As you may have already picked up from the title of this post... I have officially resigned from the LDS Church.
My inactivity in the Church over the past year have been the best year of my life however I've never felt like keeping my membership in the Church would cause any harm so I never really seriously considered removing my membership. So here's a few events that contributed to this recent move.
Policy Changes:
I really felt I wanted to express my stance on the Church and its policy change on the LGBTI issues. Did I really want to still show my support in an organisation that would disfellowship and ultimately ex-communicate me for being in a loving relationship? If this was the outcome, I would rather do it on my terms.
Parents:
My Mum told me one day that she wanted me to remove my membership as she felt that I would be held more accountable being a member and not obeying the commandments than not being a member anymore. I could see where she was coming from.
Closure:
The final reason is really for myself. I feel like the Church has still been apart of my life in many different ways despite not attending - such as the missionaries calling wanting to visit earlier in the year. I feel like my boyfriend feels somewhat threatened by the Church and the role it has played in my life and although this has been less and less of an issue, it is still the unspoken vibe that I feel everytime Mormons or Utah is mentioned on a TV show we're watching (and surprisingly Mormons are talked about quite a bit in pop culture). I've started a new chapter in my life and I feel like I have yet to completely close an older chapter and this is where my resignation comes from.
So I made an appointment with my Bishop to ask if I could see him. He was excited to meet me, it has been quite a while since we've met and I'm sure he was holding onto the hope that I had explored and realised that I wanted to return to Church. Even if that was what he was thinking he did an amazing job hiding it because he was nothing but supportive. In fact he shared some very inspiring stories and beliefs he has with me that gave me some hope that maybe one day LGBTI people would be more welcome in an LDS Church.
So that's that. A chapter closed and another chapter I'm excited for :)
I might expand a bit further in a future post some of Bishop's views.
