mark and I'm a 29 year old seminary teacher at Tippanogos High School in Orem. I'm a convert from Los Angeles, a BYU graduate and the only member or active member in my family. My wife and I live in Utah Valley and just had our first miracle boy, a child, a boy named Remy. We love him so much. I'm writing you in hopes that perhaps you could help me as I deal with the immense tension I feel between trying to balance my love for the Gospel of Christ and those who feel completely marginalized by church culture, including myself. These kids who I teach at Tippinogos are so remarkable, but there are so many who are deciding to walk away from the church and even a few who are deciding to end their lives due to different elements of our culture. This has been heartbreaking to me. Sadly, in my efforts to reach out and extend the warm welcome that I believe Christ would do, I have felt marginalized, ostracized and even threatened by parents and others who believe I'm not teaching sound doctrine. I have prayed and studied and pondered for hours and hours and I believe I am in harmony with God. I know this should be enough, but I often feel the need to walk away from this profession out of fear of losing my job. It is so hard to walk this path and I am tired and wounded. So the reason I am emailing you is to ask for your help, perhaps by having a chance to visit. I understand this is a pipe dream or email back another long shot to talk about how to navigate this delicate path. Because remember, I think that he's doing as stated at the beginning. I know this email will probably never reach you and if it does, I'm sure there are many more things that are on your plate. I'm so sorry for this request, but I felt like you were someone who would listen to me without judgment and could help Me walk the path the Savior would walk. Thank you for being a flashlight who points me and many, many others to the light switch that is Christ. And that was it. That was my last ditch. Like Utor's my only hope, right? Like Obi Wan Kenobi. He is the only one. I can't have this conversation with Quentin Cook. I can't have this talk with Bednar. I can't have this. I can't. It's. They will not see. So a couple weeks later, I actually get a letter in the mail from with church heading and it's from Kim Clark, who's the commissioner of church education at the time. And by the way, I actually had no feelings of love or appreciation for Kim Clark. He was my wife's. You know, he was the BYU Idaho president when she was there. Extremely cold. He reminds me of the Sith Lord kind of from Star wars where he's just very direct and strict and strong and. And no smiles and you know, it just. I felt so much coldness from him and he was like Elder Bednar on steroids. Right? And it's something. What's up with BYU Idaho? Just all these strict people. I don't understand why they're just promoting the strictest people there. But here's. Here's Kim Clark's response in July 12, 2019. Dear Brother Oslin, Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf requested that I respond to your email on his behalf. Which to me me, I was grateful that President Uchtdorf read it or Elder Uchdorf at the time read it. Grateful that he saw it and a little disheartened that he pass it on to somebody who I just knew was not going to answer my questions. I like he. Elder Kim Clark would have been probably the last person I would have requested. And I just said like, I know that he's busy. So I wrote it off that way. But also I felt like, so these guys aren't seeing this. Like a seer would know that I need him and not Elder Clark. He said, first of all, I want to thank you for loving your students and wanting to build their faith in the Savior and his restored gospel. It is tragic when even one of our Heavenly Father's children lose their way and wander away from his covenant path. It is our opportunity and responsibility to seek inspiration so that we can help them find answers to their questions. Is that what I was doing? And point them to the Savior and his teachings. And so I'm just like, there's so much disconnect. Like my thought was to Supersede my area director and go the priesthood route and have Elder Uchdorf say to Brother Linford and be like, nope, this guy, he is safe. You cannot fire him. That was my hope. And then I heard this. I'm like, oh, it's just a company form letter, you know, almost. As for your question, I do not believe there needs to be a conflict between loving and welcoming all students and teaching the Gospel with clarity. I think you can learn to be both a loving teacher who understands a student's sincere question and struggles, and a teacher who follows the brethren with faith and optimism. In doing this, we follow our Savior. I'm like, when did the Savior follow the brethren? Is that a thing that happened in the New Testament anyway? Of course there is room in the seminary for teachers with different approaches and teaching styles. Is there? There's not. The Lord will use your strengths and experiences to bless others as you continue to reach out in love. I want to affirm some things about teaching which I hope will be helpful. Despite differences in personalities, all effective seminary teachers have some things in common. They love the Lord and have faith. They teach with an understanding of the role of the Holy Ghost. Secondly, they have great confidence in the power of the Word. They teach the Scriptures are unfailingly loyal to the brethren we sustain as prophet seers and revelators. There we go. They know what the Lord's prophets are saying about current issues. I thought I knew that. And testify with sincere conviction of their teachings. Third, they love and trust their students. And when I'm like, he's writing us. I'm like, you don't know me, obviously, but I thought you were a seer and you were able to see how I love my students. He said, they welcome questions that are not afraid to address sensitive issues, but they do it in a way that their faith is easy to recognize. They help students see the differences between sincere search for truth and the spirit of persistent doubting. This is in 2019. That phraseology must have been a phrase that they're talking about in church meetings. Persistent doubt. Elder Renlund gave his really crappy talk about the boat and, oh, I went Evian in my boat. And not like. Like, dude, you don't get doubt at all, right? So these are conversations that these. They're having in the demonization that we now see perpetuated from Russell Nelson in April 2021. Conference of LAX learners and Lazy Lazy disciples and lax learners are. We see this conversation happening. In fact. Well, I totally forgot one thing that may be helpful to you. Is to review who. Elder Dale G. Renlund's talk from last year's June broadcast, which I literally didn't read, but there it is on the other side. And I'm like, these guys have no idea. That talk was horrible for doubters. My students hated it. I hated it. My friends hated it. You may also want to review another talk from Chad Webb. Um, I know your question has been on his mind as we try to help students feel, blah, blah, blah. And then this was the final straw for me, where I'm like, these dudes straight up don't see anything. My last suggestion is to stay close to your principal and region director. Director. I'm like, oh, those guys that have been spying on me and ripping me apart. Your supervisor at S. And I are trusted leaders who can help you try to implement these things on a practical and daily basis. For him, as a first quorum of the 70, to say, we trust your leaders is now a stamp of approval, saying, everything they've done is what we would do ourselves. I'm like, that's it. Cool. Now, immediately my faith says, you don't see the truth. You don't see the reality. You are not prophets. You're not seers. It falls apart right there. The fact that they think that these dudes, these leaders, these seminary leaders are approved and doing the right thing. I'm like, this is all crap. I already was wavering on prophets because of their past history. I was trying to do the progressive thing. Then them quoting these things that show how out of touch they are. I'm like, you guys are all frauds. Like. And even Uchtdorf, who I. Who I still cared for, I was hurt that he didn't respond. And then the next conference, after he gets demoted, he says that we're unruly, unruly children, people who walk away. And I'm just like, there. There we go. So this guy who I trusted is now a company man again, talking bad about people. There we go. That was the last straw. Uchtdorf was the last one. And I still appreciate him, and I listen to him over other people, but. And I wish that he was in the first. I wish he was president of the church. If he had all power, maybe it would be different. But I just. It all fell apart right there. He said, if you are sincerely trying to follow their counsel, you do not need to live in fear of losing your job. It is only when we feel we are the exception or you begin to feel the. That we are the only ones who understand our students and know better than our leaders how to save them, that we are open to methods and practices that could actually do more harm than good. And. And to that point, I did think I knew better than leaders.

Letters to Church Leaders and Resigning from Seminary

John Dehlin [01:32:08] I did.

Marc Oslund [01:32:08] And so he's right. But at the same time, I was actually saving kids and they weren't. So like, my results spoke for themselves. He says there is safety and counsels from learning from others who have successfully walked this path. Make sure you stay close to them and all you do is transparent and appropriate both in and out of the classroom. He said, I hope what I've written will be helpful. Please know that you are loved and that your faithful service to the Lord in and wonderful young people of the rising generation is appreciated. I'm grateful for your question and the desire to bless students as you continue to be teachful and prayer teachable and prayerful. The Lord will help you know how to do this in a way that is pleasing to him. Um, I get that letter. It's stirring on my mind. I get this job offer. I am learning that kids still like me even though I don't try to like them back. And I just thought, I can't do this. So I. I call up hr. Hey, I'm after teaching one class, hey, I'm gonna call quit. I have a new job offer. Congratulations. Like, no, this is not something that I am happy about. They're like, oh, we're so sorry. And they're like, cool. We'll send an air. Your region director, you'll talk, you'll have kind of a debriefing, blah, blah, blah.

John Dehlin [01:33:09] Did you consider waiting until they offered severance? Because by quitting you don't get the severance. Is that right?

Marc Oslund [01:33:17] I. Yes, that's true. And I thought about it. I actually went to my therapist who when I first met with. With him, told him all my stresses with seminary. He says, have you thought about quitting? And I'm like, nope. He's like, okay, okay. And then this time I said, hey, I'm gonna quit. He's like, have you thought about staying? And I'm like, yeah. And he's like, you have impact. I'm like, I know. And the severance and all of that. It was kind of like an excommunication where for some reason I wanted to resign in from this than have it taken from me. And largely because I think my insurance was on the line. I was worried what would I do in the, you know, couple weeks. And I had a job offer. If I didn't have a job offer, I I would have kept going. So having that backup plan was like, that's it. I'm good. I'm safe. I'm going to make this work. The salary that I was going to get paid was equal to after teaching six years of seminary. So I'm like, okay, good. So it's a. It's a neutral jump financially. Exactly. Yep. And so, yes, I did consider it, and I knew it would have happened. It just would have happened, happened, but I was going through so much emotional turmoil trying to be that middle ground. And then I'm going through emotional turmoil. Just. I felt like a shell of myself at Provo High. I just had no passion, no energy. I was miserable because I couldn't be me. I couldn't say what I wanted to say, and I had to be a company man, and I couldn't teach the lessons that I just disagreed with. But if I taught anything else, I would have been fired. And so that turmoil was just too much.

John Dehlin [01:34:43] Much.

Marc Oslund [01:34:43] Along with the job offer, I thought, let's go. And so I meet with my region director, who's just underneath the area director, and we ask questions, hey, what was the problem? Like, the area director, he's the problem. And this, this, this. And. And he's like, would you like to have an exit interview with human resources? Said, absolutely. I am going to rip everything apart about how seminary is done. I'm going to call them out for how they treated my friend Laura. I'm going to do all of these things. And. And they're like. He says, okay, well, we don't want you in the class classroom. You can take your vacation days. I have, like, three weeks vacation days. Take your vacation days. I didn't take them. I went to California, and I got paid out for him. I'm like, you guys have $130 billion. I refuse to take vacation days. You guys can pay me a $500 for, you know, all the pain you've caused me. And I'm waiting for the exit interview. And so I call up hr they're like, your region director said it's good. We. We don't need to have one. I'm like, of course you don't. No feedback. Just this closed loop of, we don't want to hear it. We don't want to hear the feedback. And that was it. And I start my new job. And.

John Dehlin [01:35:43] Okay, really quick, before we jump to the new job, let's just quickly debrief, please.

Marc Oslund [01:35:48] Thank you.

John Dehlin [01:35:49] On the one hand, you know, I want Robin Williams. I want, oh, captain, my captain. To be successful. I, you know, I care about those kids. And I feel super sad that such a successful teacher that was reaching so many kids. Kids there was. That there wasn't a place made for you. I'm sad that you were ahead of your time. That the church will be. And, you know, seminar. The average. You know, there's like a bell curve, and the bell curves shift and the bell curve will shift to where the majority of CS teachers are teaching. End up teaching the way you taught, but you were just on the cutting edge. And sometimes on the cutting edge, you bleed and you're kind of sacrificial like so many other people. And so for all those reasons, I feel super sad.

Marc Oslund [01:36:39] Thanks, John. You're just that alone. My friend Laura, she's been really wanting me to get this out. And, you know, there's a Spanish word, descanso. Right. Which is like this. This final cleansing. And I've been trying to find ways to do it. And as I've gone through this process with you and your empathy and your insights to my story, it has been the healing that I've needed for years. And so just even hearing somebody, instead of the judgment that I will eventually receive, hearing somebody say, I'm so sorry for what happened and you were. You were successful and good was. It just feels like a balm for me. Thank you. Like, I've just needed somebody to see the work I've been trying to do and the harm that's been caused me and the harm that's been caused by family and be validated in that. So, again, just. That means just the world to me.

