Introduction and Meet the Panelists

John Dehlin [00:00:02] Happy Valentine's Day. Hello, and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories podcast. I'm your host, John Dehlin. We are doing a live episode today. It's February 14, 2026, and today we are going to be answering the question of what do some, at least ex Mormons, love about Mormonism or the LDS Church? This today's episode was the brainchild of everyone's favorite rando on the Internet, Kolby Reddish. Hey, Kolby.

Kolby Reddish [00:00:36] Hey, John. Thanks for having me. Happy Valentine's Day. And thanks for making this panel come together. I really appreciate it.

John Dehlin [00:00:42] Actually, I think it was you who made this panel come together, Kolby.

Kolby Reddish [00:00:46] Well, thank you for hosting this discussion. I think it's going to be really interesting. So many ex Mormons find themselves in this position where there are things they look back at at their time in Mormonism, and they really appreciate those things. And so today we're going to try and model, like, holding two different truths at once, which is, yes, you know, other ex Mormons out there absolutely hear you and understand that the church or its teachings may have damaged you or affected you in negative ways. But today we're really going to focus on some of those positive aspects that we remember from our time inside of Mormonism growing up, the way it helped shaped shape us.

John Dehlin [00:01:26] And Kolby, wasn't part of this that you. You hear from apologists of the church that ex Mormons can never say anything nice about the church or Mormonism? Is that part of it?

Kolby Reddish [00:01:36] Yeah. There were a bunch of comments that we had gotten you and I together after an episode we had done together, and I can't even remember which one because this happens quite a bit, where we get comments that basically say all we want to do is find fault with everything the church does or snipe at everything the church does. And so I thought, you know, I actually know that it's a lot more nuanced than that for a lot of the people in this space, and that's why we brought this panel of people who are like that together.

John Dehlin [00:01:59] All right, well, joining us on today's panel is ex Mormon sweetheart Care Burrell Nuanceo. Hey, Carah.

Carah Burrell [00:02:06] Oh, my gosh, what an intro. Thank you, John.

John Dehlin [00:02:09] We're getting the band back together.

Carah Burrell [00:02:10] Yeah. Reunited. Feel so good. Happy Valentine's.

John Dehlin [00:02:14] How have you been?

Carah Burrell [00:02:15] So good. Oh, my gosh, I'm so excited to be here. Especially I just finished doing a project for a secular spirituality class I'm taking where I was Mormon for 30 days. So when we're talking about things that we love about Mormonism, I had to literally try to love Mormonism.

John Dehlin [00:02:29] Wait, so for a month you sort of tried your best to be an orthodox weekly attending church, Latter Day Saints.

Carah Burrell [00:02:38] I went to church, I took the sacrament, I abstained from the things we abstain from.

John Dehlin [00:02:43] Wait, are you worthy to take the sacrament?

Carah Burrell [00:02:45] Are you worthy to call yourself a Mormon? What's the word worthy mean? We're getting into this already.

John Dehlin [00:02:51] Well, you were, you were being a Mormon for a month, so.

Julia [00:02:53] Yeah.

Carah Burrell [00:02:54] And there's nothing like, you know, leaving the church, I don't know, seven years ago and then going back into it and trying to see what I can actually gain from it. So it's not about to me just what the church, you know, the doctrines and all, it's, it's everything together and what these rituals actually do to me and, and what this kind of system of mourning with those that mourn, trying to be like Jesus, you know, Mormonism hits differently for, for everybody. And me as a post Mormon, seeing how these different things hit me has been a very interesting experiment. So this is a good topic that I'm excited to talk about today.

John Dehlin [00:03:27] And are you still nuance hoeing on your YouTube nuanced channel?

Carah Burrell [00:03:31] Yeah, um, I'm especially nuance hoeing today. So, yeah, I go under Carah barrel or nuance, so on everything. And then in the fall, I'll graduate from this secular spirituality course and help people do some deconstruction reconstruction one on one. Help eventually in the future. Something I should have done five years ago when I came to work for you, but.

John Dehlin [00:03:50] Beautiful. Yeah, thanks for joining us. It's good to have you back in the studio.

Carah Burrell [00:03:54] Yeah, thanks for letting me come in.

John Dehlin [00:03:56] Yeah. Also joining us for all the way from the UK is our own Nemo the Mormon. Hey, Nemo.

Nemo [00:04:02] Hi, John. How you doing?

John Dehlin [00:04:04] This is like two, two days in a row or two nights in a row where you're burning the midnight oil for, for your U.S. compatriots.

Nemo [00:04:15] Yeah. What can I say? I'm a sucker for punishment. I. I'm pleasure, pleasure to be here. It's not that late. It's sort of early evening time here, so I will be much more coherent than I was on the other live stream we did. And I'm. I'm looking forward to having a chance to talk about my experience with the church and what I loved about it and what I do still love about it and why I wanted to stay, even when many were calling for me to leave and even when I was ultimately booted.

John Dehlin [00:04:45] And I hear you're Coming to the United States, is that right?

Nemo [00:04:47] I am indeed coming to visit with all you lovely people and spent just spend time with people out in the US and. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:04:55] All right.

Nemo [00:04:56] Exciting.

John Dehlin [00:04:57] That'll be in early what, Early April? Early April. Okay. All right. And the final panelist that we have today joining us is our own Julia. Hey, Julia.

Julia [00:05:10] Hi, everyone.

John Dehlin [00:05:13] How's it going? What's new?

Julia [00:05:15] It's great. So also, Nemo, hearing you talk, I wanted to just plug in your episode where you were excommunicated. It was very heartfelt. It was just a very good episode. So if you guys haven't seen it, go watch it. It's super good.

Nemo [00:05:28] Thanks.

John Dehlin [00:05:29] I love it. All right, well, just by way of disclaimer, I interviewed. I've been trying to do some bridge building recently and I interviewed Greg Mattson from Quick CW cwic. He's a well known sort of conservative Mormon apologist. And in that episode, I tried to say things that I still appreciate or valued or loved about the church. And I even let my audience know that recently contacted my bishop. I've never attended the home ward where I live here in Salt Lake City.

John Dehlin [00:06:03] I attended my. I reached out to my local bishop just to see if he would feel okay about me attending. A lot of people got mad and they said, you don't have to ask a bishop if you can attend, but when you're John Dehlin, when you're viewed by some as Mormon Voldemort, I think it is respectful to reach out to the bishop and say, hey, I'd like to attend my local ward even though I'm excommunicated. Even though I have this podcast, I still haven't heard back from him yet. It's been a few months. But what I will say is that several ex Mormons lost their minds.

John Dehlin [00:06:35] They called me a disgusting traitor. I think they misinterpreted what I said because many people thought that what I said was that I want to become a member in good standing again, which would mean getting rebaptized and paying tithing. Never said any of that. Wouldn't do that. Wouldn't want to do that. But I did express a desire to just meet my neighbors and see how the church is going. Just like any other Protestant Christian tradition in the world. You can just show up and see what's going on and meet people and just have an experience. And I guess a lot of ex Mormons, understandably, because of the damage and the harm and the trauma that sometimes the church causes, they process that as me being A disgusting traitor.

John Dehlin [00:07:28] So let me just start, Kolby, I'll ask you first and then other panelists can join. Is it an act of disgusting traitorship to either say good things about a church that is flawed or has harmed or damaged people, even traumatized and, you know, supported abusers, and is it an act of traitorous, disgusting badness to either say good things about that church, acknowledge good things about that church, or even attend that church? Kolby, let's have you start. And then if other panelists want to join in, that'd be great.

Kolby Reddish [00:08:12] So, no, I don't think that's an act of being a disgusting traitor or wanting to seek any of those things would make anybody a disgusting trader. I think the way I land on, you know, how to govern associating with the church as a post Mormon is very similar to how I feel about the question of, like, should I remove my records from the church? A lot of times people deal with that question. To me, those are very individual decisions. So I can absolutely understand people who feel like, you know, the church as an institution or the church's teachings have damaged them and they just want nothing to do with it.

Kolby Reddish [00:08:48] Absolutely understand that point of view and think that that can be a valid path for many people. I think one of the issues with Mormonism specifically is that it is such a family focused religion and culture. And so for some people that that route of just, I'm going to completely cut everything Mormon out of my life isn't a real path that they have available to them unless they want to cut off, you know, their believing spouse, their believing children, There are other believing family members. So for people who need to find a little bit more nuance. One reason I'm glad that Carah's here to join us in this discussion today, I think they're just really individual decisions.

Kolby Reddish [00:09:26] So maybe it's the lawyer in me, John, but I think my answer to the question is it kind of depends. But I don't think any of that stuff makes anybody a traitor. I think too one of the reasons I wanted to have this discussion is because the church is like any other institution. It can be both things at once. It can be something that has damaged people. And then my personal experience, the reason I wanted to do this panel in the first place is as I look back at my time in the church and I look at who I am as a person, even as much as I have evolved over the last four years since I kind of exited from the church, there are many things about who I am as a person that I do see directly coming from my time in Mormonism.

Kolby Reddish [00:10:08] And I can be grateful for those things, while I still have more complex feelings towards Joseph Smith or the church as an institution or what it's taught me. So I think what we're trying to model here is the ability to hold two truths at once. And that's what I saw in your conversation with Greg. So to me it's disappointing that there are some people who cannot see that, but I think very often it's because they are not able to process past and see past their own pain and trauma with this system.

John Dehlin [00:10:36] Makes sense. Any. Any other panelists want to respond to the idea that you're disgusting traitor. If you attend a Mormon sacrament meeting or give compliments.

Nemo [00:10:46] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:10:47] To the church.

Nemo [00:10:47] Nemo, I've got thoughts. I think. And again, this is not intended to be some sort of like, sneaky backhand against the Church. I will recognize that one of the criticisms that is often levied against members of the church is, is that they have this strong in group out group bias.

Nemo [00:11:04] And it seems that some people don't lose that when they cease their association with the Church. They don't lose that propensity for trying to create sacred spaces, even in a secular sense, spaces that are sacred and must be defended. And so for some of these people, I think it can be a case that their ex Mormon sphere, their sphere outside the church, the way in which they engage with the church after they've left it is also a sacred space that must be defended and must be kept pure. And so any idea of, you know, just from a psychological perspective, any idea that one of the biggest voices in that space, John de Lynn, is now engaging with the church in a way that doesn't validate their view of the church, is making the space somehow less pure, less sacred.

Nemo [00:11:46] And so that has to be rejected. So I understand where the feelings come from. I disagree with that view. I think I agree, I agree with Kolby, where what we're trying to do here is hold two seemingly contradictory things as true at once, is that yes, ultimately I don't want to associate with the church anymore. But also the church did many good things. For me personally, that can be two difficult things to hold at the same time. But I think within everyone's relationship to the church there will be those. Those things.

Carah Burrell [00:12:16] Yeah, yeah, love that. And if I can just piggyback on that, I remember when the horrific shooting happened at that LDS church in Michigan and then the same week Charlie Kirk was shot, and I felt a difference in our like, psychological Collective, where just the tendency to become tribal, become, you know, dehumanizing of people on opposing sides just really came out. And the shorthand phrase of just submitting to the lowest vibration and something that we all have within us of tribalism and us versus them. And I think there are people who benefit greatly, whether we're conscious of it or not, to make money and to divide us.

Carah Burrell [00:13:03] And if we don't consciously recognize that in ourselves and that polarity that we have as ex Mormons and that Mormons have within themselves, people of all different spectrums across America, across the world, if we don't recognize that polarity and actually try to fight against it and integrate the things within Mormonism that we do like, that we do appreciate, then we all pretty much lose that if we stay in that polarity, we are all puppets for somebody else. And it's not something that I want to build my life around. I don't want to build my life around rituals and ideas about fighting against an enemy. I want to build things off of integrating the pieces and the parts that actually spark joy.

Carah Burrell [00:13:44] And there are some certain things within Mormonism that I can't help that I learned there. And they're good, and I want to expand upon them, but I also want to integrate them and make them unique to myself and what actually makes me happy. So by going to church this past month, I felt like I had to gaslight myself a lot. And there's, you know, there's no happiness in gaslighting yourself. That's the number one takeaway that I had, is that if you have to lie to yourself and put yourself in a box, that's not helpful either. But there's. There's plenty of good things with. To be found within, you know, all different types of cultures, Mormonism included.

John Dehlin [00:14:19] Love it. Julie, anything you want to add?

Julia [00:14:22] Yeah, I just. I really like that you mentioned the shooting, Carah, because I was at the Mormon Church when that happened. That shooting, I think, was in Michigan. I think that's right. Was it okay?

Kolby Reddish [00:14:31] Yeah.

Julia [00:14:32] Okay. Yeah. I was at the Mormon Church there on that day because I was helping my daughter celebrate her primary program. And I was reflecting afterwards. I was like. The polarization that you were speaking of was like, am I contributing to this. To this, like, this hate and this love or whatever? Am I polarizing with my messages? And so I really am glad that we are doing this panel to just show that we're not trying to do that at all. And so. So I'm just really glad that we're here to have this conversation.

Panelists Share Their Last Time at Church

John Dehlin [00:14:58] I'm curious with the panelists really quick. I want to hear everyone's last time they went to church. I'll just. I'll go first. I was visiting my dad about a month ago in Palm Coast, Florida. It's where my dad lives. It was around Christmas time, and my stepmom was singing a Christmas song in her local ward. So I decided to go with my dad and my stepmom and my daughter. I attended sort of a Christmas service.

John Dehlin [00:15:28] My stepmom sang. They had a. They happened to have a black bishop, which I thought was cool. He came up to me and said, hi, and he said, don't you have a podcast? And I said, yes. And he said, oh, I watched your podcast, and people treated me really nicely, and they're really warm. I felt a strong sense of community there. I really enjoyed singing the hymns. It was fun to see youth trying to, you know, live their best lives and become their best selves.

Julia [00:15:58] And.

John Dehlin [00:15:59] And I had really good feelings, believe it or not. And, you know, it had been years since I had attended a soccer meeting before last December, but I had a really positive experience. Anybody else. Has anybody else attended an LDS sacrament meeting recently? Carah, why don't you talk about your experiences really quick? And then anybody else, yeah, I'll go

Carah Burrell [00:16:21] kind of quick because they have a lot of experience. Over the month of January, I'll just say that I went to my home ward in Provo, Utah, that I grew up in, the one I grew up in, and with my mom on the first Sunday in January, which was such a good Sunday to go to church, out of all of the times, if you have to go anytime, the Sunday in which everyone is starting the new year and all of the testimonies and testimony meeting were just about fresh starts and trying your best. And I have this kind of mode of operation that my brain works in, where every morning I wake up already and think to myself, like, okay, Carah, you get out what you put in.

Carah Burrell [00:16:59] Like, let's try our best today. And it was just a lot of messages that I could understand and relate to. Not a lot of dogmatism or anything, Just people saying, like, God does not care about perfection. He just rewards your effort. This is a new year to just try your best. And so that was when I had a lot of issues with trying to be Mormon for 30 days. But I. I agreed with that message that, like, whatever you believe about God or life, you know, you get out what you put in. Just try. Try to put forth forth your best effort and you'll see good results from that.

