Should I just let it go? Becoming Catholic

[Jodi]

I have left the L.D.S. church and am moving prayerfully towards the Roman Catholic church. I find myself scared to cut ties with the L.D.S. untill I have more firmly tied myself into the Catholic church. I have seen too many exmormons become nothing more than that. I want to be a follower of Christ not a protester against a religion that I believed in falsely for many years. Yet I am still drawn to proving its falseness not only to myself but gathing information so that I can help my parents and sibs see some of the truth when the time is right. When is the proper time to ensure my name has been removed from the rolls of the church. I know I need more balance in my scripture study. More feasting on the words of christ and less looking for another pin to deflate mormon doctrine. I can see the trap that satan has laid for me here. How do I avoid it?

 

[Shibboleth]

Saint Francis of Assisi said, “Preach the Gospel always and when necessary use words.”

Your actions will speak louder to your family than anything coming out of your mouth. Concentrate on learning your Faith in Christ and his Church for your sake of becoming a more learned Christian not for the sake of becoming better at denouncing your old beliefs.

Your family will naturally confront you when you become Christian. This is when you can preach with words that which your feet have already spoken. And when the questions do come use them to research and learn your faith better not to disprove your relatives. The disproving of your relatives will be a natural side effect.

And please get Baptized as soon as possible seeing as you are already repenting.

 

[Irenicist]

Shibboleth:

Saint Francis of Assisi said, “Preach the Gospel always and when necessary use words.”

Your actions will speak louder to your family than anything coming out of your mouth. Concentrate on learning your Faith in Christ and his Church for your sake of becoming a more learned Christian not for the sake of becoming better at denouncing your old beliefs.

Your family will naturally confront you when you become Christian. This is when you can preach with words that which your feet have already spoken. And when the questions do come use them to research and learn your faith better not to disprove your relatives. The disproving of your relatives will be a natural side effect.

And please get Baptized as soon as possible seeing as you are already repenting.

Beautifully spoken.

Irenicist

 

[Church_Militant]

Hi Jodi!
Try to focus on where you are going…not where ya been y’know? You may be called to minister to Mormons, but that doesn’t mean that that is all you need. Seeing to your own soul is most important because that’s why Our Lord has called you out of Mormonism dontcha think? There is plenty of time to deal with all this other stuff as He leads you.

You certainly have a beautiful spirit to be so concerned and want to avoid just being and anti-something instead of a very devout Catholic.
May Our Lord bless you and grant you peace in all your ways.

 

[ex-mormon]

Jodi:

I have left the L.D.S. church and am moving prayerfully towards the Roman Catholic church. I find myself scared to cut ties with the L.D.S. untill I have more firmly tied myself into the Catholic church. I have seen too many exmormons become nothing more than that. I want to be a follower of Christ not a protester against a religion that I believed in falsely for many years. Yet I am still drawn to proving its falseness not only to myself but gathing information so that I can help my parents and sibs see some of the truth when the time is right. When is the proper time to ensure my name has been removed from the rolls of the church. I know I need more balance in my scripture study. More feasting on the words of christ and less looking for another pin to deflate mormon doctrine. I can see the trap that satan has laid for me here. How do I avoid it?

I know how you feel. My advice would be not to cut ties with the LDS people, but to strengthen your ties with Christ. I found that strength in the Bible and the Roman Catholic Church. You will find, through that strength, the answers you need for cutting your ties theologicaly with the LDS doctorine. Take the family values and sense of community that you learned and and apply that to the truth of Christs Church and you will realize that you become a very strong catholic with much to share with your former brethern and all christians. The Anti-Mormon traps that so many people fall into only fuel their anger towards their own lives and keep them miserably looking further away from God. The more you read of the Bible the more it will reinforce your beliefs of Christ and his church that he established through Peter and passed down through the centuries to Pope John Paul II. As far as removing your name from the LDS church, that is a personel choice that only you can make. Closure for everyone comes when they are ready not when people tell you you are ready. I will pray for you on your journey and hope that you will not harden your heart toward a good people that are theologicaly misguided.

God bless

ex-mo

 

[Tmaque]

Jodi:

I have left the L.D.S. church and am moving prayerfully towards the Roman Catholic church. I find myself scared to cut ties with the L.D.S. untill I have more firmly tied myself into the Catholic church. I have seen too many exmormons become nothing more than that. I want to be a follower of Christ not a protester against a religion that I believed in falsely for many years. Yet I am still drawn to proving its falseness not only to myself but gathing information so that I can help my parents and sibs see some of the truth when the time is right. When is the proper time to ensure my name has been removed from the rolls of the church. I know I need more balance in my scripture study. More feasting on the words of christ and less looking for another pin to deflate mormon doctrine. I can see the trap that satan has laid for me here. How do I avoid it?

Hello Jodi,

As an ex-LDS myself I thought I would throw my 2 cents in here as well. First of all let me say Welcome Home! The Holy Spirit has been at work in your heart to draw you to the true church of Jesus Christ. I completely understand your desire to “prove” the falseness of the LDS faith. However, I don’t think you can prove a negative so the best thing to do is simply arm yourself with knowledge about why the Catholic Church is indeed true. A wonderful way to build up those “muscles” if you will, is in a forum like this where you get asked questions that challenge your thinking. This forum and the entire Catholic Answers website and radio program is simply the best place to be if you have questions. Read as much as you can and pray even more. You will get challeging questions from your family and that’s ok. Always remember that they probably have your best interest at heart. When they do challenge you with a tough question please know that there is always a great, faith confirming explanation. Through this process you will become a good defender of the Church and you may just get some of them thinking. I believe this very thing is occuring in my family.

