Introduction and Welcome

Part 1 of 4 · Ep. 1106

John Dehlin [00:00:04] Mormon Stories is a production of the Open Stories foundation and relies solely upon the support of people like you, its listeners to help keep the podcast alive or to become a member of the community. Please become a monthly subscriber by visiting MormonStories.org and clicking on the donate button on the right side of the page under support. All contributions to Mormon Stories are completely tax deductible in the United States and go towards producing the podcast and building communities and programs of support for Mormons like you. Thanks for your support. Hello everyone, and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories Podcast. I'm your host, John Dehlin. It's May 4th, 2019. May the 4th be with you. We are broadcasting live this Saturday morning from the Mormon Story Studios in Salt Lake City, Utah. We are very, very excited today to have a very special couple with us. It is Crystal and Sean Escobar, and they are known for many things. They, you know, have both been members of the Mormon Church for quite some time. Of course, they have lots of family and friends that love them and care about them, and they have their own experiences and journey within Mormonism that we're going to be talking about today. But in addition to that, Sean Escobar has been in the news as of the past few weeks and months. Sean, for those of you who don't know, Sean was sexually abused as a child by one of the most famous Mormon filmmakers ever. His name is Sterling Van Wagenen. And Sean came out with an audio recording of a confrontation that he had with Sterling Van Wagenen last year in 2018, and that was originally released on the Truth and Transparency Foundation's website under the pseudonym David. And over time, as Sean realized that he was not the only victim, he decided that he was willing to come out and use his real name and talk openly about Sterling Van Wagenen's abuse of him and of others. And this story has caught fire. He's been on most of the TV shows and radio shows or, you know, different programming here in Utah, but also the story was picked up by the New York Times, and certainly Van Wagden, Van Wagner is now, you know, facing a long prison sentence. He has not actually been sentenced, but he has admitted his wrongdoing. And so we are here to talk about that. Sean's experiences with abuse, but. But really the focus, you know, while we're going to be hearing Sean's story and we're going to be talking about Sterling Van Wagenen, really, this is about systems. It's always systems over people. And we're here to talk about how the Mormon Church historically has dealt with these abuse cases. We've covered this in the past on Mormon Stories podcast. For those of you who have not listened, check out the Sterling Swallow interview. We've done others as well. But there's a systemic problem of the Mormon Church protecting perpetrators at the expense of victims, silencing victims, and creating a culture where people are scared to talk about the abuse and punished for talking openly about the abuse. And then perpetrators go on to be protected and even supported, which leaves more victims vulnerable to abuse. And of course, we've covered the Joseph Bishop case and you know, the support of Sam Young, etc. So we're going to be talking all about Sean's experience and Sterling Van Wagenen and how the Church handled that case and mishandled that case and the implications. And then finally, in a completely different kind of reality, Crystal Escobar has been an influencer and a blogger and, and a YouTuber and a podcaster. And she's written a book called Wannabe Balanced Mom. My life is a wanna be balanced mom. And you know, she's a force in and of herself. She has, you know, an Instagram page with, you know, over 90,000 followers. She's got a YouTube presence and this podcast is 55 episodes in. And she has done a lot of work in, in helping moms know that they can be great moms or at least be self compassionate moms and successful moms, but also momtrepreneurs. How do you pronounce that?

Crystal Escobar [00:05:16] Mompreneurs.

John Dehlin [00:05:17] Mompreneurs. You know, for, for moms who want to do other things in addition to being moms. They can have businesses and they can find a way to balance all of that, maybe not in a perfect way, but in a way that, that is healthiest for all people. And so we're going to be talking about Crystal's work and her passions and her journey as well. And we're really excited for everyone who's joining us live on Facebook. We really appreciate everyone who has shown their love and support to the Escobar family. I know that they have been touched by all those who have reached out to show support because this is not an easy thing to do to come out to. Just to be a public figure in and of itself is brutal. But to be a public figure in Mormonism that talks openly about faith crises and disaffection from the church, that's brutal. And then it's just never fun to talk about sexual abuse and to confront perpetrators and then to face the wrath of everyone. Who wants to defend the church at the expense of those who are being open and honest? And just talking about abuse is never fun. So for all those reasons, we are just so honored and grateful, Sean and Crystal, that you guys would come on Mormon Stories podcast.

Sean Escobar [00:06:32] Thank you, John.

Crystal Escobar [00:06:33] Yeah, we're happy to be here.

Sean's Mormon Childhood and Family Background

John Dehlin [00:06:36] All right, well, we're gonna kind of talk in three different phases in today's interview, and I think it would be fun to begin just with your kind of Mormon backgrounds, as we always try and start on Mormon stories.

Sean Escobar [00:06:49] Sure.

John Dehlin [00:06:50] So who's older? Me.

Crystal Escobar [00:06:53] Sean.

John Dehlin [00:06:54] Sean, why don't we start with you? Let's talk about your Mormon upbringing.

Sean Escobar [00:06:57] Sure. My parents are both first generation converts to the Mormon Church. My dad met Mormon missionaries over in Australia. They taught him how to play American basketball, and he fell in love with the missionaries and he thought it was so cool to know Americans. And it was kind of always his dream to come to America. So he actually joined the church when he was a young boy. And I think maybe one of his brothers and one of his sisters also joined, but his parents did not at that time. And so that's how my dad came into the church. And then he immigrated over to the United States when he was 20 years old. I think he might have been chasing a Mormon girl. And when he got here, she dear Johnned him. It's called Dear John, isn't it? And she dear Johnned him. And so but he was here and he realized his dream of making it over to America. He was very poor. My dad met my mom, who was not Mormon at the time, in a nickel dime store. He bought a toothbrush from her. And she was Presbyterian. I think she was raised Presbyterian. And my mom fell for this crazy Australian guy. And anyway, he brought her to Utah from Arizona. And my mom took the missionary discussions six times. And then she joined the church. And I think she might have been 21 years old. I can't remember exactly, but. So my parents were both first generation converts. Now, my experience growing up in the Mormon Church was kind of unique because my dad, he wasn't active in the Mormon Church until he was about 43 years old. Semi active at times, but never active in it until he was 43 years old. My mom was once she converted. She was actually pretty devout. She went a lot. And so on Sundays, it was either mom drags me to church and forces me to go to church, which I never liked church as a kid, or it was sometimes, you know, dad wasn't going to go, and I certainly was not going to go. If dad wasn't going to go, I was going to go with dad to work on the cabin or I was going to go with dad to the swap meet, whatever it was. So as far as my Mormon upbringing, I didn't really get active in the Mormon church, like really active. I have memories of primary and things of that nature. There was a. I remember this grandma named Mrs. Friendly would always. That was my favorite part. Mrs. Friendly would come and give us treats. But I don't have a lot of memories early on of the Mormon church. But then when I turned, I think I was 12 or 13 and my brother decided to go on a mission. And that was earth shattering for our family because he had been fellowshipped by a friend of his and their family. And I remember my dad, he was shocked that my brother wanted to go on a mission and, and it was a very eye opening thing for us. My brother Anthony, he just kind of took it upon himself, I'm going on a mission. And he was just very independent that way. And it changed everything in my family life. Everything changed. We started having family prayer. We started going to church weekly and you know, instead of me just going on and off every week, we started to go and my parents immediately got sealed in the temple. At that time, what year would that have been? About 92, 93 I think it was. My parents got sealed in the temple, my dad totally activated, you know, hook, line and sinker and they've. My family's been active ever since. So I guess for 30, almost 30 years now, my family's been extremely, extremely active in the church. Now me, I was kind of a. Even though they were making me go to church when I was 13, 14, 15, 16, I was still kind of a normal teenager outside of Mormonism. I was kind of a little bit rough. I tried things that normal teenagers try, things that are not conducive or appropriate for Mormonism. I had a girlfriend at a young. 16, 17, I had a steady girlfriend, got into a little trouble there. There's lots of things that I did, I think John, when I, when I kind of shaped up, when I, how would you say? Reformed. When I reformed, I was probably almost 18 years old. And when I decided to go on a mission, I remember it was probably like the most shocking thing for everybody, for my family, for my, all my peers at high school, all my closest friends. It was like I was that guy that decided to go on a mission, kind of the, the reformed, you know, crazy sucker. And everybody was, was pretty shocked. I'd like to share what changed for me.

John Dehlin [00:12:16] Absolutely. Yeah, go ahead.

Sean Escobar [00:12:18] So, like, yeah, this is pretty meaningful.

The Good and Bad of Growing Up Mormon

John Dehlin [00:12:20] Like, how did, like, one of the things I really like to do, I, I believe that religions do good and bad.

Sean Escobar [00:12:29] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:12:29] And, and I, I do not shy away from us talking about the ways that religion helps. And so I'm curious to know, what transformations did you witness in your family?

Sean Escobar [00:12:41] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:12:41] Positive transformations did you witness in your family after they joined? How did things change?

Sean Escobar [00:12:48] Family prayer is cool because, you know, it kind of creates an openness. I think people like family prayer because, you know, it's an opportunity to just hear each other's wishes and desires. And I think outside of family prayer, I don't know that we take that opportunity a lot to talk about what we hope for and what we wish for and what we need help with. So that's a good thing. I liked, you know, sometimes family prayer was, Was monotonous. And sometimes, you know, prayer can become very monotonous. And I noticed that in my life, in my adult years, prayer became very mundane for me. And. Yeah, so prayer was one thing. We're going to say something.

John Dehlin [00:13:29] Yeah. Other, other ways that. Other ways, like your parents must have gotten active because they were missing something or needing something. I have to feel like the church filled a void or they wouldn't have bothered. Right.

Sean Escobar [00:13:42] Or not.

John Dehlin [00:13:43] Am I projecting?

Sean Escobar [00:13:44] I can't speak for my. I think my mom always wanted to be really active in the church. I think a lot of that had to do with, you know, belonging in the neighborhood and feeling like not, not like an outsider. I think for years, until my, my dad turned 43, I think my family, we probably felt a little bit like outsiders. We were definitely less active and we just didn't fit that mold of your stereotypic, typical, perfect little Mormon family. So I think my mom longed for that. My dad, this is my opinion. I think my dad was so shocked that his son. See, because my dad, if I'm being completely honest, which I want to do in this interview, my dad was anti Mormon. My dad, the home teachers didn't dare to come to our house. John My dad knew a lot of things about the Mormon Church early on, and what had happened was he'd been royally screwed over by a few businessmen, Mormon businessmen, and it didn't sit well with him. And so he became familiar with a lot of things that, you know, that were opposing the Mormon Church. And he was in a very dark, jaded, you know, skeptical place around the Mormon Church. Now, when my brother decided to go on a mission My dad's a family man all the way down the line. And when my brother decided to go on a mission at 19, I think it rocked my dad's world. It was like, I don't want to lose my son kind of thing. So I think that that was probably the predominant stimulus of why my dad took a harder, you know, took a harder look at activating as a Mormon. Was it good for him, my dad?

John Dehlin [00:15:23] You were how old? You were how old when your family got active?

Sean Escobar [00:15:26] I was right around 12 or 13. Okay, yeah, 12 or 13. I remember when I went to get sealed in the temple with my parents, and I was the only child at the time that was there, because I don't think my two sisters weren't there. I don't remember. And then my brother was on a mission, so we went to get sealed in the temple, and they put me in the nursery for hours. Like, I was in the nursery with all these babies. And so finally they called me up, and I was. I think I was just wearing white pants and a white shirt. And I walked into the sealing ceremony, and it was. I just remember, John, that was pretty alarming to see what those people were wearing. And I was like, what are we. What are we doing in here? What's going on? And kind of freaked me out. But my dad, before the church was a little bit rowdy. You know, he's guilty of telling a few, you know, unsavory jokes. Practical joker. But everybody was crazy about him. He was hilarious. He had the. He was boisterous, charismatic. And the effect the church had on him, I would say the word that comes to my mind is quiet dignity. Like, we are not supposed to be outspoken so much. We're not supposed to be boisterous. We're not supposed to be overly enthusiastic. And, like, when I went on my mission, I was kind of that person that was. I had a big personality. And I just remember every single one of my, you know, in my little zone there, my district, they'd always say, quiet dignity, Elder Escobar. Quiet dignity, Elder Escobar. And I'd be like, what's going on? Like, this is how I am. And so I think from my perspective, good things that came from my dad, I think it made him. I think there's a lot of good that came from my dad from activating in the Mormon Church. And there's also things that I think it robbed him of. That's my opinion.

John Dehlin [00:17:20] Okay, and how about your mom?

Sean Escobar [00:17:22] My mom's just always been a spiritual person. Very in Tune. And I love that about her. Everyone that knows my mom, she's there. She is their favorite person on the face of the earth. I kid you not. I've had people contact me and say, just so you know, I really love your mom. And they don't. You know what I mean? Like, they don't need to do that. They're contacting me to tell me that my mom's always kind of been. She's always been steady that way. My. My mom kind of gets it. I think, whether the church is true or not, I think my mom is just a rock solid spiritual person. I think she's a. I've always referred to my mom as a heavenly angel ministering amongst all of us mere mortals. Mormon or not. She is that. So.

John Dehlin [00:18:07] Would your family have followed. How much of the normal, traditional Mormon lifestyle would your family have adopted after they got activated and got sealed in the temple? You talked about family prayer, but was there family evening? Was there scripture study? You know, did the family become more

Sean Escobar [00:18:24] pious, less formal about. Less formal about family scripture study? No. I take that back. While my brother was on his mission, we actually did. We did read the scriptures a lot, but it was just me and my parents because everybody else had grown up and kind of moved on and moved out. I was the youngest.

John Dehlin [00:18:43] Okay.

Sean Escobar [00:18:45] As far as family, we never did like formal family home evenings. But my parents were unbelievably diligent at their callings. Like, when you talk about magnifying their callings, like, if they were giving a calling, they would drop everything. I mean, they would spend more time on the callings than they would their job. Like, they were devoted. I mean, they gave everything they possibly could. The word I would use is diligent. I mean, my parents, they're just that way. Anything they do at life, they give it everything they've got.

John Dehlin [00:19:12] Sure. You talked about being a rowdy kid or. I don't know how you described it. Did you experience a lot of guilt and shame internally? Were you trying to know if the church was true? Did you care about, you know, the spiritual stuff? Were you tor.

Sean Escobar [00:19:30] Were you ready?

John Dehlin [00:19:31] Were you tormented?

Crystal Escobar [00:19:32] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:19:33] Get these ready, John.

Crystal Escobar [00:19:36] So

Sean Escobar [00:19:38] at 17, I decided to go into the church. I met with the bishop. No, it wasn't 17. It was probably right around. It was about 18, I think. I had to wait a full year, a little over a year to go on my mission. I went in and I told him that I'd had a steady girlfriend, and I told him that I'd had sex with my Girlfriend. And that bishop was great. He was a convert. Phenomenal. And, you know, he didn't ask me for any details about what we'd done. He didn't. He didn't dig. He just looked at me. In fact, let me tell you what he said just to show you what kind of a guy this is. I felt really bad, and I'd like to talk in a minute about what my conversion. But I said to him, told him what I'd done, and then he said, it's okay. It's okay, he said. I said, I almost felt like I was just. I was a bad person. Like, I felt. I felt like I would look at these guys. There was a kid in my high school named Ryan, and I would look at this kid, and everything came easy for him. Appeared to come easy for him. He just was like, straight arrow, good as they come all across the board. Every aspect of his life, it just looked like this kid's got all his stuff together. And I just remember looking at him and thinking, I wish I was like him. And what's wrong with me? Because things I just seem to have. Curious. I was curious about life, and I was curious about the world. And so I experimented with a lot of different things. But the bishop said to me, he goes, sean, let me tell you something. He says, and he did treat the sex as if it was a bad thing. Which, come to find out, it's really not. I mean, it's not a bad thing for high school kids to experiment with such things. It doesn't make them bad people. But he did say to me, he said, shawn, if a woman walked in here right now, he said, let me tell you something. I can relate to you. He said, I'm a bishop. And if a woman rocked in here right now, an attractive woman, and if she was to remove her clothing, I'd have horrible thoughts. And you could see my demeanor changed. It was almost like I'm a bad person to. Oh, wait, what did he just say? And it helped me realize that I was human. The guilt came later. I don't know if you want me to go into all this, but I went on my mission unworthily. John, do you want me to go into it?

John Dehlin [00:22:17] Yeah, sure.

Sean Escobar [00:22:18] So I had this girlfriend, and

John Dehlin [00:22:22] we'll

Sean Escobar [00:22:22] just go right into it. I had a couple friends die. One was a kid. He died of bone marrow cancer in his leg. He's a friend of mine, my age, one of my best friends, which was my football coach, Lynn Freestone. He died in a car accident. And we were really close. It wasn't like a coach player relationship. I was his teacher's aide. I'd go to his house. I mean, tight. He died in a car accident. And I remember being at his funeral, and the bishop got up and Lynn was not active in the church.

John Dehlin [00:22:53] No.

Sean Escobar [00:22:54] And not Mormon. I don't even think. I don't know. But he said that Len showed up at his door and knocked on the door of the bishop's office and said before he went on this trip. And he said, I don't know why I'm here. I felt the need to talk to you. So I'm sitting there and I hear that. And he didn't really even say what they talked about. Okay. But that was right before he left on the trip. And then he died. And something stirred in me, John. Something says, why did he go to that bishop's office? I began to read the Book of Mormon at that time. I read it from the beginning to the end. And I think I was just going into my senior year of high school. And when I finished reading it, John, something happened. I was at a little. I was building mountain bikes at my friend's house. I got down on my knees, I said the Moroni's Promise prayer. And I got up and my phone rang. It was one of those old cell phones. Phone rang, and it was my dad. And my dad said, sean, turn on the news. There's a tornado in downtown Salt Lake City. Okay, Turn on the news. Sure enough, there's this historic tornado in downtown Salt Lake, 1999, and it's ripping through downtown, and it tore up the Salt Palace. It wrecked a whole big exhibition show. They were doing, like, an outdoor show. One person died. It was picking up cars and throwing them. It was ripping out 100-year-old trees. It was unreal. And I'm watching it. And then the news anchor said. What I heard, John, was the tornado was headed for the Salt Lake Temple. And it veered, kind of veered around it. And when I heard that, I had that feeling that we would call the Spirit. I had that feeling. I had those chills. I had that. And I thought, how did that just happen? I just finished the Book of Mormon. I'm sharing this only to. Because later I'd like to talk about why my. Explains why my cognitive dissonance was so strong.

John Dehlin [00:25:13] John, so you interpreted the serendipity of you praying. I thought it was a sign of the Book of Mormon's true. With the tornado, you interpreted that as a sign that what I thought it

Sean Escobar [00:25:25] was A sign from God that, that my prayer was answered. I took it as a sign. A lot of people don't understand how much I changed. I dumped my girlfriend. Bang, dumped her. I dumped all my bad friends. Any of my friends that drank or any of my rough friends. And I had a lot of rough friends. I dumped them. And they all know it instantaneously. Overnight, I dumped them. I shaved my face. I was one of those kids that at a very young age, I could grow a beard. I shaved off my beard. I started dressing differently. I pretty much reformed. Everything in my entire life changed at that moment in time. My fun, exciting, rowdy personality became very much more reserved. And still, even, still, even my mission companions would say, I don't know. You're pretty rowdy. But compared to what I was, John, I was the kind of kid that wore a shirt to school that said, masturbation is not a crime. I was that kid.

Sean's Mission Experience and Confession

John Dehlin [00:26:32] Seriously?

Crystal Escobar [00:26:33] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:26:33] It was a Brighton high school.

Sean Escobar [00:26:36] They made me change my shirt. I got expelled from school, John. I didn't get kicked out of school. I didn't get suspended. I got expelled because a kid beat up my friend, and I heard that he used brass knuckles. And I went and I, I, I went after the guy and I got expelled from school. I was a rough kid, John. I was rough and I. And overnight I thought I had a sign from God. And I, I completely, I, I lost who I was. I changed.

John Dehlin [00:27:09] You had an alma, the younger kind of experience. That's it, Right? So you say you went on your mission unworthy.

Sean Escobar [00:27:16] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:27:16] How did, what happened?

Sean Escobar [00:27:18] So what happened was I, I dumped the girlfriend. I was lonely, John. I didn't have any. At that point in time, I didn't really have any friends because I wasn't in with the good kids so much, and I was. And I dumped all the bad kids. And I was lonely, and I was just kind of like, doing my time. I had to meet with the bishop every week. You know how that is? I had to meet with the bishop every week because I was doing this repentance thing, and he was giving me all these miracle forgiveness to read and giving me all these assignments. I had to ch off all the time. And I was, I was lonely. And my old girlfriend showed up at the house and, and she was with a friend of hers, and she said, come hang out with us. It was like Friday night. And I got to the point, John, where I didn't even, I didn't even go out on the weekends. And she's like, come hang out. With us. And I was like, no, nope. And she's like, we can be. And she's a great person, by the way.

Crystal Escobar [00:28:12] Well, it was after your farewell, right, John?

John Dehlin [00:28:16] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:28:16] Thank you, John. I had. I had already. Like, I think I already might have even already given the farewell talk. I had already collected, like, people had given me money. Like, people had written me checks. Like some people back then, you know, 20 years ago, some people had written me, like, $50 checks. And I was like, I couldn't believe it. Like, why are they giving me. People that didn't have the money were giving me $50? I couldn't believe it. I think people probably gave me. I think if I look back, it might have been like seven or eight hundred dollars. It might have been as much as $1,500 people gave me just to support me. I'd already gotten my dental. I'd already gotten my physical. I'd already taken the picture. I already had the plaque. I mean, John, I was locked in. I was going, now, keep in mind, I'm an honest person. I pride myself on honesty. I always have. My parents would tell you. They've always, Always told them everything. Everything. I'm so honest. And I told that bishop everything. But I was lonely that night. And I went out with my ex girlfriend and her friend, and I had sex with her again one time. Oh, this gets so heavy, John. And I thought, what have I done? She went and confessed it. The stake president and the bishop came to my house. I knew what they were there for. And they said, sean, this girl says that you had sex again with her. Did you? And I said, no. They said, you didn't? I said, no. And then they said, why would she say that, Sean? And I said, because I think she's in love with me and she doesn't want me to go on a mission. And I just lied. John, let me tell you what happened. I went on that mission. They let me go. They believed me. And in hindsight, I think. I think I. I love love. But the memory of that girlfriend. I love the memory of that girlfriend. You understand? Yeah. But I think she wanted me to stay home, John. She wasn't active in the church like she. She went because her family made her, but she wasn't like one of those church girls. And I think she did want me to stay home, but that's neither here nor there. I went. I lied. And that mission was pure hell for me, John.

John Dehlin [00:30:58] And again. Where'd you go?

Sean Escobar [00:31:00] Virginia. Okay, I.

John Dehlin [00:31:04] What's that like to carry that guilt into your mission.

Sean Escobar [00:31:08] Awful. It's death. It's hell. It's pure hell. Let me. Let me give you a few examples. I worked my butt off. I was 100 obedient. I thought, like you've said, I was hustling for my worthiness. I thought, I'm going to make it up to God. I'm going to make it up because John and I accelerated on that mission very quickly. John, I was a. I think I was a district leader at four months. Four and a half months. I was his own leader by seven months. I was an AP by 11 months. I know. Yeah, I was an AP by 11 months.

John Dehlin [00:31:37] That's got to feel like God's okay with you, right? Because if God is behind the callings, which we're all taught, then.

Sean Escobar [00:31:44] No, I didn't feel like that at all.

John Dehlin [00:31:45] You didn't?

Sean Escobar [00:31:46] Oh, no, no, John, I'm a very.

John Dehlin [00:31:48] That's how my brain worked. It's like, oh, well, God must have been a call.

Sean Escobar [00:31:50] No, no, no, no, no. John, I'm a very literal person. And I thought, I don't have the spirit, but I thought, all I can do to make up for it is give this everything I've got. And I worked so hard. I mean, I was an assistant for 13 months. John, nobody else in that entire mission ever served as an assistant for longer than six. Never. I was an assistant for 13 consecutive months.