Carah Burrell [00:17:32] So I appreciated those messages. And yeah, the people that are smiling and trying their best, and I just see people getting together and trying to serve one another. And so none of the messages hardly at all said anything like upsetting or triggering. Um, it was a lot of just, you know, loving one another and trying your best. So I really liked it.

John Dehlin [00:17:54] Did it seem to be emphasizing Joseph Smith less and Jesus more in your experience recently?

Carah Burrell [00:18:00] Yeah, absolutely. That's the thing is Mormonism, like, what we do is ex Mormon podcasters is we contextualize the doctrine and the experience. And you sit down and you interview people about their trauma and they're good, they're bad. Their experiences of deconstructing of a whole time period of, you know, Mormonism and the different phases of what has been emphasized throughout the years. But I have to say, from my experience over the last month, what's emphasized is really dependent on the word you're in, the family you're in, you know, the, the political affiliations of the, the makeup of the ward and the demographics. So it's, it's hard to kind of be an excellent podcaster and say the church is this one thing because it's so context dependent.

Carah Burrell [00:18:44] And then also it's just kind of what your ears are picking up. Like you will listen messages that you agree with. And then like, I heard one thing that I didn't like in all of the three weeks that I went to church. And it was a message about how this is the one way to be happiest. And I was like, put that in the trash can. But other than that, 99% of the messages were a lot of things about mourning with those people that mourn and using this religion, this Christianity, to fight against tyranny, which is things I didn't expect to hear in a Mormon congregation.

John Dehlin [00:19:15] Love it. Other panelists, church attenders.

Nemo [00:19:20] I went to church. It feels more recent than it was the last time I was there was the 25th of May last year. It was a big multi state conference that I went to and that was in my home stake. And so unfortunately, there are some people within my home state who feel rather betrayed by what I do online. And so they tend to give me a bit of a cold shoulder or, you know, dirty looks or whatever. But whenever I travel around the church in the UK outside of that, I'm often met. Well, in fact, without fail, I'm met by at least one person who comes up and thanks me for what I do and, you know, talks to me about it.

Nemo [00:19:55] Even if they don't agree with everything I say, they, you know, appreciate me talking about what I talk about, all that sort of stuff. And so I've had generally very positive experiences as I've continued to attend church after excommunication. I've also noticed that missionaries come and take selfies with me a lot, and I don't know why that is, but they want to come and take pictures with me. And it's very bizarre.

Nemo [00:20:17] But, yeah, the past three or four times I've been to church, missionaries will see me, they'll come over, they'll talk to me about the YouTube channel, and then they'll want to take pictures.

Julia [00:20:26] That's so interesting.

Nemo [00:20:28] Bizarre.

John Dehlin [00:20:30] Julia Kolby. Julia, I know you mentioned you attended recently. Anything you want to say about church experience?

Julia [00:20:37] It was a primary program, so all the kids just get up in their different age groups and they talk and they sing. I was interested, Carah, that you said you took the sacrament because, like, I've been excommunicated. So out of respect, I just don't. Even if I go to a word where they don't know who I am, but I thought that was interesting. Did you? I wondered if you had any thoughts about the sacrament, Carah.

Carah Burrell [00:20:54] I did. I wrote a substack about it because it was the number one thing that stuck out the most. Because as I'm reconstructing a life outside of the church, I'm really interested in ritual and the fact that everything that we do, whether religious or not religious, is micro rituals that all kind of form into our identity. And I wanted to kind of use these 30 days as an investigation into what Mormon rituals are for and what they kind of bring out in me and how they land in me. And so what I found by taking the sacrament was that it was such a helpful way to have a stop and a start to the new week that I had been missing from my life, that it's a very, like, concentrated, intentional event where I'm sitting here, it's quiet, and it's the same time, the same people, the same atmosphere, the same taste of the bread.

Carah Burrell [00:21:45] And it kind of signals to me in, like, the oldest parts of myself that, you know, this week is over. Let's look at our week in review. I don't feel a lot of shame as the next Mormon about what I did in this past week. I just know that, like, from this point forward, after I take this bread and water, a new week begins. And so that's something that I've been thinking a lot about of how I want to have a, a marker, something in my post Mormon life that signifies to my brain that this old week is coming to an end and I'm starting the new week.

Carah Burrell [00:22:16] And so the last couple weeks I've started to take, like at sundown on Friday, Shabbat Shalom, put my phone in a drawer. Like a meme on the Internet tends to say, if you guys get my reference, but Shabbat Shalom, put my phone in the drawer when work is over on Friday night. And that's kind of like my sacrament for the next my, my, my, my kind of Sabbath for the next 24 hours to just have a pause to the work of the week and move on. So there's a lot of intentionality with the Sunday Sabbath of starting over a new week. And I really like that.

John Dehlin [00:22:49] Love it. Thank you. Carah Kolby.

Kolby Reddish [00:22:52] Yeah, I was thinking about it. I don't think that I've been to a sacrament meeting since. I was just thinking about this four years ago in February is when Cami and I came. And we're in studio with you and Carah John. And I don't think I've attended a sacrament meeting since. But I will say in September, I think it was late September, we went to Utah to attend a family wedding for one of Cammy's siblings. And rather than wait outside the temple, which I just did not want to do, we decided to take the kids to byu, where Cami and I had met and dated.

Kolby Reddish [00:23:30] And, well, we actually met in the mission field, but we dated at byu. We were missionaries in the same mission and taking the kids back to BYU and seeing byu. We took them to the Bean Life Science Museum where I used to work. We took them to meet one of the professors that I was really close to.

Kolby Reddish [00:23:48] It was a different experience. It's a completely changed campus, not just physically. I mean, like, the people who are there are so much younger and just this new kind of crop of younger Mormons are just so different. Like, I didn't expect to see some of the, like, attire and things I was seeing on campus.

Kolby Reddish [00:24:10] And I think it really connects with what Carah's saying like this, especially this younger generation of Mormons, they are finding and pulling the good out of this system. And it's really not necessarily about the super strict fundamentalist view that I feel like I grew up with, you know, 20 years ago when I was graduating from high school and starting to, to be in the phase of life that they're in.

John Dehlin [00:24:35] So fun. Well, it'll be fun to see if Y' all end up going back. Kolby, you and Cam. It'll be fun to hear what your impressions are as well. Kolby, let's turn the time over to you. You kind of organized this panel. Where do you want to go next?

Opening the Conversation on What We Love About Mormonism

Kolby Reddish [00:24:51] Great. So we've got five panelists here, and we've each prepared a few different kind of thoughts about things that we still find value in, the things we love about. About Mormonism or love from our time in Mormonism. So I'll go ahead and start with my first one, and then we'll get thoughts from the panel on that idea, and then we'll kind of move to the next one, and then we'll. We'll handle it that way. So my first one, one of the. I feel like one of the most difficult things that people deal with after they've left the church or they've left any type of religious structure that's given them really easy, maybe not always correct, but really simple moral answers is finding a grounding for their morality.

Agency, Moral Principles, and Free Will

Kolby Reddish [00:25:35] And I have thought a lot about that and how to basically give myself, myself and my family principles to live by as we do this without religion, without some of the advantages of having a community that's kind of reinforcing those norms. And the principle that I feel like is the bedrock of how I make moral decisions is viewing other people as agents. So really based in, like, political science theory, like the idea of social contract theory. So that comes from John Locke and Thomas Paine, if people are familiar with those thinkers. The whole idea is that we all have. These are like, very American ideals, even though they came from British folks.

Kolby Reddish [00:26:18] The idea is that all of us are given a certain level of autonomy and agency and sovereignty over our person. And it's through contract, through figuring out, and through negotiation, through seeing each other as agents, that we then make those social contracts, and we adhere to those social contracts. So I feel like my first one is Mormonism's focus on agency. So we could point to scriptures like Second Nephi 2, which talks about how we need an opposition in all things and that we're directed to be agents rather than to be things that are acted upon. You know, Joseph Smith taught that. He taught his people correct principles and allowed them to govern themselves.

Kolby Reddish [00:27:01] There are so many different things I could point to from my time in Mormonism that treated me and taught me to treat other people as agents, as people whose authority over their own lives are to be respected. This is very foundational to Mormon theology. Right. This is built into the temple ceremony because it's built into the whole belief about Adam and Eve and their right to choose and their. Their willingness to choose. And I feel like that focus on agency has always allowed me, and I see this in many of the. The good, still believing Mormons that I. I exchange with in my everyday life.

Kolby Reddish [00:27:38] It gave me the ability to see other people as not means to an end, but as means in and of themselves. So that focus on agency that I feel like I took from Mormonism was my first one. Now, the, the slight asterisk here is, I think there are times that the church and even some of the church leaders, including Joseph Smith, the quote I pulled from, didn't always model what we're talking about here perfectly, but I do feel like those teachings are very good teachings. And the reason I wanted to talk about that one in particular is because, as we've already talked about in the introduction, there are so many times that people leave Mormonism and they are suffering from this blind spot of thinking that everything the church taught them, because the church also taught them things that have hurt them or damaged them in some way.

Kolby Reddish [00:28:24] They feel like everything the church taught them now is automatically bad. And. And so a lot of times they pivot, clear the other direction. This is something that I feel like still today is a good teaching that I received from Mormonism. To treat other people like agents. That means giving them information, the ability to make choices for themselves, and recognizing that they have the ultimate authority for their lives. So that's my first one is agency.

John Dehlin [00:28:49] Love it. Any panelist responses?

Julia [00:28:54] I. No, I think that was great. I was just thinking like, Kolby, because I really like what you're saying with the agency and seeing people, they can make their own choices. I think, I don't mean to be any kind of negative, but from my, from my perspective, we were always taught that, like, people who weren't Mormon were not going to make it to heaven. And so our job was to teach them the gospel or to at least give them a chance to hear it. So I remember as a fourth grader, my. All of my friends were different religions. Like, there was a Catholic, a Baptist, we were all different religions.

Julia [00:29:24] But I felt this immense pressure to, like, try to convert them. And I couldn't totally love them unconditionally because I was, like, worried for them. And I was, like, trying to, like, get this part of them to change. And so I wish I had. I wish I had had that perspective where I was like, oh, people can just make their own choices. Because I felt this pressure. I don't know if that means anything or if anyone has any other comments about that. But that was just something that even as a missionary you're supposed to talk to everybody. And we were, I don't know, there was just this like different perspective too that I was, that I was living with.

Kolby Reddish [00:29:55] So let me answer maybe your question, Julia, while other panelists gather their thoughts on this principle. The way I would have looked at that is second EFI2 and I think it's in doctrine covenants as well. Basically give very clear direction on what you need to be able to exercise your agency, which is you need to understand the consequences of those decisions.

Kolby Reddish [00:30:16] That comes back to a common talking point of John's, which is, you know, wanting to have informed consent. I think the last thing I'd say is it then is just one of those things where it really is like family dependent or war dependent or even dependent on like the time in which you receive something. So I feel like when I started reading the Book of Mormon really without anyone holding my hand as like a younger teenager or preteen, I was able to kind of use that lens of agency to shape everything else that I learned about Mormonism. So that's not to say that like my version of Mormonism was absolutely the correct one and I wasn't maybe like adding something to what's actually there.

Kolby Reddish [00:30:58] But that is the way I received it. Is that like with your example of other friends who are from other faiths, Mormonism ultimately believes that everyone. I mean one of the beliefs I still think is very beautiful about Mormon, the Mormon system theologically is that there is this belief in a post mortal spirit world where people from other religions have this ability to choose. And so I guess when I use the word agency, I just look at it as very connected to that capacity to choose. And so I always looked at my friends from other face that way that like this is the path they've chosen right now and maybe there will be more truth that will be revealed to them them hereafter that they'll choose to follow. So does that maybe answer,

Julia [00:31:44] were there other thoughts?

Carah Burrell [00:31:46] Yeah, I can go off the rails for a second if you'd like me to. When I think of agency, I'll never forget when I was about 19 and it was my first time that I was not living my Mormon values like I knew I should have been and gotten to see some drinking and drugs and bisexual behavior at a summer camp. And it was right before I was about to get married and I went into my bishop's office in my home Ward and he's the. Was still the coolest guy. Like this is another asterisk in a, you know, bishop roulette. Depends on who your leaders are.

Carah Burrell [00:32:19] But had a very cool bishop and we had a long talk about all of the things that I did that were completely out of the norm from the friend group that I had in Provo, Utah versus a bunch of international students up in the woods and all the trouble I got into. And he said something that is still very true to this day. And he said that, you know, a lot of the things that I got into and had a lot of trauma that was included from that. He's like, yeah, that's, you know, why the church teaches that we don't drink, because when you're inebriated a lot of bad things can happen and you're not in control of yourself. And that always stuck out to me. Not as somebody, you know, who, as a post Mormon. Do I drink now and then?

Julia [00:32:58] Yes.

Carah Burrell [00:32:58] But the, the principle of agency, I think is also really interconnected in Mormonism's view of the word of wisdom. And while it can be quite dogmatic and shame filled at times, I think the principle of agency and the word of wisdom still interlock really well and make sense to, to anybody that, you know, you won't be able to act out of your free agency, your values, you, Your intentions if you're in an altered state of mind with, you know, different, different new experiences and different people trying to take advantage of you. And so that still stuck in my mind from then till now that, yeah, that's a true principle. That my agency is going to be affected by the substances that I put in my body and to just, you know, take care of my body and be aware of how those things interact with my environment.

John Dehlin [00:33:51] Love it.

Kolby Reddish [00:33:54] Can I ask you a question based on that?

Carah Burrell [00:33:57] Who, me? Go, go ahead.

Kolby Reddish [00:33:58] Yeah. Do you feel like since leaving Mormonism. I feel like when I was in Mormonism. Let me start it this way. When I was in Mormonism, I very much viewed my spirit and my body as separate. Separate things. Do you feel like leaving Mormonism you found the ability to view yourself kind of as, you know, consciousness and body, whatever words you want to apply to it more holistically,

Carah Burrell [00:34:25] you're saying as the spirit and the body, all as one.

Kolby Reddish [00:34:29] Yeah. Or just your, your consciousness in your body? I feel like when I was. The reason I'm asking is, I agree with everything you just said really strongly. I feel like when I was in Mormonism, I separated my consciousness, which I would have called my spirit back then from my body. And it was very much like these are two separate things. Right. We're taught so early that our bodies are sinful. It's because of our body's fallen nature that we will sin. I guess I'm wondering.

Carah Burrell [00:34:55] Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah, I know what you mean by that. Yeah, definitely. I think I've integrated a lot more of, you know, just simple things about breath work and nervous system regulation since I left the church that I wish every post Mormon knew. I wish everybody knew that religion at the end of the day is like a giant nervous system regulation tool of the prayers that you say and the rituals that you do to calm your body and take you back to a place of alignment and how you can do that by integrating your mind and your body at the same time. And so, yeah, I definitely feel like they're way more connected now that I, I just now when you were talking, I'm like, I'm feeling a little anxious and before I might say a prayer and try to outsource that so that my body could calm down, I.