John Dehlin [01:37:32] Thank you.

Marc Oslund [01:37:33] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:37:35] Yeah. And of course, it's hard not to see myself in your story, because whether it was me teaching seminary, where this almost same kind of situation happened where I had to quit, or when I taught elders quorum later and it just didn't work out.

Marc Oslund [01:37:52] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:37:52] I had to come to this realization that the church wasn't ready, even though it was likely to move in the direction. It was just too early. And. And then, of course, moving forward to my excommunication. Which you haven't had yet. That's when I had all these ecclesiastical exchanges and the conflict. And even though. And this is what I was going to ask you as kind of like. Like a different face to the. I'm sorry. You know, there's a point where you really still think the church is true and you still think they're prophet seers and revelators, and you're acting in an idealistic way because you're expecting them to live up to what they say they are and what they teach. And. And so it's. There's a point where it's natural to be engaging in them. Them on face value for how they put themselves forward. Yep. Then there's a point where you kind of realize that this is just an organization and these are just men, and this really isn't God's one true church. And they're really not led by God and they're just. They're just doing their best. You know, there's even a charitable spin on that.

Marc Oslund [01:39:08] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [01:39:08] Which is they're just doing their best.

Marc Oslund [01:39:10] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [01:39:10] Absolutely. And it's a bro. And we're all human and it's a broken system. And. And if the church goes away, they can't help people. So any organization, you know, the Open Stories foundation is going to. Is going to protect itself as a main priority.

Marc Oslund [01:39:23] For sure.

John Dehlin [01:39:24] Mormon stories. Because if Mormon Stories goes away, the Open Stories found is, you know, we can't help people. So there's. There's kind of these two sides where once you cross over into that second spot, it's almost like Richard Rohr.

Marc Oslund [01:39:38] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:39:38] When you're in first half of life, life, then it's. Then it makes sense to engage the church on those literalistic terms. But once you cross over the second half of life, it's easy to sort of be caught in this. Well, they're not living up. They're not really prophet sergeant revelators, and they're not living up to their standards. But in your mind, you have already concluded that they're not correct, that they're not that. But you. It's hard to let that go because they're still saying that they're all those things. That's part of it. And people are getting hurt. And even if you know in some level of your brain that they're no longer led by God, you still kind of want them to. To do good and to live up to kind of the standard they're leading. And so on the one hand, I'm sad for you, and the other hand, I'm like, and this isn't to be disrespectful. On the other hand, I'm like, well, what did you expect? Yeah. Yeah, they're not led by God. Uchtdorf is super busy. They're not, you know, they're just like, this is like. It's like that thing. I knew. I knew, you know, that snake story that we heard growing up as Mormons. You knew who I was when you Picked me up. Like, once you knew that they weren't all those things, then, of course, if you don't, if you don't, you know, if you don't toe the line, if you don't act in the way they need you to, they're going to cut you loose for sure. And I'll just say that. That, you know, there's a lot in that letter that I think is actually true. I think there probably is flexibility and a diversity of teaching styles. But I think what's undeniable is that the Mormon Church values authority and structure and obedience above all else.

Marc Oslund [01:41:21] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [01:41:21] And if you think about who you know, I've often asked, why have we not have an apostle defect? Yeah. And it's because they groom people, starting from, you know, bishops and bishopric members and elders, quorum presidents and seminary teachers. They're constantly grooming for company men, as you said, and they're constantly filtering out people that aren't putting the organization above the students or the members or themselves. And they're going to frame you as prideful.

Marc Oslund [01:41:53] Yeah, for sure.

John Dehlin [01:41:55] And that's what they're all saying about you. Maybe not all. Maybe some are like, I love that guy. I'm so sad he's gone. But the majority are just going to say that's what happens. You get prideful.

Marc Oslund [01:42:04] Yep.

John Dehlin [01:42:05] They're going to be as prideful. And ultimately they're going to say he cared more about himself or his version of, you know, goodness in ways that ultimately don't strengthen the institution. And without the institution, world, dead respect.

Marc Oslund [01:42:21] Spot on.

John Dehlin [01:42:22] So I'm not trying to invalidate you or, you know, neutralize the things I just said previously, but I'm just trying to kind of look at it objectively. And I'm guessing you feel compartmentalized.

Marc Oslund [01:42:34] Totally. And I conflicted, too. And I 100% agree. Like, only in with the distance that has come have I been able to see, like, as I was telling the story yesterday, just a couple pieces of that, and I was thinking, like, I get it. Like, there's some things that even mentioned, like, you know, my big thing was being told that, hey, we think Mark's going to have sex with a student. And being concerned about that. Now, their rationale for doing that was jealousy. But knowing what happens with Sam Young and seeing this come about, I'm like, yeah, I absolutely want every possible danger to be called out. The problem was how they did it. And so, same thing with this where I'm thinking, look, I absolutely agree that I was causing issues for the Institution. But I was doing it because I thought prophets said that that's what we should do. Right. Like, I was using prophets to critique prophets. But, but, but I absolutely agree with you. This, this was going to be the result. And a teacher that's, you know, friends with my friend basically said, like, this was always going to happen to Mark. Like, it sucks that this happened to him.

John Dehlin [01:43:32] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:43:32] And I agree. This was going to happen to me.

John Dehlin [01:43:34] Yeah. The minute I bought my podcast microphone and released my first episode, I, I had a clear sense that excommunication was going to be the likely outcome. It took 15. 15? Well, no, it took 10 years, but I always kind of knew it. Yeah. And, and I had this conflict when I was fighting it towards the end where I'm like, wow, I, I knew this all along and I, I'm acting outraged and I'm acting upset and I'm acting mistreated and shocked and surprised. The shock and surprise is genuine because you never want someone or something that you love to fulfill your worst nightmares. But at the same time, it's a little bit, I don't want to say duplicitous, but it's a little bit fraught because I always, at some level, I always knew I was going to be 100%.

Marc Oslund [01:44:30] And like, I got into it, like into seminary because I love the church and because I love what it did for me. And at the very end, I realized that what I really loved was teenagers. And what I really loved was making sure that they were, were taken care of and they were healthy. And my, my belief was that Mormonism was net negative on their life. Right. And so the, the hurt comes because I thought I was doing everything right. Right. By the. By, like, I had all the justifications, but truthfully, I knew I was going against the institution. So it really was both where I. I'm thinking, and you know, what happened.

John Dehlin [01:45:01] You knew what happens to people when

Marc Oslund [01:45:03] they go against the institution at some point. Yeah, exactly. Where I start seeing, like, I saw you, I saw Kate, I saw Jeremy, I saw. Saw and, and Bill Real had just been excommunicated and Sam Young's just about to start. So I'm like, I know this is a thing.

John Dehlin [01:45:13] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:45:13] Like, and I'm. And I'm seeing the trajectory. And I know also that they feel very protective of youth in particular, because they're so supportive. Yeah. That's all they care about. Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:45:21] That's pretty much all they care about.

Marc Oslund [01:45:22] Right.

John Dehlin [01:45:22] I mean, tithe payers and youth.

Marc Oslund [01:45:24] Yeah, yeah, that's it. And and so from my point, what I was trying to. My sales pitch to them was, I'm keeping people in Mormonism. It's not the Mormonism that you like, but they're staying. If I'm not there, then they're walking away. And so that, that was my sales pitch. But truthfully, like, I. Because when you have a teacher saying, hey, I'm not sure about these teachings on gay marriage, when the church has made that their foundation or, hey, prophets have gotten things wrong and they've made that their foundation, they're going to come for the jugular. It's the ego, Right. Whenever we have our ego attacked personally, we lash out to protect it. Well, the church has an ego, too. And whenever the church finds that ego, that fake self that's been created attacked, what do they do? They lash out. And the way of lashing out, you know, they have lawyers and they have excommunications, and they have disfellowship, and they. They have people that will distance themselves from you. And that is absolutely what ends up happening. And so the, the hurt is real because I see this community and this, this thing that I love. I. I still, like, I would be in a seminary class right now, but not. I would not say a word about Dr. I just. I love teenagers. You know, Like, I. I want to help teenagers. I want them to be happy. But that's why I, like, I just. This was gonna. This was gonna happen. This is gonna happen.

John Dehlin [01:46:36] So I. We should come back to this at the end. But I'm just going to say right now, the biggest demand I've seen over the past 15 years in the ex Mormon community, aside from kind of an ex Mormon dating service, is ex Mormon youth groups and ex Mormon youth conferences. Yeah. So as you're getting your lc, msw, msw.

Marc Oslund [01:47:00] And then I'll be in lcsw.

John Dehlin [01:47:01] Msw. Lcsw. You maybe you will feel called to start creating kind of a ex Mormon E. Fy.

Marc Oslund [01:47:10] I love that.

John Dehlin [01:47:11] And ex Mormon youth groups that can be financially sustainable by the parents that benefit. I mean, and you may not want to do that, but I'm telling you, there's a demand for that, and I think there's a way to do it. Finance, you know, that's financially sustainable. Because I believe people should get paid.

Marc Oslund [01:47:28] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:47:28] Thanks for adding value.

Marc Oslund [01:47:29] Yeah. And honestly, that idea had never hit me until. And so now we're obviously going to be brainstorming because I think it's genius. Like, my hope moving forward is as I. As I continue this msw Program. And, you know, just about a year left, I'll be. I'll be seeing clients starting in August. And while still working, my employer is so good and I love my employer and I actually love the job that I'm in. Like, I really do. But I also love helping people, so I'll have that balance. My deep hope is that I will be able to be, you know, this former, you know, non Mormon, then super in Mormon, now former Mormon therapist that is able to reach out with kindness. I'm not going to force people. It's all about self determination. But I want to be a resource, especially in Utah County. Yeah, like, we need people back.

John Dehlin [01:48:12] Belly of the beast.

Marc Oslund [01:48:13] Exactly. So, like, I'm, I'm, you know, I'm part of like a Utah Valley Post Mormons Facebook group. Exactly. And so I'm gonna message and be like, hey, in August, I'm seeing people like, come see me. That's what I want to do with my life moving forward. And so, yeah, I want to talk because that's. Especially with youth. Like, I think my, my gift is look at my faith journey and I'm gonna help people walk through that too. But then youth in particular, I just, there's something about them. We just connect in ways that I think are unique and, and special.

John Dehlin [01:48:38] So did you ever teach edfy as a 70?

Marc Oslund [01:48:41] I applied, but then I. We went to Europe and said okay. Yeah, so, yeah, I mean, Europe was cool, so it was kind of worth it. And yeah, we found out we had a baby. Like, we. We were pregnant there, so that's a cool thing too.

John Dehlin [01:48:51] Coldplay, dude.

Marc Oslund [01:48:52] Yeah, dude. Unreal. Coldplay at Sta de France. Like 80,000 people, man. Oh, it was. That's a, That's a memory that I will cherish forever and ever and ever. You know, so should we, should we move on to what happens next?

Leaving the Church and Life After Mormonism

John Dehlin [01:49:05] Yeah. So. So you, you leave CES and you. I mean, I think it's worth just taking a second to, to explore, at least lay out how terrifying it is to commit your life to ces, how limiting it is for many people. People. Because you're one of many CES instructors that have or are reaching out to me who feel trapped, who have no idea what they're going to do. They did what the church said. They, they got married young, they had all these kids. Their, Their wife never got grad graduate work, never did graduate work, wife didn't develop a career. Now they've put 5, 10, 15 years. You know, we had John and Brooke McClay on, on, I'm not sure John McClay's ever really recovered from, from all that. But they put all this on the line and then all of a sudden you're middle aged without skills that you could have developed, without a resume that you could have developed. And to, to non Mormon, you know, companies, you're like this weird. You're what, you're a religious instructor for this weird church. Yep. Like, have you done anything else? So, so can you at least talk about what that's like from staring at joblessness?

Marc Oslund [01:50:25] Ye feeling is so real. And I mean my, I was fortunate that I was young. Youngish.

