In many of our Reconversion Narratives there is a fascinating correlation between the narrator’s use of language and their perception about the Church, their faith, and themselves. This language and their accompanying way of viewing their relationship to faith can help us understand why they might have changed their views about faith so dramatically as they experienced both their deconversion and their later reconversion. The language they use frames not only their experience, but their ability to understand their experience.
by Sarah d’Evegnée
When describing his struggle to understand his testimony during his adolescence, one LDS scholar made a fascinating connection between his beliefs and the language he used to describe those beliefs. He said, “[I have] come to believe that in actuality my problem was not faith, but finding the words to express my faith” (quoted in Faith Is Not Blind p. 4). While the plots of faith-based narratives are fascinating to study in and of themselves, we’d like to take a deeper look at how our narrators expressed themselves, specifically focusing on some of the connotations of specific diction used in their stories.
“[I have] come to believe that in actuality my problem was not faith, but finding the words to express my faith” (quoted in Faith Is Not Blind p. 4).
In this section, we will examine how the language of our narrators influenced their perceptions. Our purpose is to better understand how our faith and our perceptions can be influenced by the language we use. We will look closely at how specific vernacular and vocabulary can affect the perceived choices of people going through a faith crisis or a faith transition. Finally, we will analyze how becoming aware of language can help us to prevent members who are experiencing uncertainty from feeling like their only choice is to leave the Church
All of the narrators in our analysis experienced not only one but two major paradigm shifts in the course of their story—one shift away from the Church and another one coming back to it. As we analyzed the three parts of these faith journeys (1-Conversion, 2-Deconversion, and 3-Reconversion), we noticed a tendency in the first part of their story to use extreme language as they describe how they felt about themselves, their faith, and the Church. Psychologist Alistair Ostell points out the significant connection between the way people see the world and the way that they talk about it : “Of fundamental importance is the fact that [this type of] thinking does not so much concern what a person believes, or how strongly beliefs are held, but how people articulate their beliefs” (italics added).This idea that how we use language to describe our lives is just as important as the events we describe bolstered our decision to analyze not just the events in the narratives, but the use of specific language.
The language they use frames not only their experience, but their ability to understand their experience. To go even further, the language also seems to limit not only their experience with religion, but the way they perceive how a religious experience could and should function.
In many of our Reconversion Narratives there is a fascinating correlation between the narrator’s use of language and their perception about the Church, their faith, and themselves. This language and their accompanying way of viewing their relationship to faith can help us understand why they might have changed their views about faith so dramatically as they experienced both their deconversion and their later reconversion. The language they use frames not only their experience, but their ability to understand their experience. To go even further, the language also seems to limit not only their experience with religion, but the way they perceive how a religious experience could and should function.
Many of our narrators struggled to describe how they felt as they felt their once solid testimonies crumble underneath their feet. They describe themselves as being “perfect,” one of them even going so far as to say she was “elite” and “Super Woman.” But as they felt that they no longer had a place in the Church and needed to leave, they also felt like they had to give up those descriptions of themselves. However, as they allowed themselves to see the possibility for repentance and for change, they were able to find new language and words that would allow their return.
Let’s start with connection between the specific language our narrators used as their perception of themselves and their role within the Church community. When one unconsciously adopts and then uses specific vocabulary to describe faith, especially when the language is simplistic or vague or abstract, it can cause potential problems to arise when one encounters a situation that can’t be easily categorized as “good” or “bad.” When these kinds of idyllic expectations come crashing down on people, it can leave them feeling betrayed. This sense of betrayal may have as much to do with their worldview as it does with the limited language used to express their frustrations and perceived limited choices. Social Scientist Susan Robinson said that this type of “thinking narrows our ability to determine the scope of a problem and locks us into one perspective.” When life can be cleanly, clearly, and neatly organized, decisions are relatively easy and belief is sustainable. This type of thinking feels safe and certain because it doesn’t involve the messiness of having to grapple with uncertainty.
Language can limit the perspective and choices of the speaker, especially when the person isn’t aware of their own thought patterns. This is why highlighting specific examples of the language used within the narratives can help us see ways in which this language appears to affect how the narrators felt and saw perceived possibilities to be. More choices may have been available, but the specific way the narrator spoke about what was happening seems, on some level, to partially set them up for disappointment, expectation failure, and eventual departure.
At times, the language the narrators used to describe themselves, their faith, and their relationship with the Church appears to tangibly and severely limit their perceptions and their choices.
It’s also fascinating to note that in many cases the way people describe their experience seems to either limit or expand their own perceived ability to act, and then within these linguistic walls, the language itself reveals what the possibilities for action would be. The language indicates how much control they felt that they could have over their own experiences with God and with their belief system. In the examples used in the preceding two paragraphs, much of the language used seems to be borrowed from phrases used commonly in our Latter-day Saint vernacular. This may indicate the way that language is framed and used within our common faith lexicon could actually create a black or white perception that wouldn’t easily allow for someone who isn’t completely sure about their belief system to feel that they should be a part of the community.