Carah Burrell [00:35:38] But now I know that like my anxiety, my, my brain, all of these things that are firing off are all connected to my nervous system and to my lungs and to my heart. And that there's a really beautiful post Mormon spirituality that is secular that I feel like is based in science that's helped me integrate both of those things because like you were saying, I also used to believe that we are in a fallen state. And because of that, like my body is sinful and that there's a higher minded spirituality that I need to access that's kind of like it's in co lab, it's outside of my brain.

Carah Burrell [00:36:15] But all of that can be, you know, integrated and contained right within, right within my chest. Like that same spot that I would go to, to, to pray, to feel calm, like I've been able to center that back inside myself.

Kolby Reddish [00:36:28] Yeah. And that, that finding, that holistic space it sounds like has allowed you to connect more to that principle of agency or the advantages you see out of that principle of agency understanding you Nemo, do you have any thoughts on agency or did. Was that a focus of your time in Mormonism?

Nemo [00:36:46] Not particularly. I've been exploring principles of determinism since. But we don't need to go down that messy, messy rabbit hole on this live stream.

Kolby Reddish [00:36:54] I think you're saying we're choosing not to.

Nemo [00:36:58] Well, we may not have a choice. If we were to go back 30 seconds, I think this would play out exactly the same again. So, anyway, anyway, we. We won't go there. What I will say is I do think sometimes that there is this bit of a baby bath water situation with a lot of. Of ex.

Nemo [00:37:15] Extracting oneself from a religious group or a religious upbringing. And so I think I gave a presentation at thrive in 2022 where I kind of put a Venn diagram on the screen and it's slowly being pulled apart from. And it's about making choices of what you keep and what you leave. And what you keep and what you leave. I think today's going to be kind of an exploration of that is. Is picking apart what is in us.

Nemo [00:37:41] Because whether we like it or not, the Church has shaped all of us. It has created all of us. And it. It should be a conscious decision. Take time, make it slow. I think it's fair to say that life inside the church can feel like it's going 100 miles an hour because of callings, because of responsibilities, because of all sorts of obligations, and just. It's a very. It's a very.

Nemo [00:38:05] It's not just a Sunday church, I guess. It. It forms every facet of your life. And so when you feel like you finally got the time to stop using that time to clearly and deliberately make decisions about what parts of your Mormon upbringing you want to keep, what parts of the Church taught you want to keep, and what parts you want to leave behind, I think it's very important.

John Dehlin [00:38:34] Love it.

Carah Burrell [00:38:36] John, I think you went. Yep. About your thoughts on agency.

John Dehlin [00:38:39] Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I think it's. I think it's crucial, you know, I have gotten a little bit softer on this idea of free will, more from a place of compassion, to just realize, just the thought experiment of realizing that lots of people who make decisions that maybe aren't healthy for themselves or others oftentimes. And I, I studied this quite a bit in my training for my psychology degree. Just that most people are doing the best they can and most people are a product of their genetics and their brain and their upbringing and their life experiences. But having said that, aware of the challenges regarding this idea of free will, I've always.

John Dehlin [00:39:32] I've decided to believe in free will as an act of faith because if I don't believe that my choices matter, I can just easily slip into kind of existential dread or not unproductive nihilism. And so for me, I like to believe that I have free agency or free will.

John Dehlin [00:39:56] It motivates me to. To try to make the world a Better place. And that's a very Mormon teaching that really the war in heaven, as I understand it, was fought, you know, Jesus was advocating for the ability for people to choose for themselves, and that's what I was taught. And it was Satan or the adversary that fought for forcing people to do what is right. And I think the world's a better place when people believe that their choices make a difference. So I love that. Kolby.

Nemo [00:40:31] In defense of determinism, I will say that our choices still matter. It's just they might not be choices in the way that we maybe conceptualize them in a strict sort of agency, but I think what we do and how we behave definitely still matters. Absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:40:48] Yeah. I guess what I'm saying is believing that my believing that I have agency motivates me in a way that believing that I don't really have agency, that I'm just a pinball reacting to forces around me, that's less motivating to me to want to do good. That's all I'm saying. Nemo.

Nemo [00:41:08] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:41:08] Not the choices. Not that people who don't believe in free will don't think that choices matter.

Nemo [00:41:16] Sure, yeah.

Kolby Reddish [00:41:17] Got you. Great care. Would you be willing to share your first from your list for us to discuss? Sure.

Carah Burrell [00:41:26] So would you guys mind if I actually, again, go off the rails a little bit? And I just like to say things that other people aren't going to say. And what do you come to Carabarel for but to hear things that you won't hear anywhere else? I hope that's what I'm known for by now.

Kolby Reddish [00:41:41] I expected nothing less.

Carah Burrell [00:41:43] Thank you. So I do like talking about ritual, and I think I already kind of explained how just to answer on the determinism thing. What I've been studying a lot about ritual lately is how everything that we do, Mormon, ex Mormon, every single person alive today, animals included, we all have just a basic operating system of rituals that keep us going so we're not just sacks of meat running into each other. We all have like, you know, shared agreements and things. And the rituals that we all participate in, they're shaped by our communities. And so to the determinism point, like so many things are outside of our control.

Carah Burrell [00:42:24] But I have also decided to, like John as an act of faith, change my. My brain thinking around that and, and look at the rituals and the things that I participate in, because that is going to be forming my identity. And it's, it's very context dependent and, you know, culturally dependent. But waking everyone up ex Mormons and Mormons included that the rituals that you participate in are reinforcing truths to yourself, whether you realize them or not. Like me putting on makeup today to go on a podcast is reinforcing, you know, a ritual that I am participating in here in society. And there's, would I rather not wear makeup?

Carah Burrell [00:43:02] Of course. Like, would I rather just like shave my head and not have to do my hair? You know, there's plenty of things that we have to participate so that we, you know, have identities that can coexist with within the system that we've created to survive and make money and, you know, form relationships. So it's always just very context dependent in that way. So now that I said that, I just wanted to add my. My piece about what I like about Mormonism is only found because I had to go back into it as an ex Mormon for these last 30 days in this experiment. And I was shocked by a lot of things that I could do, a lot of things that I couldn't do, and a lot of things that grew inside of me and a lot of the overwhelming feelings.

Rituals, Mindfulness, and Personal Transformation

Carah Burrell [00:43:47] About day 15, I wanted to quit. I felt so depressed. I was sleeping all the time and I couldn't get to the core of what I was feeling so off about. And not only did I not have my normal coping mechanisms and I wasn't fully invested in the coping mechanisms of Mormonism while I investigated that space in between. What I found was that nobody can tell me how to Mormon. Every single person in a congregation has their own DIY God of who they believe God to be and what that God expects of them. And again, it's very context dependent. But I realized that through the course of a lot of, you know, news events and tragedies in the month of January, that the only way that I know how to Mormon is what I did when I was Mormon, which was be like a Jesus freak for the seven years that I was there and just find words of inspiration in the life and the teachings of Jesus Christ and mourn with those that mourn.

Carah Burrell [00:44:48] And I was so impressed by the local ward that I went to in my congregation in Sandy, Utah. The, you know, what, what was I going to get my first Sunday in, in January after, you know, different tragic shootings and a lot of unrest in our country right now, I was hoping to hear messages that I would be in a congregation with other people that mourned with those that mourned that Christian the way that I was hoping that they would Christian, because you can take out the most you know, like the most dogmatic, insensitive, demeaning, hellfire and damnation words out of the Bible. And you can also take out some of the best.

Carah Burrell [00:45:29] And I was really impressed by the prayers and the speeches that people were giving that I could tell that they were. They were Jesus ing the same way that I was Jesus ing. And there was a talk given by a young couple who. This was the first Sunday after Renee Good was shot and killed. And they gave these amazing speeches.

Carah Burrell [00:45:53] And if the Mormon Stories audience would allow me to read a quote from the speech for a second, because, again, I would have never gotten this kind of view into Mormonism if I wasn't there and listening and looking for other people to use their religion how I hoped other people use their, you know, their beliefs the same way I use my beliefs. Like we're trying to make, you know, good things happen in the world with our beliefs. And people who are religious and believe in the Mormon Church, they're trying to do the same with the tools that they've been given. And one of the quotes from this young man's speech was probably in his young 20s.

Carah Burrell [00:46:32] And he said, in this moment of instability, Christ's message is not presented as a political solution or military strategy. Instead, human. Instead, Christ teaches us that survival depends on becoming a different kind of people, those who remain humble. Christ is not described as removing danger immediately. Instead, he becomes the one constant. In a world where everything else shifts. When institutions fail and fear dominates, disciples of Christ become communities of trust, restraint, love, quietly resisting chaos by the way that they live. Taken together, these stories teach that Christianity is not merely a religion of correct beliefs or formal doctrines. It's a movement, a way of living that seeks to unify humanity through love, humility, responsibility towards one another.

Carah Burrell [00:47:17] In times of corruption, Christ movement creates communities of integrity. In times of war, war, Christ movement transforms power into protection. When political systems fail, Christianity does not retreat. It fills the gap by teaching people how to live together in peace. And he goes on, and I just wanted to.

Carah Burrell [00:47:37] Anything that I can do to just share messages that I was personally touched by as people use their religion for good. And I went out to the car after their message and was so touched by it, but also it made me sad and feel all of these, you know, conflicting feelings, that there are so many good, good people within the church. The bishop of that ward is a Zimbabwean immigrant, you know, like a black man who. And then the. The first counselor looks like a rock star with his hair that's, like down to his shoulders. You know, Mormonism has all different types of people within it.

Carah Burrell [00:48:16] Yes, the structure, yes, the doctrine, yes, the patriarchy, all of that is true. But the people, there are so many good people within it, and my heart breaks for the ways in which they're not able to fulfill their beliefs and their integrity within Mormonism. That breaks my heart. And it made me go out to my car, cry, and make a little TikTok video about how moving and touching their speech was. And a couple weeks later, I went up to this young couple and had a conversation with them and really told them how much I appreciated them. And I don't know if, you know, that young couple will be able to survive like a lifetime within Mormonism without having a faith crisis like so many people that we know.

Carah Burrell [00:48:56] But for the ways in which good Mormons can be able to find the truth within the teachings of Jesus Christ, just like I would hope anybody in any other religious system, whether, you know, Muslim or Buddhist or evangelical or anything that you could name, I hope that people will find the best teachings and try to live out those principles in their communities. And that's what I see so many good Mormons still doing.

Community and Belonging in Mormonism

John Dehlin [00:49:26] Quick question, Carah. Is there any part of you that wants to occasionally keep attending LDS sacrament meeting?

Carah Burrell [00:49:34] I like it for the ritual. I like it for, like, the reminding me, like I said earlier, of taking the sacrament. It's a kind of a good reminder that I don't want this, but I want something for myself.

Carah Burrell [00:49:47] And I think as ex Mormons, we are so, you know, rightfully angry at the lies that we've been told and the ways in which we have been misled to base our lives on one thing, give our money to one thing, and all of that, you know, can take up a good chunk of your brain for a while. But overall it's a, it has a really good model for what can bring out the best in people. And it's. Every once in a while I wouldn't mind going, but like, I, I just got connected with the, like the group chat of all of the moms in my neighborhood just yesterday.

Carah Burrell [00:50:23] And so I'm like, this is our version of Mormonism of all these people of different, different faiths, some Mormons, some ex evangelical, you know, all these different moms who are looking for community people to bring them a casserole and help babysit their kids and stuff. And so it's, it's. Mormonism is, just has a good model of that. And every once in a while, I wouldn't mind, you know, going back or another thing is I was crying the first time that I went to. I'm. I'm a comedian, but I'm. Sounds very emotional the way I'm describing myself right now. I had to be very tender hearted this last month, but when I went to church the first Sunday with my mom, I started crying because I knew how much it meant to her.

Carah Burrell [00:51:02] And I'm sure you probably feel the same way when you attend with your parents. It's like, oh, this, this actually isn't that hard for me, but I know this is a thousand birthday and Christmas gifts to my parents. Being very clear like this. I'm looking at the utility of Mormonism. I do not believe, I will never believe. However, like, it felt like a really nice gift to be able to spend time with them and made me cry because my, my dad wasn't able to attend church with us that Sunday because he's been really sick. And it just reminded me that I want to spend as much time with my parents as possible before they pass away.

Carah Burrell [00:51:34] There isn't a Mormon afterlife like they believe there is, but if it's meaningful to them, like that provides a way for us to connect. And I want to build my life as a post Mormon based on connection and not in a rebellion to what I dislike.

Kolby Reddish [00:51:50] The other thing I love about that story that you shared, Carah, is it echoes was something I felt the last time I did go to sacrament meeting is, you know, so many of us have heard that trope that people use to excuse issues in the church by saying things like the church is perfect, the people aren't. And I remember the last time I did attend sacrament meeting having tears in my eyes, like looking around and seeing that. Like while I was frustrated with some people in my ward, just kind of given what led me to that, that place, that phrase echoed in my mind and I thought the truth is actually the reverse.

Kolby Reddish [00:52:28] Like, not that the, the people inside the church are perfect, but that the flaws are with the institution and the system of the church. And the people inside the church are at least vastly, in my experience, are trying to do the very best they can with this system.

Kolby Reddish [00:52:46] And a lot of times the system is like the cap, right? Like they can't move past this system, but they are trying to get and do the best they can while they're inside of that system. And so I thought of it like the people are perfect, the church isn't. Like the people are far better than the church has ever deserved. And I do believe that that's true of most of the members of the church that they do reflect better values than the institution does generally.

Carah Burrell [00:53:14] Yeah. 100 and as I was in this chapel recently looking around at all the different types of people and when people ask like, you know, how did I feel going back there? I just sat around and kind of people watched. And it's all just people trying to make their way in this really crazy world. And there's again, we all have, you know, rituals and lies that we believe in different ways and. But for what Mormon as Mormonism as people actually exhibit like it's. So let me put it this way. When we as ex Mormons talk about the doctrine and the wacky theology and all of the harm that's done, like all of that is 100 valid.

Carah Burrell [00:54:05] But the reason why it's such a shock to our system to leave this church is because for me, at least 99 of it, it's walking in a chapel and it's talking with people who are smiling and happy. And you know, you could definitely make the argument that there is a dark underbelly, which I will agree with you. But for most of it, it is a lot of people just making their way through the world trying their best, asking if you need help, how they can come visit, you know, putting on amazing youth programs for, you know, the, the kids to attend and have friends and social circles and scouting camp outs and stuff for 99 of it.

Carah Burrell [00:54:42] It's just basically this neighborhood of people who are coming together to ask how can I serve you and how can I be more like Jesus? And you, you add in all of the other stuff that's. That's true that you, you base your lies or you base your life around a lot of lies and giving your money to a church that does not deserve this money. And there's better ways to put it, but for the, the community aspect of, of what you're actually doing.