John Dehlin [01:50:31] Right.

Marc Oslund [01:50:32] I mean 20, let's see, I was 29 when I quit and, and I feel like I had some really great connections and this is why I was so hesitant to, you know, I don't want any of the people who I like that I work with or former connections to feel like, hey, I don't like them, I don't appreciate them just because they're more. That's not the case. But I, I did have a lot of really great connections and people who did care about me. And a lot of of that was because of my Mormon ties. I was really afraid of speaking out because I didn't want them to distance themselves from me as an apostate, as somebody who's angry and vile. Because I know that that happens. Having, you know, my main work experience as religion instructor is not going to fly for a company that's not run by Mormon people. Right. Like who I'm going to work for Microsoft. I'm going to go work for Adobe. They're going to see seminary instructor and they'll be like, cool. Well, we have this other guy that has an MBA and has six, four, five, six years of experience in anything business related. And so I felt very like, crap. Do I do teaching? I have a master in education, but like teaching history, like I don't know. And then the same requirements and the same demands. So it absolutely feels hopeless and scary. And I was fortunate enough to, you know, be able to start another degree. I'm still young enough where I'll be, you know, 32 when I graduate with my second master's. And so, so, you know, I have, it's still young, like my life is still ahead of me. Somebody that's 40, you know, 40, 45, 50. I mean, do you just hold on? Do you just hold on? And honestly, for those people with their job on the line, I have so much more empathy and I'm like, if you stay, I am, I'm Understanding other people that are like, well, my. You know, it's harder for me because.

John Dehlin [01:52:16] Wait, what would it be like? Oh, for your mental health, once you had gotten to that point where you had gotten your multiple letters or even without the letters, you just didn't believe anymore. Can you convey what it would be like to be teaching the youth things you don't believe? You know, propping up an organization that you don't believe in, but you spending your life, years of your life, faking it and. And upholding an institution that you really don't believe? I mean, what would that do to your.

Marc Oslund [01:52:51] It would destroy everything. I mean, it's water for you. For me? For me. I can't see a way.

John Dehlin [01:52:57] You said water torture.

Marc Oslund [01:52:58] Like, waterboarding. Like, it feels like it's just like, drip, drip, drip for years and years and years, and you're living a lie. I'm. I'm such a believer on authenticity and vulnerability. I mean, I'm. I am. Brene Brown's, like, you know, one of her largest fans. And I just think to live a lie, it is. It will destroy you. Like, how can you spend the rest of your life being somebody that you're not and not just being somebody, but actively teaching it and then being around people who teach this and, like, how do you have conversations at the lunch table with people who are so in. Like, I. Man, I'm fortunate that my friends that I made my first year at Pleasant Grove are so cool. Like, they know. Like, I'll, you know, send them things about how I think conference is stupid. And they're like. They're validating and kind. Like, that's rare. That's not the normal in seminary to have people that are still good to me after I've left. That is rare. And so the torture that people would feel and the turmoil and, like, you have to get an ecclesiastical endorsement. I wasn't going to church. I had quit. I was in California, and my bishop texted me, hey, we haven't seen you in a while. We need you to see if you want your ecclesiastical endorsement. And I said, I quit. I don't need that anymore. And he's like, what? And I'm like. And I didn't respond. But like, dude, if you don't believe in, you're paying 10%. If you don't believe in, you're sitting three hours in church or two hours now or whatever else. Or you have to do a calling. You have to do your ministering. Like, that is death by a thousand cuts over. And, like, it would have absolutely destroyed me by the time I quit. Just feeling like a shell of myself. Sad and angry and depressed and just, just purposeless. Like, Rachel looked at me and she was just like, you need to be done, because I was so miserable.

John Dehlin [01:54:41] You really do become a shell of a human when you're living inauthentically. And I think it does lead to suicidal ideation, depression and anxiety. Often it will, you know, eating disorders, overeating, self medicating. And I, I just, you know, I just want to say, if you are trapped in this situation, if you're a bishop, if you're a stake president, if you're, you know, ces, reach out to me and I will find you confidential help. You know, email me@mormonstoriesgmail.com we will find you confidential help because it can be fatal. Yeah, I don't mean to be overly dramatic, would you agree?

Marc Oslund [01:55:22] Oh, I had suicidal ideation for the first, first time in my life. Like, like, we know from my life growing up, man, I'm just the happiest, giddiest kid. And just the crushingness of it all, like, having my baby is what actually, like, was a huge gift where I'm like, Rachel, if I, if I die, she gets paid out, man. But, but I think like, I, I, I, I want to see my kid grow up. I don't even like going to the office sometimes because I just want to be around my kid. But those thoughts that came for the first time and they're horrified, man.

John Dehlin [01:55:51] Like, this was during your time.

Marc Oslund [01:55:53] This was right as I was about to quit, right as I was about, because I'm just like, what is my purpose on this earth? Like, you know, and just being so beat up for so long and, you know, it's just, yes, absolutely. Like, reach out and like, I'm on Instagram or Facebook if you need, John's the best source. But if you need, like, I have experience, reach out here. Like that feeling of loneliness, of suicidal ideation, of depression, of anxiety. Like, my, my mission trainer, he just got fired from seminary. I don't know all the details. I know that it was because he didn't transform. He conformed. But he's going through the same thing. He's like, man, I'm having thoughts I've never had before. Why are they doing this? They say, hey, how's your family? And then they fire me. Like, and, and he's like, I don't have a job. Where do I go? I, he, he has a bsw, a bachelor's in social work, but he can't do his master's, like, because he has other things he has to perform. Like the destruction it wreaks on families while they are simultaneously smiling and saying, how's your family doing? It is. It is literally insidious. It is the most despicable of anything that could happen. And so for anyone that's struggling with this, including people who are just Mormons that feel trapped from family, my heart, like, if you want to leave and you feel like you can't for whatever reason, the weight you're feeling is so real. And my heart is just. It's. It's with you. It is heavy, heavy, heavy, heavy stuff. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:57:18] Yeah. And not all abuse, you know, going back to the Scientology metaphor, not all abuse is physical. Yep. And some psychological or emotional abuse can be worse.

Marc Oslund [01:57:29] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:57:30] Than physical abuse.

Marc Oslund [01:57:31] And. And because there's the plausible deniability that allows them to gaslight you and say, oh, that was just you.

John Dehlin [01:57:35] Or I love you.

Marc Oslund [01:57:35] Yeah, I love you.

John Dehlin [01:57:36] Oh, man.

Marc Oslund [01:57:37] The Lord.

John Dehlin [01:57:37] The Lord wants this. Yes.

Marc Oslund [01:57:39] Like, oh, thank you for loving me enough to cut me, like, and to hurt me, like, dude, those are teachings that we perpetuate that we're proud of. And so you start thinking like, I am the problem. I am insane. Like my mom, who is, you know, grown up in Mormon, and you start thinking, well, if she's disowning me, it must be because I'm wrong, not because she's wrong or the church is wrong. And there's so much self doubt and self denial. And then if you do leave, then there is the betrayal. And then there's so many families that distance themselves. Like, here's my unique gift in this is I can go back to my former life.

John Dehlin [01:58:12] Yeah. So I'm trying to have a former identity.

Marc Oslund [01:58:14] Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:58:15] Yeah. So Stephen Hassan talks a lot about the bite model. Right. Yeah. If you had a prior identity, it's. It's a little. You have a little bit of an advantage over having never had your own kind of individually formed idea.

Marc Oslund [01:58:30] For sure. So, like, as I'm coming up here and I'm listening, it's so stupid, but, like, the rap music that I felt like I couldn't. That is just now it's just a part of it. Or my swearing, it's just part of it. Like, these are. This is just who I am now.

John Dehlin [01:58:39] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [01:58:40] And like, not wearing garments, that's a thing that I didn't do for 18 years of my life or 19 years of my life. Right. But people that have only ever been Mormon who have Only ever been in Utah and family have always been Mormon pioneer stock. They don't have another life. I don't have to recreate something new out of out of whole cloth like the Book of Mormon, but I have to, I can go back. Somebody else has to create a brand new identity without knowing what on earth that looks like. Proper boundaries with drinking. Like, I knew that as a high school. I'm like, hey, if I drink when and if I drink, I know what not to drink and how much to drink and when to do it right. Somebody else is like, I have no idea. This is all new for them. And so my heart just goes out for people that are having to create a new life. Whereas I just had the gift of just being able to walk back into a former life and adapt being, you know, married and having a kid. But I am still. I'm becoming more of who I always should have been, you know, I love it. Yeah. Thanks, John. So, yeah, I, my heart goes out to you all. And for me, right when I quit, Bill Real had like either just been excommunicated or was just about to be excommunicated. And so I started getting into podcasts. I was, I was finally free. I could allow myself to not have to defend the church. Right? Cause that was still a part of. Even if people like claimed I was just trying to tear it down, I wasn't, I was still trying to shift it to definitely defend it. And then I started listening to podcasts. So I started. I loved Bill because Bill, you know how he is, he's very direct, very cutting. I, I had all these seminary teachers with a thousand degrees and they all thought they were smart and they all had all these, these apologetic answers for Book of Mormon. I need somebody to cut through the BS and be like, no, this is wrong, this is wrong, this is wrong. Ex Mormon read it. I started seeing how people would critique things. I'm like, yes, I see it. I read the CES letter without having to do the Jim Bennett twist of it. And like I had read Jim Bennett's thing and he made the point on your podcast that it's, it's the best source to keeping people in after reading the CS letter. And it helped me because he, he like made it light hearted instead of this huge deal. And that helped. But then I reread the CES letter and I reread Jim Bennett's response and I'm like, oh, these aren't substantive. It's not good enough. Then I re listened to the, the Paul Reynolds Grieve training, because I kept it for seminary. And then I was like, yes, this is. I agree with this, and the church is wrong. And then I started listening to Mormon stories, and I'd hear about the Swedish rescue, and I hear about the second anointing, and I'd hear about the excommunications of yourself and so many others. And I'm like, this is horrifying. I read or I listened to.

John Dehlin [02:01:11] Was it scary to listen to Mormon stories? Were you a little bit scared?

Marc Oslund [02:01:14] Yeah. Off the bat, I'm like, what am I doing? You know? Like, I. I, like, this is me. Like, I'm an ex Mormon now. You know, like, is this really who I am? And. And not wanting to reveal that. And. Yeah, I'm like, it's always weird.

John Dehlin [02:01:24] I only mentioned that because it's always weird when people fear me, like, I'm evil or dangerous. Yeah. And maybe I am, but Mormon stories, I've just always tried to be balanced and to let people tell their stories.

Marc Oslund [02:01:36] You.

John Dehlin [02:01:36] So it's weird the way people.

Marc Oslund [02:01:39] Yeah, you. I mean, it's the excommunication serving the purpose of, hey, you're evil. Like, therefore, you're wrong. And that's. I know if teachers or people who are, you know, in between are wondering about you and your. Like, you are one of the most empathetic people I've met. You genuinely care. Like, the fact that you've brought up things that I've thought about and you've used the word abused. You brought up Dead Poets Society. Like, you're listening. You care. If you listen to the hundreds of thousands of hours of podcasts, over 1400 episodes, you'll see that that is the case. And yeah, you get direct, but it's because you care for people. And so, yeah, as I started listening to.

John Dehlin [02:02:12] I get direct. That's a euphemism.

Marc Oslund [02:02:14] That's a very nice way to say it.

John Dehlin [02:02:15] Sometimes I get. I get testy, I get grouchy, I get angry.

Marc Oslund [02:02:18] Yeah, you get Decaffeinated John, even Caffeinated John. Like, so Caffeinated John is still so nice. You know what I mean? Like, Caffeinated Mark is like, I started posting things on my Instagram that were very cutting, you know, and it ends up getting me in trouble with my state president, you know, and so.

John Dehlin [02:02:36] So Bill Real, then Mormon.

Marc Oslund [02:02:38] Yeah. And the. The transoceanic vessel, how to build a transformation.

John Dehlin [02:02:41] Expression.

Marc Oslund [02:02:42] Mormon expression.