I left the LDS Church 18 years ago and my name is still on the rolls. I thought removing it would signify I believed that my LDS baptism was valid in some way, which I do not believe. In my mind, believing you’re in Jesus Christ’s true church and then finding out it was a deception, invalidates everything received while in the church. There’s only one true church and everything is false, fake, invalid, impotent, an imposter.To me it’s like being married for many years and then finding out your spouse isn’t even human. If that was the case would you seek a divorce? Why would you when the marriage was invalid? I think having one’s name removed is unimportant. But, I understand that some people need to do that for closure.

God Bless You.

 

[cestusdei]

My understanding is the LDS church will excommunicate you if they discover you have joined another church. If that matters to you and you wish to avoid it then you must remove your name from their rolls before you convert to Catholicism. If you don’t care then that’s up to you. Welcome aboard.

 

[tkdnick]

cestusdei:

My understanding is the LDS church will excommunicate you if they discover you have joined another church. If that matters to you and you wish to avoid it then you must remove your name from their rolls before you convert to Catholicism. If you don’t care then that’s up to you. Welcome aboard.

As I understand it, even if you are excommunicated your name stays “on the books”.

 

[Catholic_Dude]

So what are “the books” and what does it mean?

 

[tkdnick]

Catholic Dude:

So what are “the books” and what does it mean?

From what I understand (and an LDS member can probably better explain) there is a database (“books”) that contains the name of everyone is LDS, and who ever was. Many say that the reason the LDS church looks so big is because they don’t take people’s names off, and because when someone dies and a living LDS member does a baptism by proxy, their name is placed on “the books” thus inflating actual LDS membership numbers. I have no idea whether this is true or not, but it’s been said. So, anyway, your name stays on “the books” until you officially request that it be removed. I have also heard that this process is not easy because LDS authorities don’t want to take the name off. I have heard talk about going through legal battles in order to get their name taken off.

 

[eleusis]

I would suggest that you read as much anti-LDS literature as possible. I was a fallen away Catholic in my youth and preached to by some very convincing LDS members. However being the person I am I read up on the scandalous history of Smith and his creation of this heresy and fled like the hounds of hell were chasing me. Since then I have armed myself with much reading and am able to discuss with some LDS door knockers from time to time on my porch (my wife wonders where the patience comes from).

Never again doubt the LDS is a lie. Especially when one understands how they manufactured the book of mormon by plagerizing huge sections of the KJV of the bible, to include the translators errors !

Your life will be evidence of the Truth to your friends but stand firm and never ever go back to that path to perdition.

 

[Jodi]

This is a difficult journey for me and I really apreciate all of your thoughtful advice. I’'ve decided to enforce a kind of equality on my studies. So that my own growth in the catholic church is not stunted by lack of time and attention. I need to understand and have a solid foundation in the catholic basics before I become an appologist. So while I can probably make many inteligent arguments against where I came from (lds) I do not as of yet truely understand the catholic faith. Getting this understanding needs to be a top priority in my life at this time. Keep me in your prayers.

 

[Jim_B]

Dear Jodi,

Know that many who read your thread offer a brief prayer of support for you. Be not afraid! I would offer this for your consideration. Why not invest some time (30 min. a week?) sitting before the Blessed Sacrament in a Catholic Church? He will guide you without words.
Once you begin to understand in your heart (and head) that Jesus is truly present in the Blessed Sacrament, you can sign up for your own holy hour of Adoration. Each week when you ‘sign in’ for your hour, you will be inscribing your name in a different ‘book of life.’
Let this newfound devotion replace being ‘on the books’ in the LDS church. In doing so, you will reinforce the new direction your life has taken, and, more importantly, begin to understand that our faith is a person - Jesus Christ - not a book.
When one develops a love for Jesus in the Eucharist, everthing else (learning all there is to know about Catholicism, if that is possible . . ) will fall into place in God’s own good time.

God Love Ya from the Lincoln Diocese,
Jim B

 

[ex-mormon]

Jodi:

This is a difficult journey for me and I really apreciate all of your thoughtful advice. I’'ve decided to enforce a kind of equality on my studies. So that my own growth in the catholic church is not stunted by lack of time and attention. I need to understand and have a solid foundation in the catholic basics before I become an appologist. So while I can probably make many inteligent arguments against where I came from (lds) I do not as of yet truely understand the catholic faith. Getting this understanding needs to be a top priority in my life at this time. Keep me in your prayers.

Dear Jodi,

You will and all of my Mormon family members and friends will be in my prayers tonight as I recieve the sacraments of Initiation; Baptism, Conframation, and First Holy Communion. I hope someday you all can truley find Christ as I have.

God Bless You,

ex-mo…New Catholic

 

[crazyage3]

ex-mormon:

Dear Jodi,

You will and all of my Mormon family members and friends will be in my prayers tonight as I recieve the sacraments of Initiation; Baptism, Conframation, and First Holy Communion. I hope someday you all can truley find Christ as I have.

God Bless You,

ex-mo…New Catholic

Welcome to the Lord’s Pillar and Foundation of Truth ,His Church…
Have a blessed Baptism, Confirmation and first HOLY COMMUNION…once you receive HIM you’ll understand what Jesus meant by saying eat my flesh and drink my blood. It is so awesome! Welcome HOME! God Bless