Carah Burrell [00:55:07] None of the people in the church mentioned Joseph Smith once or literally in the, in four weeks. Somebody mentioned revering the prophet of the church right now maybe once, you know, like what's going on in Salt Lake City is just out of the purview of, of, of what's right in front of our faces, which is just people. And I think people are people are people. And we're trying our best to make our way through this world. So I don't like the instinct in too much of, you know, ex Mormon content generally to be like, okay, hey everyone on the outside who's never been Mormon, let's look at the freak show of What Mormonism or what the freak show of Utah culture is like, I poke fun at that stuff just as much as anyone.

Carah Burrell [00:55:46] But as a person, as a mom, as somebody who is looking to rebuild my life, I. I can look at what Mormonism does and what my Mormon friends do and really applaud them for making their way in the world.

Nemo [00:56:01] Can I. Can I speak to community for a second? Because I think we as people are wired to want community, and I think we're also not often very good at making it without a gun to our backs. I think it's one of the things that religion is, kind of one of the purposes religion has served for a very long time is sort of enforcing community on pain of whatever eternal consequences you want to paint onto that. That's just not just Mormonism. That's one of the byproducts of religious groups, is very strong communities. And I think one of the best examples I've seen of secular community is something that I do every weekend called parkrunners, where I go for a run in the park and it's run by volunteers.

Nemo [00:56:45] It costs nothing to attend. You can turn up. And one of the things that I think Mormonism gave me is a desire to build community. It created a community mindedness within me that I'm really grateful for because it means I will turn up and participate in this thing, and there are other people that will do it too.

Nemo [00:57:05] But anything we can do to kind of foster that in people, I think it is a positive thing. You know, the. The run I was at this morning, they have people stood on the corners telling you where to go. There's one corner called Ray's Corner. The same guy called Ray stands there every week. And it's his corner is what he does on his Saturday morning. He gets up and he goes out and he helps put this event on so that people can have a community space to. To go to and attend. There is one park run in Utah. It's down in Cedar City, I think.

Nemo [00:57:33] So go check that out if you're down there. But yeah, I think community is something the Mormon church taught me the value of, and my time in Mormonism taught me the value of. And as the world secularizes, one of the big problems that a lot of people say is that there's a lack of community. And so I would definitely say that I'm grateful that I can take that with me from my time in the church and continue to try and apply it. Yeah.

Kolby Reddish [00:58:02] Yeah, I think that's a good example too, Nemo. I think One of the things about the church, the way the church models community, is that it is, you know, for better or worse, very much a one stop shop. Right. You talked about earlier how the church is much more than just a Sunday religion. So being a member of the church gives your kids something to do during the week. It oftentimes will give both adults something to do about once a month. And then of course you've got Sunday services where you do get time, you know, kids with kids their same age and men and women sometimes interfacing just with men and women sometimes interfacing with each other.

Kolby Reddish [00:58:38] I think one of the things you have to do if you do have that community minded aspect like you're talking about appreciating from your time in the church is you have to like supplement it in other ways. So like, you know, you have the park runs, for example, we picked up a adorable little puppy like two and a half years ago. Cammie and I take him to the dog park, the dog park of like right by our house like almost every single day. Like we have dog park friends that we run into at the dog park. And then you've got kids activities. So the thing you have to be very wary of if you're someone who really cares about finding community is you have to be more conscious and more proactive about finding different community for every different member of your family. Whereas the church's model is a lot easier that it kind of comes with a built in activity more or less for everybody.

Nemo [00:59:30] Yeah, I think that's true. John, do you have any thoughts on community?

John Dehlin [00:59:38] Yeah, I mean that's a huge that. I think when in the mental health literature when they talk about why religious people on average have a small degree of higher levels of happiness or health or well being than non religious, they, they tease out what the active ingredient is in religion that leads to smaller but significant higher levels of happiness, health and well being in its community. I think no human is an island.

John Dehlin [01:00:16] I don't think we're meant to be isolated. I think loneliness is, is a killer. I think that many of the ills of the 21st century, the anxiety, the depression, the suicidality is tied to people. Bizarrely with the emergence of social media, more and more loneliness, more and more isolation.

John Dehlin [01:00:40] And that's part of. When I attended soccer meeting a month or two ago, I just saw these people getting out, getting out of their homes, getting out from behind their screens, talking to each other, shaking each other's hands, asking how each other's doing, singing together, talking to each Other and I just think that's an objective good and I think I wish I've tried in ex Mormon secular spaces, spaces to create alternatives to, you know, weekly church service. Whether it was through this organization called Oasis that I created five different branches in Utah, whether it's through the THRIVE meetings that we're still having. For those of you who are interested, we're doing a Thrive in St.

John Dehlin [01:01:31] George. In two weeks, 700 people are coming. We've got, you know, Radio Free Mormon, Bill Real, Julie Hanks, you know, Haley Rawl, Greg Prince, so many amazing Sam Young, Jeremy Runnels. I love it when we can find ways as ex Mormons to get together.

John Dehlin [01:01:55] But I think we would all be better off if there was a way for us to have local community on a regular basis where we're meeting people who live near us to be able to form book clubs and, and playgroups and dinner groups. I do think, you know, ex Mormons will be the first to say you can find community through bowling, you can find community through hiking groups. Totally true. I don't think you need religion to find community. And I think some sort of organization that has a weekly meeting or a monthly meeting where you can meet people specifically that live near you face to face, look them in the eye, get to know them, get to know their, their partners and their children.

John Dehlin [01:02:38] I just think that's, I think civilization, human civilization was built on that practice and I think there's a reason why we've thrived and I think we, we miss out when we lose that after leaving the church at some level now there are, there are introverts who hated going to church and just are happy to never go again. And I get it again, there's people that find other replacements for that. I still think overall it's good for us. And so I think that's the single biggest good of, of Mormonism is community.

Nemo [01:03:17] I, I would agree and I think as a, as a British member, there is a slightly different flavor here for me which is it was quite a natural transition for me to have other community aspects out there because the church, while it was a seven day a week church and I love my church community and particularly my ward in Oxford, I loved attending church there and it's sad that I moved away and my excommunication happened and all that sort of stuff, but because we're a minority, there's places to land. We, we're actually often encouraged to go out into our communities, which again was something I really appreciated about growing up Mormon in the UK was you're encouraged to go out into our communities and sort of be part of building up a community around us and being involved in the community more broadly.

Nemo [01:04:05] And I do wonder if people who grew up where the church is more dominant may have a trickier time. It seems self evident, but I don't want to assume that there would be a trickier time finding community outside of the church if the church is sort of dominant in terms of the population demographics.

Nemo [01:04:27] And. Yeah, so I think people should just do. I don't know how to say it because, you know, we have thrive and things like that, but maybe people should then take that with them out into the community and see what they can do to, you know, get on the local and show that just because you've left the church doesn't mean that you want to disengage from the community. I think there's a lot of reported stories of people pulling back when you leave and it's disheartening to keep trying and people pull back. But if there are ways in which you can still try and remain engaged with the community, that's probably quite a good thing.

Kolby Reddish [01:05:07] Yeah. So I think we started that discussion with Carah's example and it sounds like Nemo was community one of. Was that your example that kind of connected the cares. Okay, excellent. And I think Carah, you phrased it more as ritual, is that right?

Intentional Living After Leaving the Church

Carah Burrell [01:05:23] Yeah, I mean, it's like I said, everything we do is a micro ritual that forms our identity. And so when you go from one identity in Mormonism to an ex Mormon or an atheist or what have you kind of identity, it's going to be filled with micro rituals and kind of putting your intentions into your habits of what forms a life and what you want to stand by and what you stand for. So when it comes to being really intentional as an ex Mormon, you know, we, we talk about the nihilism, we talk about the trauma and you know, I really appreciate John's series that he did, the Gift of the Mormon Faith Crisis and you know, nihilism and these, these, you know, horrible things that the church shouldn't have done and that shouldn't have happened.

Carah Burrell [01:06:10] But the nihilism and the phase that it leads us to can be a great gift to have a blank slate, to then decide intentionally what is important to us. And I'm grateful for the rituals that we have formed around our community. And those are still really ingrained. You know, going back millennia. Mormonism just had one way of, of showing us how it's done. And so it's, it's our, our gift of our post Mormon life to then be intentional about the types of communities that we want to form and the types of habits and rituals we want to move forward with in our, in our beautiful post Mormon life.

Kolby Reddish [01:06:51] Yeah, definitely. Julia, do you want to share one of your examples with the rest of us?

Integrity, Values, and Education in Mormonism

Julia [01:06:56] Yeah. One of my things was integrity. So any. When you go to young women's, I think it's from age 11 now to 18, if I'm not mistaken. And you list off these values and one of those is integrity. And I took that very personally, where this idea of like, you're, you're always, you're consistently the same person, you're very honest in your dealings with your fellow man. And then the church has these teachings of how there's like angels watching you and how people are, the God is judging you and things like that. And so you need to be good, even if no one else can see, see you being good or, or tell the truth, even if no one's going to catch you in a lie or whatever.

Julia [01:07:29] And so like, so to me, that's one of my biggest things that I feel like shaped who I am. And I, I do know that the church, like you were saying, Kolby, I think that the church sometimes teaches something, but they themselves don't often follow it. Maybe those weren't your words exactly, but I think that the church doesn't have, from my perspective, doesn't always keep. Have high integrity or have high honesty values. But that's something for me personally that I took away that I really, really cherish from being raised Mormon and doing all the Mormon things.

Kolby Reddish [01:08:01] So, yeah, I think that's a great example and it actually connected to my other one, which is I, I would word it, I guess, slightly differently than integrity, but I like my model of Jesus was very based around the story in John chapter eight, like the woman taken in adultery, like the defender version of Jesus, the version of Jesus that, you know, dined with the sinners and that reached out to the marginalized, that was always the version of Jesus that I always really connected with as a Mormon. And I viewed that very much the same way. Like this, this thing that we're taught inside of Mormonism from a very young age, do what is right.

Kolby Reddish [01:08:42] Let the consequence follow. Like, it doesn't matter who's on the opposite side of an issue. If you know that you're doing the right thing, you need to do the right thing. Like you're, like you said about integrity, even when nobody is watching Or I would say, even when a lot of people are watching and those that lot of people may disagree with you, and they may even be your friends or on your team, that's something about the Mormon version of me.

Kolby Reddish [01:09:09] That is something that the Mormon version of me believed was, like, essential to understanding the character of Jesus Christ. And so I took that principle out of Mormonism and out of Christianity and still believe that that is a very good teaching. So I would agree with you. Whether we call it integrity or call it something different, I think that's something that really resonates with me as well. Julia.

Nemo [01:09:31] Yeah, I said kind of as I started down this road of talking about the church more openly, I kind of said to people, you know, the church created this cellar, and now they can't control it. And I think I was being glib, but. But the church created a person in me that had a very strong sense of justice and a very strong sense of the need to speak out when you feel like things aren't right.

Nemo [01:10:00] And so that has now led me to this position here where I speak out when I feel like I'm seeing things that aren't right. But I'm grateful that that was instilled in me. And again, that can be one of those things that's hard to hold. Two seemingly contradictory things at the same time can create a lot of dissonance. The idea that you were raised in this institution with a very strong sense of right and wrong, then to have to kind of analyze the levels of right and wrong within that institution that gave you those values can be quite a difficult thing to do. But, yeah, I'm grateful for. For that sense of justice and. Yeah. And integrity that the church gave me.

Julia [01:10:43] Yeah, just. I was thinking, too, when I was an active member of the church, I had a website and a YouTube channel where I would try to speak out in favor of the church, but in a historical perspective or a geographical perspective. And so I feel like the church was trying to, you know, the church kind of created that in me, but also learning different things. I now come and doing the same things, but coming from a different angle or whatever. So I like that. How you phrase that the church created. I can't remember how you said exactly, but the church created this person in you who speaks up for justice.

Nemo [01:11:12] I really love that they created a zealot. Maybe that's not the best word, but. Yeah. Someone that is, you know, willing to just stand up and say what they think.

Julia [01:11:21] I love that.

Carah Burrell [01:11:22] Yeah.

Kolby Reddish [01:11:25] And I think that's. Isn't that just so much of the ex Mormon experience though is like looking at these principles that we still think are good and knowing that we can trace them back to our time in the church, but also recognizing like when you take those same tools and you apply them to the church as a system or to the church's teachings, that very often is not so appreciated.

Nemo [01:11:48] Yeah. What I will say without, you know, because we're trying to be positive about the church here, the way I will perhaps diplomatically phrase it is that the standards I hold church leaders to, when I'm analyzing what they say and when I'm commentating on what they have to say, the standards I'm holding them to are the standards that I was held to as a member of the church and the standards that I was taught to hold people to or certainly to hold oneself to.

Kolby Reddish [01:12:15] Yeah, John. Or care. Do you have any thoughts about integrity?

Carah Burrell [01:12:24] Yeah, I love everything that you guys said, especially about creating this zealot that they can't quite control. Isn't there an analogy that we sometimes use about like the sword that the church has created and they can't control what we're chopping with it now?

Carah Burrell [01:12:37] Yeah, I've always tried to think about that from the start of my ex Mormon content was five years ago. This month was when I first started. My anniversary of my first Mormon stories interview was five years ago. And I, my mindset when I would make content back then was thinking about what would I listen to and what, what types of arguments would actually still ring true to me when I was Mormon to try to like awaken people through satire, through comedy, but still with a sense of integrity that I am not trying to bash the church for the bashing of the church's sake. I'm trying to call upon the integrity that if I was listening to myself in that future time and you know, 2021 and I was thinking in 2018 or previously, would I listen to that?

Carah Burrell [01:13:23] Is there a sense of integrity where it's like, okay, well they're exaggerating or they're fear mongering or are they actually speaking to something that's core within the integrity in my previous Mormon self? And I think that's the, the core of what makes like post Mormon arguments or you know, Julia, what you were talking about, the, the ability to speak to, you know, the, the overlap of the integrity within Mormons of what is right and what is true. And in ex Mormon saying, you know, this is, you know, that you are better than the Church telling you that you can do this or you can't do this, and containing you within this box that the integrity that they have instilled within you, is it going to rise to the occasion now when we're presenting you with these facts or these, you know, statistics about LGBTQ suicide?

Carah Burrell [01:14:10] Like, where is that integrity that they instilled within you going to come and have a voice now? Or are you going to be subject to the, you know, the conformity that they've also taught you? And we have that choice.

Nemo [01:14:23] So,

Carah Burrell [01:14:25] John.

John Dehlin [01:14:26] Yeah, yeah, I'll just say. I remember Dan Reynolds, the lead singer of Imagine Dragons, created a movie called Believer, where after he lost his faith, he did a pro LGBT documentary on hbo. And I don't know if I'm paraphrasing a line from the movie accurately, but he, he basically said something to the, to the effect of a Mormon is a dangerous thing. And what he meant by that is like the tur. The church teaches us to be courageous.