John Dehlin [02:02:43] Man.

Marc Oslund [02:02:43] That. That one episode, it never crossed my mind. I've taught how many times in the Book of Mormon and all of a Sudden I'm like, summarize it. It's the. It's literally impossible to have these barges that come across the Jaredite barges. And by the way, the Jaredites aren't even real because the Tower of Babel isn't even real. And so if the Tower of Babel wasn't real and the Jaredites aren't real, then they didn't have the stones, and then Joseph wouldn't have the stones. So how did he translate it? Like, I'm just like, holy crap. Things that. That I had taught for so long that are just exposed is, like, clear as day. Day. And John Larsen's ability to just make it all a joke and funny. And I'm listening to literally, it is. He's like, look, we'll give a miracle. We. We'll give you grace for miracles. It is literally impossible for them to have built these barges. It could not have happened. And for me, I'm like, so I was art. Prophets were first gone. I'm like, prophets? You guys are wrong. I'll be merciful and willing to listen to you as. As some sort of authorities that are trying to help. That was still on the table. But in terms of. You speak literally to God. God, you are literal prophet. No, that gone wash away. You aren't seers. You aren't revelating any. What was the last revelation? You got like, show me what the last revelation was like there. It's just not there. And so that was gone. Then all of a sudden, faith starts being chipped away at the Book of Mormon, where I'm like, holy crap. And, you know, you start reading the anachronisms and you realize, well, the burden of proof is on the person making the claim, meaning if there's even the slightest crack. We saw this in the Netflix episode on Murder among the Mormons, where they're looking for one tiny anachronism.

John Dehlin [02:04:10] That's all it takes.

Marc Oslund [02:04:10] That's all it takes. And then, boom, they found it done. Everything Hoffman does is complete. Forgery is all broken. It's all wrong. The same thing, I think applies for the Book of Mormon. You have one anachronism and your claim that it is the only truth, the closest to God, inerrant. All of these things falls apart. But it's not just that there's one like tapers or horses and all of that. That's not what that is. It starts getting to the point of it's like 80% wrong or plagiarized or copied or. And it came to pass and like, 20% good. The pinnacle of the Book of Mormon is Jesus giving the sermon on the Mount. That's the pinnacle. That's the best part of the book is a copied part from the Bible

John Dehlin [02:04:47] plagiarized, right like that.

Marc Oslund [02:04:49] Because that's what we teach. Wow. Jesus comes to the Americas and what does he say? The same thing he freaking said in

John Dehlin [02:04:54] Matthew verbatim with the same, you know, almost verbatim with the same. Same actual copied text from the version of the Bible that Joseph Smith conveniently has in his possession.

Marc Oslund [02:05:05] Yep, exactly.

John Dehlin [02:05:06] With. With the errors that that came across with it.

Marc Oslund [02:05:09] The italics and it's just, it's. And then it becomes non stop. Right? It's just like. And then I hear David Bakoy and we talk about deutero Isaiah. I'm like holy crap. Like there. This literally, this should not be in here just by the age of Isaiah. Why is this in the Book of Mormon? Therefore he took it and like it start. You know, you get view of the Hebrews and it's just, just like, it's just so much my I as I was driving, this is maybe fun. I was, I was, I was driving. I just quit. We are going to LA to kind of rest and recuperate. Before I started my new job and my brother in law sent me a podcast, the last podcast on the left. Have you heard their podcast on Mormonism? Freaking hilarious language warning. Yeah, exactly. Strong language. But my goodness it is, it was so good because they made the light of these things that were supposed to be sacred and their whole thing was this is insane. Like it's just insane. Seeing it from eyes that weren't Mormon again reminded me what I thought all the way back to when I was 16 years old and thinking Mormonism is a mess and it's a cold and it's weird. So it brought me all the way back to now I'm seeing it from a non Mormon's eyes and thinking of how weird and strange this is. So now prophets are gone. Book of Mormon, which was already boring, is now. Now I'm like, this is not the keystone. So now I'm thinking, well what else is there? Like what else do I care about God? I'm like, he may or may not be there.

John Dehlin [02:06:33] He wasn't so much there for you. Or at least exactly. It's hard to see it.

Marc Oslund [02:06:37] Exactly. And so I'm like, look, if you were to ask me, do you believe in God? I'm like, I hope there's a God, John. I hope when I die you and I Meet with this loving, all knowing being who loves gay people and is, I hope God is a black Southern woman because my experience in North Carolina, those beautiful, wonderful black Southern women who fed me and called me baby and called me sweetie, that's what I imagine God to be. And I hope that, that God exists, but I can't say that. I know I can't. I hope that God exists. As for Jesus, I'm like the idea of Jesus being a revolutionary preacher, somebody who upended systems of oppression. That message is meaningful to me, but I don't, I don't need to check in with that God. I don't need to worry about covenants with that God. Remember that realization I had of Jesus told people to leave the boat. That's where I am, I'm leaving the boat. I followed Jesus right out of the church, you know what I'm saying? I think it was my commitment to Jesus that led me away from Mormonism. And I just don't feel sad because I don't feel like a God worth loving would be sad about working. I'm at, let's say I'm all wrong. Say I'm completely wrong and everything I believe is wrong. And God really is Mormon and God really does hate us and we really do have to wear aprons. When you get to the celestial kingdom, all of those things, handshakes and handshakes. If that's God, I have no desire to be with that God. So at that point, the telestial kingdom, the terrestrial kingdom, who knows, outer darkness, that's going to be better for me than to be with an abusive, vindictive parent like I. Having that realization takes away all the fear. And once you take away the fear, what's the point of Mormonism? Because I am not, I'm not afraid of that it might happen. I'm, I'm, I'm so much more open now to being wrong and possibly being wrong. I'll say I don't know or I have to re research that because I was basically duped before. But at the same time I'm also content with moving in this direction until look, man, if I see an angel, I'll like, that's like, you know, the epitome of the worst thing in the Book of Mormon. Show me an angel and I'll believe. I'll be, believe. I'm not locked in, I'm not locked into this path. However, the evidence that's been presented to this point is not persuasive. In fact, it does the opposite. It's not Just not persuasive. It. It is actively going against any faith. I. I can't logically have faith in this. I want to because it sounds beautiful. I want to, because I want there to be. I want to be able to see my. My. My baby forever. I want to be able to see my wife forever. I want that. I have no assurance of that. And so I'm living my life now as if we die and that's it. And it forces me to be present and to enjoy all the highs and lows of being human. And man. I hope that we get more, but if we don't, I refuse to let the joy and the heartache of this life be passed by in the hopes of dreaming of my mansion above. I just won't do it anymore. And so, and so I started having these realizations. And as I became aware of just how problematic the truth claims of Mormonism are, I felt like I needed to speak out authentically. And so I, you know, I did a couple Instagram lives where I told my students, who I never told about any of this. We've done however many hours, none, none of them knew. And so I told it all. I read the letters to them and they were pissed off and they were mad. And then I was like, and by the way, did you guys know this problem and this problem and this problem? I started doing posts on my Instagram stories, like, I'm talking about, like, very sharp cutting, like, this is wrong. This is Instagram account M osland O S L U N D and I'm private because I got in trouble because somebody found out and they didn't want it to be like, going to work and coming back to my. My job. But follow me on Instagram and, and I'll add you. And I will allow you to go in and just see all those stories that I posted that were extremely, I thought, extreme cutting.

John Dehlin [02:10:22] But you start speaking out, I mean, that's obviously. I mean, that's obviously the church's worst nightmare.

Marc Oslund [02:10:27] Exactly.

John Dehlin [02:10:28] Because you. All these students look up to you and they care about you, and now you're basically speaking out.

Marc Oslund [02:10:33] Yep.

John Dehlin [02:10:34] And I can see why you would want to do that. I mean, it's so common for people, Mormons who leave the church who served missions, to feel a lot of guilt and sadness for all the people they brought into the church now that they know the full picture and worry that the church can be harmful. I can imagine there's a multiplier there, for sure.

Marc Oslund [02:10:56] Like, mercifully, none of my former seminary, none of my converts that we had in North Carolina are active, so I'm free from that. But so 24 and families, and they're all gone. But. Which is interesting. But, yeah, the seminary guilt is real because so many people, as I started speaking out, were like, what's happening to you? Like, you, I used to look up to you. And I, I do feel bad for the kids because they don't know what to do with this information. They, they see the information, and instead of being able to digest it, it's so much easier to demonize. And, you know, their parents are, are training to demonize and to look down. And so I, I, I definitely was saying these things, and I, and kids were reaching out, and I, I lost. I think I started posting a lot in 2020. I had 2100 followers, and now I think I, I'm at like, 1600. So I've lost all of those. They're all my students that are just like, gone, gone, gone. And many of them at the beginning were leaving messages like, you're so lost. You're anti Mormon. And it's so hurtful because all I was trying to do was just practice what I preached, which was being authentic, sharing what I learned. And I get it. I understand why they would say that, but it hurts. That's what Mormonism does. Now there's the family and friends that are distancing themselves from, from you. I write this whole Twitter thread to clarify what happened in seminary. And I, like, I name names, and I was very direct. Like, I was bull. I was like, this is bull crap. All of it.

John Dehlin [02:12:23] Like, what's your Twitter handle?

Marc Oslund [02:12:24] It's. It's M. Olin 21.

John Dehlin [02:12:25] Okay.

Marc Oslund [02:12:26] And I haven't been on it in a long time because I had to go private.

John Dehlin [02:12:31] Sure.

Marc Oslund [02:12:31] And so I found a burner account, and I have my other one. So, you know, I don't get in trouble with my job or whatever you. But I had this whole long thread, and I called out seminary teachers, and it, it went not with retweets, but with conversation. It, it was taking over the Valley. And the reason I know that is because a friend of a friend said, hey, I was talking to these kids, and they're like, do you know about this seminary teacher that just, like, went off on seminary? Like, and they're from Lehigh. And then somebody else in Provo was talking about it, and then, like, my friends heard about it, and then it was on exmormon, Reddit, and then it was kind of like, going around. And then I started Getting calls from the people who I named who are like, we're so sorry. We didn't know we hurt you. I'm like, yes, you did. You absolutely knew that. The assistant area director who I named in that, he was like, I like, I'm really sorry. I'm like, dude, you were Pontius Pilate washing your hands. You had all the authority. Sorry is never going to cut this. And so now I'm starting to like, burn bridges kind of with my former career. And my fear here in posting was losing my job again, my current non church profession, because we do, it's in Utah, we work with Mormon people. And importantly, my feelings of distaste even for a religion or individual people do not apply to the people who are Mormon. Who I like. I may not agree, but who cares? I don't agree with a lot of things people do, and I'm still their friends. My fear was that they were going to see this and be like, mark hates us or we can't trust him or whatever. And I don't want that because I like, I want this, like, branded. If somebody's listened to all of this and is still like, whatever. I like Mormon people. I do, but, I mean, I just couldn't be silent. And then 2020 comes around and Black Lives Matter comes around and Donald Trump and all of the rhetoric that's going along. And so I start speaking out politically. I think it's part of my charge as a social worker to advocate on behalf of marginalized communities. And so I'm speaking out about that. And I'm, I'm getting heat from my neighborhood, my Facebook. I, I just post little things. Like, I, I think Donald, like when Donald Trump's Twitter was suspended, I just put like a wavy hand and I had like 180 comments from that of people being pissed. Like, used to be a good Mormon, a faithful Mormon. Do you know that liberals can't go to heaven because Harold B. Lee said whatever? And I'm like, no, no. And so now I'm having that in my ward and I'm just like. But I still, I get it. But I refuse to be quiet. And I, I mainly refuse to be silenced. I don't want, I don't like the feeling of being silenced. But let me tell you what's already happening for me right now. Sharing the story, getting it out. It has been this moment where I feel like, okay, I've purged, it's been heard, and it's gonna be heard by thousands. And I'm like, people will know my Story. You, John, have validated my opinion. Pain. I've been seen, I've been heard, and I'm so honored. And it feels like healing's taking place. But here's. Here's what I. There's two things I'm most worried about. I'm worried about my work. Saying, hey, like, you work with Mormon people, and they're going to see, you know, on YouTube, a Mormon Stories podcast right away, and they're going to think bad of you. And to that I would say, I really hope they listen to what I said. My hatred is not of people. The second fear is my stake president. As I was posting on Instagram, I got a text from my stake president. He's like, hey, how you doing? Oh, good. Nice to talk to you. Hey, can I talk to you? Can we come meet sometime soon? And I'm like, I nope, I don't want to meet. Like, is this about church? Like, I don't really feel like going. I just need a break. He's like, that's awesome. No, it's about something else. Cool. Is it about the post I've had on Facebook? It's about something else. And so he's like, can I just call you? We don't have to meet. I'm like, okay, because I don't want to give more time to the church. I'm going to put a suit on, and I'm going to go talk to my stake president. Why? You know, and so, on my way to, like, a company softball game, I call my stake president and we talk, and he's like, you know, I have been given a stack of papers from an Area 70 in the Utah Valley south area who's been getting reports of what your fault, what you're sharing on Instagram. Instagram. And at that point, I'd known about the Strengthening Church Members Committee. And I'm thinking, who's following me? Right? And they're reaching out, and he says, you can't keep posting this, or else we're gonna have to think of, you know, consequences. And I continue to post. What I did was I, you know, removed him, and I went private. That was my way of. Of. I wasn't yet ready to be excommunicated, you know, um, but I also wasn't ready to be quiet. And so I'm. I don't know what will happen. I am not going to church. I'm not planning on going to church. I don't know what my next steps will be in terms of speaking out. I definitely, as a therapist, and we know now with Natasha Helfer Parker, you know, crossing this line of your professional obligations to speak out against harmful systems, perhaps that will get me in trouble because I refuse to, to tell a client who's being hurt by Mormonism to stay in Mormonism if they feel like it's hurting them or they want to leave. I'm, I'm not going to hold them back. Right. So I don't know exactly what's going to come, but I definitely can see a future where, you know, I get a call from a stake president who I look up to and a member of our Stake presidency who I, as a friend and I genuinely like. I could see that coming. So I don't know what's going to come, but at this point I feel peaceful because I need my truth heard and having it heard and sharing this and sharing the students and what they're struggling with and how they aren't liking imormonism. Like that needs to be shared. And so for the Strengthening Church Members committee that's listening to your podcast and listening to me speak, you guys are going to make these changes and you better make the changes soon because you're losing kids and, and you can deny they know that. They do, they do.

