Removing my name

On 29 December 2001 I wrote a letter to Michael W. Bawden, who had been bishop of the Murray City Twenty-third Ward of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but who I later found out had been made stake president. In the hand delivered letter was a request to end my membership with the church I had been raised in. As the letter stated, I had come to the conclusion that the church is a fraud.

On the evening of 12 January 2002 I received a phone call from the Bishop's secretary (not Bawden), wanting to setup an interview. I declined. I was told that my letter would be forwarded to the Stake President, (who already had it).

On the morning of 13 January, I received a call from Mr Bawden. He asked me if I would meet with the bishop. I declined. He argued the importance of my meeting with the bishop. Again, I declined. He then asked me what disagreements I had with the church. I asked him if he had read my letter, because the answer was given there. He asked me if I had been living church standards and essentially began to interview me over the phone. I told him that, as my letter had stated, I had made my decision based on research, not sin. He then told me that I wouldn't be able to go to the temple, that I'd have to be rebaptized to return to church, that my entire salvation was at stake. Did I really understand what I was doing?

I responded, What part of my letter did you read? I had expected a friendly phone call, a plead to stay, or even persuasion, by long-suffering (D&C 121.41-44), but as with with my mission experience, I instead received the typical attempt to place the blame on me, to find the defect that had to be fixed. Otherwise, why would Bawden ask me questions that were already answered in my letter?

You will note that it took two weeks to get a response to my original letter. I had sent a copy to the Membership Records department, and it is interesting to note that the letter I received back from the Membership Records department was dated 11 January, the day before I received the phone call from Bishop Olson's secretary. This means that, considering my hand delivery to Mr Bawden's condo of my letter, he had purposely ignored it, which seems consistent with his behaviour two days later. He clearly still had the letter in his possession, otherwise, he would not have been able to respond so quickly after Keith Olson's secretary called me the night before. It is also interesting to note that even though I had moved, without informing the LDS church, my records were presumably already in Bishop Olson's possession.

The letters of 11 January were from the supervisor of the Membership and Statistical Records department, as well as a form letter, and An Invitation, from the first presidency, with the blurb:

On 13 January I received a letter from Bishop Keith L. Olson, which began, Since you have declined to meet with me and discuss your request for NAME REMOVAL... as if name removal were a side show that he was reticent to acknowledge even existed. Though the church office was warm and cordial (though insulting with their comment of invitation to, return and partake of the happiness [I] once knew), the local lay leadership came across as petty.

On 15 February, a little over 30 days later, I received a letter from President Bawden, stating, I regret to inform you that the process you requested, having your name removed from the records of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, is now complete. All of your records have been sent to the office of the First Presidency of the Church. This last point was interesting, as it seemed to confirm a suspicion I've had: membership records are never destroyed, but kept, maybe in case of the member's return, or perhaps for later baptisms for the dead.

Finally, on 21 February, I received a much simpler letter from the same supervisor who had written me on 11 January (of the Confidential Records Section of the Membership Records Department). It began, This letter is to notify you that, in accordance with your request, you are no longer a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Such cordial precision, including the change to a section of the Records Department, seemed only to continue to confirm that name removal to Mormons is about an unwanted shuffling of records. Apparently, my membership records will always be on file (in the Office of the First Presidency, as previously indicated, or in the Membership Records Department, via Confidential Records Section). At least the records no longer can be counted for membership statistics.

Perhaps I'm being overly critical here, expecting what is common among Christian churches: that the baptismal records are my business, and responsibility, not the institution's. However, in the end, all I needed was the confirmation—in writing—that, you are no longer a member.