John Dehlin [01:14:59] The, the church teaches us the truth matters and that we should do what is right. You know, let the consequence follow. So I, I often say it was Mormonism that led me out of Mormonism, and this is following on a similar theme you've all shared. But, you know, we care about truth, we care about honesty, we care about integrity, and we care about courage and doing what is right. And I learned all that from the church and, and I still love that. I'm so grateful for those principles, and I still try and live by them. And it's not just the Mormon stories. My work with Mormon stories is based on those values.

John Dehlin [01:15:44] Pretty much every ex Mormon I've ever met who, who, you know, listens to Mormon stories, they didn't leave the church because they were weak or because they never really believed it, or because they wanted to sin. They left as a matter of truth, as a matter of integrity and. Or as a matter of compassion and love and support for the marginalized, which, again, is. Is following Christ's teachings of leaving the 99 to go after the 1. It's another Mormon teaching based in Christianity that I learned. So, yeah, amen. I love those teachings, and I live. I try to live by them.

Carah Burrell [01:16:28] Yeah, amen.

Nemo [01:16:29] John, what was it Thomas S. Monson said? Dare to be a Mormon, Dare to stand alone. I think the. That takes away some of the fear that is often there when it comes to, you know, taking that step forward to say, well, actually, I don't. I, I don't think this is what I thought it was, or I don't think that this is Aligning with my values anymore or the, you know, the values you would often taught by the church that then stepping out and saying, okay, well, I will. I will go my own way is something we're taught to be willing to do now. We're taught to do it in service of the church and, you know, towards the church and away from other people. But unfortunately, as we've kind of said, it can't necessarily be controlled which direction that ultimately ends up going in.

Kolby Reddish [01:17:15] Yeah. And I think of. I think of, like, people who were examples to me of that. I think of someone like Sam Young who spoke out against the church and trying to get it to end its youth interview practices or improve its youth interview practices. And not only did the church end up capitulating to what he was requesting as far as reforms go, but, you know, he was excommunicated along the path. And I think about. And there have always been. I think this is one of the things that's so interesting about Mormonism is there have always been, I'll say two, but really more than two, but at least two camps inside of Mormonism, like the super literal fundamental believers like Joseph Fielding Smith.

Kolby Reddish [01:17:54] He was fighting against other apostles sometimes on questions of doctrine, who viewed things very much in a looser way. Right. And then I think of folks like Sam Young who were examples and role models of what that integrity, what that honesty, what that's speaking out can do.

Kolby Reddish [01:18:13] Again, I think this is why, when I think about this, it is very much centered in that character of what I thought Jesus Christ was, who I thought Jesus Christ was, what I thought he would want me personally to do that. I always believed that the gospel is bigger than the church, that the church is just a human institution that will someday fade away, but that the gospel, these eternal truths like we're talking about here, with integrity and honesty and being accountable, taking responsibility, I always thought those things were larger than the church. And I think that was, again, not to turn this into, like, a backhanded compliment that becomes a criticism.

Kolby Reddish [01:18:55] But it was. One of the hardest things for me was to recognize that other people weigh those values differently. Because to me, my time inside of mortality Mormonism, I. I loved those principles, and I still very much live by those. Those principles that we need to be honest and have integrity, be accountable, stand up for those who are marginalized, you know, go after. Leave the 99 and go after the 1.

Kolby Reddish [01:19:18] Those things, to me, were always central to my faith. I have my next example. Carah talked about ritual, and I love everything you said about that. Carah, I loved watching that short where you were talking about a talk like that. I remember having messages like that when I was in church that would hit me like, atypically, you're like, oh, this isn't exactly fully what I was expecting in a positive way.

Journaling, Meditation, and Daily Reflection

Julia [01:19:43] Right.

Kolby Reddish [01:19:43] I'm excited by it. I was also going to talk about the idea of ritual, but from a different lens. So sacrament meeting is like a weekly ritual that we get to pause and reflect. And one thing I appreciated in my time inside of Mormonism, especially with little kids, were the times of daily reflection and pausing and centering. Like you talked about finding space in our bodies, in our brains, to calm down. And we have replaced the idea of like family prayer and scripture study with reading books, usually about like, history or historical figures, or sometimes we've read about world religions. That's kind of how we've created an analog of scripture study.

Kolby Reddish [01:20:24] But when it comes to family prayer, prayer every evening, my family, we have kind of centered that in meditation practices. So we usually listen to like the same meditation every single night. There's. There's like three or four that will rotate between, kind of depending on how much time we have and how the kids are feeling. But I think I was naive when we first left the church and not really recreating some analog of that. Daily pausing, daily reflecting, daily taking a second to check in with your value system and make sure that you're living the best way that you want to. I think that's one of the things that we give up when we leave a structure like Mormonism is we leave this list of things that we know we need to or should do.

Kolby Reddish [01:21:11] And now it's just completely your choice or your choice with your partner or your family or however that looks, or just you as an individual. You get to choose what you want your life to look, look like. And there are a lot of people who think that, you know, that can lead them into nihilism or thinking about how nothing matters. To me, it had the exact opposite effect. It makes me feel a sense of urgency in aligning with my values and making sure that my time is spent in the ways that I want it to be spent, basically making sure that I'm living according to those principles and values.

Kolby Reddish [01:21:44] So I. My next thing, I guess I was going to say that I really appreciated and loved about my time and more Mormonism, I feel like I've tried to recreate it in a different way was daily pausing and reflecting.

Nemo [01:21:56] I want to absolutely jump in on that and say, yes, meditation is Wonderful. And we should all be taking more time to pause and reflect. I think just slowing down in life in general is something that I've really learned to appreciate recently, and I would advocate for it for anyone who has the opportunity to do so. I know that's not necessarily popular to the American home muscle culture that will make up a majority of this audience, perhaps. But, yeah, I think taking time to really slow down and pause and reflect was a habit that I got into through the church, through daily prayer.

Nemo [01:22:31] And it's a very natural time before you go to bed, before you go to sleep, to take some time to reflect. And whether that's journaling, whether that's meditation, whether that's any of these number of things, again, we don't have to just throw them out just because our life situation has changed, because our relationship to the church has changed, because fundamentally, a time to stop and pause and reflect is a good thing. It's a. It's a reason why many people. If you want to take a secular perspective, it would be the reason why many people would report that prayer works or prayer is helpful to them, or prayer comforts them or makes them feel calm.

Nemo [01:23:03] Because there is just something in taking that time to articulate your thoughts about the day you've had. Articulate your thoughts about. About the things you want from life, about the things you're worried about, actually taking the time to stop and articulate them. Those thoughts will spin through your head all day long. But there is something about stopping and articulating them, whether it's just within your own mind. Actually putting them into words within your own mind or writing them down is just incredibly effective. So don't throw that baby out with the bathwater. I think it's something wonderful. Prayer is something wonderful. And whether you believe there's a deity on the other end or not taking that time to articulate those thoughts, I think is good for people.

John Dehlin [01:23:47] For me, prayer was powerful, but also journal writing. I have like eight journal volumes that I wrote from the time I was

Nemo [01:23:59] like, when's the book deal coming out, John?

John Dehlin [01:24:01] I know, we'll see. But yeah, from. From like fourth grade through, like my mission, I filled up something like seven or eight volumes of journals. And how can I go back? And I read those now, and I'm just super grateful. And it was absolutely the church that taught me to keep a daily journal. And that's, again, that's. That's teaching about reflection. It's a. It's a teaching about history and keeping records, and that's all Very Mormon. And it's something I'm really grateful for.

Carah Burrell [01:24:42] Yeah, I am the biggest advocate of journal writing of all time. So some of you might know I separated from my husband over the last couple years and through all of the new identity making that happens as a single mom and as a post Mormon woman, there is just the way that I, I craft my belief is, is around what am I reinforcing to myself? And taking time to journal every day, I really mean, has been more beneficial than any therapy, any book that I've read because it, while you're Mormon and you're, you're journaling, you're kind of sometimes like reinforcing what, what you would think, you know, God would want you to write about.

Carah Burrell [01:25:25] But when you can journal as a post Mormon, you're kind of creating your own mythology, your own lore, your own stories and looking back and reflecting about. Okay, with all of these pages now, is this the identity that I want to be crafting and what do I want to try tomorrow? And so I knew that during like this really hard phase of my life, the number one way to get out of it was going to be writing. And, and so I actually, last March I. The best thing I have done for my post Mormon health has been hiring a goals coach, a lovely French Canadian woman named Brigitte who has turned into like my heavenly mother replica.

Carah Burrell [01:26:02] And every single night, 11pm we check in with each other through this app and she just asks if I did my writing. And it's like a funny different version of a relationship of, of prayer. But she asks me about my goals. I hit my goals even if I didn't. And my goal has always just been at least write something about my day, even if it's just five minutes. And it has that same rehearsal of identity making that I had within Mormonism when I was talking to God or reading my scriptures. But instead I'm writing my own stories, I'm putting down my own thoughts just, just for me.

Carah Burrell [01:26:36] And it was the healthiest thing for me to craft my own identity and my own values and have the best mental health possible. I think from just journaling and writing all the thoughts, everything that I wanted to say, and you can do it online. I don't recommend Google because it gets lost. There's an app called Penzu that I use, so everything is in its. I have a spirituality journal, I have my regular journal. I have journals about how different substances affect me. I have different categories of different things. And being able to put my thoughts into one place is something that I really lost after I left the church that I wasn't consciously interacting with my identity in a way through the first few years after I left the church.

Carah Burrell [01:27:19] But now I think I've really rebuilt that. And journaling is something that I used to do all throughout my teens, like John, and into my early 20s and into my marriage. And I noticed that the last journal entry that I had when I was like a huge journaler was in 2020, the day after my son was born. And I was writing about that and I was like, isn't that interesting that when life gets really overwhelming and I had my third child, that's when I stopped journaling. And so that is kind of like a signal that when you stop doing something that has been good for you and life gets too chaotic.

Carah Burrell [01:27:52] Like, how do you reintegrate those types of practices, whether it's meditation or praying to whatever kind of God you believe in. Like, how do you take the space and time away from all of the chaos to keep kind of building your identity and talking with some kind of figure, Whether it's yourself. For me it's just myself and my lovely French Canadian goals coach. Like I really would not be the same person without my journaling. And I'm grateful that that's a habit that I know that was useful to me in Mormonism and I just kind of re situated it as a post Mormon.

John Dehlin [01:28:28] Wanted to read a comment that we just received from Paisley. 278. She writes never Mormon here. She calls herself a Nevermo Nevermo here, who loves learning about Mormon history and culture, loves Mormon stories, podcast and Nemo and especially loves Carah Brell. Happy Valentine's Day. To my favorite YouTubers. How fun. Well, Paisley, thank you for joining us. Great to have you here.

Nemo [01:28:58] Happy Valentine's Day.

Carah Burrell [01:28:59] Paisley has donated on my, on my Timmy podcast before too. So I love you.

John Dehlin [01:29:04] Fun.

Carah Burrell [01:29:05] Thank you.

Kolby Reddish [01:29:08] Great. Any more thoughts on Daily Reflection? Otherwise, Carah, I was going to move to your second.

Carah Burrell [01:29:17] Yeah, the daily reflection stuff, that's everything we're talking about today is all been completely rapture. Rapturing my brain. Is that the word I'm looking for? Anyway, the. It's been enveloping my brain over the last many months as I've taken the secular spirituality coaching class and worked with Britt Hartley and she has a book called no Nonsense Spirituality and, and her platform deals with a lot of the same topics that I'm really interested in and has helped me grow. And it's, it's just been a. This whole topic. I feel like this is A been a wonderful ex Mormon church kind of spiritual service so far, but finding the things within Mormonism by going back and living it for 30 days.

Carah Burrell [01:29:59] I have just like a collection of, of other smaller things. One of the other really interesting things that came up for me. This is so embarrassing to admit. Wow, am I embarrassed to admit this. But it wasn't until about day three of my Mormonize me challenge that I call it where I realized how poor my self control is. And unless I tell the Internet, unless I write out a whole thesis statement for my class, was I able to have as much self control as a normal person should probably have. But by putting like, like Nemo said earlier, sometimes we won't build community unless there's like a gun to our head.

Carah Burrell [01:30:37] Sometimes we won't do things that are healthy for us unless we have an outside structure and a meaning making around it. And so the meaning making around the rituals and the do's and don'ts within Mormonism, it's yes, it's the fear of losing your family in eternity, it's breaking your covenants, it's not being worthy. But it's also just the normal human feeling of shame is in all of us. And just recognizing where that shame was coming from was, was healthy as an ex Mormon trying to be Mormon for those days that I, that I did this experiment. And so I have, I, I was really embarrassed to admit how difficult some things were that when I was Mormon, never, never a problem that never had to worry about being tempted by a substance or a website or a vibrating toy or a man or a woman or you know, name your different thing you're not supposed to do.

Carah Burrell [01:31:39] I had to look, I had to not just abstain and not do them. I, I had to dig deep within myself of where that why was coming from to create self control that honestly I never realized how out of control that that part of me was in my post Mormon journey. Everyone listening right now, John included, is like we've known but I didn't recognize how I hadn't exercised that muscle in so long when I was Mormon. And so I know the feedback, I know what the audience is thinking is, is, is all of the things within Mormonism that compel you to stay within that box.

Carah Burrell [01:32:20] But it was an, an interesting thing that I've been reflecting on at how, how, how easy some things actually were in Mormonism because you just take them out of the equation. I never have to worry about, you know, the, the substances and getting into situations in my post Mormon life that have Led to, you know, things that could be described as sexual assault, things that just were not on the table, that were not in my, you know, that were not in my experiences. But now I've been able to just sit with myself, sit with the shame, sit with all of those different complicated feelings and feel a lot of appreciation for, you know, the Carah that was within that Mormon system.

Carah Burrell [01:33:09] She didn't know a lot of things. But I did know how to say no a lot better than I do now. So that's, that's my other answer of what I do appreciate with informatism is a well, well defined muscles in self control.

John Dehlin [01:33:28] I'll just jump in and say this is a sensitive topic with ex Mormons, but I do see ex Mormons who never try to drop of alcohol their whole lives.

Carah Burrell [01:33:43] I'm looking at one right now. Yeah, unless something's changed.

John Dehlin [01:33:47] No, no, no, I haven't. But I have seen ex Mormons who never went 40 years never trying alcohol, who unfortunately, once they started drinking, became alcoholics and someone's fault. I'm not shaming or stigmatizing anyone, but limits can be helpful, especially limits around behaviors that can be damaging. And so I do think generally speaking, learning discipline and learning self control and learning to avoid harmful or damaging practices or behaviors is a good thing. And it's hard to self impose that sometimes when you don't have a reason to self impose it beyond just like does it feel good or not? Or let me just try really hard to exercise self control.

John Dehlin [01:34:43] And I do see sometimes ex Mormons getting into trouble with various vices or behaviors. And so I, I think just that practice of self control can be really valuable. Not always. And that last part, place for healthy consumption of alcohol, I'm sure. Go ahead, Nemo.

Julia [01:35:03] Sorry.

