God, Dog and the Infamous Lightbulb

I'm going to break this post into 2 parts (Don't worry, 2 part, but just one post, and you can read them both now!)

They are related, but the first has very little to do with the title.

The myth of Mormonism can be viewed as a tapestry through which are woven many concepts and principles.

As I depart Mormonism, I'm obligated to look at these principles and consider which are simply part of the myth and which hold value in the new life I'm starting. There are a few I would like to highlight here.

Truth - Mormonism places a great deal of stock in the truth. They claim to be the one and only true Church, and aspects of their rituals speak of the idea that truth can be circumscribed into one eternal round. Truth, or perhaps the lack of it is a large part of the reason for my determining that the LDS Church is not what it claims. The truth has no need for defense or lies, it can stand on it's own at all times and in all places. I shall be holding to truth because I believe that is what we all seek. I don't know if we'll ever find all of it, but as we seek for it, question what we know, discard what we find to be false and embark on new tangents to pursue evidence, I think our paths will generally be headed in the right direction.

Free Agency - Perhaps my favorite principle of all. Mormons claim this is the greatest gift from God, although in recent years, there has been a distinct movement away from this term. It has caused me a great deal of sadness. Where once the idea that each man or woman could choose his own path, and determine his own destiny, this has been replaced with blind obedience and obligation to philosophies and fallible men. They don't even like the term free agency now. They call it simply agency, because it has a high cost and obligation associated with it...

Divine Potential - I don't know if there is anything after this life, and in all honest neither does anyone else on this earth. The idea that we can continue to live is a nice one, but no-one knows for sure. There are things however which keep us back from progressing, and the idea that we can transcend those limitations is especially appealing. Our civilization is amazing, and while the technological and industrial innovations of the past centuries will undoubtedly continue to accelerate through time, this can be applied at a personal level as well...

I run, and where I used to hate it, I have grown to love it. There was a time when running an 8 minute mile seemed impossible. I could speed the treadmill up, but less than a minute into it, I was desperately trying to hang on to the rails, whilst punching the speed decrease button as hard and quickly as I could... Since that time, I've trained a lot, raced a lot, and sought the help of experts. My body has improved, and many of the mental barriers in my mind have been taken down. A year ago, the thought of running at a 6 minute mile pace was simply impossible, and yet last night, I increased the speed to 10 mph (6 minute mile) and when I'd done a quarter mile there, I continued to speed up. I spent over a minute running at a pace of 5:13 a mile. Just a hair under 12mph. I was struggling for breath at the end of that, and I'll admit to a little pain on the drive home, but there was a time when running a lap on the track at half that speed would have done the same thing to me!!

So bearing those principles in mind, I transition this piece into the title story... God, Dog and the infamous light bulb.

I've blogged about the light bulb incident before, but I think it bears mentioning again, this time, with some more background, and interpretation of exactly what happened...

First I'd like to introduce the characters...

I shall be referring to the Stake President as God. For those not familiar with the LDS Church, a Stake President is a position assigned to an uber righteous member who has found favor in the eyes of those above him, and who has been given responsibility for 7-10 congregations in a given geographical area. I call him God, because he seems to think he is...

In an effort to introduce you to him, some experiences I've had with him... Following any musical number in the meetings at which he is present, he will stand, and give a long, rambling synopsis of the piece, and then declare the offering given by those who performed or organized the performance has been accepted by God and found to be pleasing in his eyes.

Two years ago, when the 12-18 year old girls went on a camp at the height of summer he decreed that all girls were to were long pants for the duration of the camp. It gets in the 100's in Utah in the summer (40 degrees plus for those in foreign lands). Not only did he decree this, but he made each girl sign a document indicating that they would obey, or be expelled from the event. The Sunday following, he stood before us all, talked about how wonderful it was that they had made a choice to follow his counsel, and then had the gall to annonce that he had issued the decree to see if the girls would be obedient unto the word of their Stake President. He's also referred to supporter of Prop 8 and President Obama as traitors to the church, and while I could share more equally horrifying tales, I think you get the picture.

I shall be referring to the Bishop as Dog. Now don't get me wrong here, I happen to love dogs, and this guy is actually a really decent person, and not a bad neighbor either. He's young, relates well to kids and always has a smile on his face. He's a good guy, but unfortunately has bought into the little agenda put forth by God. You'll see how this plays out as the story progresses.

Alright... The infamous light bulb...

2 years ago, Dog approached my wife and I to speak in Church. Neither of us have done this for about 8 years, and so it was a little nerve-wracking. Never-the-less, wanting to take an active part in our new ward, despite my struggles with the faith, we accepted and set about preparing to speak.

We were assigned to topic of faith, and since most of what I have done in the Church over the past decade is teach teenagers, I tried to think of ways to make my presentation more interesting and hopefully though provoking.

The basic version of what I prepared was this... Faith is like a light bulb. When Thomas Edison invented it, he didn't just sit down and make a working model. It took a lot of research study and attempts, most of which failed. However, as time progressed he started to have success, and since that time, he, and many others have worked on improving the device to make it brighter, more efficient and that kind of thing.

To try and make it more interesting, I also decided to take a small incandescent bulb and pull it out at an opportune moment. People like to look at things, and so I figured it would be a good thing.