John Dehlin [00:32:18] Chris Garrett just wrote, hardest working missionary in the mission, hands down.

Sean Escobar [00:32:22] I love that guy.

John Dehlin [00:32:23] Was Chris in your mission?

Sean Escobar [00:32:24] Yeah, I love that guy.

John Dehlin [00:32:25] Thanks, Chris.

Sean Escobar [00:32:26] Thanks, Chris. So you want to know how bad it was? So imagine me being an assistant for 13 months. I got extremely close to my mission president. I love both my mission presidents endlessly. Phenomenal people. Mission president. Every single time he would call, John, I was like the only one in the entire mission with a cell phone. Okay. Every single time he would call, I think I was getting sent home every time he'd call to say, hey, Elder, how's it going? But then the phone would ring and it would say, president. I would go. I would think he knew every single time. John, every time I looked at the clock and it said 11:34 or 1:34, I thought, I'm going to hell. I really believe that God was angry at me. And because for those that don't know, and I don't even know how I figured it out, but 1134, if you reverse it, is hell. 134 is hell with one L. And I would see that every day for whatever reason. I'd look at the clock and it was like I was. It was like. Or maybe I only noticed when I looked at that time, but it was like, I'm going to hell. And I just. I couldn't. I went on that mission and I made up my mind and I am a pretty strong person. I said, this is a one way street. I'm not going home and I'm going to give this everything I've got. And hopefully God will forgive me for my. For lying. I was successful, but I. I never felt like I deserved it.

John Dehlin [00:34:05] That's a lot to carry. Yeah. Were you overall glad you served a mission?

Sean Escobar [00:34:11] When I came home from the mission, I confessed it.

John Dehlin [00:34:13] You did? And who, Who'd you confess to? Your bishop.

Sean Escobar [00:34:20] Bishop? State president.

John Dehlin [00:34:20] Okay.

Sean Escobar [00:34:21] Same ones.

John Dehlin [00:34:23] I mean, what can they do, right?

Sean Escobar [00:34:25] They let me off the hook. Yeah, they. They were. They were kind about it.

John Dehlin [00:34:29] Yeah. Well, that's nice.

Sean Escobar [00:34:31] When. When I. When I confessed about our are.

John Dehlin [00:34:35] We'll get there. Don't, don't, don't jump ahead. Is that okay?

Sean Escobar [00:34:42] Oh, sorry. No, I. I've been talking a lot.

John Dehlin [00:34:45] No, no, no, no, it's perfect. This has been perfect. This is. The flow of a story is really powerful. So this is great. So. So they. They let you off the hook. How did you feel when they let you off the hook after you had been suffering for so long?

Sean Escobar [00:35:00] Can I tell you why? Another reason why I went on a mission.

John Dehlin [00:35:03] Sure.

Sean Escobar [00:35:05] My brother hit immortal status when my brother went on that mission. And we read those letters and we talked about him every day. And my mom would put a sticker on a map every day. One sticker every day for whatever it is. 700 and something days. My brother was immortalized, in fact. And this isn't his fault. He didn't ask for this. But my parents and my sisters would go so far as to say, Anthony is our savior. Anthony is our redemption. He's the one. He's the one that activated the family. I felt like if I didn't go on a mission, I. What was I. I mean, I was meaningless if I didn't measure. I've cried so much. I'm so sick of crying. I didn't cry.

Crystal Escobar [00:35:59] How much do you know me to cry? We've been married 15 years and he's only cried on our wedding day. And my kids said he's cried more in the last two weeks.

Sean Escobar [00:36:07] My kids thought I was incapable of crying. They're like, dad doesn't cry. He doesn't know how to cry. It's not. Anyway, I Want to make that known, that the pressure, the pressure to measure up to my brother. It was hard, John. My dad would always say, Anthony is going to do something that I never did. Anthony is a better man than me because Anthony is going to make it to his wedding day as a virgin. I'd already, John, I'd already. That ship had sailed from me. And I don't think my dad meant harm saying that around me. He was saying it to my brother. But I would hear it and I would think, what does that make me? And I love my family. I love my brother.

John Dehlin [00:36:55] Of course. Of course. And your dad, I've heard you talk about your dad, my parents,

Sean Escobar [00:37:01] that damn social conditioning.

Childhood Abuse and Its Impact on Sean

John Dehlin [00:37:04] So I just want to jump in and just, you know, this on my part, this has been intentional. But what we haven't talked about is the fact that, you know, Sean was sexually abused as a young child and as a mental health professional, you know, there are all sorts of common behaviors and traits and acting out that sometimes can accompany a child that is sexualized, sometimes before they even reach puberty. So this isn't to draw unuseful correlations or to make excuses or to stereotype victims of abuse, but when you're sexualized at a young age, first of all, sexual activity as a teenager is normal and probably healthy. So let's just start with that. But, you know, as you're talking about different ways of acting out or even being violent at times or, you know, lying or, you know, who knows what, what it's like to be sexually abused as a child and how that, how that affects things. And I'm intentionally not going there because I want to really go back. When we talk about Sterling Van Wagner and your abuse, I want to kind of rewind and have you tell that story.

Sean Escobar [00:38:19] Okay.

John Dehlin [00:38:19] But I just, I, I can't not throw that in. Right.

Sean Escobar [00:38:22] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:38:23] Because certainly that had to have affect all sorts of things about your upbringing. True? Or am I just, I don't, I,

Sean Escobar [00:38:31] I, along with you. I, I cannot, we'll talk about that, but I cannot quantify what effect that had on me. But I was a very defensive person. Very defensive and very guarded. And so, yeah. Did it affect me? You bet it did. I'm not, it's not normal to sleep with a knife, John. And I, from 13 on, I slept with about a 10 inch hunting knife at my side. My brother and my sisters thought I was. Something was wrong with me.

John Dehlin [00:39:02] All right, so thank you, Sean, for. And by the way, we're going to be calling out both, you know, Stern in the bad wagon and the church in dishonesties and, you know, all sorts of matters involving sexuality, which I think makes it extra courageous for you and noble that you're willing to admit your own, you know, lapses with honesty or sexually acting out. It kind of helps, for me, bolster your credibility because you're willing not just to sort of acknowledge other people's failings or mistakes or acting out, you're willing to own up to your own.

Sean Escobar [00:39:39] Can I say one more thing?

John Dehlin [00:39:40] Sure.

Sean Escobar [00:39:41] And I carried so much guilt about me lying. I felt I lied to God. Literally, I lied to God. And I thought that God was angry with me. I'd learned. I'd been taught as a missionary about a God that was vengeful. I'd been taught about a God that was jealous, about a God that had no tolerance for sin in the least degree. And I. John, John, I've been. I've lived through hell. I know what hell is. Hell is not what I've been going through with this sexual abuse thing. I mean, I could call it hell. I have called it hell. That's just the stress. But true hell is thinking you're going to a dark place where there's not gnawing. What do they say? Gnashing of teeth.

John Dehlin [00:40:26] Weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Sean Escobar [00:40:27] I mean, I literally thought. John, I thought. I believed the church so much. I literally thought if my life was to end at any moment, I would go to hell and I would be separated from my family. And you know why it felt even worse? I thought I was special, John. I thought I was special. I thought that God gave me that tornado. And you can read about it. It was historic. You probably know about it. And 1999. I thought that God, I was special. I thought that only. Only a special person would get a tornado. Everybody else just gets a little burning in the bosom. I got a tornado. I thought I was special. My patriarchal blessing said that some very unique things. But I'm also, like, the only person I've ever met from the tribe of Judah. And I always thought. And the patriarch, he sat me down after that patriarchal blessing, and he said it's the only time he'd ever told someone they were from the tribe of Judah. And I thought. And my parents said, we knew there was something special about you, Sean. I thought I was so special. And so, John, if you imagine, here I am, supposed to be special, and yet I squandered it. I squandered it by my choices. And I'm Going to hell. I forfeited all those special things that I was supposed to have and come to find out I'm not special, John. I'm just like everybody else.

John Dehlin [00:41:59] So it sets you up for an extra level of shame and guilt and self loathing. You'd think telling you you're super special and setting you up to interpret these life experiences in a way that make you think you're extra special and anointed by God, then when you make a

Sean Escobar [00:42:18] mistake, you know, it's another reason you don't own up to it. John, it's not just, it's not just that you're, it's not that you're dishonest and it's not that you don't want to face the music. I mean, you're letting a lot of people down. There's a, there's, it's heavy, it's deep.

John Dehlin [00:42:33] And so it, in some ways it can foster unintentionally a culture of dishonesty and shame and self loathing and yeah, it's, it's tough. By the way, those patriarchal blessings and the lineage stuff, that's supposed to be blood lineage. So you should have the same lineage as your parents.

Sean Escobar [00:42:50] I don't have, I do not have the same lineage as my parents. I'm the only one I've ever met, which is weird. The only one.

John Dehlin [00:42:55] Why would you be Judah but not your parents?

Sean Escobar [00:42:56] The only other one I'm aware of ever in my life, that was Judah, which I, which I was told was Jesus's tribe.

John Dehlin [00:43:03] Right.

Sean Escobar [00:43:04] The only other one that I know of was like this guy I think was Clausen, which is a Jewish guy.

John Dehlin [00:43:09] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:43:09] That was like a lecturer for the church.

John Dehlin [00:43:11] Exactly. So, so random.

Sean Escobar [00:43:14] Well, it, it, it sure made me feel like there was supposed to be something special about me. There's a guy on my mission that gave me a blessing. He was this 70 and he told me I was going to be a bishop, a judge in Israel one day. And I thought, there we go again. I'm supposed to be special.

John Dehlin [00:43:30] Yeah. And you. And that can work well, if it makes you. And for me, it did. I, I, I was a Saturday's warrior. And I was saved for the last days to, you know, to prepare the earth for Christ's return. And I didn't make some of those early mistakes, I made them later. But so I, it, for me it worked out great. But for all the other people's, for many other people, it ends up just adding complexity and guilt and shame and torment. Right.

Sean Escobar [00:43:58] So it's on a lighter note, can I just say, I think if there is a Mormon God, I should go. I mean, I should get a hall pass and go direct to the. And sorry if that triggers anybody, but I should go direct because to be sexually active and then to cut that out for two years, like, that is hard.

John Dehlin [00:44:19] I've never had to do that.

Sean Escobar [00:44:20] And let me tell you something, I

John Dehlin [00:44:22] would not want to do that.

Sean Escobar [00:44:23] I did that. Okay. You think it's hard to be a monk? Try. Try being a monk after you've been, you know, after you've tasted the popcorn. You know, try to. Try to eat one piece of popcorn.

John Dehlin [00:44:33] As a young adult. Right? As a young adult.

Sean Escobar [00:44:34] Right.

John Dehlin [00:44:35] Yeah. Yeah, that's actually true. The genie's out of the bottle at that point. I am grateful. I didn't have to worry about, you know, once. Once I got married. You know what I mean? All right, let's change gears. Crystal, it's your turn. Okay, so tell us about your Mormon uprie.

Crystal's Mormon Upbringing and Faith Foundation

Crystal Escobar [00:44:55] Okay. Well, my. I don't think we ever had. We didn't have, like, a real strict upbringing around the church, but I always saw my mom as somebody who had a strong testimony. Just my mom. My mom had nine kids. She had five before me, and I was the sixth. But she was married before she met my dad, and I'm the first of the kids from my dad, and then she had three more after me. So we. I grew up just. Even though I had five older siblings, they didn't really live with us the majority of the time. Maybe a total of two years here and there. And we. They weren't really active because they lived with their dad. And my. My dad was never active, although he claims that he believes that the church is really true. And. But he's. I've. Never. He never was. He never wore garments growing up. My mom wore garments. And so they were never sealed in the temple. We were never sealed as a family. And so then. Yeah. But I don't think that I felt. I think I always felt like my parents got divorced when I was 12, and there was a lot of.

Sean Escobar [00:46:22] Her dad was a sexual abuser.

Crystal Escobar [00:46:24] Yeah. Which is hard for me. To.

Sean Escobar [00:46:26] Which she might not want to talk about, but I just want to. In line with what we're going to talk about, sexual abuse. And I, you know, I'm open about such things. I don't. I don't mince words anymore about that stuff. And Crystal had a very hard upbringing, I think.

Crystal Escobar [00:46:43] Yeah. It does. The abuse. I had different, like, sexual abuse. Experiences, but not with from my dad, but knowing that that had happened, that my dad did that, and that really affected me and my self worth because I felt like it was a part of me, you know, and I always felt shame around it and was afraid to have friends come to our house. And it always felt like it was my secret to share. And oftentimes I did share it with my friends over after. I felt like they were becoming good friends and I could trust them and I would tell them. It felt like I had to tell them, you know, and it was like my secret and I always felt like I had to share it. So that, that really affected me a lot. But overall, as far as the church goes, we just, we missed a lot of church. But I remember my mom did whenever she was struggling, she would go to the temple a lot. And we never really had family prayers or family home evening. My mom, I would see my mom, I would praying a lot and reading her scriptures a lot. And I, I don't think I ever really enjoyed church until I became a, until I became a beehive in young women's and that was like my first time actually really loving it. But I only loved it for like a year as a beehive. And then, and then that, then once I became more of a teenager, I, I think I always just had a lot of this feeling of not being like everyone else because of the broken home and the sexual abuse and being in the Mormon community and not, you know, my dad, not, we're not sealed in the temple. And so I think I always had this feeling of less being less than everybody else. And I would see all these other Mormon families that their moms and dads, they were still married and they just seemed to have this like perfect little family. And there was a lot of fighting and yelling when my parents were married. And so it was stressful childhood. They would fight a lot. And

Sean Escobar [00:49:17] I love you so much. I don't know how Crystal came out of what she came out of. I mean, she's a gem, man.

Crystal Escobar [00:49:31] When I was a teenager, I, you know, I really just wanted to fit in. I think. I don't think I ever had like a strong testimony now that I look back and I'm able to understand why I was in the church for so long. I just really wanted to fit in. I wanted to be worthy. I wanted to, you know, I was always hustling for my worthiness, you know, and just wanted to be like everybody else. And so I just. But as a teenager, I just gave up on it. It just seemed too hard to just. It just seemed like it wasn't fun to be Mormon. You know, I wanted to have fun. I wanted to go to parties, and I wanted to have a boyfriend and not feel guilty about it. And I wanted to kiss lots of boys and not.

Sean Escobar [00:50:20] She did.

Crystal Escobar [00:50:22] So at first, when I started experimenting with, you know, the. The other lifestyle as a teenager and letting myself just be a normal teenager, I felt a lot of guilt and shame. But then eventually I think I just let it all go. And I don't remember feeling a lot of guilt and shame for a few years. When I was living that. That life of going to parties and I had a boyfriend for three years, and it was a serious relationship. I didn't feel any guilt or shame. But then I became unhappy with my relationship and I was unfulfilled. And I thought I started to think more about my future and what I wanted. And I thought, well, I just want a good man. I want to marry a good man, an honest man. And the only good man in my mind was a returned missionary. So I had. I decided, okay, well, I want to be the person I want to marry. So I chose to go on a mission as well. And yeah, I did.

John Dehlin [00:51:31] That was back in the time when. Yeah, it wasn't Mormon girls weren't serving mission.

Crystal Escobar [00:51:35] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:51:35] When I. When I met her and she said she went on a mission, I about hit the floor. I thought, you did not go on a mission to two drop dead gorgeous to go on a mission. That was the stereotype back then. And I'm sorry. There are some very beautiful return missionaries.

John Dehlin [00:51:50] They're all beautiful.

Crystal Escobar [00:51:51] Yeah, they're all.

Sean Escobar [00:51:52] Yes. Excuse me. They are all very beautiful. Take that back.

Crystal Escobar [00:51:57] But so I lived in Arizona. I moved out to Arizona. I think I was pretty independent from age 16, 17, because, I mean, nothing against my mom, but she just kind of. I think she kind of just decided she was done parenting. Once I was about that age and then all the other younger siblings, we became real independent. A job and I had to start paying rent and I just. And then when I was 18 and graduated high school, I moved out to Arizona with my best friend and was completely independent and living the party life in Arizona and went to Scottsdale Community College. And yeah, then I was. Just became really unhappy with my relationship mostly, and I wanted to be in a good. A good relationship, and I wanted to start thinking about who. What kind of man I wanted to marry. And I knew that I kind of had to be that person as well. So Then when I decided to start going back to church and to prepare myself to go on a mission, I. I was really afraid to tell people because I knew that they. I think I felt, I felt like people would absolutely laugh in my face and say, you, you did have someone laugh. Yeah, there was somebody that laughed and. But she didn't, she thought I was joking. And so she's, she's like, oh, I'm sorry. Okay, you're serious. Okay. Oh, that's awesome. You know, so she retracted. But I really thought, like, church leaders would be like, I'm sorry, but you know, people like, you can't go on missions. And that was my biggest fear. And so I was afraid to tell people that I wanted to go on a mission, but I felt like that was my only way to kind of make up for living that lifestyle and to be able to deserve and be worthy for a good guy. And so I was surprised when I went and talked to my bishop and I said, I'm here to confess about everything. And also, I really want to serve a mission. And, and it was a really great interview. And I know it's unlike a lot of interviews I've heard. You know, it was. I didn't have this feeling of interrogation at all. And I just told him that, you know, I've pretty much done everything. And he said, okay, that was it. And so that was a good experience for me when it came to confessing and I didn't have to go into detail about anything. And he's like, he just, you know, said, yeah, let's, let's work towards this. Let's give you a year and see how you do and, and we'll make this happen. So I spent the next year doing the exact same thing Sean did. I broke up with all my friends and the boyfriend and, and just. It was lonely. I agree. It becomes lonely because you lose all your friends and you're home on Friday and Saturday night reading your script.

Sean Escobar [00:55:07] Self righteous.

Crystal Escobar [00:55:08] You're reading your scriptures, friends, they think

Sean Escobar [00:55:10] you're just, they think you're just a self righteous person that judges them from that point forward.

Crystal Escobar [00:55:16] Yeah. So I spent a lot of time home alone reading scriptures and books. And I did one thing that did help me during that time was to train and run, train for a marathon. And I ran a marathon right before I got my mission call. But at the time, that was something that kept me busy from the loneliness and the. It was really. It's hard to change your life so dramatically and then to know that you're going to be leaving for a year and a half and to who knows where, that was a scary thought. But I just wanted so badly to be, to be a good person, you know, I just wanted to be seen as a good person. And I thought that's, that's the only way is to be Mormon and go on a mission, get married in the temple. And you know, being in the Utah culture, you just look around you and, and that's kind of your, your belief around what is a good person.

Sean Escobar [00:56:22] It almost was familiar, right?

Crystal Escobar [00:56:23] Yeah. Oh, Mormon, okay. If you're Mormon, you're a good person. I guess I gotta do that. So it really never had anything to do with having a testimony. I'm realizing, because I prayed a lot about is the church true? And I never got any powerful experiences.

John Dehlin [00:56:40] You'd get a tornado.

Crystal Escobar [00:56:41] No, no tornado for me.

Sean Escobar [00:56:43] Watch it.

Crystal Escobar [00:56:46] But, you know, I felt the spirit a lot, but I'm realizing that I felt the spirit on many different occasions that have nothing to do with the LDS Church. I feel the spirit when I hear an ambulance drive down the street because it makes me feel good to know that the humanity and the fact that people are going to save another person, you know, like that makes me feel the spirit, the love, you know, and the humanity. So I realized that I had always assigned that to the church and I gave that to the church, you know, that, oh, it must mean the church is true because I felt the spirit. But now I realize that I felt. Can feel the spirit all the time in all different ways. It's not about the church, really. So I, I went on my mission and I never felt like I was worthy enough to go on a mission. I felt like I was. I. Yeah, I was always comparing myself to all the other sister missionaries, thinking like, oh, they're way better than me. They know more of the scriptures because they've been spending the last five years reading their scriptures and I'm just barely started reading my scriptures. I learned about Joseph Smith's first vision in the men in the missionary training center. I mean, I remember hearing it in primary, but not really grasping it. And when I learned it in the missionary training center, I'm like, oh my gosh, I can't believe I didn't know this. And I'm going on a mission and I don't even know anything about Joseph Smith or the scriptures. I'm just doing this.

Sean Escobar [00:58:17] But she went through all young women's. And you, you did all of that?

Crystal Escobar [00:58:19] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:58:20] You were actually very involved for, for quite some time.

Crystal Escobar [00:58:24] Yeah, I did like young women's and girls camp. And. Yeah, I have a lot of good.

Sean Escobar [00:58:29] I think that's so brave of my wife to say, and we can talk about it a little later when we talk about our faith crisis. But I thought it was so brave of my wife to say I never really had a testimony. I looked at her and I thought. I just thought that's a courageous thing to say. I thought, well,

John Dehlin [00:58:49] I think it reflects for me your reflection on your life. But at the same time. And I remember having the same doubts, too, and not getting the answers that I wanted. But at some point you do submit to the process and you sort of say, well, I have a testimony. You're told the testimony is gained by burying it, and you start burying it, even though you don't really know it or believe it. And so it's not like you're going through this time thinking, I don't have a testimony.

Crystal Escobar [00:59:14] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:59:14] I mean, as a missionary, you can't. I thought, I have a testimony because that's right. How it's going to convert other people. Right.

Crystal Escobar [00:59:20] Yeah, it's. I definitely thought I had a pretty strong testimony because of the fact that I chose to go on a mission. And, you know, I felt like, of course I have to believe this if I'm going to, like, up and leave everything and just serve 24 7, give all my time to the church. So, yeah, I just assumed that I had one.

John Dehlin [00:59:43] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Crystal Escobar [00:59:44] Because I wanted to fit in and I wanted to be a good person and I wanted to deserve a good man to marry.

John Dehlin [00:59:50] Right. So how was your mission?

Crystal Escobar [00:59:52] It was. It was really.

John Dehlin [00:59:53] Tell us where you went.

Crystal Escobar [00:59:54] I went to Germany. East Germany.

John Dehlin [00:59:56] Oh, wow.

Crystal Escobar [00:59:57] Yeah, it was the Leipzig mission after

John Dehlin [00:59:59] the wall came down.

Crystal Escobar [01:00:00] Yeah. Now it's the Berlin Mission, but they combined it.

Sean Escobar [01:00:04] But, yeah, she had a Nazi, threatened to kill her.

Crystal Escobar [01:00:07] Yeah, he wanted to shoot us once he realized we were from America. It was definitely challenging, but I am still grateful for the experience because I learned so much. You know, the disciplines and the. The culture. Learning the culture and the language. And. Yeah, I'll never regret that experience because you learn so much, you grow so much. But it was very challenging. We didn't have. I got to participate in seven baptisms. Right. Like the last few weeks of my mission, which was really gratifying to. Okay, finally I get to see some baptisms. But in Germany, you don't typically baptize people that quickly. And so these people that got baptized had been taking the discussions for months, even years. So they just. I just happened to be there at the end.

John Dehlin [01:01:01] Jess Reagan writes, and you are a rock star. Missionary.

Crystal Escobar [01:01:04] Oh yeah. Jess.

John Dehlin [01:01:05] Jess, he says. Sorry, Sean.

Sean Escobar [01:01:07] That's a man. Jess is a man.

Crystal Escobar [01:01:12] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:01:26] Thank you for joining us today on Mormon Stories. If you enjoyed this episode, please help us make more like it by becoming a monthly subscriber@mormonstories.org. Alright to Be youe is a collaboration song by electronic musician Milo Craft and singer songwriter Angela Soph. In 2018, they founded the Be Moved Project to create music that helps people feel happy and connected. To hear more music or support the project by becoming a patron, please visit angelasof.com that's s o f f e dot com.