John Dehlin [02:18:21] They're. They're desperately trying to figure out what to do.

Marc Oslund [02:18:25] Yep.

John Dehlin [02:18:25] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:18:25] Yep. And so make the changes or lose a generation of kids and lose an entire millennial and Gen Z population. You will not have a church. You'll have a church in Africa and South America. America. And once they start figuring it out, then you're not going to have them either. And your church is going to shrink to nothing. Or you can adapt and kind of throw prophets under the bus and say, hey, we've gotten it wrong. Let's move forward. And if you do that, you'll have a church that will maybe grow a little bit more and be healthy. So that's, that's where I am right now.

John Dehlin [02:18:54] So there's still a lot of bullets on your, on your page. I, I don't know if there's any other, if there are any other things you wanted to make sure and mention and yeah, we're really important your story. And then I do have some follow up questions. Cool. As well.

Marc Oslund [02:19:06] I mean, I just, when I see all of these things, I've just been thinking about the hurt that's come to me about the hate from people. I was actually on a KWAKU video. One of my former students was on there and was like, I've talked to you about this, like My seminary teachers, he just. He just lost his faith. He just went crazy. And I'm like, that's what people have branded me as. And it's been so hurtful. Like, I get it, but it's super hurtful. And so I don't feel like I have any of that, really. Respect. People assumed that I wasn't faithful, and that was mean because I'm like, do you know how faithful I've been? Like, do you not. Have you not heard my story? You know, I don't think that prophets are bad people. I think that they. And some people would disagree, and they think, no, they're all. They're all evil. I don't. I don't think they make six figures. They make upwards of, you know, probably 200,000. They're getting traveled, they're getting medical benefits. They're getting fame and popularity. But I still. I think that they're convinced that this is the best way to get to heaven and will lie for the Lord and do all of those things that are necessary. So I don't think they're just purely evil, even though I think that they are frauds. Right. I like when I Hear Nelson announcing 20 temples, including in Yorba Linda, California. And I just think, what are you doing?

John Dehlin [02:20:14] Like, is that near where you were?

Marc Oslund [02:20:15] Yeah, it's close to where we live. And, like, our stakes are combining. We. We've dropped. Like, my home ward has, like, three new wards combined in it. And the sacrament meeting attendance is, like, the same as when I was there in 2008. And so, like, what are you doing this for? Like, somebody, a seminary teacher said, like,

John Dehlin [02:20:31] well, the answer is temples are good for tithing. Yep, They're. They're great. They're kind of like showcases for Mormonism in any local community. They've probably seen that it helps with the missionary work. It's like, hey, have you seen that beautiful building that's ours? It looks super nice. So for investigation gators, it's like, hey, wow, that's a beautiful building. Tell me more. Makes an association in their minds, and then it's a way to keep, you know, aging members busy and connected to the church and paying tithing for people that really criticize the church for building a lot of temples. I mean, I can understand why someone who doesn't believe in the church would be critical of that. I think the church wouldn't be doing it if it didn't make sense for the church.

Marc Oslund [02:21:16] Church.

John Dehlin [02:21:17] So they're doing it because it helps them.

Marc Oslund [02:21:19] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [02:21:19] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:21:20] And it makes a ton of sense

John Dehlin [02:21:21] and shouldn't they help them?

Marc Oslund [02:21:22] Yeah, definitely. Right. That's the whole vision. And like, you know, I've been thinking about the idea of taxing churches and, and how important I think that would be. The, the idea of non taxing churches is to like the good that you do, the public good offsets the money you would pay in taxes. And I just think where's the public good? Like I, where, like I, I think beautiful buildings have a role. I'm a humanities major. I love architecture. Like I, everywhere we go, I'm always looking at cathedrals and other beautiful buildings. Buildings. And Mormonism can have that. I don't think like some of these ugly boxy temples are that. But I think about the Salt Lake Temple and I think that has a role. But it's just so hurtful to hear the rhetoric of Nelson and, and, and which rhetoric? The rhetoric of lax learners and lazy disciples. Like, what is that? Like, are you just doubling down because you're afraid? Like why, why are you? Why?

John Dehlin [02:22:06] Yeah, what I, what I said this week was why would a, a disciple of Christ, Christ add to the pain and suffering of people that he should be super empathetic with at this point.

Marc Oslund [02:22:19] Exactly. Especially if you're the closest to God on the earth. Like, show me a verse where Jesus would have said anything close to that. Just like I, I, it's just not there.

John Dehlin [02:22:28] He did say, you generation of vipers.

Marc Oslund [02:22:30] Yeah. And he called that to the Pharisees, who I think the church is more like, he called that to the predominant culture. And so like when I taught Matthew 23, my whole lesson was who are the Pharisees? Mormons are the Pharisees. I totally forget to mention that, but that's like, that was a big deal. Like you can't call out our culture. And so yeah, Jesus spoke very harshly, but it was always towards those in power. And if anyone's going to be getting a generation of vipers, it should be Russell Nelson and the rest of them. Right. Because they're the ones in power. And so yeah, I just, I, I'm becoming to, I'm getting to make peace with Mormonism in the sense that, that it's not going away no matter how much I would want it to or want it to change. And I'm not the one that's going to be able to do it. But there are so many. I have in laws on my own family. I have in laws on Rachel's family, like my, my, her cousins whose uncle or whose dad is a Stake president. They're leaving the church. They're listening Mormon stories. I have in brothers in law that are sending me Mormon stories messages. I have Rachel's aunt and uncle that are being like, we met John de Lynn. And like, this is, this is. It's everywhere. Like, it, it's just, the bleeding is just coming and coming and coming and it's not going to stop and things need to change dramatically for it to stop. And so speaking out about this is like, hey, listen. And they know it. But then they keep, they keep trying to hedge their bets. I think they're trying to keep the rich people that are paying tithing happy when. While minimizing the loss of millennials and Gen Z. And then once the rich older people die, they'll rechange so that millennials will feel comfortable. Um, I think that's what they're holding onto. Um, but yeah, I, it's just at this point, there is just nothing about Mormonism that is appealing to me in terms of its truth claims. I just, it's not appealing. And I truthfully. And I think this is the, the, the tagline or the. I don't think this would have happened if it wasn't for seminary. I think seminary and my experience seeing the inner workings of the church and what they want us to teach, I think that is exactly why I am where I am. I think if I'm just a convert and I move on and I go somewhere else, I think I might still be Mormon because I could be more lax. But seeing it all, trying to change it, realizing it can't. I can't. I'm done. There's no, there's no room for me. You don't want progressive Mormons. You say you do, but you don't. And so for all the progressive Mormons that are like, they want us, I'm like, my answer is I. They don't. Like, they want your butt and they want your tithing, but they really don't. Elder Holland and Elder Uchtdorf, who says there's room for all in the choir. There's not. There's not.

John Dehlin [02:25:03] They want. If you're quiet.

Marc Oslund [02:25:05] Yes.

John Dehlin [02:25:05] If you're discreet, if you're not speaking out on social media and if you have private conversations behind the scenes that are always faith affirming. Correct. But they want you quiet at church and on social media. Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:25:18] And we see that phrase so much. Like whenever I hear somebody now who's just like, now, I'm not criticizing profits, but like that. It's so, it's so sad for Me, where I hear these people having to protect their true nature. And I think that's the realization that I'm having my job isn't ne. There's other people that are doing it. You and Bill and Radio Free Mormon are the ones that are picking it apart. And they're doing it better with a bigger audience than me. My role is to the people that are presented in my life that are having gut reactions to things that are wrong. My role is to sit with them, to love them, and to allow them to trust their instinct. Because I think the story of my time in Mormonism was a denial of who I really was and what I was really thinking. And when I see that now with other people, I want to just be like, just trust your gut. I don't even need to maybe add to it. I just want to trust. I want you to trust yourself. You are so much bigger than what Mormonism offers. You are so much. Your soul is bigger. Religion is this tiny box that is trying to trap a big, beautiful, wonderful soul. And, and I just, I, I'm in the. The one belief I have more than anything else right now was, is the, the goodness of every human. I read a book by Greg Boyle called Tattoos on the Heart and a follow up called Barking to the Choir. Talking about gang members in LA who we always demonized growing up and, and wealthy suburbs with million dollar homes and hearing their stories and seeing their pain and realizing the harm that they're causing is from generations of trauma. I thought, if these people are good people, so are every single person that's ever lived. The people that hurt me, the area directors, the principal, they are good at their core.

John Dehlin [02:27:05] So if they are, they're victims of the system.

Marc Oslund [02:27:08] And that realization, John, that realization that they're good, but they're victims of a system. Where does my rage go? No longer to people, but to systems. Yeah, the system's the problem. Even David Benner uchdorf they are people. And I, I think they're worthy of love and respect. The system is the issue. Therefore, I want to tear down systems. And I feel like that's a role of social work. And I, and that's why I want it so clear to people that I don't hate people. I don't. I feel like they're victims and I'm. I don't want them perpetuating harmful systems. Right. So that's, I think, a good snapshot of where I am. And, and like Rachel and I are happier than we've ever been. Um, and Remy is doing so great. And it's just like this beautiful little two year old with so much personality and who knows what's gonna happen when he turns 8 and he sees kids that are starting to get baptized. Dad, I wanna do that. Like, he'll. We'll have a real conversation about why we're not Mormon and why I don't think that's a good idea. But, but it's a really beautiful time in our life. And, and like, other than the pandemic and all of that, like, my work's going great, I have good friends, I feel very loved by my family. Better than we've been in years. And let me ask about that. Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:28:18] I don't want you to have to tell Rachel's story, but is there anything you can or have permission or her blessing to say about her faith journey? You want to just let her.