Nemo [01:35:04] No, no, that last part you said is something I maybe wanted to just highlight briefly is the idea of is there a difference between compliance and control? That is when you have a well organized structured system that tells you what to do and what not to do, then what you're doing is you're complying with that system. When you say no, you're saying no because you've already made a decision to comply with that system, when all of a sudden you're the one responsible for designing that system, for coming up with your own reasons why you will and won't do things. That's where self control seems to play a much bigger role. And so, yeah, maybe that's a skill that we don't always leave with as quite as well developed as maybe we think. And that's why perhaps some struggle.

Kolby Reddish [01:35:44] Yeah. And I think the principle. I mean, the way I would have phrased the principle, which is, I'm glad you talked about this. Care. It's something I also really appreciate about my time inside of the church. Like you said, it does make life easier in some ways, is. I would have called it like the idea of discipline. Maybe that's too broad.

Kolby Reddish [01:36:01] But the way I look at it is like, there is value in denying ourselves something just for the sake of, like, exercising that muscle. One of the nightly meditations that we do as a family is a breathing exercise that has like a full minute and then a full minute and a half long, like, breath hold. And I always joke with Cammie and say that I just have a really finely evolved a sense of self preservation. But I'm terrible at holding my breath for that long. And I know this is a really small example. I'm not trying to make light of it, but it's the same muscle that we're trying to exercise here.

Kolby Reddish [01:36:39] I get a lot of value in, like, the times when I'm able to like, center my brain enough to say, like, resist the feeling to take this breath because you're going to be okay on the other end of taking this breath. And of course, the breath is just a very small thing. But exercising that muscle of being disciplined, exercising self control and not just immediately giving in to whatever might feel the best in any particular moment, I think is a very valuable skill that you learn inside of the church, especially when you're choosing it right. I had family members that I grew up with who were raised so fundamentalist that when they saw like a bottle of alcohol on the side of the road, they would, like, literally run the other direction because they were convinced that alcohol is evil, like, as a substance is evil.

Kolby Reddish [01:37:27] That's not. That's not pulling the correct message either. These things are just things. And learning how to make our conscious decisions, I guess coming back to the whole idea of agency, learning how to make our conscious, conscious decisions about those things and how we want to show up in the world, I think is the value of being disciplined or having the ability to be disciplined. And I. I think you're right. There are a lot of people who leave the church and kind of go hog wild with trying everything that they've never tried before. And that's not necessarily always the best path for your life, depending on, you know, what you want your life to look like.

Kolby Reddish [01:38:01] It's about choosing what you want it to look like based on where that's likely to take you, in my view. Any other thoughts on that one?

John Dehlin [01:38:12] Yeah.

Carah Burrell [01:38:13] Yeah. Thank you guys for putting my words that don't always come out so eloquently into your eloquent speak. And speaking on that subject, what I have found instead, all of those things are true. The conformity versus, you know, actually choosing for yourself how in which you engage in things that were always off limits before.

Carah Burrell [01:38:38] My more guiding principle. That is also something that is, I don't know, ingrained in me from whether Mormonism or just being a homo sapien that wants to care after my community and my children. I'm really intentional with my journaling and what goes in my body and what I watch and what I read. And part of that is developing a sense of a value system based around, honestly, just like awe. Just, you know, what do I get out of bed for? What am I here on earth for? I don't know about God, I don't know about a lot of things, but I know that in this body I'm in, I want to experience the feeling of awe the most amount of times.

Carah Burrell [01:39:19] I think that's the most incredible feeling that we can have as human amongst many other great feelings. And so the, the instinct from Mormonism to just be in awe of my kids as much as possible. And that informs my habits and what I do with my time and what I put in my body and what time I go to bed so that I am able to feel in awe of my kids in the morning and not be hungover or grumpy or needing a substance, you know, things like that. And so by building a value system based around that, it's, yeah, it's informed all of the other habits and things that I do with my time in my life.

Carah Burrell [01:39:57] So I just looking for, like to be connected with people, to be wowed, to be like, oh my gosh, look at that sunset. I don't need anything else other than, you know, the, the kids that I giggle with and you know, community and these other just really awe inspiring interactions that can be helped and increased in some ways by other non Mormon activities and non Mormon substances. Sure. But the, the main staple of my life is just a value system based around going, wow, incredible. I love being alive. I love the colors of that sunset. I love spending time with my kids and giggling as I put them to bed, you know, so I don't feel conformed by my value system. I feel, you know, it grows and inspires me to just keep, keep plugging away.

Gratitude, Wonder, and Appreciation of the World

Nemo [01:40:52] Can I jump in for 30 seconds on appreciation of sunsets. People travel thousands of miles to go and see the northern lights. Right. People love to look at the sky and think, wow, it's lit up in all these wonderful colors everywhere on Earth. Every single day, the sun puts on a show for you. So just go out and appreciate it, please. Thank you. Rant over.

Kolby Reddish [01:41:15] That's awesome. Well, we're coming to you for your next one, Nemo. And then we'll go to Julia and then John.

Nemo [01:41:20] So, Julia, I've expounded your mind throughout everything else, so you can go.

Kolby Reddish [01:41:26] I'm in awe of that.

Julia [01:41:27] Sure. So named me. You say you're done with that?

Nemo [01:41:31] Yeah, I'm done.

Julia [01:41:32] So my last one was about knowledge and in the church. So I know that the church, historically, they have not put a lot of emphasis on women getting an education. I do think that with Hinckley, he was the one that kind of was like, oh, yeah, women should get an education. Of course, your place is in the home and to be a wife and a mother, but go and get an education. At least that's what I remember from growing up. And then also I think Joseph Smith or somebody, I think it was Joseph, he said that whatever knowledge you obtain in this life, or this is a scripture, whatever knowledge you obtain in this life, it will rise with you in the next.

Julia [01:42:03] And so this whole concept of, like, enriching my mind, because that's the only thing that I can really take. I can't take gold or riches or whatever books that I. Or whatever things that I have. I can just. Just bring my knowledge with me. And then the most important thing is the knowledge of the gospel. And so I was constantly reading to different books and expanding my knowledge about different things. And that's something that I've still carried over and I still love today. Like, I'm learning about the KKK and the. And the Ozarks here, which is one of the classes that I'm taking. And just the things that I'm taking or getting a master's degree, like, just these things that I really think that the church really helped me have that foundation of just continue learning. Like, just don't ever stop learning.

Kolby Reddish [01:42:42] Yeah, I love that too. Just Julia. And one of the things that I did, like, when I was in the middle of my faith crisis is I really rediscovered this. This love of learning about things just to learn about them. So especially when I was looking at, like, analogs of who the Book of Mormon peoples may have been that some apologists point to, like, whether it's the Maya or the Aztecs or the Hopewell. I really started to put together, like, these little mini, like research papers on these people and their cultures and started to listen to podcasts that were more based in history.

Kolby Reddish [01:43:14] And I was kind of shocked at how much I wasn't even recognizing that all of the learning I was doing was in furtherance of this system. And as soon as I lost that, I was able to rediscover this love of learning just for the sake of learning those things. And I really appreciate that value that I do believe began inside of Mormonism, for sure.

Julia [01:43:38] And I'll say, too, that not everything, like people can find a love of knowledge and a love of different things or virtue or integrity or whatever. They can. They can. All these things that we're talking about, I feel like people can get those from different religions as well. I mean, we're not saying that these can only come from Mormonism, but I think we can. I can say that for all of us, this came from Mormonism because this is how we were all raised. And I just wanted to throw that out there.

Carah Burrell [01:44:01] Yeah.

Kolby Reddish [01:44:01] Anyone else have any thoughts on learning? Otherwise, we'll move over to John.

John Dehlin [01:44:06] I was just going to say quickly that when I was at byu, had an honors colloquium class, and one of the professors there, his name was Ted Lyon, shared with us a statistic that in the early 1900s, Utah, as I understand it, led the nation in per capita female PhD graduates. Some crazy statistic like that. I don't have the actual source, but he's a super smart guy, and I. I would challenge people to go back and see if they can find some sort of statistic, but it turned. And also I've heard that, you know, late 1800s, early 1900s, a lot of Mormon women became nurses or physicians for whatever. Whatever cultural reasons were present on the frontier again in the late 1800s, early 1900s.

Julia [01:45:04] Well, I was gonna say even Brigham Young was asking the. The sisters to open up a hospital there. So if they had a hospital there for several years. And I just think that's really cool.

John Dehlin [01:45:14] Yeah. Yeah. So. And again, something that people don't know is that Mormon, you know, we always think about in. In the modern era, sort of church curriculum being sterile and boring and correlated. But prior to Harold B. Lee's correlation, you know, that emerged in the 60s. If you go back and read, you know, priesthood manuals or Sunday school manuals prior to the 1960s, you'll find them talking about astronomy, talking about geology, talking about science, you'll remember we had apostles like James E. Talmage and John E. Widstow who were PhD level scientists.

John Dehlin [01:46:03] So before science fell out of fashion, starting with Joseph Fielding Smith's sort of correlate and Harold B. Lee's Correlation in the 1960s, Mormonism had a very rich heritage of respecting science. Even B H Roberts was someone who valued and appreciated science. And that's what led to those secret Mormon meetings of 1922 when he started studying anthropology and archeology and linguistics and realized that we had a problem.

John Dehlin [01:46:36] But that came out of a love and appreciation for science. So we actually have a deep heritage of valuing education and even science. It was just sort of Harrowby Lee, Joseph Felix Smith correlation in the 60s that that sort of took us in a wrong direction.

Carah Burrell [01:46:54] And who among us hasn't been naive thinking that church leaders would want to hear our scientific or data backed takes and being ushered out of the building, you know, universal experience.

Kolby Reddish [01:47:07] I do think you're. I do think you're very right about that though, John, because my time at byu, I never felt like I was in the science program, science program at BYU in micro molecular biology. And I never felt, I never really felt that tension. Like I always felt like I was very will. I was very able to follow the science where it led. I felt like that was the way I was trained and taught in that program. Of course I had separate religion classes that may have had a different lens put on them, but it.

Kolby Reddish [01:47:38] I agree with you that I think that is one of the coolest things or coolest strains inside of Mormonism is this belief in higher education and especially in the sciences, you know, to go back to Nemo's pitch for sunsets and Carah's pitch for awe. I have always felt at the most connected with the divine when I'm out in the mountains. Like I grew up in Idaho, live in Idaho still today. And I've always felt most connected to the divine when I'm surrounded by mountains and streams and wildlife. And I learned that in part because of this, this love that Mormonism does have with the natural sciences. Absolutely, I agree with you. Do you want to give us yours or play the game?

John Dehlin [01:48:24] Okay, so it's my turn. Okay. I thought, I thought for my. I only prepared one main thing. I prepared a little game and I'm excited to play it. And I need all the panelists consent. I want you all to be sort of participants in the game. So Carah, do you consent to play?

Nemo [01:48:45] That's not informed consent, is it, John? I don't know what I'm consenting to.

Carah Burrell [01:48:48] Well, I just asked me and I raised my hand.

John Dehlin [01:48:51] I'm saying, do you consent to play a game?

Kolby Reddish [01:48:54] It feels very jigsaw.

John Dehlin [01:48:56] Yeah, no, this will be. This will be fun and innocent, I promise.

Nemo [01:49:01] Consent that it's fun and innocent. I will consent.

Primary Songs and Hymns Quiz

John Dehlin [01:49:04] Okay. All right, so here's what. Here's what, Nemo, I want you to be scorekeeper.

Nemo [01:49:08] Oh.

John Dehlin [01:49:09] So get a pen. Pen or pencil and a piece of paper.

Nemo [01:49:12] Julia, love this.

John Dehlin [01:49:13] I'm going to need you to be quick to jump to different screens because I'm going to ask questions, and the first person that responds, you got to switch the camera to them. So is that all right?

Julia [01:49:24] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:49:25] Okay, so Julia is the. The camera person, and Nemo's the scorekeeper. You ready, Nemo?

Nemo [01:49:31] To judge people and score them?

John Dehlin [01:49:33] No, to score. This will be the deal. I'm going to ask a question. You get one point for answering the question. But the questions are going to be asking about songs, either primary songs or hymns that we were taught. Because the one thing that I love perhaps most about Mormonism is it taught me a love for music, and it taught me a love for learning values or good things through music.

John Dehlin [01:50:04] And so my happiest memories as a Mormon literally were either sitting in singing time during primary and learning primary songs, or sitting in the chapel singing hymns with my fellow Mormons, or singing in the choir in the ward or state choir or the MTC choir as a Mormon, or attending general conference, hearing the Mormon Tabernacle Choir sing, or singing at general conference with the entire, you know, 10,000 people or whatever in the conference center, or even singing with my family.

John Dehlin [01:50:43] Margi and I used to gather the kids together. We would sing primary songs for family, home evening. My family and I used to go Christmas caroling, and we would sing Christmas carols, knock on neighbors doors and sing Christmas carols. So what we're going to do is a little quiz or a test.

John Dehlin [01:51:00] I am going to share some principles or values that Mormonism taught us. And you get one point if you can name a primary song or a hymn that teaches that the value that I mentioned. And if you sing it, you get two points. All right.

Nemo [01:51:23] Oh, hello.

John Dehlin [01:51:24] All right. Is that good? Nemo, I know you like to sing. Kolby, I'm pretty sure you sing. Carah, I know you sing Billy Ocean.

Carah Burrell [01:51:32] Billy. Oh, yeah.

Nemo [01:51:34] Julia, how you feeling?

John Dehlin [01:51:35] Julia, are you a singer? No. All right, well, you're. You're going to get one point. Channel your Mormon girl. All right, so here it is. Here's the first one. What's a primary song or a hymn that teaches a love for truth?

Kolby Reddish [01:51:56] I'll say, what is truth?

John Dehlin [01:51:58] Sing it.

Kolby Reddish [01:52:00] I don't know how it goes.

John Dehlin [01:52:02] Say, what is truth? Tis the fairest. Jim. That's all just a stanza. I love that. That's probably my favorite hymn. So Kolby gets one point and I get two points. How's that?

Nemo [01:52:13] John, Are you being scored in this?

John Dehlin [01:52:15] Yeah. I mean, I will if you losers don't come up with a song or thing. I love it all just by singing the songs with the hymns you aren't willing to sing. How's that, Kolby?

Kolby Reddish [01:52:25] I love it.

Nemo [01:52:26] These are going to be pre1984 hymn book songs. John, to give you an advantage that's.

John Dehlin [01:52:31] I'll say what his truth is the hymnbook.

Nemo [01:52:34] I'm just calling you old. It's fine.

John Dehlin [01:52:35] Okay. All right. Well, I am old.

Carah Burrell [01:52:37] Can we use the 2002 EFY album?

John Dehlin [01:52:40] Sure.

Carah Burrell [01:52:41] Good, because that's what I've been listening to a lot and forcing a lot of my followers to listen to as well.

John Dehlin [01:52:46] Is there a song about truth in that?