Sean Escobar [01:02:17] There is a love for the taking

Crystal Escobar [01:02:21] it's all right

Sean Escobar [01:02:26] these guys don't have

Crystal Escobar [01:02:27] to be you

Sean Escobar [01:02:30] Baby are somebody new when the lines are drawn in front of you

Crystal Escobar [01:02:41] to be you. It's all right to be you Shame,

John Dehlin [01:02:54] disbelief

Crystal Escobar [01:02:57] It says who you want to be but there is a wiser part of you I know you feel it too.

How Sean and Crystal Met and Married

Part 2 of 4 · Ep. 1107

John Dehlin [00:00:04] Mormon Stories is a production of the Open Stories foundation and relies solely upon the support of people like you, its listeners to help keep the podcast alive or to become a member of the community. Please become a monthly subscriber by visiting MormonStories.org and clicking on the donate button on the right side of the page under support. All contributions to Mormon Stories are completely tax deductible in the United States and go towards producing the podcast and building communities and programs of support for Mormons like you. Thanks for your support.

Crystal Escobar [00:00:50] So, yeah, that was my experience, and I got home and met Sean five months later.

John Dehlin [00:00:57] Where'd you guys meet?

Crystal Escobar [00:00:59] Go ahead.

Sean Escobar [00:01:00] Strip club.

Crystal Escobar [00:01:04] Yeah, I became a stripper right after my mission.

Sean Escobar [00:01:06] No, no, no, no. Okay, do you want me to tell it or you can tell it? I talked enough. You can tell.

Crystal Escobar [00:01:15] Okay.

Sean Escobar [00:01:15] Actually. Okay, let me say one part. I came home from that mission and my mission, and sorry to take over, but it was. It kind of precludes what she's going to say. I got married, John, right off my mission.

Crystal Escobar [00:01:26] Yeah, we almost forgot that. I almost forgot about that.

Sean Escobar [00:01:30] So I came home from my mission and I confessed. I confessed. And then I had this feeling, you know, the mission president was said, you go get married now. You know, and he was a close friend of mine. That's your new mission. Your new mission is to go find a wife. And then I got home, the bishop was saying, you know, time to get married. And my. My parents were, you know, they were obviously knowing my history, thought there was safety in marriage. And so I. I got married. Very. I think I. I kind of jumped into a marriage. I.

John Dehlin [00:02:10] Well, I mean, just sorry to cut off, but sure. You had. You were sexually active before your mission. You went two years putting that genie in the bottle. You're gonna explode when you get back. Uh, yeah. So, Mary, I mean, this is what. This is for everyone, but especially for you, Mary, as soon as possible or you're gonna transgress. That had to have been the messages you received?

Sean Escobar [00:02:31] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:02:31] Not take your time, get to know the person, make sure you're compatible, you know, make sure you're a good fit for each other. It's like freaking get married before you transgress.

Sean Escobar [00:02:41] That's right. And.

John Dehlin [00:02:42] And.

Sean Escobar [00:02:43] And I did. I. I in. In fact, I prayed and prayed and prayed, and. And I asked God who I should marry. And I actually felt that, you know, there was this one person that was involved in my life and had written me on my mission, and I thought that I was probably supposed to marry her. So I Did. And that only lasted five months, and we got it annulled. And she's a great person, and she comes from a great family, and it just was. But it wasn't a good fit. I went into a great, deep, dark depression for about three months. I hardly left the house. If I did leave, I brought my dog with me. I was a wreck, John. I always was supposed to be the person that was really good at things. I was the person that got the good grades, and I was the person that. Captain of the football team, had Division 1 college football scholarships. I was. Everything I did, I succeeded on the mission. And when I failed at that marriage, I felt like I was. I really did feel like for the first time in my life, I felt like an absolute failure. And I actually believed that everyone that knew me was pointing. Was not literally pointing their. But, you know, pointing their finger at me and laughing. That's how I felt.

John Dehlin [00:04:09] Yeah. There's this saying that I learned from Noah Rashetta and Secular Buddhism podcast that negative labels are lead chains, but positive labels are gold chains. But in the end, both are chains. Yeah. But before your mission, you're feeling worthless because you transgressed, and that's a chain that binds you. But then you're ap. On the mission, and, oh, you're redeemed and you're forgiven, and now you're a warrior of light, and. Well, what happens when things go wrong? The good labels can be just as much of a chain and a burden as the negative ones.

Sean Escobar [00:04:46] Yeah. And so then you can tell how we met.

Crystal Escobar [00:04:50] Yeah. Well, how long was it after I met you?

Sean Escobar [00:04:53] Eight months after I got divorced.

Crystal Escobar [00:04:55] Yeah. So we met actually the first time in high school through my best friend, the one I ended up moving to Arizona with.

Sean Escobar [00:05:04] So that's confusing because I just said we met eight.

Crystal Escobar [00:05:06] Okay, well.

Sean Escobar [00:05:08] But we bumped into each other.

Crystal Escobar [00:05:10] I knew of him because my best friend was really good friends with Shawn. They were buddies in high school, and so I always heard the name Sean Escobar. We bumped into each other a couple times, but there's not much.

Sean Escobar [00:05:25] The first time I saw her. This is fun. This makes me happy. On a bright note, I saw her when I was a sophomore in high school, and she was at my friend's house.

Crystal Escobar [00:05:33] Yeah, you a junior?

Sean Escobar [00:05:33] A junior. Okay. And she was getting in a car with an older boy, maybe like a senior. She was. We were sophomores, and I remember she walked out of the house, and I thought, who is that? Like, that girl is gorgeous. And then I remember thinking I should have her her best friend. I should have her introduce me. And then I had this thought, she looks like she's with a much older dude, and I don't think I stand a chance. So that never happened.

Crystal Escobar [00:06:00] Yeah. So we never really, like, got to know each other or hung out. I just knew of him and shooting, you know, they were good, you and Bren, I mean, not to mention names,

Sean Escobar [00:06:09] but your best friend. Yeah.

Crystal Escobar [00:06:10] Yeah. So, yeah, we. They kept in touch. My best friend and Sean kept in touch throughout his mission. And then so when I got home from my mission, she's like, we should go visit Sean Escobar, my friend. I'm like, oh, yeah, sure. And we went over to his house, and he happened to be like, on a double date at his house.

Sean Escobar [00:06:33] And John, I had straightened out my life. I mean, when I say straightened out, I was being good, but I mean, I thought the marriage had failed. And my new motivation was, I'm going to live the gospel perfectly. Everything. I'm going to do everything. Exact. And then God will bless me with a life that, you know, it's going to work out this next time. And that was. All I cared about was. Was finding my. My wife.

Crystal Escobar [00:07:02] Yeah. So we went to his house. And it was funny that Sean instantly was not paying too much attention to his date.

Sean Escobar [00:07:12] No, I was on a double date at the house.

Crystal Escobar [00:07:14] Right. Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:07:16] And I. I just. I just stopped paying any attention to my date whatsoever. And I, like, locked in on Crystal and I was like. So she said, I'm a return missionary. I was like, what? And then she's like, I do network marketing. And then I was like, wait a minute, like, I do network marketing. So we had that connection, and. And it was just unreal. I mean, it got so my date left. My. My date that I was with, she just said, hey, you know, looks like you want to catch up with these guys, I'm gonna leave. And I was like, okay, sorry. And so when we visited for an hour or so, a couple hours, and then I asked Crystal for her phone number before she left there.

Crystal Escobar [00:07:59] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:08:00] Yeah. Ooh, this is about to get pretty crazy, this story.

Crystal Escobar [00:08:06] Then he called me the next morning and asked me out. And I think it was a matter of like three dates, which is all within one week that we were like, we are getting married. And three months later, we were married.

Sean Escobar [00:08:21] I looked at Crystal. We were in my parents basement. It was our third date. And she said, I like you a lot. And I said, I love you. She goes, what? Is that possible? I said, I think so.

Crystal Escobar [00:08:32] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:08:33] Then we started talking about getting married.

Crystal Escobar [00:08:35] Yeah. Yeah. So I think everybody was a little shocked when we were like, yeah, we're getting married. We just started dating like a week ago, but we're engaged and we're getting married in three months.

Sean Escobar [00:08:46] So it was one of those storybook, movie type love stories.

Crystal Escobar [00:08:52] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:08:52] I knew John the minute she walked in my house. I knew she was the girl that I bumped into in high school. And I knew right then and there, I'm gonna marry this woman. And my best friend happened to be there. He was my best friend at our wedding, and he's since passed on. But after Crystal left, I met back up with him and he said, you're gonna marry that girl. And I said, I know. It's just how it went.

John Dehlin [00:09:18] Crystal, how did you overcome knowing he had been divorced?

Crystal Escobar [00:09:21] That was hard at first. I was not interested in him at first, only because of that. Just that first night.

John Dehlin [00:09:28] Damaged goods, right?

Crystal Escobar [00:09:29] Yeah. I was like, there's something wrong with him. You know, I instantly judged him and assumed that there's some issues there.

Sean Escobar [00:09:36] And there were some issues. Like, to be fair, like, early on in marriage is hard. And I look back on my first marriage and I. I didn't do anything. There was no infidelity, There was no violence. But, you know, I was pretty immature and. And I. I was there. I have regrets about that. It wasn't meant to be anyway. But I want to own the fact that, yeah, I. I was. I very much played a role in my divorce.

Crystal Escobar [00:10:06] Yeah. But I got over that really quickly because he's so awesome and amazing and handsome and. Yeah. We just had that connection instantly. Yeah. That first night we went, we got together, I was just like.

Sean Escobar [00:10:20] Yeah.

Crystal Escobar [00:10:20] It didn't bother me anymore knowing that he had been divorced. I just had.

Sean Escobar [00:10:23] We both had a passion for the gospel at the time. It did draw us together.

Crystal Escobar [00:10:27] Yeah. Yeah. It was really just like everything. My dreams were all coming true. I felt like I'm getting a returned missionary, we're getting married, and this is like so perfect, like, the happy ending,

John Dehlin [00:10:40] you know, that's what you had served your mission for.

Crystal Escobar [00:10:42] Yeah. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:10:42] You had activated back in the church for.

Sean Escobar [00:10:44] Yeah, it all came crumbling down.

John Dehlin [00:10:46] Yeah. So how to happen?

Crystal Escobar [00:10:48] Well, and I. I do still. I do believe that I. Both of us were supposed to be in the church and that, you know, if he felt like that was an answer to a prayer, I feel like that was an answer to a prayer. But I also feel like we're on the right path now. And I feel like that it was just part of our evolution and. And it's just a stepping stone in our spiritual development. And of course, there's some damaging parts that we've come to find out over the last year, working through everything. And we realize some things that really have affected us in a negative way that we didn't see until even more recently.

Sean Escobar [00:11:29] Right. We've been able to assign a lot of meaning to our experiences. As far as my answer to my prayer around the. The temple, the tornado, I've been able to assign some meaning to that. I actually do believe that God, you know, I don't think it was just an answer to my prayer. I think there was a whole host of people, not even Mormons, that were praying that day about things. And a tornado came. And I think I was supposed to be Mormon for a time. John.

Guest [00:12:01] Sure.

Crystal Escobar [00:12:01] Yeah. That's how we see it.

Guest [00:12:04] Sure.

Sean Escobar [00:12:05] And she wouldn't have been interested in me if I wasn't a returned missionary. And she's my one and only. She's my soulmate.

Crystal Escobar [00:12:11] It brought us together.

Sean Escobar [00:12:13] I was meant to find this woman, and I wouldn't have found her otherwise.

John Dehlin [00:12:21] I'm just going to interject one thing. Some people love it when I interject, and some people hate it. But I've been reading an author named Richard Rohr, and he has a book called Falling Upward, and he's a former Franciscan monk in the Catholic Church, and he's one of the world's experts in faith crises and disaffection. He's an advocate for maintaining your Christian faith if he can, and even maintaining affiliation with the church. But he talks about first half of life and second half of life, and he basically makes the argument that the first half of life is meant for you to, you know, to get a sense of self, to get an ego, to get an education, to get financially stable, to build a community, to build an identity, because you need all of that infrastructure to then go on that quest of your second half of life to figure out who you are and what you want to do and how to make the world a better place and to find meaning and purpose. But he makes the argument that religion is a great infrastructure for you to build up a sense of self and a stable life so that then you can lose your faith and go on a quest to find deeper and positive meaning. And, you know, I'd had this sense all along, but Richard Rohr kind of helped me put that into words, that that's why I don't hate religion, I don't hate Mormonism that's why I celebrate people who find happiness and joy in the church, because I really do believe that you guys are perfect examples of how, you know, what would your lives have been if you hadn't been in the church? Maybe it would have been better, maybe it would have been worse. But how could any of us, myself included, deny the value of. Of having an identity, having a morality that keeps you out of trouble, that keeps you safe, that gives you an education, that gives you a community, that gives you a sense of meaning and purpose, and that kind of focuses and targets you towards a constructive, healthy trajectory. And I think it's not only unhealthy, it's not only inaccurate, but it's unhealthy for us to then just say, well, Mormonism was all bad and all evil and. And a bad influence on our lives. No, I think. I think Richard Rohr, who's Catholic, not Mormon, would say Mormons do the first half of life better than almost anyone because it just. It can set you up. You know, of course, there are. There are examples of abuse and ways that the church really destroys people, but on average, the church sets you up for a really healthy, happy life if, you know, if things go decently for you.

Sean Escobar [00:14:52] I have one. Just one. I never liked church, John. From the time my mom used to make me go to. Through, even on my mission, I didn't like it. I don't like to put a suit and tie on. I don't like the formality. I don't like the authority. And so I agree with everything you just said. By and large, I do. But I will say there's some misfits and.

Crystal Escobar [00:15:14] Right.

Sean Escobar [00:15:14] And I was a misfit. And all I did for 20 adult years of my life was wonder what was wrong with me.

John Dehlin [00:15:21] Right. Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:15:22] But everything else you said, I agree with it. And it. It taught us good disciplines and good morals and values, like you said, and gave us a good culture. I love Mormon people. They're my people.

John Dehlin [00:15:32] Right.

Crystal Escobar [00:15:34] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:15:34] And also. But I'm even gonna. I'm not gonna push back, but I'm just gonna say to you, Sean, you know, socioeconomically, you're in the 99th percentile of the world. Right. Right now, the Escobar are. And you were as active, devout Mormons. And so to what extent. Can you just say the church had nothing positive to do with the fact that you're among the most fortunate people on the planet right now? Right. I. Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:15:59] I don't know how to. Yeah. I don't know if I could quantify that.

Guest [00:16:02] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:16:02] Well, and I'm. I've never been the victim of the abuses that you have and I didn't have to deal with the self loathing.

Sean Escobar [00:16:08] And let's put it this way. I know, I know more wildly successful geniuses outside of Mormonism than I do in it.

John Dehlin [00:16:19] Of course. Because Mormons are a small percentage of the population.

Sean Escobar [00:16:22] That's right.

John Dehlin [00:16:23] Yeah. And I'm not making the argument that you need to be religious to become a good person.

Crystal Escobar [00:16:28] Yeah. The first half of your life.

John Dehlin [00:16:29] But.

Sean Escobar [00:16:30] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:16:31] So anyway, thanks for your indulgence. So. But my sense is your courtship was not uncomplicated, that there became some complications in your courtship.

Sean Escobar [00:16:39] Why would you think that?

John Dehlin [00:16:41] Just a little homework that I've done.

Crystal Escobar [00:16:44] We.

John Dehlin [00:16:45] Because you'd both been sexually active.

Crystal Escobar [00:16:47] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:16:47] And you're madly in love with each other.

Crystal Escobar [00:16:48] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:16:49] That genie had been in the bottle for a couple years.

Crystal Escobar [00:16:51] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:16:52] You've got a. You've got some common sense there. Yes. So we, Crystal and I, we tried so hard to be good and to wait till our wedding day, which was, you know.

Crystal Escobar [00:17:05] Yeah. We couldn't even wait three months.

Sean Escobar [00:17:07] We couldn't wait three months. And we, we succumbed to the temptation, I guess we'll call it, and we immediately went in.

Premarital Choices and Church Discipline

John Dehlin [00:17:16] Okay, wait, I have a question. So you're both returned missionaries, you're both really into the church. You're both feeling like God is putting you together and then you have sex.

Sean Escobar [00:17:26] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:17:26] What goes through your mind and what emotions do you feel? Forget the bishop. Between the actual sex and the bishop, what goes through your mind after you've fornicated? You know what I mean?

Crystal Escobar [00:17:38] Well, initially I felt really bad and, and upset. You know, I'd come so far and now I'm messing it all up. But at the same time, I think I. I was justifying it in my mind, like, well, I'm in love with him. We're getting married. You know, like, why do I have to feel.

Sean Escobar [00:17:58] I don't think justification is the right word. I think it's confusion, it's confusing.

John Dehlin [00:18:01] Yeah.

Crystal Escobar [00:18:01] Maybe it's just back and forth, like feeling bad, but also. But why do I have to feel bad?

Sean Escobar [00:18:05] It doesn't feel wrong, it doesn't feel evil. And yet you're taught and told that it's like one of the chastity. Breaking the law of chastity is, you know, right up there. And especially when you've been next to murder. Right. So I think that we were very conflicted, but we felt really bad, John. And we went and confessed it right away.

Crystal Escobar [00:18:26] Right away.

John Dehlin [00:18:26] And so you didn't. You didn't do the same thing and hide it this time?

Sean Escobar [00:18:30] Well, there was no need to hide it. We did what we thought was the right thing.

Crystal Escobar [00:18:36] Yeah. So we confessed. And then. So we knew we weren't right. Then right away we knew we weren't able to get married in the temple.

Sean Escobar [00:18:43] We could have hidden it. We could have hidden it and gone and got married in the temple. We could have done that.

Crystal Escobar [00:18:47] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:18:47] For your mission.

Crystal Escobar [00:18:48] So we knew right away that, okay, that's, you know, that's gone out the door. We're not gonna get married in the temple. And then at that point we're like, well, then why would we stop having sex?

Sean Escobar [00:19:03] Okay, we're being honest.

Crystal Escobar [00:19:06] So we just threw in the towel all together, I think.

Sean Escobar [00:19:09] But at the same time, John, we can laugh about it, but every time we'd have sex, we'd feel bad. It felt good. Then we'd feel bad. It was very hard,

John Dehlin [00:19:23] and it should. And Natasha Alfer Parker has a great podcast where she tells her own story about falling in love with this young man in high school, having this wonderful, beautiful sexual experience, and how that should have just been a beautiful, healthy, normal, developmental sexual experience, but instead it gets layered with this incredible guilt and shame that spoils what could have just been something beautiful.

Sean Escobar [00:19:48] Yeah, it was humiliating to get. Well, we. We had to. I had. I had to go through a church council. John, we can talk about that. Because some things happened in that that were very unsettling.

John Dehlin [00:19:57] No, we need to talk about it, but, but whatever you want to talk about.

Sean Escobar [00:20:00] I don't want to. So.

John Dehlin [00:20:01] What. What?

Sean Escobar [00:20:03] I think I'm a pretty, pretty much,

Crystal Escobar [00:20:04] you know, open talk about that.

Sean Escobar [00:20:05] Pretty much an open book at this, at this point in time. But where was I going? So we.

Crystal Escobar [00:20:16] You had to go through the.

Sean Escobar [00:20:16] It was humiliating to get married civilly, John. Like, her mission president came to our wedding, and it was humiliating to get married civilly. And it was sad. It's really sad because especially all your

John Dehlin [00:20:27] families, like all these triumphant return missionaries.

Sean Escobar [00:20:29] You know how we paid for our wedding. Like, her family had no money. Her dad didn't contribute, not a cent. And my parents, you know, I'm a boy, so they're not supposed to pay for it. But my parents were so generous and they said, you can have a yard sale with everything we have and you can keep all the money for your wedding. That's so sweet. Now that I think about it, it's really awesome. And so we had a two day garage sale and we raised, I think it was $4,000. And that's what paid for the whole wedding was $4,000. And what should have been a really, really fun, exciting, awesome day there, there was that what, how do you say, something hovering over cloud. Yes.

Crystal Escobar [00:21:13] Yeah. I was, I was a little embarrassed, you know, to see my, you know, people know when they come in, they're like, congratulations. I'm like, thank you. You know, so there's a little. There's a lot of embarrassment and shame having to see them at my wedding.

Sean Escobar [00:21:29] My past bishops were there. It's humiliating.

John Dehlin [00:21:33] Yeah. And it's so public, you know.

Crystal Escobar [00:21:35] Yeah. It's just like everybody knows, you know?

John Dehlin [00:21:39] Yeah. That's so hard. Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:21:42] Yeah. We had to go through a church council. Do you want me to go into that?

John Dehlin [00:21:48] Yeah, please.

Sean Escobar [00:21:49] Okay. Crystal. Which I was so grateful that they. They kind of just gave Crystal a slap on the wrist. I was very happy about that. And me, I probably had a little mark on my record, John, because I'd lied about that going on my mission. And when I came and confessed that I probably had a mark on my record and I did have to go through a church council at that time, too. And they kind of, you know, they showed me mercy. That time.

John Dehlin [00:22:26] Right after your mission, you went through a council.

Sean Escobar [00:22:28] I did.

John Dehlin [00:22:29] And you weren't disfellowshipped?

Crystal Escobar [00:22:30] No.

John Dehlin [00:22:30] Okay.

Sean Escobar [00:22:31] They showed me mercy, I think, I think anyway, that none of that really matters why they showed me mercy, but I was grateful this time. I had to go through a church council. This particular stake president was very invasive. He wanted lots of details. I had to meet with him. I want to say it might have been weekly, it might have been every other week, but a lot. And we were. We got married and I had to meet with him a lot. And he would ask a lot of questions that I think in hindsight were inappropriate. He asked a lot of questions about what we did in the bedroom. Now, what's unfortunate about that is this was not someone like a one night stand. This was not someone that I wasn't committed to. And this was absolutely consensual. But this was someone that I loved and was engaged to and ultimately married and was committed to. And I was asked a lot of questions about what we did in the bedroom.

Crystal Escobar [00:23:29] Yeah. Even after we were married, because I think we went through the council because I.

Sean Escobar [00:23:32] Because I still had to read. I was in this, you know, this repentance process. And I had to keep meeting with him for like a Year. And. And it got to the point where I was disturbed by the questions he was asking me and very confused.

John Dehlin [00:23:45] Why do you. Are you comfortable sharing the questions? Because I think that really brings it home when you.

Sean Escobar [00:23:51] I'll share one of them. One of the questions was this was the one that. That when I finally just said, enough is enough, you know, I'm pretty outspoken, and. And I don't. I don't like stuff like that.

John Dehlin [00:24:04] So just to give for those. Ultimately, give us.

Sean Escobar [00:24:08] Ultimately. He looked at me and he said, when you're having sex, does. Does your wife ever give you oral sex? And then he wanted me to describe how often and what does that look like? And that's when I finally said, I'm not. I don't want to talk about this stuff anymore. Like, this is my. I'm married now, and if I wasn't married, I'd feel inclined to talk about it. But as far as I'm concerned, what happens in the bedroom behind closed doors is my business. And then I think that pretty much shut him down. And that was the end of those kinds of ridiculous questions in the council. Something happened in the council, John. The disciplinary council or court. Something happened that stuck with me all this time. I went through the whole thing. I was very penitent. I felt horrible about what I'd done and that I'd done it to Crystal. And I remember we went through the whole council, and, you know, there's like 15 men in there or something like that, and 12, 15 men, and they're all, you know, going around, and they were being very kind, and they were being very understanding. And then all of a sudden, it was almost over. And I thought, well, I felt like this went well. And then all of a sudden, this one man, he was probably in his 30s. He was young. He was young to be in there. I was only 20, 24 at the time. And he looked at me and he goes, wait, wait, wait, everybody. I've got one question that I want to. Before we end this. I've got a question. He looks at me, and he, like, looked at me with this, like, stare, like. Like he's trying to look through me or something. And he goes, you're a returned missionary. You took out endowment. You did the endowment. You took out covenants with your heavenly Father. Sacred covenants, Eternal covenants. And he goes, I just want you to tell us what went through your mind when you took off those sacred emblems, those sacred garments and put them on the floor. And that's how he said it, John. And I think at that point, I felt like. What I felt like saying John, I'm glad I get to say it here, because I can be witty. I'm not as witty as is a lot of people, but I wouldn't have sworn at him, but I would have looked him in the eyes. What I did say was I wasn't thinking. That's what I said. I wasn't thinking. And nothing really went through my mind. I just did what I did. But what I wanted to say, what actually was in there but didn't come out was, hey, you know exactly what wasn't going through my mind. And you know exactly what was going through my mind. Because you're human. And every single one of the men in this room, you all know exactly what happened, because you've all done it to some extent. That's what I wanted to say.