Marc Oslund [02:28:27] No, she, I, she, she has no problem. So, So, I mean, she had some really real conversations with her family about how I was treated. Her big thing was like, man, and this was so humbling because, you know, sometimes I can be really hard to live with. And seeing how defensive she was of what was happening to me in seminary was a huge deal for her.

John Dehlin [02:28:47] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:28:48] Like, look at this abuse. And because she sees who I'm saving, she sees who's I'm, who I'm helping. And that was a big deal. She already did like going to church. She already didn't like reading the scriptures. Um, and then I start presenting some of this information to her and it's like, yeah, that makes sense. And so like, why would she. She's like, I already don't want to go. We have a baby. I'm exhausted. And now there's this like, why would I do this? She is always going to be much more neutral and much more kind and, and not as direct as I, as I am. But like, she listens to Mormon stories. She loves it. She loves Mormon stories more than I love Mormon stories.

John Dehlin [02:29:23] Wait a minute. Like she.

Marc Oslund [02:29:24] No, she really does. Like, she loves hearing people's stories and. Cuz sometimes I'm like, oh, these stories don't resonate with me. But Rachel's like, I love hearing them and feeling like I'm not alone. I love hearing people that grew up Mormon and. Because that's like me. And like they're starting to have texts with her sisters. Right. About Mormon stories and about all these other things that are presented and Mormon enlightenment and Waters of Mormon on Facebook. Like, and, and we're talking about returned missionaries. We're talking about people that are all married in the temple faithful. Like these are. Oh yeah, you know what I mean?

John Dehlin [02:29:53] Like tipping point is coming.

Marc Oslund [02:29:55] Exactly.

John Dehlin [02:29:55] I'm calling it the Mormon Spring. I'm calling, I just did an episode or a little 20 minute public service announcement where I called it that spring of 2021 is the Mormon Spring where we're, we're experiencing an enlightenment post. Covid. Yep, that's going to be probably a tipping point for the church.

Marc Oslund [02:30:13] It has to be. And I mean, I have so many students, like I mentioned earlier, that are like, church is boring. I'm not coming back being like the church is rushing back to get back to meetings because they know they're like, oh crap, people are, have gotten a taste of what it's like, you know that one week of state conference that nobody attends and like it's like that prolonged over a year and they're like, oh, get them back, get them back. Get them back and get fear and get shame back in, you know? Yeah, get them back. Because otherwise they're feeling too free, too liberated, too healthy and even, dude, even my super believing in laws, my wonderful, amazing grandfather in law who's a patriarch, is amazing human. But he's like, I will tell you, it's been really good to just be doing zoom church. Like they love it.

John Dehlin [02:30:56] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:30:57] And so this is happening even among believers. And then they'll be like, no, I love church. And that's whatever. They can do that. But my point is that it's happening and Rachel definitely feels is more, she's more believer in God and Jesus than I am. Whereas I'm. I would say I'm more agnostic. Right. Leaning towards atheists at this point, Rachel's more of a believer. Rachel still has a hard time thinking that Joseph Smith was a fraud. Even though she's like, well, there's evidence and she can't deny it. She's just, this is your upbringing. Right. Joseph Smith is the prophet of the restoration, so that's that. But she did have a really cool conversation with her parents. We were visiting at their house they have in St. George. And Rachel was kind of telling what happened with seminary, how hurt she was and her parents were being very kind. I love my in laws with all my heart. Like I wish everybody had in laws as amazing as I do. Like, I love, love, love them. And they were kind of saying, hey Rachel, yeah, this is hard. And Rachel basically said, I need you to be on my side. And they're like, okay, we'll be on your side. And that was really cool. And so it's just been. Yeah, there's gonna be more enlightenment. Um, again, Rachel's dad, her. His brother has just recently, like, left the church and. And told him. And so they were kinda like, why'd you tell me? Like, we don't care. Like, we love you. And so it's just been. That's where she is. We did bless Remy, but it wasn't recorded, so he's not on the records of the church. So I'm like, sweet, you know, like, good for him. Um, and Rachel always wanted that we bless him at home. And I was wearing a blue shirt and no tie. You know, like, just like, little things. Yeah, exactly. Well. Oh, that was a thing in seminary. I was wearing, like, a blue shirt. And they're like, you can't wear that. And then after I get fired, they change the policy. You can now wear blue shirts. You don't have to wear suit coats.

John Dehlin [02:32:44] Yeah, of course.

Marc Oslund [02:32:45] Just so shady.

John Dehlin [02:32:46] But it's not. It's. It's about obedience. It's not about the content.

Marc Oslund [02:32:50] Yeah, and that's. And that's what. That's what some. One of the teachers said that I called out on that Twitter thread where he was like, I like, oh, blue shirt must not sustain the profit then. And that type of. Those kind of digs, you know. So, yeah, that's where Rachel is. And again, we're very healthy and happy, and we're. We're much more open about so much. And eventually, with the help of my therapist, I did tell her about all of, you know, my past. And I was so worried that she was going to leave me. Right? Because, wow, I had sex before. And Rachel just looked at me. She's like, mark, I'll always love you. And I. And I knew that, and I just wanted you to be honest with me. And so we are just really going through some. Some good experiences and excited for the future. And, like, people say you can't have joy outside the church, man. Like, I would. I feel very contrary to that. Like, I feel like we're doing really well other than the shame and guilt that is perpetuated by people still in the church. So.

John Dehlin [02:33:42] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:33:42] Yeah.

Reflections, Regrets, and Gratitude

John Dehlin [02:33:44] So a couple questions. One is so you. You know, you clearly. So on the one hand, as I think back to the beginning of your story, you had kind of an ideal life. In some ways, no life is ideal,

Marc Oslund [02:34:01] but it was about as ideal as it could be.

John Dehlin [02:34:03] But, I mean, it sounded like you had loving, supportive parents and good socioeconomic status and good opportunities for education. And yet you felt like you wanted or needed the church. And so I guess. Okay, the first question I wanted to ask is, and we've already touched on this, but I just want to make it very explicit. As a convert to the church, as somebody that took the missionary discussions, do you feel like you were offered informed consent when you joined the church? No. And if not, what were the things you would have wanted to know that. That maybe would have allowed you to make different decisions?

Marc Oslund [02:34:43] It's a great question. I know the answer is clearly no. Like, and. And I am grateful I joined because I have Rachel and Remy from it. And yes, I did have the ideal. Like, truthfully, I have no problems saying I had the ideal life. I truly believe I am the most privileged of all people that have ever lived in terms of just my upbringing in life and talents and skills and socioeconomic status and all of those things. Like, so lucky. And I wish that I would have been told clearly about the temple. I wish I would have been told about the problems with Joseph, Joseph Smith polygamy, about the seer stone, about prophets getting things wrong. That that was my biggest thing. Because this is what the church is built on. And then you find out, wait, they're wrong about polygamy. They're wrong about women in the priesthood, they're wrong about black people in the priesthood, in the temple, they're wrong about queer people. Like, I wish I would have known that. I wish I would have known about the church's finances and how we tithe money.

John Dehlin [02:35:40] Money.

Marc Oslund [02:35:41] Even though, you know, I think it was Joseph Fielding or somebody. Joseph F. Smith says, like, there will come a day when we won't need to tithe because we'll have tithes sufficient. You know, I just. There's just so much I can't even. And the church is trying to do that now. I also wish that the church would apologize because I. I would advertise that instead of just being like, no, we don't do that anymore, which is what I taught about polygamy. We don't do that anymore. I wish there would have been apologies for. For the lack of consent, for the coercion, for the manipulation. Because now, as a missionary coming in saying, hey, we want you to know our whole past, and we want you to know that we have statements from prophets apologizing and making reparations in whatever form to families. That now allows me to say, okay, here we go. We can now make a choice. I want them to say, I mean, geez, this is a pipe dream, but the book of Mormon. We can't take it literally. Literally. It has to be a figurative.

John Dehlin [02:36:36] Figurative history.

Marc Oslund [02:36:37] Yeah, we can't. It can't. It's not factual history. It's not, it's just, it's just not objective. Exactly. And so being saying, hey, you can read this book, it will give you strength. Even saying it will draw you close to God, that's totally fine. I'm, I'm okay with them saying that. But not that this is the most correct book. Not that this is a real book. Not that Lamanites are real. Not that there are real Jaredites. Not that Joseph Smith really dug it up. Not that he saw morose. Not. And please tell me by the way that he was a treasure digger and tell me that he did all of these things and all of a sudden he's like, how can I make money for my family that's poor? I guess I can turn this into a religion. Like that's important. I don't know this. I'm like, Joseph Smith is just an innocent 14 year old dumb farm boy and he prays and sees God and it's perfect. And then he has opposition. Like, no, I want to know about the printing press that Joseph Smith had destroyed when they talked about polygamy.

John Dehlin [02:37:27] And I want to know.

Marc Oslund [02:37:28] Know about Joseph Smith seeing multiple accounts of the first vision or writing down multiple accounts of the first vision. Like, how can I make a decision if you don't show me the fine print? None of those things are real decisions. Only until I'm 26. Right when my brain starts becoming actually formulated based on science, that's when your brain like, basically like is an adult. That's when I started making all these realizations. And I think, well, what would have happened if I would have known that off of the bat? And man. And then ultimately I wish that even if people do join Mormonism, which at this point seems baffling to me, which it was to you, like, why would you do this in 2008 during Prop 8? I, I wish that there would be more inclusion of families. I wish that, that my non LDS family could have been in the temple. Like I'm, I just. Man, like, why, why has Mormonism caused that pain to my family, man? And so I wish that and, and, and then ultimately I wish the missionaries left a message of if you don't believe that this is true or there's somewhere else for you to go, we believe that you're gonna be saved. We hope that there's something that you could take from what we taught you, about charity, about service, about, um, prayer, meditation, what have you, and take that and make yourself a better person, a better Christian, a better whatever you are. Like, that message to me is a message of informed consent, not you better get an answer. Or if you did it, then you didn't get it right, or this is the only truth. Nope, I need that. Not dumbed down, but I need it more inclusive, right off the bat for comforts. Because a coerced message of this is the only truth or else is not one. One that you can make. It's made under duress. Right. And it's made under a guise that it's going to be okay for you and your family. And it's. It's just not okay.

John Dehlin [02:39:27] Beautiful. Okay, follow up. Let's just say that, you know, I know the Jehovah's Witnesses, I think they require like at least a year of. Of affiliation. And let's say that you had still met faith. Yeah, Faith, inner family. You, you know, the church was still meeting your social needs, but using the inoculation techniques. You did attend seminary and you were taught essay versions of all the controversies. Polygamy, peep stones, Book of Abraham. You were taught the correlated contextualized version. Because you can't expect the church to teach that. It's all a fraud.

Marc Oslund [02:40:10] For sure.

John Dehlin [02:40:11] Sure. Do you think that if you had been given more time and taught all those problems and taught about the blacks in the priesthood and Joseph's, you know, the Nauvoo expositor and all that, do you think you might. Do you have any idea whether you would have just still. Well, I had that big, strong feeling that one time, and I love these people, and this option is giving me more meaning and purpose than like, being raised without anything. Do you even know whether that would have made a difference?

Marc Oslund [02:40:40] No. That's a good question. I mean, I. I definitely think so.

John Dehlin [02:40:44] The.

Marc Oslund [02:40:44] The red alert that was going off in my mind when I went to the temple was so strong that I feel like if I would have known what was going on in the temple before I joined the church, I would have said, yep, that's a cult, and that's why I'm not joining, or that's why people say that. And so if I would have known that, I think that would have been a big key before I already got in, had a mission call all.

John Dehlin [02:41:06] So if you had seen YouTube video goes on in the temple with the veils and the funny hats and the green aprons and the handshakes, and you would have just been creeped out.

Marc Oslund [02:41:16] I think I would have been like, I definitely don't think I would have gotten baptized as quick as I would have. I think I would have had to be like, let me, like, you're gonna have to work through this with me, you know. But the answer to the other, like

John Dehlin [02:41:27] that might have been true for Rachel.

