Note: As is my way, I made a silly movie and post first, which sparked this much more serious post.

Six weeks ago, I enjoyed the company of several active, LDS women who all hold temple recommends and various ward or stake callings. This last week, I was able to reconnect with them and we talked about something that rocked my entire being.

Nearly every single one of them is considering leaving the church either by resignation or indefinite absence.

The recent crackdown on those of us who live in the borderlands of church membership and dare to question the status quo or advocate for greater inclusion of our marginalized brothers and sisters has left many of us wounded and fearful.

We are fearful, not for ourselves, but for our children. None of us want to raise children in a church that will allow local leadership to discipline anyone based on a vague definition of apostasy. None of us want to raise children in a church where people rejoice at the excommunication of one of our own. None of us want to raise daughters in a church where they are taught their bodies are visual or physical prey for the whims of men. None of us want to raise daughters in a church where they are taught that the only path to happiness for women is marriage and motherhood—experiences removed from their own agency and fully dependent on the choices of men. None of us want to raise sons in a church that teaches them entitlement. None of us want to raise sons in a church that teaches them that their self-control is dependent on the clothing and actions of our daughters. None of us want to raise daughters or sons in a church that privileges boys and men above their own faithful mothers, grandmothers, and sisters.

When women leave the church, they take their children with them, directing multiple generations away from the saving ordinances of the gospel.

I have not slept well for the last several weeks. I’ve faced some difficult consequences surrounding my own support for marriage equality. I’ve watched dear friends lose their membership and even their faith. I’ve listened to tearful women express their pain and anguish over what feels like betrayal.

I cannot bear to see my sisters in such agony. Every time I hear, “I have to leave; I cannot stay anymore,” my lungs squeeze a little tighter and my heart grows a little colder. We are losing the best and brightest women I know and I feel each loss deep in my bones.

I won’t stop them. I can’t stop them. I value their agency and self-respect far above my own comfort. Instead, I mourn with them and feel their pain in my hands and heart and wonder when our pain will be so great that the church as a whole will find it unbearable as well. And when that day comes, how many women will be left?

There is a constant prayer in my heart that someone, somewhere, will find the courage to stand up and stop this brutal expulsion of our sisters.

I am a faithful, believing Mormon. I have faith that those 15 men at the head of the church want to do what is right and good. I want to believe their lungs squeeze a little when they hear of another sister leaving the church. I want to believe their hearts hurt with the pain and tears of their sisters. I want to believe they feel the loss of our sisters in their bones.

And yet, all we hear is silence, and the silence has been the most painful sound of all.