Crystal Escobar [00:27:11] Well, I don't know if everyone. John was a virgin before he got married.

Sean Escobar [00:27:15] No, no, no. Done it to some extent. Oh, we've all done things we know we're not supposed to do. We've all like, all.

John Dehlin [00:27:22] He's trying to shame you.

Sean Escobar [00:27:23] He's basically all those men. Every man in there has looked at pornography. Everyone. I know that. But they're gonna look at me and judge me and cast stones. And that was hard for me at that. At that moment. That was really hard for me to tolerate. And I actually. I think they disfellowshipped me. And so I.

John Dehlin [00:27:42] What does that mean to someone who's not Mormon?

Sean Escobar [00:27:44] I couldn't take the sacrament, which is

John Dehlin [00:27:47] a very public shaming act. Right?

Sean Escobar [00:27:48] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:27:49] The whole congregation is in your mind watching. And each Sunday as they pass the sacrament, you've got to let it go by. And it's like this big scarlet letter that's branded upon you, right?

Crystal Escobar [00:28:00] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:28:00] Yeah. I couldn't hold a calling, which means I couldn't serve, couldn't pray in public.

John Dehlin [00:28:05] And then people say, what's your calling? And you're like. I mean, the different mechanisms the Mormon Church has to heap guilt and shame upon people is profound, you know, and so just imagine when you're disfellowshipped. Hey, brother, you know, Brother Escobar, would you say the prayer today? Oh, I can't say the prayer.

Sean Escobar [00:28:26] That's right.

John Dehlin [00:28:26] Right.

Sean Escobar [00:28:27] That's exactly what happens.

John Dehlin [00:28:28] And so people are like, well, oh, shot Ken.

Crystal Escobar [00:28:30] What did he do?

John Dehlin [00:28:31] What did he do wrong? You know, that's what happens. And. And the ironic thing, and I was going to mention this earlier, that. Is that what this breeds In Mormonism is a culture of dishonesty where the honest people who. Who admit to doing something wrong are. Are punished in a public shaming way. And then the other people see that and they're like, well, I'm just gonna lie. And so the church. And so those people who do make the mistakes, they don't get the public punishment, but they've been reinforced to lie. And then they have to go through their ward experience living the shame that you lived on your mission, Sean. So it's kind of a lose, lose. The honest people are shamed and humiliated, and then, you know, the dishonest people are rewarded, but then reinforced to be dishonest and then have to live with the shame. It's just. It's a shame. Cluster F. Sean, you're getting emotional. What are you feeling?

Sean Escobar [00:29:56] I just felt never. I never felt like I was a spiritual one. I would look at all these leaders and I would think, these are the spiritual ones, and I'm the one that's fallen and I don't have the spirit, and I'm always going uphill. I'm always pushing against the grain. I'm always. I'm the misfit. Even in my adult years, I look at these men and I hate to stereotype, because a lot of Mormon people are good people, and a lot of Mormon men are really good people. The majority of Mormon bishops are as good as they come. But there are some. There are some pretty hypocritical people at a church level that aspire to callings, and I'm familiar with some of those people.

John Dehlin [00:30:41] We're going to get to that when we talk about Sterling, right?

Sean Escobar [00:30:44] Yeah, but not just him. I mean, at every. At every level. And I see it and I sense it and I pick up on it, and I see what they do in business, and I see how they get into these callings, and I see the politics involved. And yet, you know, my own children, John, it killed me for years. My oldest is 13, and it's killed me for years to think that my daughter will be taught her entire life who is spiritual. And I'm not one of them, John. Because I have a mark on my record, John. I'm a very successful person. I've had wild success. And I don't say that to be arrogant or to boast, but God's given me gifts. And I've never valued beyond my mission. I was never valued in the Mormon Church. I spent. I spent 10 years in the Scouts. I never had a meaningful calling, or what some people call a Meaningful calling. I'm a nobody. I was a nobody. And my children, it killed me, John. Every time we'd go to church, it'd kill me to think, my children, they look up at these men, and those are the spiritual men. And what is that? What is that? They killed me. And it caused the most contention in our marriage. If we're going to get into. That was the church. Because I saw everything that. For years, for. For 10 years, I saw everything that was wrong socially, culturally, administratively with the church. And I would voice it to Crystal, and she would shut me down big time because she thought that's what she was supposed to do.

John Dehlin [00:32:19] So in a sense, the humiliation, the public humiliation of the disfellowship meant was this additional blow of just you feeling unworthy and broken and defective and eventually that leaves a scar. What's ironic, I just have to note something. If the atonement works as we're taught, which is that you're, you know, the scriptures say white as the snow, you know, as you were scarlet, now you're white as snow. If that's true, what you had done on, you know, prior on your mission and would have not mattered because you had been totally forgiven.

Crystal Escobar [00:32:53] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:32:54] So technically, the fact that you guys both transgressed, you know, after your missions, you're on. You're on equal. Equal level. So the fact that Crystal, you got off and were exonerated for the same sexual acts, I'm assuming that. That he engaged in, that makes no logical sense.

Crystal Escobar [00:33:12] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:33:12] Like, yes, Sean, you're gracious in saying you're glad she was spared that humiliation. And we all are glad that you were spared that.

Crystal Escobar [00:33:20] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:33:20] But at the same time, according to logic, you didn't deserve that any. Any worse than she did. And so yet you're facing it. And now there's this. This disparity of worthiness. And then because we're in this patriarchy and everything's so arbitrary, you're carrying that scarlet letter of having begun your marriage, something that's supposed to be pure and holy and sacred and beautiful. You're starting off on the foot of unworthiness and shame. And then you're again always caught in this worthiness treadmill of always hustling for worthiness, like you said. And this goes, you know, this strikes at the heart. And those of you who are still, you know, orthodox Christians are really believers. I'll have to ask your forgiveness in advance. We all think the story of Jesus is beautiful. We all are inspired by these stories of Christ and compassion and kindness and love and forgiveness. Good on all that. I still am a believer in all those good teachings. There is something fundamentally insidious about the teachings around the need for an atonement, because what it does is Christianity begins with the assumption that we're all broken, born flawed. Born broken and flawed.

Crystal Escobar [00:34:39] And.

John Dehlin [00:34:39] And unintentionally, I'll just say, in a charitable mindset. You know, I'm sure religions don't intend to do this, but they want to break you down and make you feel worthless and flawed so that you need them, you need the religion to then feel worthy. And so they're always got you on this. This carrot and stick where they're holding you up to these expectations you usually can't possibly live by. Then you feel unworthy. Then they beat you and punish you to make you feel terrible so that then you feel like you need them to be worthy. And it's a sick cycle. And as beautiful as we all have associations with Jesus and Christianity, there's something toxic about this teaching of an atonement. We're all broken, so we need a savior figure to make us whole. What if we're just whole to begin with, but instead you're now living this beautiful life, always feeling broken and flawed.

Sean Escobar [00:35:37] Absolutely. That was very well said.

Guest [00:35:39] And

Sean Escobar [00:35:41] thank you. Your knowledge, really. Crystal said this from the first time she listened to Mormon stories. She said that you're brilliant and you really are.

John Dehlin [00:35:54] Well, back to your story. So this marriage, you begin again. You're just on the shame wheel, right? And as a priesthood holder in a patriarchy, which is also messed up, the wife's looking to the husband to be the worthy priesthood holder, and you're starting off just. Just flawed and soiled and broken spiritually. Right.

Sean Escobar [00:36:16] We wanted to be. We wanted to be righteous. I mean, like our second date, we went to the temple and did an endowment session. I mean, that's what we did.

Crystal Escobar [00:36:23] We.

Sean Escobar [00:36:23] We wanted to be good. We wanted to be worthy. And it's. John, if we're being honest, let me say my opinion. I would Bet that over 50% of active Mormons did stuff before they got married. I know people and I know what drives them. And the fact. Listen, at least I got to go. Get it out. These people are living hell. I know how they're feeling because I spent my mission living in literal hell thinking God was unhappy with me. Any man that's in a leadership position, John, and he's hiding stuff. You are as sick as your secrets. And these guys, they're human. And it doesn't make them bad people, John. It doesn't make them bad people. Some of them don't feel like, like, like we need to talk about later, about when I told Crystal just recently that I viewed pornography.

John Dehlin [00:37:21] No, we'll get there. Let's not talk now.

Sean Escobar [00:37:23] Let's not talk about it. I was just saying that these guys, what they did, it doesn't necessarily make them bad people, but they are. They have their hands tied, John. I felt I couldn't be honest to go on that mission, and so I lied. An honest, brutally honest person, I'm an open book, right? I mean, I'm really an honest person. But when you tie someone's hands up and you back them in a corner and, and you basically don't give them the option, good people will lie. Yeah, I.

John Dehlin [00:37:54] And that's. And just by the way, my understanding is that Utah has one of the highest rates of sex abuse and child abuse in the country.

Sean Escobar [00:38:07] Top three per capita, Top three in every category.

John Dehlin [00:38:10] And how can it not be that this culture of shame and guilt and oppression, right? And literally teaching people to lie and demonizing sex and making sex perverted and focusing hyper focusing on sex, how can that not contribute to a culture that would lead to higher rates of sexual abuse of children?

Sean Escobar [00:38:31] Yeah, right.

John Dehlin [00:38:32] So anyway, keep going. Sorry.

Sean Escobar [00:38:34] We never felt like we really fit in those years. We tried so hard to serve. If we were Sunday school teachers, I mean, we were the voted. We were really trying every. And her especially, I mean, Crystal, bless her heart, she gave everything to her callings. And she tried to be the perfect mom and do all the family home evenings and I mean, you were a stalwart. Like you wore yourself out. Crystal wore herself out trying to be that perfect mom that did every Mormon thing exact to the table. And sometimes I felt, Crystal, I felt like I was unworthy of you. Sometimes I felt like you were better than me. I actually believed that. I believed you were better than me. And sometimes, like if I saw her reading her scriptures, I would say I would have a feeling inside of me that because I never enjoyed reading scriptures, I didn't like it. It never really appealed to me, that kind of language, that ancient archaic way of talking, I don't like it. I never enjoyed it, you know, and so I would rather read like modern day talks and stuff. But Crystal, I mean, she was devout, she did everything to the T for all those years. And sometimes I would think she's just trying to be better than me. She's just trying to show me up. She's reading her Scriptures in front of me just to make me feel bad. And it wasn't the case. She was just trying to do what was asked.

Starting Marriage Under Shame and Pressure

John Dehlin [00:40:00] So, Crystal, let me ask. So you start your marriage off, number one, with this disfellowship meant and this sense of shame and the public shaming of you, not of you, having to get married outside the temple. And then Sean receives the disciplinary council punishments. Tell me in your mindset how that set up your early marriage in terms of power, in terms of perception, worthiness, your goals and aspirations, what's going through your mind as all this is happening and then you're starting to, you know, start a family.

Crystal Escobar [00:40:32] Yeah. I don't think in the beginning I really had.

Sean Escobar [00:40:38] We were overwhelmed with, with, with having. We had children early.

Crystal Escobar [00:40:42] Yeah. Right away we started having kids. And I don't think I ever thought, is he doing his part as the, the patriarch of the home? That came, that came later, probably more like 10 years into the marriage. And I started as our kid. We had all of our kids. And I felt like, okay, we have our family now. We need to be doing our part as parents to raise these kids as good, worthy Mormons. So I started to become a little more proactive about our role. Because when you're having babies, I don't think you're really thinking much about family home evenings and getting to church every Sunday.

John Dehlin [00:41:19] It's in survival mode.

Crystal Escobar [00:41:20] Yeah. Now I'm like, okay, we got our kids and let's. What can we do to make sure that we are checking off all the boxes?

Sean Escobar [00:41:28] I was, I was trying early on. I was making such an effort. Right. I was really trying. And I think the breaking point for me, the tipping point was that temple. Temple worker calling.

Crystal Escobar [00:41:39] Oh, yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:41:39] And that, that just.

John Dehlin [00:41:42] But keep, but keep talking. So, so first is the kids. But then what?

Crystal Escobar [00:41:46] Then, yeah, so I started having these high expectations. Suddenly I started realizing, wait a minute, he's not being that patriarch of the home that I had envisioned, you know, when we first got married. And like I said, we hadn't. I hadn't really thought much about it until this point. And I wanted him to be more diligent about making sure we get to church every Sunday because we would miss it. And it was just kind of like, should we go today? Like, let's go boating instead, you know, so we had some. We, we went for the most part, but we weren't afraid to be like, let's just skip it today and go boating.

Sean Escobar [00:42:22] You know, the first few years, we, we never did.

Crystal Escobar [00:42:24] Yeah, we, we really it wasn't until I. I was.

Sean Escobar [00:42:28] I was supposedly called as a temple worker.

Crystal Escobar [00:42:30] Oh, I think that really.

Sean Escobar [00:42:31] That was critical.

Crystal Escobar [00:42:33] Yeah. That really affected you. About five years into our marriage, I think. Or maybe. Yeah, was about five years or five years.

John Dehlin [00:42:38] Okay, so you're saying early on, you. You weren't.

Sean Escobar [00:42:41] It was like. It was like three years.

Crystal Escobar [00:42:42] Oh, okay.

John Dehlin [00:42:42] Early on, you weren't shaming him or seeing him as inferior. You were just trying to raise the kids and survive.

Crystal Escobar [00:42:48] I felt like we were spiritual and we were doing our best.

Sean Escobar [00:42:51] I was working hard at it, too.

Crystal Escobar [00:42:52] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:42:54] But I think what this might reflect is even if Crystal's super happy with you or just overwhelmed with life, all that baggage of shame and of judgment is probably leaving you continually feeling unworthy, always. So even a look from her could be interpreted by you as something, even if it's not meant that way. Yeah.

Crystal Escobar [00:43:17] Yeah. Did you want to talk about the. That calling? Because that's kind of like before that

Sean Escobar [00:43:23] happened, before I was called. I was called into the bishop. It was about three years after we got married, and I was called into the bishop, and he said. Exactly. He said exactly. He said, sean, the Lord has called you to be a temple worker. And I literally went like this. John, really? And he said, yes. And, John, I think I probably even. I was just, like, overwhelmed. I didn't cry. I didn't used to cry, but I remember going home, John, and I was on cloud nine. And I went. I felt so proud.

Crystal Escobar [00:44:16] He's getting out 15 years of tears that he's been holding in.

Sean Escobar [00:44:23] I went home, and I was so excited to go into my house and to find Crystal and to say, I'm a temple worker. So happy. And I finally thought that God knew me and that I was finally forgiven for all the things I'd done and for the lie and

John Dehlin [00:44:46] because surely God wouldn't call you to the holy place.

Sean Escobar [00:44:48] I mean, to me, a temple worker. To me, a temple worker was as big as it got for me. I mean, I thought, wow, like, this is amazing.

John Dehlin [00:44:57] Was this Draper?

Crystal Escobar [00:44:58] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:44:58] So the Draper Temple had been built.

Sean Escobar [00:45:00] No, no, not yet.

John Dehlin [00:45:02] West Jordan.

Sean Escobar [00:45:03] I would have been at the

Crystal Escobar [00:45:06] South

Sean Escobar [00:45:06] Jordan, whatever it is.

Crystal Escobar [00:45:09] South Jordan, isn't it?

John Dehlin [00:45:10] Yeah.

Crystal Escobar [00:45:11] Oh, is it?

Sean Escobar [00:45:12] Thank you. Oh, my gosh. I know, because I've been in. Yeah, we got sealed there.

Crystal Escobar [00:45:17] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:45:20] About a couple. I told everyone, John. I told everyone. I was so excited. I just felt redeemed. And then a few days later, I got a call that I needed to come back into the bishop. So put on my Suit. And I went back into the bishop and he said, sean, you know what? And you got to consider at first he said, the Lord has called you. That's how it was put to me. And then he called me back in and he said, Sean, your mother in law and your father in law, they're the ones that recommended that you be a temple worker. And I said, oh, wasn't aware of that. And then he said, I just found out that you can't be a temple worker because you were divorced in the last five years and you're on a probation. And John, I. Yeah, that was, that

Crystal Escobar [00:46:27] really affected your testimony.

Sean Escobar [00:46:29] It did.

John Dehlin [00:46:30] What did that do?

Sean Escobar [00:46:32] Well, for one, I thought. I thought the Lord called me. What happened? Not only did the Lord not call me, I was recommended. And not only did the Lord not call me.

John Dehlin [00:46:44] And he only told you that when he had to explain why it was.

Crystal Escobar [00:46:47] Never mind.

John Dehlin [00:46:48] He didn't tell, you know. Right.

Sean Escobar [00:46:52] I'm sorry. It's just not funny to me. I hate it.

John Dehlin [00:46:54] I'm sorry.

Sean Escobar [00:46:55] It's really, really a bad part of my history. And you're right, crystal. You know, 2020 hindsight is 20 20.

John Dehlin [00:47:04] So you were upset because you thought it was called of God. What else?

Sean Escobar [00:47:09] Um,

Crystal Escobar [00:47:12] and because of the fact that you. Because of your marriage, that didn't work out, John.

Sean Escobar [00:47:19] It was at that point I realized that there's no redemption. I did my time, John. I went through that counsel. It was humiliating. And at that time I realized that the atonement didn't work for me. I wasn't forgiven. And I realized that I would have a notch or a mark on my record for the rest of my life. And I. And that I was going to pay a price for that throughout my, my whole life.

Crystal Escobar [00:47:51] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:47:52] So what did that, what did you conclude from that?

Sean Escobar [00:47:55] I just started to get jaded.

Crystal Escobar [00:47:57] I think he. Yeah, after that, I think I could tell he just had kind of more of a negative attitude about things. And it started to really bug me. I would get really annoyed if he ever said anything critical about the church or one of the leaders. You know, even if he like said, I hate the way that his voice sounds.

Sean Escobar [00:48:17] I feel like, well, I didn't like the spiritual voices in church. I don't agree with that. I don't like how a person can talk one way. It's no different than a news anchor. A news anchor. I mean, are they really going to get up, hey, everybody, now we're gonna go to the bathroom and we're going to eat our cereal like how come the spiritual voice is employed? Like, I never liked it. It didn't make sense to me. And there's a whole host of cultural things that they do that Mormons do that never added up to me. And I would mention them to Crystal and she would get very. Oh, man, you are not allowed to say anything. Pot.

Crystal Escobar [00:48:55] Yeah. Like if. If you even said, like, that was a really boring talk from a general conference, you know, I'd be like, how could you say that? Like, you can't.

Sean Escobar [00:49:03] Or if. If the church would come down on gays, I would. I would speak up about it. Or, you know, there was all kinds of issues that I would speak up about all these issues all the time. And it got to the point where I think at one point we got in such a big fight. Big fight. Biggest of our marriage.

Crystal Escobar [00:49:18] Five years ago, I thought we were

Sean Escobar [00:49:20] going to get divorced. I left. And the reason I left was because I thought, I'm not what she wants. I'm not what she dreamed of. And I left and I went to my cabin and I stayed there. I think it was three days up there. And I remember I was up there and I was just thinking, I can't be myself. I can't be who I am. And I remember I got a call from my dad. He said, what are you doing? I said, I told him, because I tell my parents everything, my whole life. And he said, sean, listen to me. He said, you're gonna. He basically said, is it worth losing your marriage over? And I decided it wasn't. And so I began to stuff everything down. I came home and I began to do my best, my very best, to bury every critical feeling, everything that was out of alignment. Anytime I didn't agree with what was done, I would try to bury. Keep in mind, we had many fights about religion, but that one was the tipping point. That one was where I finally realized this could end in divorce.

John Dehlin [00:50:46] Thank you for joining us today on Mormon Stories. If you enjoyed this episode, please help us make more like it by becoming a monthly subscriber@mormonstories.org. Alright to Be you is a collaboration song by electronic musician Milo Craft and singer songwriter Angela Sof. In 2018, they founded the Be Moved Project to create music that helps people feel happy and connected. To hear more music or support the project by becoming a patron, please visit angelasoaf.com that's s-f f e.com There is

Guest [00:51:24] a light beyond the shore Calling to you once more this is, this is the life you're making There is a love for the taking it's all right these guys don't have to be you Baby, you're somebody new when the lions are drawing friends of you you always all right to be. It's all right to be you Shame, disbelief it says who you want to be but there is a wise part of you I know you feel it too.

Early Doubts and Encountering the CES Letter

Part 3 of 4 · Ep. 1108

John Dehlin [00:00:04] Mormon Stories is a production of the Open Stories foundation and relies solely upon the support of people like you, its listeners to help keep the podcast alive or to become a member of the community. Please become a monthly subscriber by visiting MormonStories.org and clicking on the Donate button on the right side of the page under support. All contributions to Mormon Stories are completely tax deductible in the United States and go towards producing the podcast and building communities and programs of support for Mormons like you. Thanks for your support. There had to have been some cracks in how you perceive the church and leadership and everything. You know, at some point, at some point.

Sean Escobar [00:00:59] I read the CES letter in 2013. I read it right when it came out, John.

John Dehlin [00:01:03] Okay, so, so, and this is the point I'm making, like for a long time when you're on this guilt and shame cycle, it's always me. It's always me. It's always me. It sounds like that, that erroneous and egregious temple calling and then withdrawal and exclusion. Am I right in understanding that that maybe started some cracks in your faith where you're like, wait a minute, this whole time I've been saying I'm the problem major. And so what? Talk about that mindset. So what year was that temple calling about approximately?

Sean Escobar [00:01:39] Would have been around 2007.

John Dehlin [00:01:42] So between 2007 and 2000 and let's just say 14ish, some things start changing. So just really quickly describe those seven years. What happens to how you view the church and how you view yourself and how you view your family in the church. And Crystal, I want to hear your perspective of those seven years.

Sean Escobar [00:02:05] Those seven years I began to be very suspicious of church leaders. Very much so, yeah. I began to think that a lot of them were just putting on a face. I began to think that there was this hierarchy and I didn't like how people, people glorified the brethren, as they call it. I didn't like it. I started to see church leadership for what it was. And what it was was a bunch of imperfect men hiding behind a mantle. It's like almost like a self proclaimed, self endowed mantle. I can't fathom I couldn't fathom even then. You know what I started to think? Okay, I'm glad you said this, because this is coming out. I started to think that the church isn't true, but it was. It used to be. And the tornado and all my mission service and my testimony was all based on Joseph Smith and the early church. But I started to believe that Something had gone wrong along the way and I hadn't read anything. I just had a feeling, John. I had a feeling that somewhere along the way we've gotten away from the truth. And because I didn't, I no longer believe that the brethren, as they call them, the quorum of the twelve and the first presidency. I no longer believed in my heart that they were literally God's prophet and apostles. I couldn't. I don't see it. Because there's no miracles, John. Show me the miracles. Show me the healing. Show me the revelation. I mean, two hour church. This is your revelation. I mean, and we celebrate two hour church. Why don't you celebrate four hours church? If church is so good for you and you love it so much, why do they all throw a celebration for two hour church? It makes no sense. And why are they all begging for coffee to be legalized? You know, like none of it makes any sense. John, you're getting me a little fired up now.

John Dehlin [00:04:01] Sorry, go back to that seven year. So you're starting to feel like it might not be true, but you're in this marriage and you're surrounded by this culture. And so it's. What does that do to you? So how does that. How do you start to behave as a result of this cognitive dissonance?

