We’re beyond the two-and-a-half-year mark, as of March 27, 2019, of it happening. Still, the experience has not left me. A secret way to contact a former member. The negligence of the considerations of a woman member. As I learned firsthand in one experience, both are seen in cults like Scientology and in patriarchal organizations.

Both are seen in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

I got a forwarded letter in Sept. 2016 from Mark Naugle, the QuitMormon.com attorney who has made the otherwise really difficult task of resigning from LDS Mormonism a one-step process, that I was off the records of the church.

Then I got texts I’d never expect.

Texts about helping with a women’s organization event. A sender being the leader, a woman, of the woman’s organization.

They came from women from the “ward,” or congregation, my ** attends.

(In each of its wards, or congregations, the church has organizations exclusively for men and women. And I feel for these women — they probably did not know that the church was using them like this.)

My resignation from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints yielded texts I’d never expect. (News Radio 1310 KLIX)

It seems quite clear that before they deleted my church online account, the church had taken my phone number, if not all of my contact information. And they put it in place of my **’s account — her account — for the primary contact information, if not all of it. My **’s mom checked her online church membership account, which the church creates for each of its members.

(I truly do wonder at her adherence still to this institution.)

Also, the bishop of the ward to which I was assigned asked to meet with me twice. The second was after I resigned from the church.

This experience with the Latter-day Saint (ex-Mormon) church reminded and still reminds me of Scientology since I understand that Scientology will not let you break free of their contact, as shown in the scary-splendid documentary “Going Clear” (a terribly ironic title). It relates in terms of surveillance to another personal experience I had when officially leaving the church.

(Read: Besides having to engage with it over and over, possibly for the rest of your life, if you have believing family, with traditions like marriages and missions that your family members do, it’s hard to get away.)

It also shows that LDS Mormonism is not being near-considerate enough of women. It seems clear that the church just manipulated my **’s church account without regard for her feelings.

Is this entrapment and patriarchy commonplace in all absolutist, authoritarian religions like LDS Mormonism and Scientology?

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Even if you no longer affiliate with the church but enjoy sociality with family and friends as before, you can still find social settings organized by the Utah Valley PostMormons. There, you can find your people. And of course, if you don’t enjoy those relationships like before, the many UVPM events that happen each week can be even life-saving.

Led by wonderful people like Kirsten Barksdale and Larissa Norman, UVPM is also for folks who just are struggling with it or are “never Mormons” seeking a break from the predominant culture. Find their events on Facebook and Meetup.

This story was originally seen in The Good Men Project.

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