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It has been a difficult few years for me, trying to sit and listen and just be with several friends in my ward and larger circles going through acute crises of faith. The causes are varied: feelings of having been hurt by the church’s policies or actions, social alienation for having the wrong kind of family, troubling historical facts, or just feeling like they needed a break from church activity. At times I felt overwhelmed by selfish personal sense of loss of not having these friends with me at church, overwhelmed by the emotional exertion they sometimes called on me to help them bear for a time, overwhelmed by my own complex feelings and faith in a time of tension between different parts of the flock. So often talks from our leaders seemed to ignore or belittle these struggles I saw all around me and within me. Even when it was addressed in conference, it often felt oblique or keeping the doubts (and by extension the doubters) at a safe arm’s length. Speakers usually seemed to misunderstand or mischaracterize the concerns, and there was a lack of feeling like voices of this struggle were even heard, much less having an impact. Then came today’s talk by President Wixom. Wixom, tenderly quoting a woman in her ward who faced doubts and left activity for a time:

“I did not separate myself from the Church because of bad behavior, spiritual apathy, looking for an excuse not to live the commandments, or searching for an easy out. I felt I needed the answer to the question ‘What do I really believe?’”

…

“My testimony had become like a pile of ashes. It had all burned down. All that remained was Jesus Christ.”



Finally, letting the voices speak for themselves in their own words.

Finally, directly confronting the cliche misconceptions about why people doubt or leave.

Finally, an authentic frankness is allowed to pierce the sugar coating.

Wixom then immediately summoned the ultimate “if even this person experienced doubts, then you don’t need to be ashamed of them” exemplar, no less a saint than Mother Theresa:

About this time she read a book of the writings of Mother Teresa who had shared similar feelings. In a 1953 letter, Mother Teresa wrote: “Please pray specially for me that I may not spoil His work and that Our Lord may show Himself—for there is such terrible darkness within me, as if everything was dead. It has been like this more or less from the time I started ‘the work.’ Ask Our Lord to give me courage.”

This is the talk that I and so many others with imperfect or unconventional faith have been waiting to hear. It wasn’t perfect (I’m not sure I like the idea that we are cleanly divided into those with doubts and without–don’t we all have things “on the shelf” or where we dissent?), but even in its imperfect ministry I find a valuable kind of grace: to love and empathize with another we need to do our best to hear and represent their voice authentically, and we don’t need to say just the perfect thing in response.

I am grateful to President Wixom for showing two important components of love: courage and frankness.

I am especially grateful to the courage of the woman in President Wixom’s ward, whose comments in Relief Society inspired Wixom’s talk. I am perhaps even more inspired by these circumstances that led to the talk than by the talk itself. This is an instructive example of how having the courage to live authentically and openly, to follow Uchtdorf’s counsel yesterday in Priesthood to not present a too-perfect Potemkin village facade to each other in our Sunday meetings, can create the kind of nurturing and healing space we all need to thrive in our church community. Uchtdorf said:

The Church is not an automobile showroom—a place to put ourselves on display so that others can admire our spirituality, capacity, or prosperity. It is more like a service center, where vehicles in need of repair come for maintenance and rehabilitation.

Wixom’s fellow ward member dared to bring her station wagon in for maintenance. I have no doubt her ward’s Relief Society is now a safer, stronger community, and now the whole church is blessed by her courage. What a valuable ripple to send out in the pond. My heartfelt thanks to her.