Sean Escobar [00:04:18] I didn't want to go to church. I would try to find every excuse to get out of going. If when I had callings, I wouldn't fulfill them, not like I used to. I wouldn't magnify them. I would just do the bare minimum.

Crystal Escobar [00:04:30] You would do them. But I.

Sean Escobar [00:04:32] And it was, you know, it was a sad deal because usually I'm very passionate about, enthusiastic about everything I do. But not anymore for the church. I just became very jaded, very withdrawn. I wouldn't say a lot in lessons. I'd go to elders quorum, I would just sit there quiet, not say a word. Oftentimes I would sneak out. I would go to church. I would sneak out and go drive around the neighborhood and not even tell my wife I was ditching out on church. All kinds of things started to happen around that. In fact, it got so bad that I think a half a dozen times I was so unhappy. And I decided, John, that even if it's true, I'm unhappy and I'm sick of it and I'm sick of being unhappy. And even if it's untrue, I just want to be happy. And so I started telling Crystal things. Like, Crystal, you know, you don't have to be a leader in the church, to be a spiritual person. I would say things like that a lot. I would say Crystal, you know, a lot of what the church does is just to be seen. You know, a lot of these guys aspire to those callings. A lot of that's political. Have you ever noticed how the, you know, the stake president calls his best friend the bishop? I mean, I picked up on everything, John, all the subtle details, all the little nuances of, you know, the political garbage, the social, everything that. And it wasn't even doctrinal yet, all the Crystal. I said, okay, you know, I'm not going to come at the doctrine, but this is wrong about the culture, this is wrong about the administration, this is wrong about the social aspect of it. And I turned pretty to her, not to other people, but to my sweet wife. I got pretty antagonistic against the church. There were times, John, last thing I'll say about it, I. Six times I'd be out and about, I'd be unhappy. And I had every reason to be happy, John. I was making lots of money, beautiful children, beautiful wife, had everything going for me. But I was unhappy because of the church. And that's when six times I said, I'm going to go home. I would rehearse this. I'm going to go home, I'm going to sit my family down, I'm going to tell them that God told me that the modern day prophet and apostles are not true. Joseph Smith was a prophet, but these guys have fallen away and they're just looking apart. They don't speak to Jesus, he doesn't guide them. There's no revelation. I had it all played out, John. And then I would think, it's going to cost me my marriage. She's too committed. I can't do it. She'll leave me. She'll kick me out.

Crystal's Experience as a Committed Mormon Wife

John Dehlin [00:07:18] So Crystal listeners are saying they really want to hear from you. So you're having several kids, you're recommitted, you're buying into this sort of worthiness, hustle for worthiness kind of thing. And now you're watching your husband slide into less than faithfulness. Talk about the woman's or the wife's perspective. And I'll just have to say that part of what's so tragic is you're actually starting to see things clearly, Sean, in this paradigm, because all those things you witnessed about male leadership is true. And you're starting to question the church's truthfulness, which is legitimate. And so even as you're being perceived by Crystal as falling away and being dark and unworthy from a reality standpoint, you're actually starting to claim your own power, trust your own instincts, and see the world clearly for the first time. And so I just have to note this paradox of you awakening in a very positive, grounded, truthful way. But, Crystal, from your perspective, that must have not been very exciting or happy. So talk about what it's like to see him slide into that.

Crystal Escobar [00:08:31] Well, I don't think I really understood or even thought that this had anything to do with his testimony. I think, like, his being negative or critical. I just thought it was his personality. Like, he's just, you know, he kind of. I always just thought he was just more critical about things. And so I didn't really read into it. I just thought that's just, you know, that's just Sean, I guess he's just. He. He calls people out if he doesn't like what they're doing, and he's not afraid to say it. And for me, I've always been more like. Not ruffle any feathers. Like, we don't have to tell people if we don't like what they're doing. Let's just let them be them, you know? And so I just kind of. I got really irritated every time he would say anything negative towards the church. And, like, you aren't. That's disrespectful. You're. You shouldn't say things like that. And. But. And so five years ago, it really had that impact on our marriage. And I was so frustrated. And so I started to decide to just shift my focus and start working on my own personal development because I was suffering so much, because I was so worried about the way he was acting, you know, and the way he was living. And I got more consumed in worrying about him. And I realized that that's not where true growth happens. And so I realized that I needed to focus on my own personal development. How can I just be the best version of my. And allow him to be where he's at? So in this. So I just embarked on my own spiritual journey and personal development without focusing so much on him. And that journey allowed me to just be more accepting of him where he's at and allow him to say what he wants, allow him to be who he is. And. And once I just became a little more accepting and just focusing on working on myself, that's when I realized that I had my own doubts, you know, when I started work, thinking, putting the focus on myself. And did you want me to go into.

John Dehlin [00:10:52] Well, before we do that. So did it. Did it reach a point where there was tension because of the spiritual or religious differences in commitment? Where. Where you were expressing disappointment or feeling disappointment or, Sean, where you were feeling like you were all the time?

Crystal Escobar [00:11:07] I would say. I remember my exact words.

John Dehlin [00:11:10] Talk about that.

Crystal Escobar [00:11:11] Sitting on the stairs, yelling at each other. And I was like, step it up, Sean. You are not the spiritual guy that I thought I married. You know, like, come on, you need to step it up. As the patriarch of the home. We need to be doing family prayers and family scripture study. We need to go every Sunday and keep the Sabbath day holy.

John Dehlin [00:11:32] And what's making you feel that way at the time?

Crystal Escobar [00:11:35] I think just that finally getting to that stage in motherhood, were you afraid of something? I was afraid of dropping the ball

John Dehlin [00:11:43] as parents, because what would happen? What were you afraid that I would.

Crystal Escobar [00:11:48] That we would all this time would pass and be like, we didn't raise good kids that, you know, that are making the right choices? So I just felt a little fear, I guess, around doing our part, the best of our abilities as parents.

John Dehlin [00:12:03] And it had to. There had to have been some tie to your upbringing, right? Like, your upbringing probably wasn't fantastic.

Crystal Escobar [00:12:09] Yeah, I think, for sure. I always thought, I'm not gonna have that same life. You know, I'm gonna make sure that we do everything right. You know, we're not gonna have to divorce. We are going to be spiritually worthy all the time and wearing our garments and, you know, temple worthy. And I just had this ideal picture in my mind of what our life would not be based on my upbringing. And so I just. Yeah, my expectations were really high because I wanted to make sure that we had. I just thought that we could do it perfectly.

Sean Escobar [00:12:42] There was the perception, too, right?

Crystal Escobar [00:12:44] Oh, yeah, for sure. The cultural perception and being in the community and wanting to look that part, you know? Yeah, there's definitely that. Wanting to make sure that we are seen as spiritual people and our kids are good and we go to church and we do what is right, that

Sean Escobar [00:13:03] we fit the mold.

Crystal Escobar [00:13:04] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:13:06] Thank you. And so, Sean, what's it like to be awakening to yourself for the first time, starting to gain your own orientation to the real world and your own voice and your own power and to be told, step it up by your wife, what does that do to you, to your intimacy, to your marriage?

Sean Escobar [00:13:25] I thought she was right about me. I really did. When she would tell me, you're negative, you're critical, you resent authority, this is all you. I thought. I thought she was Right. About me. And so when we got in that big fight. John. And how did I feel? John? Yeah. I felt like I was a horrible person. I felt like I wasn't worthy. And I also felt I wasn't spiritual. I felt like I wasn't one of the spiritual guys at that time. It was all stirring. It was too fresh. And then that we almost. I think we almost went down the road of divorce, I think. So

Crystal Escobar [00:14:02] we'd never been in a fight for that long. And where he left overnight, this was five years ago.

John Dehlin [00:14:08] Yeah, 2014.

Crystal Escobar [00:14:10] Because Owen was a baby.

Sean Escobar [00:14:11] Yeah. But I mean, I had already. I had already read the CES letter that.

John Dehlin [00:14:15] Talk about that. So talk about how you started to move from having concerns about the culture and criticisms of the culture to the truth claims. How did that start?

Sean Escobar [00:14:26] I couldn't. I couldn't. I read it.

John Dehlin [00:14:29] Wait, so how did you even. Was that the first thing? How did you find it?

Sean Escobar [00:14:32] There was whisperings about it, I think. I think my brother. I think my brother actually said that. Everybody's talking about this. Everybody's talking about. About this letter to the CES president. I didn't even know what it was, but I was always.

John Dehlin [00:14:44] You can go to cesletter.org, jeremy Runnels, you know, shared his experience of learning problems about the church's truth claims and having concerns. Trying to talk to a CES director who is a family friend, writing him a letter, trying to say, hey, I've got problems with all these issues, you know, polygamy, polyandry, the Book of Abraham, Book of Mormon, historicity, did it really happen? Anachronisms in the Book of Mormon, all this stuff. He writes the letter to the CES director that his dad referred him to trying to get help, and the letter was never answered, and he never got satisfactory answers to his questions. So he published the letter on the Internet, cesletter.org and ultimately is excommunicated for just sharing that letter. But anyway, so you stumble. You hear about the letter.

Sean Escobar [00:15:32] I looked the letter up. I read the entire letter. I thought I was bulletproof. I thought, nothing can shake me. My testimony was too strong. My conversion, let's call it my conversion, was too strong. I read the letter and keep in mind, my issues at the time were cultural, administrative, you know, political. I read the letter and I dismissed it. I read the entire thing and I dismissed it. And I said to myself, a lot of that's a little unsettling. However, I'm going to shelf all of it because I can't Deny that I. I had an answer to my prayer. And then when.

John Dehlin [00:16:12] What is your prayer?

Sean Escobar [00:16:13] 2,000. My answer to my prayer. The tornado.

John Dehlin [00:16:16] The tornado.

Sean Escobar [00:16:17] The tornado always resurfaced for me.

Crystal Escobar [00:16:19] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:16:20] I mean, tornadoes happen all over the world, right?

Sean Escobar [00:16:23] Not in downtown Salt Lake, and not this big.

John Dehlin [00:16:25] No, I know, I know. No, I'm just saying, like, hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, natural disasters, all sorts of bad things happen to people, right?

Crystal Escobar [00:16:33] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:16:34] But it's the religious context that allows us to make those associations.

Sean Escobar [00:16:37] That's right.

John Dehlin [00:16:38] And those simple associations, it can be a license plate.

Sean Escobar [00:16:41] You'll find what you're looking for. You'll find what you're looking for. And not only that, that's the crazy thing about the brain. Your brain will assign that meaning and draw those connections, and your brain is actually giving you the answer because you want the answer.

John Dehlin [00:16:55] It's confirmation bias. Go look it up.

Crystal Escobar [00:16:56] Yeah. Confirmation bias.

Sean Escobar [00:16:58] It's crazy. When I learned about confirmation bias, I think I learned about it through your podcast. I was like, that's cognitive dissonance. I was like, I was guilty of it more than anybody. But keep in mind, I had kind of subconsciously made up my mind that I was unhappy in the church. And even though I really believed Joseph was a prophet and the Book of Mormon was true, I was sick of being unhappy. And I kind of consigned to. I would rather live a happy life and go to hell, because I'm already in hell. This is not fun for me. You know, that's kind of where I was. But that fight, to be fair, we got in that fight. Crystal went on this massive quest of personal development and growth, but it was all stuff outside of the church. Everything she was reading was outside of the church. Okay. And at the same time, I came. So she came this way towards me. She became a lot more tolerant towards me and loving, appreciative. And I came this way because I said, if I don't start stuffing this stuff down, it's going to end in a divorce. And so we kind of met in the middle. And

Suppressing Doubts and Marital Strain

John Dehlin [00:18:07] so even though you read the CS letter, you dismissed it and you said, I'm stuffing. From now on, I'm stuffing.

Sean Escobar [00:18:12] That's it.

John Dehlin [00:18:13] How did that feel for you, Crystal, to have him kind of back off and stuff?

Crystal Escobar [00:18:18] Oh, I didn't really notice. I didn't notice any change. Really?

Sean Escobar [00:18:24] Yeah, maybe I didn't. I don't know. I thought. I thought. I was. I was far less critical. I. I started to. When my nephew went on his mission, I literally said to myself, I have got to be a better, a better Mormon. And I just, I just stopped, I tried my hardest to stop being critical of the church. I tried. I guess maybe I wasn't so good at that.

John Dehlin [00:18:48] In your mind, I mean, who knows? In your mind it's more about what you were feeling and how you were trying to manage your emotions.

Sean Escobar [00:18:56] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:18:56] And, and you're saying that you realized that your marriage and your family was at stake, that people are asking how many kids you had by this point.

Crystal Escobar [00:19:04] I was pregnant with my fourth when we had that big blow up fight.

Sean Escobar [00:19:09] I remember when my nephew went on his mission. I remember thinking, I've got to be a better Mormon. And I started trying again. And then I stopped being so critical. I stopped talking about those things. And that was, I think that was like two years ago or so. And I really made a conscious effort at that point. And then, and then she. And I consigned to the fact, I consigned to the fact that I'm going to be Mormon the rest of my life. I have to go, I have to participate and I might as well submit.

Crystal Escobar [00:19:41] I think the reason why I didn't notice is because I stopped, I took my focus off of him so I wasn't paying attention to, oh, is he becoming more spiritual now? Is he being less critical? I just stopped noticing it altogether because it was causing me too much anger and resentment.

John Dehlin [00:20:00] Yeah. Okay, so really quickly, Sean, what is it? I think the church is full, hundreds of thousands if not more of Mormons that at some point realized it wasn't true. Or there are big problems here. But if I, if I come out, it could affect my marriage, I could lose my family, I'll disappoint my parents or my grandparents. And then many have economic ties to the church and they're like, oh, it could wreck my income. And so, so many Mormons are in the church, but they're stuffing. Can you talk really briefly about if for you there were any psychological costs to kind of flipping that bit and just stuffing and trying to just fit the mold and internalize any doubts or fears or questions that you might have? Or for you, is there no cost psychologically to that cost? And then we'll turn to Crystal's awakening costs.

Sean Escobar [00:21:01] Do you mean cost costing me? What was my true nature? Is that what you mean?

John Dehlin [00:21:06] No, because that's significant. But for many people, internalizing distress leads to depression and anxiety. For example. Oh, or self medication.

Sean Escobar [00:21:16] I gotta tell you, I can put on a happy face. I can be the enthusiastic guy if I have to be. I can fake things if I have to. I don't like to. I really don't. I like to be real, but

Crystal Escobar [00:21:33] it

Sean Escobar [00:21:34] doesn't feel good to fake things. I just felt inauthentic.

John Dehlin [00:21:38] And over time, does that wear on you?

Sean Escobar [00:21:40] Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

Crystal Escobar [00:21:41] Yeah. And I. I can't wait to tell how much things have changed over this last year since. I mean, I.

John Dehlin [00:21:48] We're gonna get there. Yeah, we're gonna get there.

Crystal Escobar [00:21:49] Crazy.

Sean Escobar [00:21:50] Yeah. John, you're making me think about a lot of really deep things. You really are causing me to think about a lot of things. But I think, you know, I'd meet people all the time, John, this is. This is probably what you're getting at. I'd meet people all the time and they would. And I thought I was like really cool and successful and worthwhile and intelligent. I thought I was. But I would meet people all the time and they would say, why are you holding back? And I would say, like, I'd get like, my pride would, you know, and. What are you talking about, Sean? You don't give people the opportunity to get to know you. Yeah, I do. Talking about. People don't know what they're talking about. And I can see now. I can see what. And there wasn't one or two. John, it wasn't one or two people that would say this. These were brave people coming up to me and I was a millionaire. And I was, you know, and they were saying, you're not bringing it. And I was like. I was like, who are you to say that to me? Not a few, John. Yeah, it happened a lot.

John Dehlin [00:22:56] Yeah. And just like sometimes orthodox religion can condition us to be dishonest. It can condition us to be inauthentic.

Crystal Escobar [00:23:03] Yeah. Really closed off.

John Dehlin [00:23:04] And you just. It's. It's all about this false sense of self that you're projecting to the world. And maybe it wasn't true in your case, but in so many cases I've seen the anxiety, the depression, when you're stuffing that and you're packing it down and you're packing down what you really think and who you really are and what you really feel. And sometimes you create this split life where you all develop all sorts of secret behaviors that aren't, you know, what you present to the public, and that's got its own set of problems. But even if you don't do that, there's just this internal distress that you're always packing down and managing that can lead to all sorts of self medication or depression or really unhealthy behaviors. And again, that may or may not have been your experience, but. But I just want to call out as a mental health professional, that really wears on people. And when you hear about people getting autoimmune deficiency sort of diseases, or, you know, Epstein Barr, chronic fatigue, or all these different sorts of things, or even irritable bowel.

Sean Escobar [00:24:02] Wow, that's crazy.

John Dehlin [00:24:03] And digestive problems, right?

Sean Escobar [00:24:05] That's crazy.

Crystal Escobar [00:24:05] He got sick a lot, and I was resentful. My gut was really bad about how much he got sick, because I always thought you were doing it to his heart.

Sean Escobar [00:24:13] And yet here I was, this health guy. I exercise, I eat well. John. I do all those things, right? And the stress. You're right, the stress was killing me, and I had all kinds of health problems also. I would like to talk about the pornography if it's time to visit that.

Pornography, Shame, and Secrecy in the Marriage

John Dehlin [00:24:32] Was that happening in this timeline?

Sean Escobar [00:24:34] I looked at pornography off and on my entire marriage.

John Dehlin [00:24:37] And what was that like for you?

Sean Escobar [00:24:39] And, okay, so I looked at pornography, and Crystal right out the gate. When we started. When we started dating, she made it very clear. And not once or twice. I mean, this was a recurring theme. I could never tolerate my husband to look at pornography. It's unacceptable. It is cheating. She would say, it is cheating. And I. I think her exact. Oh, sorry. I think her exact words were, if you were to do that, I don't think that I could. What was the word you used? I don't think that I could tolerate that. And I interpreted that as, I will divorce you. So this was a hard thing. I don't think I had an unhealthy. Now, looking back at the time, if I look at pornography, I felt horrible. And I would only usually look at it as like, if Crystal didn't want to have sex. And there was a lot of times. You can explain why that was. But there was a lot of times where Crystal would say, no, I don't want to have sex, and I would want it, so I would turn to pornography. Not to say that that's not your fault I made the decision to turn to pornography. It's not that I'm not. I wasn't justified in turning to pornography. But my relationship or our belief around pornography and sex and such things has changed a lot in the last year. But I just remember feel this overwhelming amount of guilt every time that I would periodically look at pornography, and I would feel like I was just evil. And I put a great big picture of Jesus right in front of my computer. And it was Jesus. The one Picture where half his face is merciful and the other half of his face is very stern and just. And I had quotes all over my office about obedience and about pornography, like indirectly about pornography. Right.

Crystal Escobar [00:26:49] That was your one thing that you felt like?

Sean Escobar [00:26:51] She was my one thing that I. And so I never told Crystal. And because I thought it would end my marriage and my marriage was too valuable to me, I couldn't afford to lose that. And so periodically she would repeat. And sometimes she would look at me square in the eyes in like a private setting, and she would look at me and she would say, you've never looked at pornography, have you? And then I would say no. And I would lie to her over and over and over because it wasn't going to cost me my marriage. And I really believed she would leave me. And I know people who have. I know marriages that have ended because of pornography. Keep in mind, I'm a man. I've always been a man, my whole life. And I know how men are, I know how men think, I know how men operate. Every single man has looked at pornography. That's my opinion.

Crystal Escobar [00:27:56] Yeah, I don't know. Every single day. I think like a good 90%, would you say?

Sean Escobar [00:28:01] I think the majority. And it's my opinion, and I'm not justifying my actions, but I no longer think that what I did was what I thought it was. But the guilt, John, I killed myself over this. I would cry. I would be on my hands and knees begging God to just remove that urge to look at pornography. And I would be crying and begging him to just take that away. Now, keep in mind, I wasn't looking at it. Like, I don't think that I was chronically addicted, but I would go like three months without looking at any. And then something would happen. Really stressed out, or she didn't want to be intimate, or sometimes we'd get in a fight. I don't think I ever even told you this, but sometimes we get in a big fight and I don't know why, but I would feel like justified, like, almost like retaliation. And so I would indulge in that periodically. And then when I did, I felt like I was the scum of the earth and I had no discipline and that I was out of favor with God. And I couldn't own up to it, John, because again, my wife, she made it clear from the get go. And over 15 years, she made it very clear that that's the one thing I absolutely have no tolerance for whatsoever.

John Dehlin [00:29:22] And what were you thinking?

Crystal Escobar [00:29:23] Crystal, when he told Me?

John Dehlin [00:29:25] No, no. What were you thinking?

Crystal Escobar [00:29:26] Just about throughout my marriage, why that was such a big deal? I think because of the. The sexual abuse growing up gave me a really. Gave. Put a lot of fear in me around sexuality, and I thought that pornography could lead to perversions or cheating or, you know, so it was just always at the top of my mind because of my experience growing up. And I just, you know, I didn't. I just felt really a lot of fear. That's really what it was. Because I thought I didn't have the right education around it, and I really thought that pornography leads to those types of things.

John Dehlin [00:30:06] And I just. You know, again, as a mental health professional, if, you know, we. There are orthodox Mormons that listen to Mormon stories, and you guys, because you'll share this and have shared this on social media, there will be people who listen, who are orthodox Mormons. As a mental health professional who has had as clients hundreds, if not thousands of orthodox Mormons, I can tell you, bishops look at porn. Bishopric members look at porn. Stake high councilmen members look at porn. Stake presidency members look at good pornography. They all have masturbation problems. They all have porn problems. And again, Crystal, not all, but so. So, so many. I. I have intelligence that there are general authorities who. Who have. Who have had porn problems and who have been caught looking at porn, you know, in church administrative offices. Like it's. And so I want to disabuse you of the idea that. Oh, you know, that Crystal and Sean ended up losing their faith. Well, of course they did. It's because they looked at porn. That's. It's. It's a. It's a glow. It's a worldwide church epidemic from the highest levels of leadership on down. We now are made aware of stake presidents that are caught in parks with prostitutes. Right. So. But. But you can't blame any of that on porn, because it's so pervasive that if porn were the cause of child abuse, if porn were the cause of perversions, everyone would be child abusers and everyone would be perverts, but they're not. You know, it's just something that is a reality in the 2000s. I'm not. I'm not saying that porn is even good. Like, don't even mistake that. We're saying on Mormon Stories podcast that porn's a good thing. You know, some will say that there's healthy erotica and that sometimes it can be useful. But the point is that here isn't even to sort of say porn is good necessarily but what I, what I am going to say is it's, it's ubiquitous, it's everywhere. And it's your current bishop, you know, it's your current counselor, it's women too. It's your Relief Society president.

Crystal Escobar [00:32:10] Right.

Sean Escobar [00:32:10] I go so far as to say it's your husband. And I know that offends a lot of people.