Carah Burrell [01:52:47] It goes, we believe in one name under heaven, where all things are given by faith. Do you know that one?

John Dehlin [01:52:58] That is not about truth. You just need an excuse to sing that.

Carah Burrell [01:53:01] It's about what we believe. We believe, and all of those things are truth.

John Dehlin [01:53:04] Got it. Okay. Okay.

Carah Burrell [01:53:05] And also, in that case, am I

Nemo [01:53:06] allowed to throw in musical tracks like what?

John Dehlin [01:53:08] Two points for Carah, two points for Carah.

Nemo [01:53:11] Okay.

John Dehlin [01:53:12] Okay, here's the next one. The next one is a song about honesty or integrity.

Nemo [01:53:19] Choose the right. Say it. Choose the right. When the choice is placed before you.

John Dehlin [01:53:24] All right. Any others?

Carah Burrell [01:53:28] Does this count? I'm sorry. I have to go off the rails all the time. What about income? Thou fount. When it goes, here I raise my Ebenezer. Does that count?

Nemo [01:53:36] Sure. I hope I've come.

Carah Burrell [01:53:40] When the BYU chorus comes in here.

John Dehlin [01:53:42] I raised my Ebenezer hither By myself I go.

Nemo [01:53:49] Love it.

Kolby Reddish [01:53:50] And by whom.

John Dehlin [01:53:51] How about I believe in Being Honest? Isn't that a primary song?

Kolby Reddish [01:53:57] I was thinking of the Carolyn Pearson song about. We're Getting there.

John Dehlin [01:54:01] We're. Oh, we're getting there. We're getting there right now. It's about honesty. Okay, the next one is. This might be. Oh, I'm the only one who knows these, but how about a song about stillness or reverence? Or reverence.

Carah Burrell [01:54:18] Be still my soul.

John Dehlin [01:54:19] Yeah, sing it. Be still my soul. The Lord is on my side. Of grief and pain okay. Any others?

Kolby Reddish [01:54:34] Stillness. Abide with me. Tis even tide.

Julia [01:54:36] Ooh.

Carah Burrell [01:54:37] Sing it.

John Dehlin [01:54:38] Which version?

Kolby Reddish [01:54:39] Me. Tis even tide. The day. I can't remember the rest of the words.

John Dehlin [01:54:45] This pastagon. There's two versions of Abide with Me. Do you guys know the other one?

Julia [01:54:51] No.

John Dehlin [01:54:52] Abide with me. Fast falls the eventide. There's two. There's two versions with those lyrics.

Carah Burrell [01:55:00] What was the question again?

John Dehlin [01:55:02] Stillness.

Carah Burrell [01:55:04] Yeah, there's a lot of those.

John Dehlin [01:55:05] How about this one? It shouldn't be hard to sit very still to think about Jesus. His cross on the hill. Do you guys remember that one?

Carah Burrell [01:55:15] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:55:17] Or how about this one? The chapel door seemed to say to me,

Carah Burrell [01:55:25] Shut up. That's how my family sang it. Did you guys have a. Different versions of inappropriate songs? Versions of this.

John Dehlin [01:55:32] You're taking us off the game.

Carah Burrell [01:55:33] I know, but that's.

Kolby Reddish [01:55:35] It was.

Nemo [01:55:35] Always choose the sprite when the Coke is placed before you. Classic.

John Dehlin [01:55:41] I love it.

Nemo [01:55:42] Okay, next one, John.

John Dehlin [01:55:44] Okay, the next one. The next one is hard work or industry.

Carah Burrell [01:55:50] Put your shoulder.

Kolby Reddish [01:55:51] Put your shoulder through the wheel.

John Dehlin [01:55:57] We all have work. Has anyone ever had ex Mormons singing Mormon hymns before? I think this is.

Carah Burrell [01:56:10] You do this on every Mormon Stories podcast. What are you talking about?

John Dehlin [01:56:12] Yeah, but not as a group.

Kolby Reddish [01:56:14] The Lord commanded me.

Nemo [01:56:18] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:56:19] Is that. What. What is that? What's the theme? I will go.

Carah Burrell [01:56:22] I will do.

Nemo [01:56:25] I know.

John Dehlin [01:56:25] The Lord provides a way. He wants me to obey. That's obedience. But it counts.

Kolby Reddish [01:56:30] Folks who want to know how hard it would have been to build a boat, they can listen to the excellent John Larsen episode on that. That's hard work, John.

Carah Burrell [01:56:38] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:56:39] The other one I was thinking of is in our lovely Deseret. Where?

Nemo [01:56:42] The Temple of God.

John Dehlin [01:56:43] I bet there's a multitude of children just come.

Carah Burrell [01:56:48] Come.

Kolby Reddish [01:56:48] You say kind of Onward, Christian soldiers, too.

John Dehlin [01:56:57] Okay, good. All right, Next one is.

Kolby Reddish [01:56:59] How about.

John Dehlin [01:57:02] How about obedience? Or, you know, limits to behavior?

Kolby Reddish [01:57:06] Choose the right.

Nemo [01:57:07] Yeah, choose the right.

John Dehlin [01:57:11] I will go. When a choice is placed before you. All right, all right. How about keep the Commandments?

Carah Burrell [01:57:27] I like that one.

John Dehlin [01:57:28] Keep the commandments. Commandments. In this, there is. Me. All right.

Kolby Reddish [01:57:40] I don't follow the prophet. That's obedience. Follow the prophet.

Nemo [01:57:52] Or has Julie been sitting this out? I need to know whether she's.

John Dehlin [01:57:57] Julie did this when we said singing. Yes.

Nemo [01:57:59] Okay. Right.

Kolby Reddish [01:58:01] Okay, Julia.

John Dehlin [01:58:04] Okay, a couple more. How about courage?

Julia [01:58:08] Oh, that's a good one.

Nemo [01:58:10] That song is called Nephi's Courage. The Lord commanded Nephi.

Julia [01:58:15] Right.

John Dehlin [01:58:16] All right.

Kolby Reddish [01:58:18] Christian soldiers again.

John Dehlin [01:58:19] Okay. Any others?

Carah Burrell [01:58:21] In a sea of shifting values while the wind.

John Dehlin [01:58:35] Let the consequence follow what is right. Let the consequence follow. Battle for freedom and spirit and mind. Sing it, Nemo.

Nemo [01:58:53] What? God will protect you Then do what is right. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:58:58] Good. I love it. Good. It. All right. And then there's Dare to do Right. Dare to be true. You have a work that no other can do. Do you guys know that one?

Carah Burrell [01:59:10] Yeah.

Nemo [01:59:13] John. A song about flexibility because I want to crack out. I'm all made of hinges and don't you try to stop me.

John Dehlin [01:59:18] What is it? Go for it.

Nemo [01:59:21] I'm all made of hinges and everything. Ben's right. Do you remember that from primary?

John Dehlin [01:59:26] I love it.

Carah Burrell [01:59:27] Yeah. There's some exercise related songs in primaries to get the kids moving.

John Dehlin [01:59:32] Okay. How about kindness or, you know, loving people that are different than us. Kolby, you. You made a right.

Julia [01:59:42] People do.

John Dehlin [01:59:44] Okay. As I. Okay, wait. As I. As I've loved you. Love one another.

Nemo [01:59:47] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:59:48] Nobody gets two for that.

Carah Burrell [01:59:49] Yeah, but I won't. I won't. I'll walk with you.

John Dehlin [01:59:54] I'll talk with you. That's how I'll show my love for you. Shout out to Carolyn Pearson. Kolby, you. You. You get a point for mentioning that song because you mentioned it first, but.

Kolby Reddish [02:00:07] Cool.

Carah Burrell [02:00:11] Trying to pull into.

John Dehlin [02:00:11] Yeah, I'll walk with you as a banger.

Nemo [02:00:13] I don't know how anyone's pulling away because everyone's absolutely smashing this.

John Dehlin [02:00:18] All right, and then the last one is about hope or optimism.

Kolby Reddish [02:00:23] Any ideas of Israel rising might.

John Dehlin [02:00:27] All right. Okay. I love it.

Nemo [02:00:34] Any others?

Carah Burrell [02:00:39] Kind of about Jesus. So it's kind of like all of them.

Julia [02:00:42] I don't know.

John Dehlin [02:00:43] How about the day dawn is breaking, the world is awaking.

Carah Burrell [02:00:49] Can I share the most impactful religious related song? I don't know if it's in Mormon canon, but I sang it in my high school graduation in Provo, Utah, which was 100 Mormons, and it was the song Be thou a smooth Way. And it's. Yeah, there's. There's just, you know, songs about the. The turbulence of life and Jesus Christ is like be thou a smooth way before you. That I have everything taken care of. So there's, you know, I like the choral music of Mormonism more than the. The hymns that you have to sing in Sunday. So the arrangements of the a cappella of Tempe High School cannot be matched for sure.

John Dehlin [02:01:30] Any other favorite Mormon hymns or primary songs before I. Before I read? A couple.

Nemo [02:01:35] He beams Our Father's Mercy is a

John Dehlin [02:01:36] four part men's rightly beams Our Father's mercy. Sing it, Nemo.

Nemo [02:01:42] From his lighthouse evermore that was our mission.

John Dehlin [02:01:47] He gives the keeping of the lights along the shore.

Nemo [02:01:53] It's one of the parts that was

Julia [02:01:56] our missionary theme song whenever I served in Salt Lake. Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:01:59] The lower lights be burning.

Carah Burrell [02:02:02] What about I Love to look for Rainbows?

John Dehlin [02:02:03] That's, like, the best.

Kolby Reddish [02:02:04] Oh, yeah. I love that one.

Nemo [02:02:06] They just recently changed that. There was a theological change made with that hymn.

Carah Burrell [02:02:12] Really?

Nemo [02:02:13] Yeah. Think about the next line and think upon the beauty of an earth made clean. Again, they got rid of the word an and they changed it to the Getting rid of the plurality of worlds.

Julia [02:02:23] Just make. I think I did see your. Did you make a subtle change?

Nemo [02:02:26] It makes all the difference.

John Dehlin [02:02:29] Any other favorite primary songs or hymns before we end?

Nemo [02:02:33] Book of Mormon stories. Absolute banger.

Carah Burrell [02:02:37] Did they change the hand movements on that one?

John Dehlin [02:02:42] You like Mormons can't stop Trying to stir up trouble. You're going to mention Follow the Prophet and Book of Mormon Stories. Stories. And

Carah Burrell [02:02:53] I. I love that song because my high school friend's dad wrote it, and I was always like, hey, but the family is cool. The way that this song encourages people's, you know, authoritarian instincts, it's another thing.

Nemo [02:03:07] But I have beef with a primary. Popcorn popping on what kind of tree

John Dehlin [02:03:13] looked out the apricot?

Kolby Reddish [02:03:15] Yeah.

Nemo [02:03:15] Apricot trees don't grow popcorn.

John Dehlin [02:03:17] No, it's an embarrassingly.

Nemo [02:03:20] Embarrassingly grown man. When I work that out.

John Dehlin [02:03:24] Nemo, it's talking about how the blossoms look like popcorn. Nemo.

Nemo [02:03:28] Yeah. Given that we have no native apricot trees here, as far as I'm aware. Metaphor was lost on me. Took it very literally.

John Dehlin [02:03:36] All right. Well. All right, Nemo, what's the score? What's the tally? Why don't I read. I'll read a couple comments really quick, and then we'll have Nemo give us the tally.

Kolby Reddish [02:03:46] I also gave you an image of the way I felt when you were asking us to play a game. There at the bottom. John, if you want to share that.

John Dehlin [02:03:53] Oh. Oh, okay. What is that?

Kolby Reddish [02:03:56] Kolby, that's you as Jigsaw.

Nemo [02:03:59] Kolby, you need to get off. AI.

John Dehlin [02:04:04] I don't know. The reference there.

Carah Burrell [02:04:05] It's from the.

Kolby Reddish [02:04:07] Okay.

Nemo [02:04:08] And his line is,

Kolby Reddish [02:04:11] explain the reference franchise. That's the phrase he uses.

John Dehlin [02:04:15] Hello, Kolby. I want to play a game.

Kolby Reddish [02:04:18] That's how I felt.

John Dehlin [02:04:21] Nice. Nice.

Julia [02:04:22] I love it.

John Dehlin [02:04:24] Let me read a couple. Let me read a couple comments really quick. Captain Blood writes, I loved the refreshments. He's referring to his favorite thing about Mormonism. He loved the refreshments. Yeah. Like Ward Potlucks, jello salad, funeral potatoes. Those things are bangers. Dan Bogle we love Dan Bogle, he writes, There are parts of us like anger and sexuality that we disown and post Mormon we can claim them. That's not his favorite part about Mormonism, but it is a good observation. Dan Vogel we always are glad when you join us.

John Dehlin [02:05:00] Stephanie Wing, 2658, writes, Nothing good about the church makes up for the insidious doctrine in damage it's done by being false. Okay, that's not in the spirit of this episode, but we'll share it as representing, I'm sure, what not just only one person feels. And then we love Bishop Bo Euler. Shout out to Bishop Bo during a time where the church is directly going after him. We love and appreciate his courage. Speaking of integrity and truth and courage and sticking up for those who are marginalized, I think Bishop Bowe represents the best of what Mormonism taught us all, and he has been speaking up at a great personal cost and sacrifice to a degree that none of us, I think, really understand who aren't friends with Bo.

John Dehlin [02:05:56] So we love you, Beau. We our hearts are with you and with your family during a very hard time. Bishop Oiler, check out his White Soft White Underbelly interview. I've been wanting to play and respond to that on Mormon stories. We've just been waiting for the right time in the right way to do that. But check out Bo Oiler, Bishop Bo Euler's episode on Soft White Underbelly. It's a really powerful, thoughtful, respectful telling of his Mormon story. But Bishop Bow writes, I agree, and when we do it for ourselves, he's talking about this idea. I think it was during the alcohol conversation that when we do things of our own intrinsic motivation and ethics and moral values, Beau writes, it feels much more rewarding than when we did it to be worthy of the church.

John Dehlin [02:06:49] And I'll just kind of say that reflects kind of the Richard Rohr concept of as indicated in the book Falling Upward, where he talks about first half of life and second half of life. In the first half of life, our brain's already been developed enough to have a lot of good self awareness or self control.

John Dehlin [02:07:06] So Richard Rohr argues that it's good to have a religious system or a framework to grow up in so that you have a set of values to operate from and so that you can keep yourself out of trouble and out of danger when your brain hasn't even fully developed yet. So Richard Rohr himself, who's Catholic, says that no one does first half of life better than Mormons. And I think that means something. What I think Richard Rohr also says is that few people do second half of life worse than Mormons. And I think Bo, what bo's talking about there is this transition from an extrinsic authority and from an extrinsic sense of motivation to an intrinsic one, which is what happens when you have that being born again experience or that second half of life experience or a faith crisis experience.