Marc Oslund [02:41:28] Oh, I, I would imagine so as well.

John Dehlin [02:41:30] Right?

Marc Oslund [02:41:31] Like, yeah, especially just the garments and. Yeah, it's just so, I don't know. Here's the thing. I can tell you I joined in the middle of Prop 8 while people in my ward were picketing and that didn't sway me. And the answer, I don't think is because I didn't matter to me. I think it was because I was still a 17 year old kid. What did I know about anything? Like I was so ignorant because I was so privileged and my life was so good. I just cared about sports and friends and hooking up with girls and drinking. Like, so I don't think it would have swayed me. I don't. Because I don't think, think it would have registered how impactful that was. But at the same time I think I would have heard it and been like, if, if they were that open, I would have turned to the missionaries, been like, hey, everybody's telling me this is a cult and this sounds really culty. So again, I would have had to toss it back to them and I'm sure they would have had answers that would have made like, calmed me down or what have you. If I would have joined the church when I was 26, I think it would be different because I was more politically aware. I was more just aware of life and religion in general. I think things are different. I think as a 17 year old, I didn't really have the capacity to really know any of the implications of what that meant because I didn't know about Prop 8. To me that's like a huge deal for me now. And I'm not embarrassed because I didn't, I just, it didn't register. So that's how I, I'm guessing I would feel about the other ones also.

John Dehlin [02:42:49] Yeah, okay, this is, this one's probably hard, probably an emotional question. There's, there's a way to argue. Like you said, you have Rachel, you have your son. Remy.

Marc Oslund [02:43:05] Remy, Remy, Remy.

John Dehlin [02:43:07] And you know, whatever benefits you got. So there's clearly going to be benefits by taking this path. I guess I want to ask you, in what ways do you feel like you were harmed by joining this church and, or what regrets you have and take your time.

Marc Oslund [02:43:24] Yeah, no, I, I'm glad you asked because I've been doing some real, like, kind of emotional work on that recently, trying to understand, hey, why do I feel this way? Because I, I, I just felt like I was raging, you know, on Instagram and, and realizing I'm only losing friends and losing followers and this isn't having the effect that I want and it makes me angry. And so I had to do some soul searching, like, why am I raging so much? And eventually I came to this realization of I've been harmed by Mormonism. And I had a trajectory and because I had a trajectory in a my life. I am an all American athlete. I'm going to be professional baseball player. I'm going to live in Los Angeles. I'm an Angelino at heart. Like, I'm misplaced here in Utah and we're probably going to live here forever. But I, I am an Angeleno and I wanted, I want to be by the beach and I want to have all the friends and food and do the things that I did in la and I thought I was going to be a big freaking deal. Okay. And then I come up to Utah and I'm like, okay, I'll just, I'll be a big deal here in Utah.

John Dehlin [02:44:18] Big fish, little punch.

Marc Oslund [02:44:20] Exactly. I'm like, cool. I'll just, I'll make it happen. And, and then I saw my trajectory kind of going up in seminary and then it plateaued. I don't think I'll ever have the, in terms of number, the impact that I'll ever have like I did in seminary ever again. I'll, I'll be doing therapy work and I'm, I'm so excited to do that. And, and I think it'll be deeper and meaningful. Um, but I don't think it will be numbers. I don't think I'm going to be a public figure. Right. Which was a dream of mine. I wanted to be Martin Luther King. I wanted to be a famous baseball player. I wanted to make an impact in the world. I wanted to be remembered and then realizing I can't even be cool among the, how we in LA viewed the weird Mormons in Utah. I can't even be significant here. Like, that was a massive hit to my ego and once I named it that I was able to see it for what it was. And I realized, dude, the hurt is I gave up my baseball career. I harm family relationships that are being repaired.

John Dehlin [02:45:12] Which ones?

Marc Oslund [02:45:13] My, my immediate family in terms of my mom, dad, brother, sister, all of them.

John Dehlin [02:45:16] It harmed that.

Marc Oslund [02:45:17] Oh, for sure. Harm my grandma and grandpa because I

John Dehlin [02:45:19] never harmed your relationship with your.

Marc Oslund [02:45:20] Well, because they couldn't. They couldn't come to the temple. They saw me as judgmental. They saw me as angry. They saw me as this uptight, weird Mormon. Like, and I was super judgmental. And my mom, who I think consistently has always just tried to look out for me joining something she viewed as a cult. Now I'm having to agree with her, but I've also had years and years of fighting against her and. And she's just being, like, so trusting of, okay, Mark, if you want to do it. But also being a mom's love and trying to be like, don't do this. You know, my grandparents were hurt because they weren't at.

John Dehlin [02:45:51] At.

Marc Oslund [02:45:51] At our temple wedding. Like, my. All of my extended family was hurt. My. My relationship with Rachel was harmed because I was lying to her about my past. It was harmed because of how uptight I was about Mormonism and how it put strain on our relationship that now we're finally actually on the same page. And it feels so good.

John Dehlin [02:46:09] Patriarchy harms men and women.

Marc Oslund [02:46:11] Absolutely harms men and women.

John Dehlin [02:46:13] And.

Marc Oslund [02:46:13] And it's just so toxic. And marriages. Yes. And it harms, like, the. My relationships with my. The queer students that I had because I could only love them to a point. And now I'm free to be an ally and open and have my pride fly flying. Right. And. And so it harmed every relationship. It harmed my career. I gave up baseball for harmed. Like, we're here in Utah. I would. BYU was not even. I. I almost didn't even know BYU existed.

John Dehlin [02:46:41] Right.

Marc Oslund [02:46:42] Truthfully.

John Dehlin [02:46:42] Yeah.

Marc Oslund [02:46:43] And then I'm at byu and I haven't left you, Utah. And I. I was never going to ever be in Utah. That's what I said about Utah State. And so everything in my life is because of that decision. And now there's good and we can make good, and it has been good. But every consequence that has come to my life came because of Mormonism, including a miscarriage and infertility. Look, I wouldn't have been married to Rachel because I. We were 24. We were 22 when we got married. We're 24 when we started trying to have kids. 26 when we had a miscarriage. Miscarriage. 29 when we had Remy. Like, I wouldn't have had any of that pain. And the pressure to try to have kids wouldn't have been there. And the pressure to fit into my ward. Like, I mean, it's just, it's, it's endless. It feels like the harm that has been caused, you know, and I, I feel strong and I feel able. Like dude, I did hard things as an athlete and I feel like I can do hard things now, but that doesn't mean the harm and pain that I cause caused wasn't deep and wasn't real.

John Dehlin [02:47:44] I think I want to at least give you a chance to speak to the hamster wheel of, of trying to, of unworthiness, basically.

Marc Oslund [02:47:56] Dude, that man to you.

John Dehlin [02:47:59] So, to you. Yeah, I, you didn't mention that.

Marc Oslund [02:48:02] Yeah, I probably blocked it out, right, because it's such a theme. I mean I've had some amazing experiences in therapy that have healed that and made it a strength in my life where I believe in my inherent goodness and I'm powerful and loved. But that happy kid, dude, that's that 17 year old kid that was kind of a punk and did stupid things but was so happy and then just had to give it all up because I wasn't loved

John Dehlin [02:48:37] it.

Marc Oslund [02:48:38] I mean it damaged me in ways that I'm still healing from. It damaged me in ways that I like the fact that I felt guilty about watching YouTube videos that I liked or saying swear words or speaking too loudly or listening to music. I had like subwoofers in my car and they were loud and I felt like that was a bad thing. Or loud laughter. Like, man, everything about worth, like that constant hamster wheel, the constant feeling of never being good enough, it just grates on you and it wears on you and it's so harmful. That was the most destructive thing that happened to me in my life from Mormonism. And my mom saw it. I think that's why she was like, mark, you're different. You're not, not happy. And I'm like, yes, I am. I am happy. You know what I mean? Like, I remember vividly driving to Chattanooga, Tennessee to visit my, my brother from Atlanta, Georgia where they live now, and having that conversation and just being like, no mom, you're wrong. Even though I knew she was right. Like man, I, I, I mean thousands of dollars of therapy and, and all of that that are again being twisted and made and made beautiful. The rose growing from the concrete. But, but that was just years and years and years of shame and years and years and years of guilt and years and years and years of just believing like I wasn't loved. Like, that's not a way to be happy. That's not a way to live a life that's so short and so Fleeting. And then getting a cancer diagnosis and being like, crap, is this it? And I'm gonna go to my grave feeling like I'm not good enough. Like, the toxicity of that is, in my opinion, the most harmful single thing that happens. Happened to me.

John Dehlin [02:50:21] There are some that would say, oh, you know, Mormonism helps you get a good family. It teaches you good values. And they would say, hey, it's not like Scientology. You didn't get beat. You didn't get put in jail. You didn't. You weren't forced to have abortions. You know, so you really didn't have it that bad. What would you say to that kind of argument?

Marc Oslund [02:50:47] Yeah, I mean, my. My heart, like, as I watch a lot of the documentaries, Scientology, and I think about them sneaking out of cars and what it does. Like, obviously, like, I would never say I would trade my experience for that, but the emotional damage that is provided, that is unseen, it makes it worse. Because when I share, which is what I was doing on Instagram and Twitter and sharing my hurt because it's unseen, people then begin to say, you are the problem, which adds hurt on hurt on hurt on hurt. Whereas most people if a Scientologist, other than people inside Scientology. Right. So Leah Remini and Mike Render, and they leave and they speak about their truth. The whole world says, this is insane. The limited Scientologists are like, you know, they're trying to absolutely ruin their lives. Like, I mean, physically coming to their home and threatening them, like, that's unacceptable. But for Mormonism, I'm sharing these truths. And what's going to happen is there's going to be people listening to this. I know this. That are going to be judging me and saying, that didn't happen, or it was your fault, or you did this, this wrong, or you should have been better, or why did you believe that? And that message of not being affirming is deeply, deeply harmful. Deeply, deeply harmful. And I just. Man, I hate that. I hate that I have to then defend my harm and my hurt. I hate it. I hate that I can't just have the world. And that's why being on Mormon Stories, having your validation and I know your listeners are going to validate, validate this and say, me too, and I've been through it. That is healing. But the other people that are going to deny and denounce, man, I. That wound might almost be deeper than the problems that were caused in Scientology in some ways. Right?

John Dehlin [02:52:27] Yeah. Thank you.

Marc Oslund [02:52:30] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:52:32] All right. So are. How are things with your mom now?

Marc Oslund [02:52:36] Better. I'm Gonna actually be in LA next week. My grandma, she's, she's getting really sick. She's had cancer for years and I think it's just finally, you know, her time. So we're going to be home in la. My mom's there and we're going to have some cool experiences. I think I'm going to tell her about my experience with Mormon stories and say, mom, I want you to listen. And I really have to own it. And that's hard because I don't like being wrong. But being like, mom, you've always been right and I'm so sorry for the harm that's been caused. I think that will be healing for her. The truth is, is my mom will always love, love me. She, she's proven it and there's religion right there. Yeah, that is, that is, that is the, the joy of what religion should be. My mom is. She's never given up on me even though I've, I've. My decisions have hurt her. Um, she's done everything she could to be supportive even though she sees the hurt that I'm putting myself in. And I'm, I'm seeing a future where we're going to have a much better relationship and we're still hard headed, both of us, which makes it difficult when we disagree. But already now I'm seeing, I'm seeing that, that bright future starting to come, which is really good.

John Dehlin [02:53:44] So look into the camera and say something to your mom.

Marc Oslund [02:53:46] Mom, I love you. I'm sorry. You were right and I just. Thank you for caring about me the way that I care for Remy. I get it now and I just. Thanks for loving me and trusting me even though you knew it was gonna hurt me down, down the road. So thank you for giving me that space. I love you.

John Dehlin [02:54:07] Yeah. Cause parents can make it worse. They can create the backfire effect by like being too antagonistic and that pushes you too far back for sure.