John Dehlin [00:32:13] Or your wife. Right, Wives too. So, so anyway, I just want to just dispel that. It's part of the, it's again part of the shame cycle where porn is going to be so pervasive on the Internet these days that everybody's going to be confronted with it. And again, the tragedy is not the porn itself, although there deep problems with porn and the way women are treated and the way men are treated and the way that it objectifies people and the child abuse and the working conditions. Like again, we can talk about all the problems of porn, but for me the really big problem with porn within the Mormon church is how we talk about it. Because the person who views the porn thinks of themselves as dirty and awful and loathsome. But, but because of that they feel like they have to lie about it. So they become liars again, the church training us to become liars. And, and then they develop this private life and the public life and they learn to be fake in public. And we're gonna, this, we're gonna get to this. When we get to, you know, Sterling Van Wagnen, you get your public voice and your public face and your public testimony because you learned from a young age to separate what you do in private with how you appear. And so that bifurcation of a public face and a public testimony versus what you're doing in private leads to a split personality where you become more and more shameful about who you are. You live more and more of a fake and a split life. And then the more you feel awful about constantly deceiving people and being this bad person, the more you need to self medicate those awful feelings. And oftentimes you turn to porn more because orgasms feel good. And it leads you down the spiral, this toxic shame spiral, reinforcing the behavior. And there's no wonder that Utah leads the nation in porn use. Why would the one true church in the one state completely controlled in every way by Mormonism have amongst the highest porn usage and porn addiction problems in the country? It's because of the shame and the guilt that's heaped upon it. It's because of this nurturing of a public and a private Life and all the shame that's wrapped around it and all the fakeness of trying to pretend like it's not a big deal in so many other cultures. It's like, oh, yeah, I've looked at porn. It's no big deal. It's not that interesting. Okay. I look at it sometimes, but then you just go on and live a happy, healthy life. It's when it's demonized and shamed. And now Crystal's looking at Sean as a dirty, filthy person, or Sean's feeling like he is a dirty, filthy person. That's when the toxicity really starts to wrap itself around. And I do want to get to how you've worked through that, but I don't want to miss the timeline. So let's not jump ahead.

Crystal Escobar [00:35:02] Okay?

Sean Escobar [00:35:03] I just want to say that I didn't like having a secret. That was my one secret, and I didn't like it. And there were times, John, where I felt such tremendous love for my wife. And the love was so immense. And I would look at her and I would say, like, this voice in my head would say, tell her. Tell her what you've been doing. And then it would almost leave my lips. I would almost say it. And then I would correct myself and I would think, is it worth losing your marriage over? And I would stop and I wouldn't tell her. I came forward to her with that information after we had left the church.

John Dehlin [00:35:45] She didn't get there. Let's not get ahead.

Sean Escobar [00:35:47] I'm sorry.

John Dehlin [00:35:47] That's okay.

Crystal Escobar [00:35:48] I didn't, like, catch him. He told me so.

John Dehlin [00:35:51] Yeah.

Crystal Escobar [00:35:51] But.

John Dehlin [00:35:52] Yeah, so we'll get to that.

Sean Escobar [00:35:53] So. Okay.

John Dehlin [00:35:54] That'll be a happy ending to the story.

Crystal Escobar [00:35:55] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:35:56] Okay. So why'd you bring that up, Sean, in the midst of this sort of four or five years ago faith crisis?

Sean Escobar [00:36:01] Why'd I bring up the porn?

John Dehlin [00:36:03] Yeah, just be. It just.

Sean Escobar [00:36:04] I don't know.

John Dehlin [00:36:04] Because an important part of that story,

Sean Escobar [00:36:06] I don't think that my behavior of. Of periodically observing porn. I never looked at child porn. I never look at fetish porn. I never look at, you know, violent porn. If I ever even saw, like, violent porn pop up, I was disgusted by it, repulsive. And so that's not my stuff. Like, we don't need to go into it. But bottom line is, I think looking back, my relationship to porn was probably a normal relationship to porn. I don't know that we're going to call it healthy, but I don't think it's crazy that I felt so horrible about it. And it's you know, I bring it up because you said that. Were there any other signs that you were. You know, you said people, when they bury things and they're not authentic, it manifests itself in other ways. Now, here's what's crazy, John. I don't know if you. I'm skipping ahead, but since I told Crystal that I looked at porn, I got to tell you, like, my desire to look at erotica has gone from here.

John Dehlin [00:37:11] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:37:11] Like, I don't even have much of an interest in it at all anymore, because I don't. Because now she knows, and she would allow me to if I really needed to, but I don't really have a taste for it like I did.

John Dehlin [00:37:24] And that's the irony.

Crystal Escobar [00:37:25] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:37:25] We'll jump back to that.

Sean Escobar [00:37:26] It's like a gift. Like, you talk about miracles. I feel like there's a miracle in admitting you've seen it and looked at it or participated in it, and all of a sudden. And knowing that it's not what the church makes it out to be, and all of a sudden you go, it's that pink elephant syndrome. You know, don't picture a pink elephant. And then yet we're all picturing a pink elephant. You can't suppress something that heavily and. And not have it backfire and proliferate on you.

Crystal Escobar [00:37:52] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:37:55] And talk about how, you know, we can. You guys have been really good in your podcast and blog recently, talking about sexual shame, sexuality, all these negative messages about sex from so young and all this shame. Crystal, what was that like for just your. Your sexuality individually and as a couple throughout your orthodox years? What. What did that do?

Crystal Escobar [00:38:20] I definitely suppressed a lot. I think overall, we had, like, a. I guess, healthy.

Sean Escobar [00:38:27] You know, by Mormon standards. We had a very healthy sex life.

Crystal Escobar [00:38:30] Yeah. But I didn't know that there could. It could be even more amazing if I was able to release a lot of the. The. The Mormon mentality around it, which, you know, when Sean would tell me certain things like you did. You know, there's a doctrine that says that you should only have sex to have babies, and that's an old dog. And then I would feel bad. I'm like, really? Like. And then I'd start feeling some shame around it again. You know, so it would come and go and. Yeah. So I would wonder, do we have it too much? Do we like it too much? What if I need to fantasize? Is that bad? Like, we're all taught about, you know, have control of your thoughts, don't think about things that are inappropriate and So I. I would feel really guilty if I, you know, would fantasize about things. And that was really hard for me. That was, like, my secret, you know, that I was holding in and. Yeah. So. And that was. It was. It made me feel like I had this secret and there's something wrong with me or, you know, if I. Yeah. So there. There's just a lot that I.

Sean Escobar [00:39:36] She would withhold sex a lot. Because she thought we weren't supposed to like sex.

Crystal Escobar [00:39:39] Yeah. Like, I was really. I would always try to make sure that you didn't see me naked. I would, like, hurry and cover up if I heard you coming up after I got out of the shower. You know, just, like. Just really trying hard to avoid it as much as possible. Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:39:54] Yeah. And she would say things to me. John, I'm sorry to jump in, but you would say things to me about my desire for sex.

John Dehlin [00:40:01] Yeah.

Crystal Escobar [00:40:01] I'd be like, gosh, like, why do you like it so much? Like, can't you just.

Sean Escobar [00:40:05] She'd be like, you, like, want it every day? And I'm like, yeah. And she's like, something's wrong with you.

Crystal Escobar [00:40:12] Yeah. I'd make.

Sean Escobar [00:40:13] And I wouldn't want it. I would just want it, like, once a day. I really love it. But it wasn't like I wanted it like, four or five times a day. But she. She really looked at me like something was wrong with me.

Crystal Escobar [00:40:24] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:40:25] And I'm Spanish man. Spanish blood. Like, they're passionate, romantic people.

Crystal Escobar [00:40:31] Yeah. So I definitely suppressed a lot of my own sexual desires as well, based on what I'd been taught about it.

John Dehlin [00:40:39] Right. Okay. So, Sean, you know, four or five years ago, you go into the suppression mode. Crystal, let's talk about your awakening as it relates to the church. And take as much time as you want to tell us how you got.

Crystal's Faith Crisis and Awakening

Sean Escobar [00:40:51] This is my favorite part, too.

John Dehlin [00:40:53] That's fun to see you guys both smiling so big.

Crystal Escobar [00:40:56] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:40:56] This is exciting. Can we skip the sterling stuff?

Crystal Escobar [00:40:59] Just.

Sean Escobar [00:40:59] Let's not do that.

Crystal Escobar [00:41:00] Yeah. You've had to talk about it a lot.

Sean Escobar [00:41:02] Okay.

Crystal Escobar [00:41:04] So. Yeah. Since I started my own personal development and spiritual journey, over the course of that four or five years, I just was reading a lot of books and more so within the last. You know, I've always been blogging, and over the last 10 years. But then when I started writing the book, I started just really reading a lot, and I was just excited about it, too. And I felt like I was in this new stage of life where I had a little more time to read and I couldn't stop. And I was just so excited about all the things that I was learning. And I started reading Martha Beck's book, finding your own North Star. And I felt like that really started to allow me to think a little bit differently and wonder, what is my North Star? And.

John Dehlin [00:41:57] And what does she mean by North Star?

Crystal Escobar [00:41:59] Like, finding your. Your true path, you know, and being the most authentic you. And I started to really analyze myself and wonder if I was being the most authentic me and following my. Did I know what path I was, where I was headed? You know, where was my North Star? I don't know. And. And then I read the Untethered Soul by Michael Singer, and that really started to allow me to question my own spirituality. Like, it's the first time I ever heard. Heard that you are not your thoughts, you know, and that was liberating for me. And I was like, really? And I was able to separate my soul from my mind and also made me wonder that if I. I remember feeling like I don't feel like I have an untethered soul. The way he described it, I was like, I want to be an untethered soul. I feel so bound in so many ways, you know, and it really started to make me think of certain scriptures that made me feel bound and why I couldn't just think freely on my own. And then I read Educated by Tara Westover and that's.

Sean Escobar [00:43:21] You don't know how much this woman reads.

John Dehlin [00:43:23] Wow.

Sean Escobar [00:43:25] Oh, man. Like, I married up.

Crystal Escobar [00:43:28] But that book really was eye opening for me because it's about her story as a Mormon and extreme Mormonism. And it made me wonder too, like, wait a minute, have I been brainwashed? You know, like, the way she described it made me realize. It just really made me look at my own life a little bit more and really start to question a lot of things. And I was so intrigued by the story and that I googled her because I really. She didn't really explain at the end of her book, like, what she believes now as far as, you know, around the church or around God. And so I just really. I love the story so much that I just wanted to know, well, where is she at spiritually? What does she believe? And so I googled her and I came across your interview on YouTube with her, which is also on your podcast. And I watched it and I just

John Dehlin [00:44:20] remember just skipping real quick before you jump in.

Crystal Escobar [00:44:22] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:44:22] Had you heard anything about Mormon stories or. Me?

Crystal Escobar [00:44:24] I've never heard of Mormon stor.

Sean Escobar [00:44:25] Thought it was faith promoting.

John Dehlin [00:44:26] Okay, so what Year is this? What year is this?

Crystal Escobar [00:44:28] This was just last year. Exactly this time.

John Dehlin [00:44:30] Okay, I just have to stop. It's 2018 in this timeline. Three years after I've been excommunicated, right?

Crystal Escobar [00:44:37] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:44:39] Thirteen years after I started Mormon Stories.

Crystal Escobar [00:44:42] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:44:42] She's living in Utah. I mean, if there's ever a testament. And the Youngs, Leah and Cody Young, Same, same thing. Their awakening happened in like 2000, late 2017. I'm like, if ever there were a testimony to how much of a intellectual bubble that Mormons live in, these are people living in Utah. My mom's in Draper. Like you guys are in Draper. My mom's in Draper. That you can get to 2018 having never heard of Mormon Stories or John Dehlin or even though my. I mean, you know, Sean, your story's in the New York Times, right? And I thought, well, that's okay. But even though that's the world's largest circulation newspaper, most Mormons are never going to hear about that because Mormons don't read the New York Times. You know what I mean? So it's just so mind boggling to me that after Kate Kelly, after Jeremy Reynolds, after me, after all the excommunications, after, you know, all these podcasts, you arrive at 2018, you're stumbling on Mormon stories, YouTube, and you're like, oh, what is this? What could this be? This must be faith promoting. Yeah, I'm sorry. It just shows how much control the church has over information, over people's behavior and over people's awareness of what's going on all around you.

Sean Escobar [00:46:06] And they keep us so busy.

Crystal Escobar [00:46:08] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:46:09] You don't have time to read anything else.

Crystal Escobar [00:46:11] Well, for the majority of my life in the church, I always felt this pressure that I had to read my scriptures first and listen to a conference talk and say a prayer. And by the time I did those things and write in my journal, by the time I did all those things, I didn't have time to read any other books. And so once I just decided I'm going to read some other books.

Sean Escobar [00:46:33] Remember what I did to you?

John Dehlin [00:46:34] Yeah.

Crystal Escobar [00:46:34] You'd make me feel bad if I ever did.

Sean Escobar [00:46:36] She was reading anything. Like, one time I. I saw her watching like a Joel Olsteen video. And like, the Mormon came out in me and I just, like, I just came down on her like, how dare you? You know, that guy has a $30 million house. How dare you watch that guy? And the Mormon just came out at me. And I was like, you are only allowed to read it sounds really controlling. But I didn't tell her she had to. But I was like, you should only read church stuff.

Crystal Escobar [00:47:04] Yeah. So that's what I did the majority of our marriage day.

John Dehlin [00:47:08] So isn't that weird that you had your own doubts?

Crystal Escobar [00:47:10] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:47:11] And yet you're being the enforcer.

Sean Escobar [00:47:13] Cognitive dissonance.

Crystal Escobar [00:47:14] I'm telling you. We didn't mention this, but there was a lot that he made me feel like music that I had listened to. Like, I remember one time we were.

Sean Escobar [00:47:22] Sorry.

Crystal Escobar [00:47:24] We were fasting and I was like, I'm so tired. And you're like. You said some scripture. Like you're not supposed to show that you're tired or something.

Sean Escobar [00:47:31] Can we just stop?

Crystal Escobar [00:47:32] But I just want to. No, say, this is good.

John Dehlin [00:47:35] This is important.

Crystal Escobar [00:47:36] Like, Sean also was. Had a lot of.

Sean Escobar [00:47:38] Let's just say it. Can we just say Sean was a.

Crystal Escobar [00:47:43] Yeah, he was self righteous too. Although he had his doubts. He definitely was very self righteous in the beginning. But we were to each other, so.

John Dehlin [00:47:52] But that's. It's just like, you know who are the most strident homophobes? It's gay religious men that are packing down their sexuality.

Sean Escobar [00:48:02] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:48:02] And so they're the sometimes the most ferocious and mean homophobic people in the LGBT world. It's called internalized homophobia.

Crystal Escobar [00:48:10] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:48:11] You had internalized the people that are doubting. Internalized people that.

Sean Escobar [00:48:16] People that are doubting.

Crystal Escobar [00:48:17] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:48:18] John, people that are doubting. You know, this. Your most. What do they call it? Your most. Behemoth defenders. They're off. Oftentimes they're the ones doubting.

John Dehlin [00:48:28] Right? Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:48:29] Behemoth. Vehement, Vehement, vehement.

Crystal Escobar [00:48:31] But yeah, it is funny because I remember telling Sean, like, I cannot believe I've never heard of Mormon stories. He's been doing this for what, over 10 years, right? Yeah. I was like, what? How can I.

John Dehlin [00:48:44] 14th year.

Crystal Escobar [00:48:45] Yeah. So, yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:48:47] When I saw as Long as we've been Married.

Crystal Escobar [00:48:48] Yeah. So when I saw that episode, I just remember scrolling to the very end because I wanted to hear what her beliefs were.

John Dehlin [00:48:55] Now, is this the interview I did with her alone or the. I brought her to Salt Lake and we did a.

Crystal Escobar [00:49:00] She was on a. She was not with you. She was on her computer.

John Dehlin [00:49:03] Okay. So this was my first interview with Tara Westover before I brought her to Salt Lake where we're doing a one on one. So you find that you think it's faith promoting.

Crystal Escobar [00:49:10] Yeah. I'm like, oh, I love podcasts because I listen to podcasts all the time. I'M like, oh, good, this is probably perfect for me. Mormon stories. I need like, Mormon stories. Because I. I just wanted to hear. I wanted to hear about other people's experiences in the church and hopefully finding somebody that could relate to me because I didn't feel like I could always relate to. I wanted to find the stories that were a little more like, let's live spiritually kind of a little more on our own terms, but we're still Mormon. Because I didn't like having to follow everything so perfect and exact.

Sean Escobar [00:49:46] Honey, you were feeling pretty spiritually unfulfilled

Crystal Escobar [00:49:48] is what I. Yeah, for sure. That's why I finally allowed myself to read other books. Because I'm like, I am not growing. I don't feel like I'm growing spiritually. So, yeah, when I discovered your podcast and I started, I got hooked. I couldn't stop listening and it was so good and so intriguing and. So how long did it take you

John Dehlin [00:50:06] to realize, number one, that I'd been excommunicated and number two, that it wasn't always orthodox.

Crystal Escobar [00:50:12] It took probably about a week, but I was listening to it like a full time job.

John Dehlin [00:50:17] And what was interesting, how was it feeding you or not?

Crystal Escobar [00:50:21] It was helping me because. And I didn't know. Yeah, it was helping me to allow myself to have my own questions and doubts because I didn't feel like I was ever allowed to voice anything. And I wasn't enjoying the church. I wasn't enjoying it at all. And wondered why. What was wrong with me too? I started to wonder why, why don't I like this? Why do I prefer to read these other books, you know? And like, I love Oprah and all that she teaches and I would rather just follow Oprah than our own prophet, you know? So, yeah, so I just started to feel a little more spiritually fulfilled through all the other things that I was reading and I was feeling like, alive again, like really. I was just getting so excited about all that I was learning and I was feeling liberated, like so much liberation. Realizing that I. Realizing that I had put myself in this little box and not allowed myself to step out of it ever and try to experience a new realm of spirituality.

John Dehlin [00:51:25] Any. Can you recall any of the episodes on Mormon stories in those. In that early week or two that. That really hit you hard? Just for those who are going to go, oh, yeah, what are some of the episodes that were useful to you? Do you remember any?

Crystal Escobar [00:51:38] I know it was like, I can't remember. It was like a former mission president

Sean Escobar [00:51:44] or stake president she turned me on to Tom Phillips.

John Dehlin [00:51:47] Roger Hendrix.

Crystal Escobar [00:51:48] Yeah, that's what it. There was like four episodes or something, right?

John Dehlin [00:51:51] It was like ten and a half hours of Roger Hendrix.

Crystal Escobar [00:51:53] Yeah, yeah, it was really long and I loved all of it. So that was my very first one. And then I just went on and I found some. I, I was curious to know what you believed. So I was digging, trying to find an episode that. Where you were talking more about what you believed now, because I knew it was obvious within the episode that you knew a lot about everything and things that I were. I was totally unaware of. Yes, it was really eye opening for me and I just wanted so badly to know what you believed. And then I came upon the episode where you shared somebody. Do you want me to share this part?

John Dehlin [00:52:28] Was this Sean McCraney who's interviewing me?

Crystal Escobar [00:52:30] I don't remember because I was just skipping through episodes. I was trying to find this one part. Does John de Lynn tell me what do you believe now?

Sean Escobar [00:52:39] She, you know, she kind of had. You'd built this rapport, you know, through the interviews and she, she was really.

Crystal Escobar [00:52:47] Yeah, I had a lot of respect because I could tell you really have done your research. You know, it's just I didn't really even consider Mormon stories to be an anti Mormon at all. I thought it was very informative and I didn't feel like, oh, no, I shouldn't be listening to this. But when I found the episode where somebody had asked you, so what do you believe in God? How would. What do you believe about God? And you said, well, before we get there, I okay, you told me about when I told Sean and then this happened. So then after listening for a few days of the podcast, I was like, hey, you should like. I was trying to casually tell him because I thought maybe he would. Yeah, I thought maybe he might not agree with what I was, you know, listening to everything that you're saying because overall I thought it was good and some episodes were face promoting and just really informative. But I, I wasn't sure what he would think about it, so I just kind of tried to casually bring it up. Hey, hey, you should listen to this Mormon Stories podcast. It's just a lot of stories from Mormons and yeah, it's really good. And at first he's like, is it anti Mormon? I'm like, like, no, no, it's not anti Mormon at all. Which I really didn't think it was because in my mind, anti Mormon is negative and, and just ignorant people just wanting to be angry towards the church. But I didn't sense any, I didn't sense any anger whatsoever in any of the episodes that I listened to. So that, yeah, I had a lot of respect for you in, in that sense because there was no anger. It's just more like matter of fact, these are, this is the information and let's just talk about it as adults. And so, yeah, I shared it with Sean and he started listening to it. I think you got hooked. Three days later, I remember laying on our bed, you pulled your earphones out of your ears and you're like, we've been duped. And I was like, I already kind of knew, you know, at that point I was like, yeah, I kind of think that the church is not true. But when he said it, it was like, whoa, this is real. Like, we are, we're probably gonna do something about this.

John Dehlin [00:55:17] Thank you for joining us today on Mormon Stories. If you enjoyed this episode, please help us make more like it by becoming a monthly subscriber@mormonstories.org. Alright to Be youe is a collaboration song by electronic musician Milo Craft and singer songwriter Angela Soph. In 2018, they founded the Be Moved Project to create music that helps people feel happy and connected. To hear more music or support the project by becoming a patron, please visit angelasoaf.com that's s o f f e dot com.

Crystal Escobar [00:56:10] Okay. It's all right this girls don't have to be you Baby you're somebody new when the lines are drawn in front of you it's all right to be you. It's all right to be you

John Dehlin [00:56:43] Shame

Crystal Escobar [00:56:44] disbelief It says who you want to be but there is a wise apart of you I know you feel it too.

Telling Family and Losing Community

Part 4 of 4 · Ep. 1109

John Dehlin [00:00:04] Mormon Stories is a production of the Open Stories foundation and relies solely upon the support of people like you, its listeners to help keep the podcast alive or to become a member of the community. Please become a monthly subscriber by visiting MormonStories.org and clicking on the donate button on the right side of the page under support. All contributions to Mormon Stories are completely tax deductible in the United States and go towards producing the podcast and building communities and programs of support for Mormons like you. Thanks for your support. So, Sean, after she had been, after you had been stuffing and stuffing and stuffing for years, and then she comes to you and says, well, I'm starting to have, you know, listen to me.

Sean Escobar [00:00:58] She said to me in the bathroom. Yeah, she said, I, she said, come to me in the bathroom, told me about your, your, your Mormon stories. And then she said, what if it's not true? And then I remember, I just paused,

John Dehlin [00:01:11] like, yeah, what did you think that she was even questioning? What came through your mind? What did you think?

Crystal Escobar [00:01:17] Well, he was silent and I was nervous when, by his silence because I was like, oh, but it's okay. Like, don't worry. Like, I'm, I'm just saying, like, you know, it might not be true. Like, and it's okay, like, we can still, like, be Mormons. I was afraid from his silence. I was, I was afraid he was worried about me.

John Dehlin [00:01:33] So what's going through your mind when she breaks this news to you?

Sean Escobar [00:01:36] I was thinking, first of all, I think, how would a good Mormon husband respond? That's what I thought. How do I address this as a good Mormon husband, you know, should. But then I had this thought, come in secondary sneak in and thought, maybe this is a good thing because I'm, I'm sick of it. I'm fried. I've been mentally checked out for 10 years. It's totally fried.

John Dehlin [00:02:00] And so what did you start listening to or what?

Sean Escobar [00:02:02] First one I listened to was Tom Phillips.

John Dehlin [00:02:04] Okay.