Just to get everyone on the same page. The LDS Church has a super secret book, held by it's leaders which details all the rules. Inside this book... Actually, I just checked and this book says nothing about the usage of props in talks... Hmmmmm - and yet Dog said it did. Moving on... It may have been a letter from the prophet sent out a few years back which discussed the usage of props in talks. The thing is... Where do you draw the line? If someone holds up a bible, could that be considered a prop? Anyway, so considering all of that, I didn't think a light bulb was irreverent in anyway, I thought it added to the topic which I was presenting, and it really didn't seem to be that big of a deal.

So there I am up on the stand giving my talk... My knees are shaking, my throat is dry and I'm trying very hard to speak slowly and clearly, since apparently my accent gets really thick and my diction suffers when I'm under stress.

I pull out the light bulb and look around as I'm speaking. People are paying attention, no-one seems to be asleep, and then...

There's a tap on the back of my leg...

"Brother Koda... The brethren have asked us not to use props."

Awkward pause...

"Please put it in your pocket and just go on without it."

OK - Stress level is now through the roof, but I put the bulb in my pocket. Now... Where was I, and how do I go about converting all my references to a light bulb which is now out of sight in my pocket.. In my haste to reorient myself I mix up pages, but after what seems like a 10 minute break - which was likely no more than a couple of seconds, I apologize, and start back up again...

About this same time, the apologies start happening behind me...

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry..." whispers dog, over and over again. I don't know if he could have done anything more distracting, but lets look at this for a second...

In his mind he's done the right thing, or has he... Why is he apologizing for doing the right thing?

As I said before Dog is a good guy, but in this instance, his loyatly to God has made him do something which he knows deep down was wrong. He's humiliated another human being in public, and he feels guilty - and rightly so.

I manage to finish the talk about when I need to, and sit back down, obviously shaken, red-faced, and shaking like an absolute leaf.

The meeting concludes, bishop apologized again, and talks about the object lesson and how good it was, and I head off to teach my class. They ask what happened, I explain and it's over.

OR SO I THOUGHT!!

I went home after that to take care of sick kids, and just this weekend I obtained new information about what happened next...

Apparently the mens meeting started, and one individual (I think I know who too), brings up the incident, and asks if it wouldn't have been better to wait until I was done, and then speak to me about it one on one - which ironically enough is actually how one is directed to handle things like this in the LDS Scriptures.

A pretty heated debate then ensues, most of the men proceeding to dump on me, and defend the actions of Dog. Which is pretty much what you have to do if you want to be considered a good Mormon. The person who initially brought it up apparently then apologized for causing such a ruckus and the debate raps up.

Dog, now feeling extra super guilty then feels the need to call me.

He doesn't tell me what happened, instead he simply says that he had discussed the incident in priesthood, and asked those present for their impressions about the object lesson - light bulb = faith. He kept apologizing, which I thought was odd, and then ended up by dumping on me again, by saying I should have known better, but then continuing to apologize. The whole thing seemed weird, but whatever... Time to put it behind me.

4 hours later I get a call from a good friend - who may have been the person who stood up for me earlier in the day. He describes a little of the debate, what certain men had said, and then tells me that he wishes I could have been there, so I could have seen Dog, who "Had my back". First of all... WTF?!? And second, had my back?!? And yet he let this debate continue after it started?!?

I skipped church for a couple of weeks and when I returned again, it felt like things were getting back to normal. Dog had ask a man who I think should most aptly be called Dickhead to speak. He begins with...

"I asked my wife how I should start my talk, and she said that as long as I didn't do anything stupid, like pull out a light bulb, I'd do just fine."

You'd think these people had never heard anything funnier in their lives... HUGE LAUGHS!!! And Dog doesn't do a damn thing... Just lets Dickhead go on. In hindsight, I should have walked out.

This last Sunday during my meeting with the bishop, I mean Dog (I need to check and see if I blogged about all that happened), Dog proceeds to ask if he ever apologized about what happened. He seems to be under the impression that I was offended, and that is why I'm having issues now. I told him that as far as I was concerned, it was water under the bridge, and that even if I was upset by it, it was more what happened in Priesthood than about him embarrassing me in front of the congregation.

Before I share the next part... Just understand... here I am sitting across from a man, who claims to be Gods representative. He is judging my actions, and has concluded already that I am not worthy enough to perform my duty as a father. People like this should really be held to a higher standard...

Anyway... Dog then asks what happened in Priesthood, because he wasn't there...

Um - wait a second, you called and told me right afterward that you were...

I explain that I had heard that a debate had broken out about what had happened, and that some pretty nasty things were said about me.

He then proceeds to give me a first person account of what had happened in the meeting, and his involvement in the debate.

You know, if you're going to tell blatant lies to my face - probably best not to contradict yourself less than 2 minutes later.

He then apologized again for interrupting my talk, and explains that he'd had to meet with the person who had defended me, and make sure they understood that he was only doing what he had been trained to do. It wasn't his fault, his leaders taught him to, and he was obeying like a good little dog.

BAD DOG!!!

If we go back to those principles of Mormonism I spoke about in the beginning... Free Agency, Divine Potential and Truth. If there is one thing I can conclude from this experience, it is that if I am to pursue those principles and ideals, Mormonism is an obstacle to every one of them.