Marc Oslund [02:54:14] And like that's, you know, that's mom, you know, like our back and forth and, and you know, my dad will be more like, hey, kind of let Mark do his own thing, but mom, my mom will fight back and that's where I get my fire from. And so yeah, that did happen, but ultimately it was because of love. I see that clearly. Like, so thank you for loving me so much that you were. You're trying to save me from harm. I like, yeah.

Messages to Seminary Students and Final Words

John Dehlin [02:54:35] What, what would you say to any seminary students that are watching? It's a delicate thing because, because you don't. Maybe you don't want to, like, screw with their faith, harm their faith if it's working for them, if they need it on some level, if it would be unsafe for them to leave it. So you want to be thoughtful about that, but you also want to be truthful and try and undo any harm you may have done.

Marc Oslund [02:54:57] For sure.

John Dehlin [02:54:58] When you were part of a broken system.

Marc Oslund [02:54:59] For sure. Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:55:00] So what do you say to your former students? A great question.

Marc Oslund [02:55:04] I have former students that are listening to this podcast that are excited about. Um, they. They love you. They love the podcast. They've left the church. They're telling their parents. And so obviously, I'm really proud of you and I'm. I. They know. Cause, you know, we've been messaging and I'm here for you and the dozens of them that are walking away. For the ones that are still in, I would. This is the hard one. Because my experience, I think, is clear that this has been overwhelmingly harmful. There has been good. There's no question about that. I just see it being a net negative. But I. I'm learning now that I don't want to force people into things that they're not really ready for. I. I think I was doing that in the summer of 2020, and that's not good. I don't want to keep doing that. Um, I will say to people that are questioning or not even questioning, questions are still good. Like, I taught that, and I still believe it. Keep asking questions. Don't be worried about sources. Be worried about truth. Find truth.

John Dehlin [02:55:56] Don't be worried about sources.

Marc Oslund [02:55:58] Yeah, like going to the church website instead of Mormon think, for example.

John Dehlin [02:56:01] Oh, so just find truth. Wherever it is.

Marc Oslund [02:56:04] Find truth.

John Dehlin [02:56:05] Yep.

Marc Oslund [02:56:05] The quest is for truth, not getting it from a source that has already kind of made it.

John Dehlin [02:56:10] Don't discount certain sources, because the truth is who tells the most accurate Mormon Church history. It's Mormon think. It's CES letter. It's people who've come on Mormon stories. It's Rich Fon Brody.

Marc Oslund [02:56:22] Yep.

John Dehlin [02:56:22] Maybe Richard Bushman, but not as good as Fon Brody.

Marc Oslund [02:56:25] Exactly.

John Dehlin [02:56:26] And those are the most trustworthy books.

Marc Oslund [02:56:28] Yes.

John Dehlin [02:56:29] And it's not saints, and it's not the essays, and it's certainly not the church.

Marc Oslund [02:56:32] Church.

John Dehlin [02:56:33] So seek out the best books.

Marc Oslund [02:56:35] Yep, exactly. That's right there in scripture. And truly, like, we should be trusting authorities, and so don't be afraid of that. Like, find the truth.

John Dehlin [02:56:42] And.

Marc Oslund [02:56:42] And. And then I think the most important single message this has really been on my. On my heart the last couple weeks is trust your Gut. Trust your gut. You know what you don't like. You know, what makes you feel uncomfortable, you know, when something's not okay. You know, you don't want to meet with bishops and talk about sexual things. You know that you don't want to feel guilty about not going to church. You know, like, you know that LGBT

John Dehlin [02:57:05] people don't choose to be gay.

Marc Oslund [02:57:06] Exactly.

John Dehlin [02:57:07] You know, you know that dark, dark skin is never a curse for wickedness, you know? Yep.

Marc Oslund [02:57:13] They know it all.

John Dehlin [02:57:14] You know the polygamy is wrong and that lying about polygamy is wrong.

Marc Oslund [02:57:17] Yep.

John Dehlin [02:57:18] Right.

Marc Oslund [02:57:18] They know it all.

John Dehlin [02:57:19] And that. And that. Honestly. Well, I mean, I don't want to stack the deck, but I'm not so sure angels deliver golden plates. I'm not so sure about that, and

Marc Oslund [02:57:26] I don't think they are either. And. And they know, like, hey, you're not getting answers from God. And so instead of betraying yourself, trust yourself. That has been the message of. I've just seen. Yeah. So many people betraying themselves to make Mormonism work. And my message is, stop doing it.

John Dehlin [02:57:43] Don't betray yourself. Don't betray yourself. That's the most important message.

Marc Oslund [02:57:45] Yep. That's it. That's it.

John Dehlin [02:57:46] And Christ kind of said, the kingdom of God is within.

Marc Oslund [02:57:49] So did k. Right. Exactly. Goldplay did Heaven is Inside.

John Dehlin [02:57:53] The song.

Marc Oslund [02:57:54] Every teardrop is a waterfall, and I'm literally crying in Paris, like, yeah. Heaven is inside, like. And so, like, yeah. Yep.

John Dehlin [02:58:02] Don't abandon yourself. Don't.

Marc Oslund [02:58:05] My. My friend.

John Dehlin [02:58:06] Or any.

Marc Oslund [02:58:06] No. My friend Laura is a great example of this.

John Dehlin [02:58:08] Who.

Marc Oslund [02:58:08] She's also not going to church, and she's currently having seminary teachers reaching out and trying to rescue.

John Dehlin [02:58:12] And she's like, she's coming on Mormon stories.

Marc Oslund [02:58:14] Yeah. Yeah, exactly. She had the official invite, so as soon as I'm done, I'm texting her and say, hey, you're coming on. Exactly.

John Dehlin [02:58:19] Or you're next.

Marc Oslund [02:58:20] And so, like, we've had a ton of talks, and she has been. I think she's been huge for me and having that support, and I'm just so grateful. Her and Rachel have been like, my two people, and then my other friend, who's still teaching seminary, have just been like, the three people in my life. But Laura's story, I think, has been this huge realization where my friend Laura, who has been making herself small and not who she's always intended to be this. She is small. She's, you know, she's not a tall person. She's thin, and she is a big soul. That has constantly put herself in a box and watching her be, like, find her inner power. She told of a story, and I'm sure she'll tell this when she comes on, but she went to the sequoias, and she was expecting to feel really tiny among these giant sequoias in California, and she felt, I am like this. And so seeing my friend, like, set boundaries with her mom, stand up for herself, say no to things that don't make her happy. Like, I haven't forced Laura into things she hasn't wanted. I've watched her become who she's always wanted to be. And that's the message. Trust yourself. Don't put yourself in a box. You're too big to make your life so small. And that's the message I want to share with everyone, and especially my students. Like, if Mormonism works for you, okay. Like, I can debate you on why I think it works and all of that, but I don't need to. If it's not working for you, don't force it to fit. Don't force it.

John Dehlin [02:59:50] So for the Strengthening the Church Members committee that are watching, spend one minute telling the church what you think it should do to make things right. It's just a minute. Keep it.

Marc Oslund [03:00:00] Yeah. Here's my best advice. Create a millennial council. Meet a millennial and Gen Z council headed by a member of the First Presidency in the quorum of the 12. Hear what they're actually saying. Involve people who are converts, who are not Mormon, who have left the church. Ask them.

John Dehlin [03:00:18] LGBT people.

Marc Oslund [03:00:19] Lgbt, everybody.

John Dehlin [03:00:20] Women.

Marc Oslund [03:00:21] Yep. The most diverse thing. Transgender people, everybody. People who have been harmed, people who have hate, excommunicated people who. People. Put them all on a thing. Ask them questions, listen to their answers, do what they say. Because for me, it was, I am where I am. Because I listened to people like, the way I promised Jesus I would when I was baptized, and I refused to ever, ever, ever harm somebody when they said it was harming them. So, listen, you already know the answers. Do no harm. You know the answers. But if you need more affirmation, ask the millennials who are bleeding from your church, and. And then do what they say.

John Dehlin [03:00:59] All right? And the last question I have for you today, other than, like, to give you a chance to give any final words, is someday, you know, Remy has no idea.

Marc Oslund [03:01:10] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:01:10] And even he won't have any idea about the significance of the decisions you guys have made, because he won't have been raised in the church. So someday, hopefully, he'll watch this whole Interview. And I just want you to have a chance to talk to Remy when

Marc Oslund [03:01:24] he's, you know, man, I, I, I feel like the emotions that I have are, are, are rare. I don't often cry, but I do when I man that love. Remy, I love you. I guess I'm just going to say what my dad said to me, that you won't know how much we love you until you hold your kid in your arms. And we only want you to be happy for your whole life, no matter what or who you are, we just want you to be happy. And the kid you are right now at 2 years old and the joy you have, like I want, I just, I, I will do anything to make sure you have that smile, that joy every day. I love you with all my heart. You are the greatest gift in our life, and I hope you just find so much joy in your life. Buddy, we love you.

John Dehlin [03:02:26] What about his worth?

Marc Oslund [03:02:28] Your worth is eternal. And any message that ever, ever makes you feel like you're not worthy run far, far, far, far from that. Um, the way that I look at you and the way I feel for you is, is the way you should always feel in any message, any message that ever makes you doubt what I'm expressing to you right now about your love and worth. It is a lie. It is not true. Do not listen to that message, buddy. Um, you are perfect, and you will always be perfect. And you are so, so, so good. So never, ever question. Question that.

John Dehlin [03:03:10] Beautiful.

Marc Oslund [03:03:11] Thanks, John.

John Dehlin [03:03:12] All right, so the, we've got like two minutes and the card's going to run out of space. So any final words to everyone you know before we end?

Marc Oslund [03:03:21] Thanks for listening. It's an honor. Thanks for sharing my pain, my hurt. You can reach out to me on Instagram or Facebook. My Instagram's M oland o n d I'm excited to be offering working with clients in Utah Valley specifically. Hopefully people going through faith transition reach out to me. I'll be on the Utah Valley Post Mormons site and reach out to me. I'd love to work with you or your teenagers. And just thanks for listening. Thanks for your goodness and my heart is with you too. I'm proud of all of you and grateful for you listening.

John Dehlin [03:03:53] Also, Rachel, thank you for supporting Mark because as I know with Margi, this is a team effort, even if Mark's the face and then Mark, I just want to challenge one thing. Coming back to something I referred to earlier, I don't know that it's a foregone conclusion that your Days of highest exposure to youth and to others are over. And as someone who wondered if you, you know, as someone who often wondered, am I ever going to make an impact? Am I ever going to reach my potential? I can just say you can turn, turn this pain and this difficulty into a huge gift and you can, you can make lemonade from lemons. But more importantly, you can take pain and turn it into a huge blessing and gift not just for yourself, but for others. And so don't count yourself out for that, that big influence down the line because there's so much opportunity. Whether it's post ex Mormon efy. Why? Whether it's youth groups, secular youth groups, not just ex Mormon, secular youth groups, community building, mental health, social media, sky's the limit. So maybe you're, maybe all of this works to you actually achieving the, the, that potential just in ways you don't know yet. So don't. I just want to say don't give up on that.

Marc Oslund [03:05:20] Thanks, John. And I'm open to anything that life throws at, at me and I'm, I'm, I'm certainly willing. Um, I think I've made peace with it not happening. But I, if we come up with an idea and we have an amazing conference for post Mormon E F Y kids, I will do it with my jump in both feet and I'm ready for it too. So thank you. I am so appreciative.

John Dehlin [03:05:39] All right. All right, everyone. Love you. Thank you so much for staying with us today. I'm running out of steam. Donate to MormonStories.org if. If you want to see this content because continue. Click on the donate button at the top. Become a monthly donor. Less than one out of a thousand people donate and we're losing donors every year and so we got to replace them to keep it going. Thanks for your support. Thanks. Please share. Spread the love. Share this everywhere. But most importantly, Mark and Rachel, thank you so much for your story. Thanks for your courage speaking up. You're going to help a lot of people. And on behalf of Mormon stories, all our listeners, this community, community, we love you. We're grateful for you and we, we are going to expect good and big things from you. Thanks, John.

Marc Oslund [03:06:23] I appreciate all of you.

John Dehlin [03:06:24] Thank you. All right, thanks. Here. Take care, brother.

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