Crystal Escobar [00:02:05] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:02:05] And I got to tell you what, what it did to me, you know, he talks about the, the scientific angle and the historical angle, and he talks about all that and that all kind of. Yeah, I had those suspicions already, John. I had all those. They're non doctrinal suspicions, but, you know, historical suspicions. I had all those and they were kind of buried down deep. But he said something at the end of that interview that really rocked me. And what he said was, he finally, he was a stake president and all that, you know, he received the second anointing. You know, everybody should Go listen to that. Because a lot of people don't know what the second anointing is. Calling, calling an election, made sure. And just for those who don't know,

John Dehlin [00:02:47] it's a secret ordinance in temples that's pervasive. It's only for like kind of the wealthy, connected friends of apostles and people who really show a lot of commitment to the church. It's given through a referral system where people get the second anointing, refer others to get the second anointing. And you're basically told that you made the celestial kingdom, you've arrived in this life and you don't have to worry about not making the celestial kingdom because

Sean Escobar [00:03:13] you're there, you're taken to a temple and an apostle washes your feet, right? Anyway, but what he said, John, he said that, you know, here I was thinking, like, I want to believe that my family loves me. Not just my immediate family, but, you know, not just my wife and my children. I want to believe my parents love me and my siblings love me, that they know who I am, they know my heart, that I'm worthy of love, that I'm. And when he said that he, he was the one that converted. He converted by missionaries knocking into him. He converted, he got his family into it. And when he told them that he'd. And he didn't research it a little bit, he researched it. He went to the greatest ends, contacting the Smithsonian and so forth. And when he told his family that it wasn't true, his wife, I want to say, if I remember correctly, his wife terminated the relationship and his children essentially disowned him. In fact, the son in law threatened him physically and threw him out of the house. And that's when I had this awareness of, wait a minute, if it got that bad for him, then the writing was on the wall, John, I could start. I told Crystal for years, the church is bleeding, the church is hemorrhaging. And that was just me. Based on my observance, I could tell that the millennials were all leaving, they were all exiting. And I could tell that, you know, there was big, big problems. You could just see it, you could feel it. And I thought to myself, if I stay in this another 10 years, 20 years, 30 years, and then I decide to leave, I will have sent my kids on missions that, you know, that will only further indoctrinate them. I will have. I will miss my children's weddings and they may. Family is everything to me. Family is everything to me. And the thought of my own kids, me Being my own demise. Indoctrinating my children to the extent that even if I was to say it's not true, and I've discovered it's not true, they would disown me and terminate the relationship, which is happening. You know how much that's happening, John? Children disassociating from parents, parents disassociating from children. It's not right. And then we say families can be together forever, but the church is ripping families apart.

Guest [00:05:48] Oh.

Sean Escobar [00:05:56] And that did it. Just that I didn't. I mean, I. I spent eight solid months just studying. Eight solid months. I didn't even work, John. I. I have a unique position where I don't have to work. I didn't work for eight months. I just needed. I just needed information. I felt. It's interesting, John. I felt charged to know everything and I read everything and listened to everything. You. I really. I mean, what are some of the

John Dehlin [00:06:21] most important books and podcasts that you listen to? Books you read, podcasts you listen to?

Sean Escobar [00:06:27] I read all those ones about the Book of Mormon. Study of the Book of Mormon. I read Rolling Stone. Stone Rolling. Anything. I read everything that people would recommend through your resources and your community. I would read all that. I would buy all those books on Audible, huge library, and I would just read it all. But, John, I gotta tell you, looking back, I understand what I was doing. I was trying to arm myself because I thought there will come an opportunity where I can get my family out.

John Dehlin [00:07:04] Meaning your parents and siblings?

Sean Escobar [00:07:06] Yeah. I love them like crazy. And truth be told, if it wasn't for my dad and my brother, I never would have gotten involved in the Mormon Church. They influenced me greatly. They pressed upon me greatly. They thought they were doing the right thing for me. But I thought I need to be armed so that if they will listen to me, I will have that capacity and that knowledge. So I know everything. All the way to Danites, all the way to Mormon castrations. I mean, I've read it all. And I spent eight months reading. And guess what?

John Dehlin [00:07:36] I've determined which podcasts were helpful just to give a shout out to some other podcasts.

Sean Escobar [00:07:40] Hans Matzon.

Crystal Escobar [00:07:41] No, no, no, no.

John Dehlin [00:07:42] No other podcasts.

Sean Escobar [00:07:43] Oh, Bill Riehl. Sorry. Yeah, there's the other one that's called Infants on Thrones. I listen to all that stuff. There's one by the women. It's like these women's.

John Dehlin [00:07:58] Your polygamy.

Sean Escobar [00:07:59] There's that one. And then there's another one that is just all about. It's almost like women's Liberal. Women's Liberal. Mormons. Feminist. Mormon. Thank you. Sorry. Feminist was the word I was after. I listened to that one. I listened to. I listen to all of what's his name?

John Dehlin [00:08:17] John Larsen, Mormon Expression Podcast.

Sean Escobar [00:08:20] All the old stuff, all the original stuff. Was he the one that swears a lot?

John Dehlin [00:08:24] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:08:25] Yeah, I like that guy. I like that guy a lot. And he tells it like it is. And I consumed all day, every day, earbuds in my. My ears. All I did was listen to material. Now I took a different approach. I wish I had taken Crystal's approach, John. I did all of that and now I can see that it wasn't really necessary. She took the approach of let me find my way. I took the approach of let me make sure that I know I did the right thing here. And then I would ask my dad to hear me out and he couldn't hear me. Nobody could hear me, John. They don't want to hear me. And then I came to the realization

Guest [00:09:04] that

Sean Escobar [00:09:06] doesn't happen on our timetable and it doesn't happen. There is nothing we can do or say to these Mormon people, active Mormons, like I was. It has to happen in their time.

Crystal Escobar [00:09:17] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:09:18] And it's. And I came to the conclusion that I don't have to be. That this was in December. I don't have to know everything. And I'm going to stop because it was consuming my life and it was getting very addictive to know everything, all of it. And then I thought, I'm not going to be the next John de Lynn. I'm not going to be the next historian. It's. It's. You know, I never even liked history, but I did enjoy. It was consum. Enjoyed what I was learning. Believe me, it was very fascinating, everything I learned. But I came to the conclusion I better get on her train. I had better start learning about where we go from here because it wasn't making me happy. John. Digging up all that stuff non stop when I was.

Crystal Escobar [00:09:55] What I was searching for on Mormon Stories podcast was different than him. I was looking for the happy story, like, because I was really scared. And, um. Do you want me to share? Like at that point where. Okay. We discovered that it wasn't true, but then I was like you said, well,

Sean Escobar [00:10:15] we skipped something too.

Crystal Escobar [00:10:16] Oh, what was it?

Sean Escobar [00:10:17] McKenna Denson.

Crystal Escobar [00:10:19] Oh, yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:10:20] That was major for her.

Crystal Escobar [00:10:21] That was big for me.

John Dehlin [00:10:22] Talk about that.

Crystal Escobar [00:10:23] We.

Sean Escobar [00:10:23] That was before.

Crystal Escobar [00:10:24] I remember Sean was just, you know, he always reads the news and I don't. And so he just started playing this audio on his phone. And we were in bed and I was like, oh, what's that? And you're like, this is about mission president who raped this woman.

John Dehlin [00:10:39] And so I started in the mtc.

Crystal Escobar [00:10:41] Yeah. And I was like, I started listening to it and I listened to just a few minutes of it, and I just broke down in tears because I didn't know that that was possible. I had no idea because I had such my views on mission presidents or anybody with a high calling was that they are absolutely called of God. And there's no mistake about that, you know, and to know that he had been called as a mission president and was capable and actually did those things, that really put a huge crack in my shelf. And I remember just like a couple weeks after that, we did our first podcast episode about the church. And. And we titled it One Size Doesn't Fit all. Because we started that. That was the beginning of all of our conversation around the church and just kind of allowing ourselves to have those questions. And we communicated the questions with one another. And this is way before that we came upon your podcast, but it just allowed us to start that conversation and really think, wait, and for me to allow him to express his concerns without getting defensive about the church. And so we talked about some things that we didn't like about the church in that episode, but we were active. We were active. And we assured everybody in the episode,

Sean Escobar [00:12:07] she deleted about half of what I said.

Crystal Escobar [00:12:09] He got real angry about some things. So I'm like, let's like remove that. But.

John Dehlin [00:12:13] But, you know, let's just not forget you guys had both experienced sexual abuse in your childhoods. Yeah, so. So to have to be kind of almost validated that this was a problem that was system wide in the church and that the church was complicit in the COVID ups. How was that for you?

Crystal Escobar [00:12:32] Yeah, that's just shocking for you? Yeah, it was shocking. Like, I just had no idea that that could ever happen with a mission president or anyone with a. Even a bishop. I never was aware that anything like that could happen with a bishop or anyone with these high callings. And so, yeah, we did that first episode and I think it was just a month, a couple months after that, where we did our. Our other. Another episode, which turned our podcast into more of our faith journey because it was more about, you know, like, personal development. But then I just couldn't help but anyway, that's jumping ahead a little bit. But when I listened to your episode, when it said they answered the. You answered the question, well, what do you believe about God now? And I said, I mean, you said, God is unknowable. And I can literally.

Sean Escobar [00:13:26] Damn you, John.

Crystal Escobar [00:13:27] I can literally feel that same feeling that came over me the second you said that. Because I was not prepared for that. I thought for sure, based on all of your knowledge, you would absolutely say there is a God. And I know that there is a God. I just needed you to say that. Why didn't you say that? And that that triggered my full on panic attack that lasted three days. And it was the most intense thing I have ever experienced. The dark night of the soul.

John Dehlin [00:13:58] But I'm sorry.

Crystal Escobar [00:14:00] Well, it is absolutely. Say sorry to him.

John Dehlin [00:14:04] Sorry, Sean.

Crystal Escobar [00:14:05] It was absolutely necessary. I can look at it now and be like, wow, what was so shocking?

John Dehlin [00:14:12] Why was that so shocking to you?

Crystal Escobar [00:14:13] Because I thought based on your knowledge, you would say, yes, there is a God. And that's all I needed to know to move forward. I just needed. I'd be like, I just thought, okay, I can be on my own spiritual journey as long as there is a God. And that was essential for me at that time. And so I have.

John Dehlin [00:14:32] Can I just make a disclaimer for those who are listening for the first time? I have never identified as an atheist or an agnostic. To this day, I would never tell people God is unknowable. What I think I probably would have said in that interview is that for me, I have not found that God is knowable. In other words, like, I just. This is how I feel. Like, yeah, I want it to be true. I've prayed a billion times, I've tried to get a connection. And that for me, I've just never been able to know for sure.

Crystal Escobar [00:15:01] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:15:01] And so many people through their emotions have made so many different conclusions.

Sean Escobar [00:15:05] It wasn't what you. It wasn't what.

John Dehlin [00:15:07] At the end of the day that. At the end of the day, I think I just trying to make the point that I think we're all guessing.

Crystal Escobar [00:15:11] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:15:12] And none of us really know for sure.

Sean Escobar [00:15:13] It wasn't what he said.

Crystal Escobar [00:15:15] It's not like you said, no, there's no God, you know, because that's the way I took it. I took it like you said, no, there's no God.

John Dehlin [00:15:21] And why was that? Why did that cause a panic attack for you?

Crystal Escobar [00:15:23] Because then I felt like everything was random and we're all just floating. We'll end up floating around in space and in darkness and no meaning. Yeah. No meaning or purpose. And I just wondered, how do you possibly live?

Sean Escobar [00:15:37] No eternal. No eternal.

Crystal Escobar [00:15:38] Knowing that there's, you know, the eternal progression and that there's a God and that we have, like, guardian angels and all these things that had always brought me so much peace and comfort. I couldn't imagine living a life without that. But I've come to a new understanding, and my dark night of the soul is. Was an important stepping stone to be where I'm at now, which is amazing. But, yeah, you can't just remove the heart, the process. You can't remove any parts of the process that comes from losing your religion and your beliefs and starting from ground zero. But it is amazing. That's. And that I wanted to also mention that Brooke and Josh Miller's podcast episode was really comforting to me because. And I found myself skipping through a lot of different episodes to get to the very end. But Brooke and Josh, as I listened to the whole thing, because I felt like we could really relate. We were about the same age and

Sean Escobar [00:16:39] same with Leah and Cody.

Crystal Escobar [00:16:41] Yeah. Lee and Cody's for sure was.

Sean Escobar [00:16:43] We were just searching for people like us.

Crystal Escobar [00:16:45] Yeah. And I, I just needed to hear people say comforting things about what their life is like after Mormonism. How have they found peace? So that was what I was searching for after I already discovered that it wasn't true. I just needed to hear people's stories, like, is life good? Is life so good? Are we going to be happy? Like, I just needed to hear lots and lots of stories of people saying, don't worry. It's amazing. You just got to get through the. You got to go through the process. And part of it may be a dark night of the soul. Sean never experienced that, but, you know, and I, I, I'm happy for that experience because it, it makes, I think, you know, the contrast of things makes you really appreciate life, the good part, so much better. And, yeah, I've definitely come a long way in my spiritual development. And I wouldn't say either that I know that there is a God, but I hope there is, and I, I want to believe there is, so I'm just gonna go with that.

John Dehlin [00:17:46] Right. It doesn't matter whether you end up believing or not. It's the fact that you have to make your beliefs your own.

Crystal Escobar [00:17:51] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:17:52] And go through the process of figuring out.

Crystal Escobar [00:17:54] Yeah. And it came from within. First time in my life that it came from within. Not based on cultural conditioning or what anybody else told me to believe. So that feels amazing.

John Dehlin [00:18:05] Love it. Okay, so you go through the dark night of the soul, but you're also, by this point, public figures. Right?

Coming Out Publicly and the Social Cost

Sean Escobar [00:18:12] Yeah. We came out.

John Dehlin [00:18:13] And you're following your big following. What percentage is Mormon?

Crystal Escobar [00:18:16] Right. Yeah. My whole goal 10 years ago when I started my blog, was to target Mormon moms, because that's me. I was a Mormon mom. So I always would target that. I would use the hashtags, you know, and on Instagram and any way that I could. And I was very open about the fact that I was Mormon. I would share my testimony on my blog and talk about my mission and all these things. And so, you know, I was always connecting with other Mormon moms. And then I started my podcast about a year ago, and I. It was all just more geared around personal development and not so much about motherhood, just personal development.

Sean Escobar [00:18:55] Do you remember how I asked you not to tell everybody? I was like, can we please just give it a year before we tell people? And she's like, okay.

Crystal Escobar [00:19:04] So I. After we had discovered this, it was right at the time where my season of the podcast was coming to an end, and it was the summer, and so I'm like, hey, like, I shared the dark night of the soul on the podcast without mentioning that it had anything to do with the church. And. And then, like, that was the end of the season. And then over the summer, I was just like, I want to share this experience on the podcast, but I am so scared. And I kept telling Sean, like, can't. Can I share it? And he's like, no, let's just wait for, like, a year, because, you know, we need to have a little more background, and we don't want to jump the gun. And I'm like, okay, okay. So all summer long, we just kind of had this agreement that we wouldn't be public about it, and Which I started to feel increasingly inauthentic as I would post on Instagram. Like, I posted a picture of me wearing shorts that were not as long as garments. And I had my first comment of somebody saying, wait, aren't you Mormon? And I was like, because of my shorts, you know, she's asking me, she's noticing of that I'm not wearing my garments, and she's going to voice that to me. And I hated feeling. I hated feeling like I couldn't be authentic. You know, the people were going to judge me and look at me like, oh, my gosh, look at her. She's not wearing her garments. You know, So I just kind of felt like if I'm going to keep. Maintain this. This platform and being and continue doing what my intentions have always been around it, which was to be completely authentic, I just felt like there's no other way for me to continue doing this without sharing this experience. So right when I was about ready to start the next season of the podcast, I just decided to do it.

Sean Escobar [00:20:55] And she did it without.

Crystal Escobar [00:20:57] Without him knowing he was out of town. And I just went for it. And.

John Dehlin [00:21:01] What? You claimed your own power?

Crystal Escobar [00:21:03] He's like, wait, so I. I guess you did it. And I'm like, yep. So then it just kind of unleashed everything.

Sean Escobar [00:21:10] There was fallout. Instant.

Crystal Escobar [00:21:12] Yeah, that was hard. Like, it was. It was really hard for me. I thought my first episode, because I was very, like, political and just was really. I. I said it very lightly in the first episode, and people were very kind and nice, but then there were a few that were like, you know, you shouldn't be sharing this publicly. You could be leading people out of the church. You're causing. You know, and she said something about the recent talk where. Who was it that said doubt? Yeah, she said Uchdorf's. She was talking about Uchtdorf's. Talk of, you're gonna cause them to doubt, or. Yeah, I don't remember.

Sean Escobar [00:21:52] You're gonna cause them to doubt.

Crystal Escobar [00:21:54] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:21:55] Yeah.

Crystal Escobar [00:21:56] So that made me feel really bad, and I suddenly felt scared and afraid to influence people in that way, because I didn't. No. You know, I almost at a point was like, I don't want anyone to experience the dark night of the soul. That was too intense. I don't want to do that to people. And so that. But then, you know, as I've grown, I. I realize that there is so much beauty outside of Mormonism. And I've. He and I together have grown in more ways than I ever even knew. Like, I just feel like the last 15 years of our marriage was just so inauthentic. And this last year, we feel like we're getting to know each other, like, on a much deeper level, and we're allowing ourselves to be who we are. It's really amazing. But, yeah, we just came right off.

Sean Escobar [00:22:51] You lost 3,000 followers over there.

Crystal Escobar [00:22:52] Yeah, I lost a lot of followers. Got a lot of negative comments and reviews on my podcast, which was hurtful because you can't delete negative reviews. And I was proud of my five stars, so.

John Dehlin [00:23:05] And people don't. It's not like people actually listen and then evaluate the quality of what they're listening to. It's just like, oh, I heard that Crystal and Sean left the church. I'm going to go leave a super negative review on the star.

Crystal Escobar [00:23:17] Exactly. And they're Going to do their missionary work to tear me down by leaving

John Dehlin [00:23:22] negative reviews, often without listening is all I'm saying.

Sean Escobar [00:23:25] Yeah, they think they're doing God's work.

John Dehlin [00:23:27] Yeah.

Crystal Escobar [00:23:27] So that really affect me and affected me in the beginning. And then I became gun shy and I didn't share much for a little. I mean, I would on the podcast. I always felt like I could be a little more open on the podcast, but I never dared say anything on Instagram or Facebook for a while. But now, more recently, I feel like I just feel real confident where we're at and that this is a good thing. So I have no fear around sharing every bit of our story. And even if it means we're causing people to doubt their religion, I think it's a beautiful thing, what we've experienced, you know, so if people are on. On this same journey that we were. We were on, I hope to be that person, too, that can help them on their way to say, everything will be okay. Life is beautiful. There still can be so much purpose to life. So I just wanted to be that for people when I needed it, you know, I needed that, too.

Healing from Abuse and Finding Personal Power

John Dehlin [00:24:27] So, Sean, so many years of torment. What's the past year or two been like for you in terms of your torment? The guilt, the shame, the suppression?

Sean Escobar [00:24:38] I feel like I've rediscovered myself. I feel like I no longer had to put on a. A face. I no longer had to pretend. I feel like, you know, it's funny, because I always felt like I had a good heart. And there's a shell. There's a Sean shell. And I can be. I can. If you haven't already recognized in this interview, I can be a lot of. I can be controlling, I can be skeptical, I can be negative. And sometimes those programs fire off pretty strongly. But I've always known that I have a good heart and I've always enjoyed service and helping people. So it just actually, what it did for me, John, it made me realize that there wasn't anything wrong with me, that I. That I'm a good person and that I always was. And that those feelings that I had and all the guilt and all the shame, that everything that was tormenting me, it wasn't my fault and it wasn't me. I feel redeemed. I feel liberated. I feel free.

John Dehlin [00:25:47] What's that like?

Sean Escobar [00:25:48] It's awesome.

Crystal Escobar [00:25:50] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:25:52] So your marriage. Stronger or weaker?

Crystal Escobar [00:25:55] Oh, my gosh.

Sean Escobar [00:25:55] Like, so much stronger and.

Crystal Escobar [00:25:59] Yeah, it's just.

John Dehlin [00:26:00] How can that be? They say wickedness never was happiness. Right.

Crystal Escobar [00:26:02] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:26:03] So from the standpoint John, part case, part of the reason, I was telling her, please do not go public. Because, you know, I was in the back of my mind, I was thinking, I know what Mormons say about people that leave the church, and it's all going to fall apart and you're going to get divorced and you're going to lose all your money. And I know what they say, and I know. I know the meaning they tie to that. And I actually, I think it was again, the Mormon firing off in me, and I was like, let's give this some time, because I'd hate to. I'd hate to go public and then have that be right, have our lives fall apart. He'll just give them further evidence. But it's been the complete opposite. It's been so great.

Crystal Escobar [00:26:37] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:26:38] What's great? What's great about.

Crystal Escobar [00:26:40] Well, finally to just feel like. I just feel like you can go. It's just crazy that you can go 15 years being married to somebody and then once you remove all of these barriers and limiting beliefs and you allow yourself to step outside of the box and you feel liberated to be everything you always knew you were, but were maybe ashamed of in some ways, based on your beliefs. And for me to get to know Sean in this way, like, it's amazing to compare. Like, I did notice him getting sick a lot. There was a lot of times where he'd just sit there and be quiet and spacey. And I always wondered, like, what's going on with him? Like, you know, and I. I've never seen him be so, like, happy and free and confident and even emotional. I've never seen him get emotional, which is like, a sign that he's finally just allowing himself to be who he is, unapologetically, without shame or guilt. And just. Yeah, it feels just like a huge weight has lifted. And we. And for me to be able to. And we had, like, a huge breakthrough more recently. We continue to have these breakthroughs over the last year. So it just, you know, it. It's been so exciting this entire year. But more recently, we had one of our biggest breakthroughs in our marriage. And I feel more free, freer than I've ever felt because I was finally able to share every bit of my past, all the different, like, sexual abuse experiences that I had that I carried, feeling shameful about that it was my fault. And, like, I never felt like I could tell him a lot of things because I thought he would judge me.

Sean Escobar [00:28:47] To be fair, I shut her down early on. She told me about something that had happened And I, I shut her down and told her I didn't like to hear about those things. And I was. I really regret that. That was early in the marriage.

Crystal Escobar [00:29:01] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:29:02] So to get that out, to get

Crystal Escobar [00:29:03] that out is like, amazing. Like, I didn't realize how much it affected who I am, you know, like, my own confidence about who, who I am. I felt like I did kind of, in a sense, play this role of like the timid little mouse and, you know, like, okay, like, you're the one in charge, you know, like, I'll do what you say and, and, and not really feeling confidence around my capabilities, around, you know, my own blog. I had a lot of self doubts and feelings of why, you know, like, I could never be as successful as Sean when it comes to business. And just not feeling like I measured up when it came to being successful, you know, Contributing. Yeah, contributing.

Sean Escobar [00:29:48] Not money, but.

Crystal Escobar [00:29:49] Yeah. Yeah. Bringing something to the table, you know, I just always felt like Sean was the one and I, you know, I just kind of have to. I just.

Sean Escobar [00:30:01] A lot of that was probably my fault.

Crystal Escobar [00:30:03] I just always felt like I wanted to have something to offer, something to contribute, you know, And I never really allowed myself to be 100% me, you know, and now, now I feel. It's crazy how much I feel like both of us are just noticing with each other, like, who are you? Like, oh my gosh, I had no idea. You know, like, just so many breakthroughs and we're just. We've peeled back so many layers that we really didn't even know existed.

John Dehlin [00:30:38] And your own personal empowerment, how are you feeling now in terms of your power and worth?

Crystal Escobar [00:30:43] Like, like incredible. I. I just never. Yeah, I just feel like I have so much to offer now.

Sean Escobar [00:30:54] And I saw something come out of her. I saw power come out of her. I mean, I couldn't believe it. And I don't. I don't want to believe that I was so unsupportive, that I was just like this egomaniac. I don't believe that. But, you know, subtle things that I would do and say and, and I can see the effect that I had on her, and I really regret that.

John Dehlin [00:31:13] But now.

Crystal Escobar [00:31:16] And yeah, like, I think I always felt too, that I'm, as a Mormon mom. I'm not supposed to do anything else besides be a mom. So that was always something weighing on me and making me feel like I shouldn't be doing my blog. This is taking time away from my kids, and that's bad. So, yeah, just to feel more equal, I think an equal partnership. I think in the beginning, you know, like, I really did take that literal, that part of the temple where it says, hearken unto the counsel of your husband as he hearkens into the counsel of the Lord. I always thought that no matter what, Sean is right, and I have to just do what he says, no matter what. You know, when it comes to parenting or money or anything, I always just felt like he's the one in charge. So now it feels really a hundred percent equal in our role as parents. And, you know, I don't really, like, I don't think that as far as, you know, how much money we make, you know, like, he is the one that built the. The majority of our business in Isagenix. I don't really see that as, oh, he's better than me now. I feel like what I've done has contributed in a different way. And we're just like equal partners in that way, you know, so it just feels equal.