John Dehlin [02:07:59] That's the gift of the Mormon faith crisis is transitioning from outward external to internal intrinsic self knowledge. And it's a beautiful thing when you can do it. And we can all appreciate as ex Mormons, experiencing some level of that. And what I loved about today's episode, all of you panelists, and especially you, Kolby, for organizing this is, I think what we're all expressing is we have deep gratitude for the first half of life, for the structure, for, for the framework, for the identity, for the morality, for the spirituality, for the community, the meaning and purpose that our Mormon upbringings gave us, that delivered us into the beautiful humans that all of you are.

John Dehlin [02:08:46] So, Kolby, thank you and we'll give everyone a chance for final thoughts. But Kolby, thank you for organizing today. I think it's been beautiful and powerful.

Kolby Reddish [02:08:56] Thank you. And I'll just go ahead and share my final thoughts now. One reason I wanted to do this episode and Carah already touched on this, is we have seen such a rise in division and people furthering division, both like over political situations in our country and, and in these religious divides that after Charlie Kirk was shot and after the shooting in Grand Blanc, Michigan, I really have tried to think about the ways that I engage with the world and have tried to think about the ways that we can do bridge building better because we should be able to hold two truths at once, which is that, yes, there are critiques and criticisms that we have of the church and its leadership and its doctrines and teachings and its history and its practices.

Final Reflections and Round Robin on the Church's Future

Kolby Reddish [02:09:43] All of those things don't go away. So for the comment that you addressed from Stephanie, no, we're not saying that the fact that we appreciate and value some of the things from our time inside of Mormonism erases any of that for each of the panelists or for other people individually, however, we're just not really giving people, we're not finding other people's humanity or recognizing other people's humanity if we can't also talk about the good things that came from this system. Because there are people that are close to each of us who. Who are still part of this system, that it still means a lot to them.

Kolby Reddish [02:10:18] And frankly, it still means a lot to me. It is a system that helped. Shaped me. And while I do want it to change and I do want it to evolve, I still want it to be the best system it can be for the people who are still in that. And that's why I wanted to do this panel kind of as a Valentine's gift to Mormonism and to everyone across this spectrum where Mormonism has affected their lives. So thank you all for being part of it, and thanks, John, for allowing us to use your platform for this discussion today.

John Dehlin [02:10:49] My pleasure. Other final thoughts before I give a closing goodbye?

Nemo [02:10:55] Yeah, I. I will say firstly, that Carah won that game. Kolby came second, I came third, and fortunately, Julia, I think it came forth. And then John, I refused to mark John, given the, you know, unfair advantage he has of the question center.

Nemo [02:11:24] Yeah. I will say that I'm grateful to be here and discussing this. A lot of people have often struggled with my position, position that I didn't want to be excommunicated. For those that don't know, I was excommunicated in 2024, and I didn't want it to happen. I love my community. I love the church. I wanted the church to be better, as Kolby said. I wanted the church to be better for my family who are still in it. I wanted the church to. There's so much potential in the church.

Nemo [02:11:53] And so I think a lot of people struggle with that position. But I hope today can shine a light on the. Some of the reasons why one may discover things about the church that tend to cause people to leave and yet either not want to or still want to hold on to the good from the church or hold on to the things in that first half of life, as John said, that, that they find valuable and how there's no need to throw everything away just because your relationship to the church changes.

Nemo [02:12:23] No need. There may be practical reasons to. There may be other factors, but it's not a blanket need immediately to just go, yep, gotta get rid of it. That's just everything about me that was ever touching it. We'll have to go because, unfortunately, it probably touched most parts of you. It probably is in you in a way, in ways that you're going to be working out for years.

Nemo [02:12:42] So, yeah, those. Those are my final thoughts. I'm. I'm excited to hear how you cover Bo John. I'm covering him tomorrow on my channel. I'm gonna be talking about the helpline more generally. So people want to go check out. They're free to go check that out.

John Dehlin [02:12:57] But yeah, before Julie jumps in, I'm gonna do a round robin quiz. So the. The choices are A, destroy the Mormon Church or B, make the Mormon Church better. Each of you respond quickly. Firing round. Carah. Destroy the Mormon Church or make it better.

Carah Burrell [02:13:12] Make it better.

John Dehlin [02:13:14] Nemo. Destroy the church or make it better.

Nemo [02:13:17] Make it better.

John Dehlin [02:13:18] Julia. Destroy the Mormon Church or make it better.

Julia [02:13:20] Make it better.

John Dehlin [02:13:21] All right, Kolby. Destroy the Mormon Church or make it better.

Kolby Reddish [02:13:24] There's a lot of pressure on me.

John Dehlin [02:13:27] All right, take that, a Mormon apologist. 5. Is it 5 or 6? 5 out of 5 ex Mormons want not to destroy the Mormon Church, but just to help make it better. Julia, final thoughts?

Julia [02:13:44] Yeah, I really like what you said, imo, that. That I was excommunicated also, and I really even I didn't want to be excommunicated. And still it's like kind of a tender spot because the church meant everything to me at the time. I also think that the church raises us to think in very black and white views. And so I think, again, as we've been saying, when people leave the church, they still sometimes hold that black and white perspective, when in reality, the human experience. Experience is a kaleidoscope of different, different, different colors of experiences and perspectives that we should all allow them to exist. So if somebody says, I want to go back to church, or somebody says, I don't feel comfortable at church, or that the church is harmful or that the church is really good, like, there.

Julia [02:14:24] There's just. There's space to have everyone have their perspectives and for those to all be valid. And I think that's another sign of, like, I don't mean to be like. Like a sign of maturity or a sign of, like, I don't know, just like, allowing people to have their perspectives. And that's just what to me, this episode was, is to just how have people like the bridge building and just having these exist on the table all together?

Nemo [02:14:49] John, you're muted.

Kolby Reddish [02:14:50] You're muted. John.

John Dehlin [02:14:53] Beautiful. Thank you. Julie. That was beautiful.

Carah Burrell [02:14:56] Yeah. And Carah, everything you guys have shared today, been so beautiful. I feel like this. This is a ex Mormon testimony meeting. Yeah. And to expand upon your question, John, of to destroy the Mormon Church or to make it better.

Carah Burrell [02:15:10] We are critics of the Mormon Church. That is what we are known for. But we also are, you know, well versed in what creates, you know, healthier mental states and families and communities as well. And we can look at what Mormonism does, right, to create those outcomes. And we can critique things that it needs to improve on. And when we are combating dogma and authoritarianism, the answer isn't just our own endless dogma and our own endless critique. It's about meaningful construction of our own lives and what we would hope to see within the church. And so that can kind of get lost when we are known for exposing lies, exposing corruption, because all of that is necessary for people who need a lot of healing from those things that have been enacted within their lives.

Carah Burrell [02:15:59] But within that healing comes a, you know, a stage of integration of the good, the bad. And overall, my last few years has been based around the question of, like, within Mormonism or anything else that, you know, I've, I've done, or friends I've had or places I've worked or whatever. It's the question of, like, what is this bringing out in me? And for people who are within the church, if it is bringing out the best aspects of the best things that Jesus Christ taught, then I want them to, you know, feel encouraged from ex moral podcasters to keep doing that within their communities, because who else will, you know?

Carah Burrell [02:16:41] So within my deconstruction and reconstruction post the church, I, I look back at the last, you know, 30 years I spent within the church and the last 30 days that I spent within the church, and it's still looking at those rituals, it's still looking at those lessons and asking, you know, not is it true? Capital C true, but what did this ritual do to me? What did this practice? What did this teaching do to me? And I think we've, we've like, really hit a lot of those important things. Um, because I was such a Jesus freak for my time within the church, a lot of the structure of the church worked for me, but the person that I was worshiping was kind of a DIY God of Jesus Christ that I created in my head.

Carah Burrell [02:17:20] And I had to kind of recreate that God in the last 30 days of a God who mourns with those that mourn, and a God who isn't into spiritual bypassing and just putting in a dogmatic scripture about, well, God came with the sword, so what do you expect? Like, it's a God who wants to be in relationship with its children. And it's, it's a God that I don't believe in necessarily, but I believe in the principle that we're all children of God. And there's, there's a lot of good calls back to our humanity within that Religion and, you know, recreating that space in my own secular, spiritual life, moving forward is something that I want to keep growing and encouraging other people to do as well.

John Dehlin [02:18:05] Love it. My final thought is just that, you know, some people say that the opposite of love is hate. And I would say that in many instances, for me, the opposite of love is indifference. It's just not caring at all. Love seems to be the epitome of caring, and the opposite of that is just zero caring. And I can tell you with 100% certainty that all my work on Mormon stories from the beginning, for the past 20, 21 years, has been rooted in a love for the Mormon people, a love for Mormon culture, and a love for the Mormon Church and what it has done for me and what it does for others.

John Dehlin [02:19:00] And it comes not from a place of apathy or of hatred, but from a place of love and admiration and appreciation. And if I've been critical, if I've supported criticisms or any. Any sort of thing, it for me has always come from a place of just wanting to see the church be its best self, to see the Mormon people be its healthiest self, to see Mormons and church leaders rise to the highest level that they can rise and do the most good and the least amount of harm in the world. So I love the Mormon people. I love the many aspects of the LDS Church, and I just want to see more kindness, more good, more love, less harm, less pain, and less suffering.

John Dehlin [02:19:50] And this is a manifestation of that at my heart. I don't think of myself as a critic I think of. Or as a hater. I think of myself as someone who's trying to improve and make our people better. And at the end of the day, I think that's very Mormon.

John Dehlin [02:20:09] So that's it. That's all I got. And let's have everyone just go quickly around, and if. If our viewers and listeners want to hear more or learn more from you, tell them where they can find you. And, Kolby, let's start with you because you have a new YouTube channel you just launched.

Kolby Reddish [02:20:28] Yeah, I do. It's aimed at. I just launched it literally yesterday. It's called let's Disagree and Other Interesting Conversations with Kolby Reddish. I started it basically as we've been in line with everything we've been talking about today, trying to find a place to model respectful disagreement with interesting folks. And I've been kind of floored at the amount of people who've reached out that want to be part of that. So thank you. You can email me at let's disagree. Showmail.com if you're interested in that. Or just find me there on YouTube. And that doesn't mean I won't still be a recurring guest and your favorite rando on the Internet.

John Dehlin [02:21:06] So you may be graduating from rando status soon, Kolby.

Kolby Reddish [02:21:12] I will. I will always be a rando to me, John.

John Dehlin [02:21:17] Julia, tell people how they can follow you.

Julia [02:21:19] Yeah, my name is Julia Sanders. You can find me. I have the. I run the analyzing Mormonism, Tick Tock and Instagram and. And YouTube and Patreon. So if you want to find me there, I post everything on those platforms, so.

John Dehlin [02:21:32] And you do a lot of history. Mormon history. Really thoughtful. Nemo.

Nemo [02:21:37] Look up Nemo the Mormon anywhere you would like to consume social media and you'll find this face looking back at you. And then you can hit the little thumbs up button or the little subscribe button. Both of them. Tell YouTube you want to see more of it. So.

John Dehlin [02:21:51] And if people want to help subsidize your trip to the United States, how do they do that?

Nemo [02:21:55] Donorbox.org Nemo the Mormon.

John Dehlin [02:21:58] And they can just give you money and then you'll be more likely to spend time with them if they come to the U.S. is that right?

Nemo [02:22:03] Yeah, essentially. Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:22:05] Okay, so basically you're for sale. Basically.

Nemo [02:22:09] We're hoping to have a meetup. And, you know, but if you. If you pay for my play tickets, I'll have lunch with you. Like, that's not. I don't feel like that's an unreasonable thing. Okay. To say, you know, all right, I'll have lunch with lots of people while I'm there. But, you know, if you want to secure your place to eat carbonara together or whatever it is Cheesecake Factory serving up these days, then what about waffles? Oh, waffles. John. You know, we're gonna hit waffle love while we're there.

John Dehlin [02:22:34] All right.

Nemo [02:22:35] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:22:36] And care if people want to buy your love and affection. How do they do that?

Carah Burrell [02:22:40] Waffle love. I am on all the platforms. Instagram, tick tock, YouTube, under nuance, ho, which is probably easier to spell than Carah Burrell, which is also my name, but Hoe.

John Dehlin [02:22:54] Right?

Carah Burrell [02:22:54] Hoe. Yes. And my YouTube channel is where I'm probably the most active, under Carah Burrell. And I have two podcasts that I run. One called the Mormon History Hoedown, where I talk about all the subjects related to deconstruction, not just Mormon. And then another podcast called Timmy did what That I run with my good friend Ryan, who is a former friend and business partner of Tim Ballard. So I kind of took all of this ex Mormon stuff post deconstruction about Joseph Smith and said, when there's a modern Joseph Smith, can I just dedicate my life to making sure people know that he needs to be in prison and face the full consequences of the law?

Carah Burrell [02:23:35] So Tim Ballard taking him down is another side quest that I am very much involved in. So you can watch my podcasts over on the Carabrell YouTube channel and my occasional visits here at Mormon Stories back when me and John get back together like the olden days.

John Dehlin [02:23:52] So are you taking Tim Bellard down from a place of love, Care Barrel?

Carah Burrell [02:23:55] Oh, no, no, no. Everything else I said scratch that. When it comes to.

John Dehlin [02:24:01] Okay. All right, beautiful. Well, it's great to have you all as panelists really quickly. Please subscribe to Mormon Stories Podcast YouTube channel. We're a couple thousand away from 300,000. We really want to break that threshold. Please subscribe to that YouTube channel. You can also subscribe on Spotify.

Closing Thoughts and Support Mormon Stories

John Dehlin [02:24:21] We exist at the at the generosity of our donors. So if you value this content you want to see continue, you can go to mormonstories.org donate Become a monthly donor. We are. Our ad revenue and donations are in decline starting in 2025. There's probably reasons for that I won't go into, but if you value this content you want to see continue, please donate.

John Dehlin [02:24:45] We have received a letter from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints that they are threatening to sue us if we don't. And originally it was with the threat that if we don't take Mormon out of the title of our podcast and all our URLs and handles. I'm in mediation with the church right now. Hopefully we'll reach amicable terms.

John Dehlin [02:25:11] But, you know, we really value those of you who are willing to support us because we need your support more than ever. All right, well, Kolby, thanks again for making this happen. Hope to see you again. You're also with Julia Nemo leading the LDS discussion series, which I'm really appreciating that y' all are taking that and running with it.

Kolby Reddish [02:25:34] Yeah, that's been great. And we'll keep. Keep working on that. Thanks, John.

John Dehlin [02:25:39] All right, thanks again, everyone, for joining us. Thanks everyone who joined us in the comments as well. We appreciate it. And happy Valentine's Day. Be good to each other, love each other, be kind to each other. Mormon or ex Mormon, let's have less black and white thinking, less binary thinking, more love, more compassion, more nuance, and more kindness. And thanks again. Nemo. Great to see you. Thanks, Julia. Thanks, Kolby. And of course, thanks, Carah. And thanks to all of you. Be good to each other. Be kind to each other. We'll see you all again soon on another episode of Mormon Stories podcast. Happy Valentine's Day. Take care, everybody.

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.