Hello,
I am a lifelong atheist. I grew up in a household that was Christian in name only, and my family attended a local liberal Christian church very irregularly. My mother tells me that I told first her I did not believe God was real at six years old. My parents divorced when I was eight and after the divorce all church attendance stopped.
In high school I was very active in debates and I have in my life probably sat through days, cumulatively, of recorded debates between Christians and Atheists, Christians and Muslims, et cetera. I know a lot of the common arguments both for and against theism, Christianity, and, to a lesser extent, Mormonism. I always envied the certainty of apologeticists who would talk about the "self-evident nature of the Universe" in regards to its having a creator. For me this was never self-evident.
Now on the other hand, I would consider myself very conservative. I believe strongly in no sex before marriage, just due to my research into the statistics of number of partners a person has and their outcomes. I also believe that homosexuals make terrible parents and should not be allowed to adopt, or marry because I view marriage as a contract for raising children. I support very open free markets, and politically I would say that I am libertarian.
To cut to the chase: I'm getting older. My fellow atheists, morally, leave much to be desired. I really want to settle down and have children, but it seems that there are no good women to be found in the secular world.
I've been studying a lot about Mormonism, and to be honest I don't really think it's true. The apologetic arguments for the Book of Abraham are not convincing, and if that's a fraud then it is easy to conclude that Joseph Smith is not trustworthy. I really do find it worrying that in Mormonism, the text is not the standard; the prophets are...this means, in my view, that the good morals that Mormons espouse could easily be swept away by a divine revelation coming to a Generation Z "living prophet" telling him that (just for example) homosexuality is AOK. After all, as that snake Justin Trudeau would say, "it's the current year!" My research of history has shown the living prophets to be quite spineless: they quickly threw away their beliefs in polygamy and the unacceptability of black Africans for the priesthood to win some good public relations.
But still, I really do like all of the morals espoused by Mormons and in my own life I follow them to a tee: cessation of coffee drinking would be my only change. I think that the Church could be a good place to raise my children in, as it would give them a good moral foundation.
Do you think it's wrong to convert for belonging and virtue and hope that I can find faith in the history and Joseph Smith later? Or would you be disgusted to know that someone like me had joined your church?
Thanks for your time.