John Dehlin [00:32:41] Love it.

Sean Escobar [00:32:42] I've never felt so loved, John. Oh, my gosh. John.

John Dehlin [00:32:47] Bye.

Sean Escobar [00:32:47] Bye. My wife. I've never felt so loved. And it has nothing to do with sex.

John Dehlin [00:32:52] It's.

Sean Escobar [00:32:54] I've. I've never. I always. My whole marriage, I thought, I'm crazy about this woman. I adore this woman. I know I was hard to live with at times, but, I mean, my love for her, my loyalty to her, it's fierce. But I never. I always knew she loved me, but I never. I never thought she loved me as much as I loved her. I just. I didn't think it was possible. And just. Just in the recent. You know, the last few months, I've. I've realized that she loves me every bit as much as I love her. And I can't tell you how good that feels.

Crystal Escobar [00:33:27] I feel good. To be able to. At any given moment, to be like, what are you thinking about?

Sean Escobar [00:33:34] And I can say it.

Crystal Escobar [00:33:35] We can say it and not feel like in any way that I'm trying to hold back or hide anything or there's no secrets or. You know, I just remember certain times I would feel certain things from my past would come up and. And torment me, and I would be experiencing this anxiety without ever being able to have to. Being able to share why I'm feeling that way with Sean is like. He'd be like, what's wrong with you? Nothing. I'm fine. You know, like, just trying to put on the happy face and. And not able to share, like, what's going on with me, you know? But now it just Feels so cool to be able to. To know each other that deeply. And I can't believe it's taken us 15 years to really get to know each other.

Sean Escobar [00:34:21] Wow.

John Dehlin [00:34:22] It's kind of a miracle, right?

Crystal Escobar [00:34:24] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:34:25] All this blossoming that you would never in your wildest dreams imagine was possible after losing your orthodox testimony.

Sean Escobar [00:34:32] You know the feeling I've been having lately? It's like. Because I've had a lot of stress lately, a tremendous amount of stress the last nine months and the last year and especially the last two months. And the feeling I've been having lately is none of it matters. None of it. None of it has any bearing on me. None of it has any hold on me because I have this woman and we have each other and I'm the luckiest guy in the world.

John Dehlin [00:35:01] And

Sean Escobar [00:35:04] I could go, I could. As long as I have her and I have this, I could do anything. I could go through anything. I just tell myself, look what I have. And the love is that strong. And I thought it was before, but it wasn't.

Crystal Escobar [00:35:26] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:35:27] So beautiful. There's that. There's that. I Once we were Claire and Margi and I and Winston were driving down the freeway and we saw that billboard like 1-800-Call God or whatever God lives or the Bible's true. And we were just feeling silly, so we called the number. We got in a conversation with the guy on the other line. He's actually quite intelligent. But I put it on speaker and the kids were listening as I had this conversation with the guy trying to convince me the Bible is true and God lived. And I wasn't debating, but I just having a conversation and he literally said to me, well, why would anyone not cheat on their spouse if they didn't believe in God in the Bible? Right?

Crystal Escobar [00:36:08] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:36:08] It's like there's no other possibility. Yeah, no, I've had. What would your guys response be? Why in the world would you decide to remain married and maybe even remain faithful to each other?

Sean Escobar [00:36:20] We don't. We're swingers. Well, no.

Crystal Escobar [00:36:23] Didn't you see our Open marriage podcast episode?

Sean Escobar [00:36:26] No. Do you mind if I just say that Crystal taught me this. Crystal's taught me so much. Oh my gosh. This girl has devoured books like, oh my gosh. And I've just been supportive of that because I see what it's done for her and I see what it's done for our marriage, the growth. And I've just been so amazed by you, my respect for you. Like, I just didn't know what I Married. I married a girl that I was attracted to and that I loved her, her giddy personality. And I thought, well, she's fun and she'll keep me young and she's bubbly. I didn't know I married someone that was so committed to growing. I mean, she's a grower. She wants to grow in life and everything. But why would I not cheat on my wife? Because I know it would hurt her, for one. Because I know I would lose her, I mean, and that would hurt me. It's pretty, I mean, you look at it on the surface, it's pretty simple, right?

Crystal Escobar [00:37:31] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:37:32] I don't want to lose her. And if she was to cheat on me, it would hurt me. So why would I want to do that to her? It's simple, right?

Crystal Escobar [00:37:42] Yeah. We don't need a God or any religion to tell us that that's not good.

Sean Escobar [00:37:47] You don't need eternal consequences. There's enough consequence here in this life.

Crystal Escobar [00:37:51] Yeah, we have consequences.

Sean Escobar [00:37:52] You'll pay a price. You cheat on your wife, you'll pay a price for that here.

John Dehlin [00:37:56] And the irony is, after I lost my faith and had these realizations, I was more faithful to my wife than ever.

Sean Escobar [00:38:04] Yeah, I feel that. I feel I can trust my wife so much now. And I was always like controlling her and like, you can never talk to men. And I'm embarrassed. Like, forgive me for what I said when I was Mormon.

Crystal Escobar [00:38:16] He's saying that like all the time. Forgive me what I said when I was Mormon.

Sean Escobar [00:38:19] I desire all to receive what we have now. I desire all to receive. It's beautiful. It's amazing.

Life Beyond Mormonism and Looking Forward

John Dehlin [00:38:26] All right, well, we're, let's see, 9, 27, so we're a good, you know, almost three and a half hours in and I'm not surprised. You know, I think we're coming close to the end of this segment, which is kind of your faith journey. It's been beautiful. People are commenting on your body language and your love for each other and your vulnerability. And listeners have really been hanging in and loving what you guys are sharing. Any, you know, we still have to get to in the next segment and I need to check on Cody's time and your guys's time. But we, we still need to talk about, you know, Sterling Van Wagenen and the sexual abuse and the church's cover up. And then we also want to get to this amazing book. My life is a wannabe balanced mom, along with your, your work with women. But I want to make sure we, we talk about everything you guys want to talk about as it relates to your faith journey. So what else do you guys want to make sure we cover before we move on to those?

Sean Escobar [00:39:33] I just wanted to talk about when I told Crystal that I'd looked at pornography.

John Dehlin [00:39:36] Okay, yeah, let's. That's a great. Come back to that.

Sean Escobar [00:39:39] I want to help men. Yeah, I do. And that mission, I lived. I lived with pure. Pure guilt and hell and. And it's the same thing. My whole marriage. I felt like I'm not worthy of this woman. I don't deserve her. And I felt powerless, and I felt evil. And what happened was we fell in love hard after this faith crisis. And it was just maybe a few months ago, and Crystal and I were having this nice, intimate moment. Not sexual. We were talking a lot, talking about all kinds of things. And Crystal started to tell me some of the things that she'd always wanted to tell me that she didn't feel safe to tell me. So she told me these things, and some of them were pretty heavy, and it was amazing. I found myself responding not as myself. I found myself responding with love and tolerance and acceptance and. Not that she needed. Not that I have any control over her, but she expected me to. She didn't expect a positive outcome from what she told me. Right. And I felt a tremendous amount of love in that moment. And the love was so overwhelming. And I looked at her in the eyes and I thought. I mean, I remember saying in my head, God, you are such a good person. And it just came out. I've looked at pornography throughout our marriage. Off and on, I've looked at pornography. And she goes, okay. And then I said, I'm so sorry. I didn't feel I could tell you. And I expected it was funny, because right before I said it, I had that little voice in my head again, right before I said it, it was like, teller. And then another voice said, don't you do it, you stupid idiot. She's still going to leave you. But my love was so powerful, it just came out. And maybe you can just talk about how. How it went from there.

Crystal Escobar [00:41:47] Well, initially, I. It wasn't as big of a shock as I thought it would be. All throughout our marriage, it being such a big deal to me. But being on this faith journey, I've really been able to separate myself from. From, you know, understanding the ego and the physical form and our spirit. And I think being able to educate myself on that alone allowed me a more open response to that. And it didn't. If he had told me that may even like three years ago, I would have been a complete wreck. And yeah, I don't know what that would have meant for our marriage. I don't think I would have left him, but I would have been. I would have emotionally divorced him. I wouldn't have left for our kids sake, but I wouldn't be able to be with him intimately again. And I would have thought that was the same as cheating, you know. And so all this, like all that I have learned over the past year really allowed me to be a little more open minded about that. And so it didn't affect me as much as I thought it would, but I just knew that, okay, now the next step is just maybe just a little education around this. And so then I searched and I found the podcast episode on Mormon Faith Transitions.

John Dehlin [00:43:18] Mormon Transitions podcast with Natasha Alfred Parker. Yeah, Mark E. Was probably on it.

Crystal Escobar [00:43:22] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:43:23] It was about healthy sexuality.

Crystal Escobar [00:43:24] Yeah, I found that the next day and listened to both of those episodes and I was like, oh my gosh, everything's okay. Yeah, you know, I just needed to.

John Dehlin [00:43:35] Now does that mean in your mind you're like, porn is good?

Crystal Escobar [00:43:38] Well, I just, it's not bad, you know, to me, for Sean or me together. But I can see, I know that there are different cases. So it just all depends.

Sean Escobar [00:43:49] But we have a lot of. I mean, we probably don't have time to go into it. We've read about it a lot now and we've kind of formed opinions about it, but these opinions are still evolving. And we're learning there's certain things that do not work and are unhealthy and there's certain things that. That might be helpful. I think, I hope before anybody passes any judgment on us, just appreciate that we're being honest only because we want to help other people in their marriages.

Crystal Escobar [00:44:13] And I just think that. And we keep coming down back to this. Every time we talk about anything around this topic is all that really matters is that we maintain an open conversation about this and that we don't ever again feel like we need to hide anything because we don't need to. We can talk about it. We can decide, does this work? Does this not work? Do you feel okay with this? Do you not.

Sean Escobar [00:44:37] Have you ever felt a zing in your relationship? Like a zing? It's like an orgasm, John, and it lasts like all day. And I gotta tell you, I never had that. For almost 15 years, I never had that. But the last few months, it's been like that almost on a daily basis. I zing. And it has nothing to do with sex.

John Dehlin [00:44:57] It's emotional intimacy.

Crystal Escobar [00:44:58] Yeah.

Guest [00:44:58] Wow.

John Dehlin [00:44:59] Right?

Crystal Escobar [00:44:59] It's really amazing, mind blowing.

Sean Escobar [00:45:02] And I adore this woman. This woman is my everything. And I thank you. Thank you. I need to do this. Thank you, John. And thank you, Margi. Thank you. Because if she hadn't discovered your podcast, truly your podcast, my wife saved me. I never could have left the church. Not ever. And my wife, she saved me. She gave me permission to be myself, and she also gave me permission to tell my deep, dark secret. And I. Even through all this stuff that I've been dealing with, I feel so renewed. I feel so happy.

John Dehlin [00:45:47] And ironically, you already said this, but almost without question, when you are able to say to your spouse, I look at porn, sometimes masturbate, and then they say to you, well, I love you anyway.

Sean Escobar [00:46:02] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:46:03] What does it do to your porn use?

Sean Escobar [00:46:05] It goes down.

Crystal Escobar [00:46:06] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:46:07] It just.

Sean Escobar [00:46:07] It just plummets.

John Dehlin [00:46:09] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:46:09] You don't. You don't need it. It's a miracle. That's a miracle in and of itself.

John Dehlin [00:46:13] Which shows that the porn use was

Sean Escobar [00:46:15] tied to what the religion and secrets. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:46:19] Secrets and shame and stigma.

Sean Escobar [00:46:22] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:46:22] Is what's driving the porn epidemic.

Crystal Escobar [00:46:24] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:46:25] And the child sex abuse is tied to all that too, I think.

Crystal Escobar [00:46:29] Yeah. So, yeah. The. Natasha Helford.

Sean Escobar [00:46:32] Thank you, Natasha.

Crystal Escobar [00:46:33] She. I mean, just to hear from somebody who is educated on the topic, I think that every member of the church just needs to listen to that episode and be like, oh, maybe. Maybe there's some research or statistics.

Sean Escobar [00:46:49] John. If they can control sex. If they can control sex, they've got us.

Crystal Escobar [00:46:55] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:46:56] Sexual emotions.

John Dehlin [00:46:57] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:46:58] Because human beings like sex. And if they can control the narrative, the shame, the guilt around that one thing that we actually really do love. They've got you.

John Dehlin [00:47:12] Beautiful. All right, anything else you guys want to share to kind of wrap up this segment about your faith journey? Like beliefs? Do you want to talk about your beliefs now? Do you want to talk about. Have you looked at other churches? Do you still believe in things? Your kids? Are you better parents, worse parents?

Crystal Escobar [00:47:29] Yeah. We're kind of on a.

Sean Escobar [00:47:32] We're on a journey. I will never subscribe to another formal religion the rest of my life. I don't believe in formal religion. I can recognize now, me personally, as you said, John, there's people that religion is good for them and that structure and those parameters, and that's a good thing for them. And I can acknowledge that there's a lot of good about Mormonism. For me personally, I don't do well in authoritarian type Environments with rigid structure. I do not thrive in that environment. I regress. But Crystal, you can maybe share how you feel about different things in terms of beliefs, whatever you feel. I just did my one thing, Crystal, when she told me that she was doubting that there was a God for a minute there and she had that major, you know, that crisis, I just remember not feeling that at all. Everything made sense to me. All of a sudden. It was like everything that never made sense to me in the church. All of a sudden I understood life and all of a sudden I understood why we're here. And I don't need to go into all of that because it's actually really simple for me. I actually believe that we're put on this earth to realize at some point that, that we're not here to discover why we're here.

Crystal Escobar [00:48:49] We're also desperately trying.

Sean Escobar [00:48:51] We're here to live and experience and see what works and what doesn't work for us. And we're here. You know, I tell Crystal all the time, a dog doesn't need a mission and a purpose to live a happy life. He just lives and he's happy. And that sounds pretty, pretty simplistic. That's not earth shattering. But I almost feel like I'm here. And I want to believe there's a God too, but I don't need to know there's a God or to know that Jesus did what he said, what they say he did, in order to live a good life and to serve people and to do what brings me joy and to raise good kids and have good morals and have good values. I don't need any of that. That's just my set of beliefs. And so. And that's brought me a tremendous amount of fulfillment. I'm not saying it's for everybody, but it sure is for me.

Crystal Escobar [00:49:38] Yeah, for me, I definitely just have decided that I don't have to know. And I'm never going to claim to know anything, but if I find something that I like, I am okay with allowing myself to hope that that's true or even to believe in it. But yeah, I too have no desire to belong to any organized religion or get sucked into anything like that. I just want to. I want to keep it my own spiritual journey. And I want to pick and choose from all the different books and philosophers and the science, and I just want to. I just want to decide on my own and decide what feels right with my soul. And for me, I like to believe that there is a God, but I no longer envision God as a man, I don't really envision God anymore. Just feel, you know, it's more about feelings now.

Sean Escobar [00:50:37] God's a woman. Of course

John Dehlin [00:50:40] I love Mark. When I interviewed Margi, my wife, there's this point in the episode where she's like, beliefs are overrated.

Crystal Escobar [00:50:47] Yeah,

Sean Escobar [00:50:50] that's cool.

John Dehlin [00:50:50] And I love what you said. The purpose of life is not to figure out what the purpose of life is. The purpose of life is to make the most of your life and enjoy

Sean Escobar [00:50:57] it and grow, discover your talents, serve

John Dehlin [00:50:59] others and be kind and have fun and find joy and. And just make the most of it. And if there's an afterlife. What if we worry about the afterlife if we're there?

Crystal Escobar [00:51:08] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:51:09] One of my favorite quotes now, John, one of my favorite quotes that applies to my beliefs is, tomorrow we die. Now, religion's key in on that. But today we live. Don't spend your whole life thinking about what's going to happen after you die. That's not. And that's not a way to live.

John Dehlin [00:51:28] And yet the Book of Mormon kind of like sets this up and talks about the wicked prophets. Is it Zizoram? Zoram? Is it Khor? Whoever. Nihor. I don't remember now, but the Antichrist, they're wicked. If they say, eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow you die.

Crystal Escobar [00:51:42] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:51:43] You know what I'm saying? Like, Mormons are set up to think that this teaching that life is to be enjoyed now versus the teaching that life is to be enjoyed after.

Crystal Escobar [00:51:53] Yeah.

Sean Escobar [00:51:53] Remember what you taught me.

John Dehlin [00:51:54] We're speaking wickedness according to an orthodox.

Sean Escobar [00:51:57] We are. And she. But she taught me something so cool. She goes, sean, because I'm so literal. I'm such a literal person, pragmatic person. And she goes, sean, life is not a test. And I go, yeah, it is. You pass or fail, heaven or hell. And come to find out, Mormons don't believe in hell. They only believe in outer darkness, which is only for people like me, unfortunately. But she said, sean, life's a classroom. Life's not a test.

Crystal Escobar [00:52:26] I didn't originally say that. I've heard that many times. Lots of different people quoting you.

Sean Escobar [00:52:31] But I love that we're here to live.

John Dehlin [00:52:34] It's learning.

Crystal Escobar [00:52:35] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:52:35] It's not sin. It's learning. It's growth. It's not sin and unworthiness and worthiness. It's learning and growth, period.

Crystal Escobar [00:52:43] And what's a confirmation for me that we are absolutely on the right path and have not been deceived by Satan? Is that how, if God, we've always been taught that love is the answer. And you know, God is love and love is all you need. And if my capacity to love has expanded over the past year, then how could that possibly be from Satan?

Sean Escobar [00:53:12] Boy, it's earth shattering. You become more tolerant, you become less judgmental. You become better in every way. Actually, I've never felt like I love all people more. I've never been. In fact, I feel so much less judgmental, it's not even funny. I'm not judging people. And it feels so good. By their fruits, you shall know them.

John Dehlin [00:53:38] I mean, your countenances right now are brilliant. They're shining. Your eyes are sparkling.

Crystal Escobar [00:53:43] You need to put some makeup on.

John Dehlin [00:53:45] I'm just saying that this isn't dark and loathsome. This is bright and delightsome. I won't say white. I'll say bright. This is bright and delightsome here.

Sean Escobar [00:53:54] Jesus wasn't white either. Just want to put that out there.

John Dehlin [00:53:58] That's so beautiful. What a great testimony. All right, anything else you want to say before we wrap this segment up?

Crystal Escobar [00:54:03] In the name of John Escobar and John de Lynn.

John Dehlin [00:54:07] Crystal Escobar. Come on.

Sean Escobar [00:54:12] I do want to say thank you to the Mormons that have been so good to us. It's changing, guys. It's shifting for the better. Our whole mission around being so public around this was just to make it safe for people to leave, to make it socially acceptable. We want change in the church. I actually want them to remove the damning doctrine that says that me, a good person, a good, valuable. My wife and I, we're contributing members of society. We have good morals, good values. Don't damn us. Just please don't damn us just because we left your club. That's not cool. Every active Mormon should resent that doctrine. That doctrine's gotta go. It's gotta leave. Until that changes, I will continue to be an activist for change. That has to go. That's the number one thing that has to go. Because it's destroying families. It's destroying my own family. Every single member of my family is active and goes to the temple. And they all have been taught, indoctrinated, that I am a son of perdition and I go to hell, the Mormon equivalent of hell. That's only resigned for me. Hitler doesn't go there. Neither do child molesters. Only me, a good person, because I left the club. We got to make some change around that. But otherwise, the members, there's doctrine that has to change. But the members, they're getting better. I mean, we're getting invited to Mormon parties.

John Dehlin [00:55:22] They're waking up.

Sean Escobar [00:55:23] Oh, man, they've been great. They've been great. It was way better than I ever could have imagined. I thought we were going to have to move or something. It's been great. I love you all. I love my family. It's getting better. It's just going to keep getting better.

John Dehlin [00:55:36] Crystal, you get the final word on this episode.

Crystal Escobar [00:55:42] Yeah. I think our mission is to help people be okay with their questions and their doubts and know that if you are going through a dark time, if you're right in the thick of it, of the faith transition or fresh out, I know how dark it can feel. But once you get to the other side, you will be so grateful that you took that leap into the darkness, because that is the only way you can find your inner light that comes from within.

John Dehlin [00:56:19] Amen.

Sean Escobar [00:56:20] Amen.

John Dehlin [00:56:21] All right, so to the hundreds of people that have been joining us on our livestream, we want to thank you all. Your comments and questions are just beautiful. You guys need to go back and read all the comments people have made. It's been in the hundreds, if not the thousands. People are just rejoicing in the brightness and the wisdom and the authenticness, authenticity that you all have been showing in the vulnerability that you've all been showing today. So thanks to our viewers and listeners who have been joining us so far. Thanks so much to Cody Layton for coming in on a Saturday to help with the audio visual production. Thanks to our donors, the Open Stories foundation, that make all this possible. If you love this programming and don't yet support it, please consider going to MormonStories.org click on the Donate button and signing up as a monthly contributor. 10 bucks, 50 bucks, 100 bucks a month. Whatever you can afford. It makes all this possible. Don't forget that we have the Thrive Conference coming up. Thrive Beyond Mormonism. That's not an Open Stories foundation project, but it's very much in the spirit of the mission of the Open Stories Foundation. Crystal and Sean will be there. Leah and Brinley Young will be there. Margi will be there. John Larsen will be speaking. I can't even list David Bacavoy. Just so many amazing speakers. Natasha, Julie de Azevedo, Hanks off on the Shelf. So many great speakers are going to be there. If you want to learn how to have good mental health, how to have good relationships, how to develop a morality to raise healthy kids, healthy spirituality, so many amazing sessions. ThriveBeyondMormonism.org, 75 bucks a person for two and a half days. That includes two lunches. It's an amazing opportunity. We, we're like a few dozen tickets from selling out completely. We sold out the first venue, we had to upscale the venue and now we're just days away from selling that out. Check out the Thrive Beyond Mormonism Conference because it's just all about healing and growth after orthodoxy. And you gotta come. Anyway, thanks everyone for joining us and don't go away. We are going to take a quick break and we have to come back and talk about Sean Escobar, the abuse that he experienced as a child with Sterling Van Wagenen, how the church covered that up, how the church empowered, you know, neglected Sean and empowered Sterling von Wagner to go on and, you know, do all sorts of other things for the church and abuse other victims. And it's a tragic story, but it's also a triumphant story because Sean has come out and New York Times and other venues have shared his story. And now Sterling is going to receive justice. But more importantly, a big, massive spotlight is being shined on the church again and how it protects perpetrators and neglects and punishes victims at the expense of, of justice for its own image, for the money, for the reputation. And we're going to just tell that whole story because it's a really important story. So just come right back, look on Mormon Stories podcast Facebook page. You'll see the new video link pop up and we're going to talk about some really heavy but important stuff. So don't go away. And then of course, after that, we will talk about My Life as a Wannabe Balanced mom by Crystal Escobar. So we'll see you guys on the flip side. Thanks for joining us and we'll see you soon. Thank you for joining us today on Mormon Stories. If you enjoyed this episode, please help us make more like it by becoming a monthly subscriber@mormonstories.org. All right to BE you is a collaboration song by electronic musician Milo Craft and singer songwriter Angela Sof. In 2018, they founded the Be Moved Project to create music that helps people feel happy and connected. To hear more music or support the project by becoming a patron, please visit angelasof.com that's S O F F E

Guest [01:00:45] There is a light beyond the shore Calling to you once more this is the life you're making There is a love for the taking it's all right these guys don't have to be you, you baby, you're somebody new when the lions are drawn Friends of you it's all right to be you. It's all right to be you Shame, disbelief It says who you want to be but there is a wise part of you I know you feel it too.

Transcript © 2026 John P. Dehlin. All rights reserved. Brief quotations are welcome with attribution and a link to mormonstories.org; all other use requires written permission.