At times, the language the narrators used to describe themselves, their faith, and their relationship with the Church appears to tangibly and severely limit their perceptions and their choices. Psychologist Susan P. Robbins warns that limited thinking that only allows one to think in terms of good and bad tends to focus on “criticism and blaming.” Logically, the person who sees the world through a lens that only allows for extremes will have emotions that mirror that same bifurcated language. When someone sees themselves as “perfect” (“the perfect young woman,” or “the perfect missionary” or the “perfect mother), they have what they perceive to be an unblemished personal record and they can operate within this kind of black and white world view. However, when someone is confronted with their own failure to live up to these extreme expectations or a situation within the Church community that doesn’t fit into the simplistic categories, they tend to become either angry or disillusioned. Robinson continues: “Those who diverge from their demands are not only seen as being in the wrong but are blameworthy as well.” Interestingly, in many of the narratives we studied, narrators applied this sense of criticism and blaming to both their view of themselves and their view of the Church.
Many of our narrators couldn’t seem to continue on their chosen path once they perceived that they no longer fit into the black and white categories that their linguistic labels allowed. They were either perfect in every way, always going to church, never doubting, OR they could not be a part of the Church at all. The world seemed to be full of opposites-good or bad, completely believing or completely doubting, completely certain or completely uncertain. Doubts are only seen as a negative weakness rather than something that could possibly help to nurture a belief system in any way. These narrators felt that they either had to be “perfect” or they were completely unworthy to be a part of the Church. Their language did not allow for any other possibilities. Once they saw weaknesses in Church policies or Church leadership or their own weaknesses and inability to live up to what they perceived as impossible standards, they could no longer see themselves or their membership in the Church the same way. That seemed to contribute for many to the decision to leave the Church.
In addition, this type of thinking appeared to set the stage for greater resistance to progression and growth. Whereas they used to believe that they were “perfect” or “always” attended church, their paradigm shift seemed to push them all the way to the other extreme where they “can’t belong to the Church” or they can’t see themselves as being an active participant in the church because their doubts make it so they aren’t “perfect” any more. Related to the labels the narrators used to talk about their participation in the Church, there’s also appears to be a close connection between limited vocabulary and perfectionism. If our available labels for ourselves and our experiences within the Church can only be “all bad” or “all good,” then our world and our faith will be defined by this stark dichotomy. To put it another way, the way that they perceived themselves and the Church created an unfortunate double bind in which there was no possible way that they could remain in the Church if they weren’t completely certain about their faith or completely perfect in how they practiced it. This type of thinking cannot allow for the possibility of growth or development. Faith is static—you either have faith or you don’t. Within this type of perception, there are no transitions, no nuances, and no room for improvement.
Interestingly, this limiting language is especially prevalent in the beginning portions of the narratives—the part which is commonly referred to as the “exposition” of the story. Interestingly, the narrators tended to use broader, more individualized vocabulary when they described their decision to return to full activity in the Church. This linguistic shift seems to indicate a pretty radical shift in the way that they view the world and the Church. Many of them leave behind their idealized language as they themselves develop and progress in the positive ways that lead them come back to the Church. As they describe their return, their language is more generous, less severe, and more open, which reflects their new attitudes about faith, themselves, the Church, and their relationship with God.
For example, when describing herself before leaving the church, one narrator says, “I was referred to as perfect.” Just imagine the pressure she must have felt trying to not only be “perfect,” but to have others “refer” to her as being “perfect”! Notice as well how it isn’t just that she perceived that she was perfect herself. She is conscious of how others perceived and used language to label her as well. Another narrator says, “My testimony was always on high or off.” This description is interesting because there didn’t seem to be any middle ground in the way a “testimony” could be described. Of course, we know that a testimony can be something that can and should be continually nurtured and developed, but the language used here seems to indicate that the narrator perceived that there were only two choices: “high or off.” Unfortunately, when she didn’t feel like her testimony was completely on “high” she chose to leave the Church, almost as if that were the only option available. The other option of staying in the Church and working on her testimony or nurturing her faith almost seemed non-existent in this description.
As in the preceding examples, many of the narrations reflect descriptions of experiences affiliated with the church using superlative terms like “always” and “never.” Rather than just describing paying tithing or having family home evening, people seemed especially conscious that they needed to be “perfect” in how they did those things. Note that they are describing what their lives were like before their deconversion, so their perception of themselves and their previous world view is reflected in the language they use. Please pay attention not just to what they talk about, but to the way they talk about it. One narrator says, “We went to Church every week, never missed.” Another narrator says, “I always paid my tithing. . . I always did those things” and yet another echoes a similar sentiment when she says, “I was always a tithing payer” One narrator uses a similar superlative: “We would always have family home evening” and then continues with “I never struggled with my faith before.” However good these aspirations of consistency are for any believer, this type of stark categorization indicates the difficulty of believing that someone could ever be “good enough” if they aren’t “always” living up to perceived standards of perfection.
One of the most intriguing descriptions surfaces when one narrator became disenchanted with trying to be what she refers to as “Wonder Woman.” As she deals with her disillusionment about being able to keep up with that kind of heroic expectation, she admits, “I was no longer one of the ‘elites’ that the Bishop didn’t have to worry about. Inside I had accepted the fact that I was never going to make it to the Celestial Kingdom.” And this description is about the period before she made the choice to leave the Church. The language she uses almost seems to set her up to believe that she has no other choice but to leave.
According to some of the language that was used in the Deconversion sections of the narratives, a religious experience should not correspond with anything perceived as negative or even uncomfortable. One example of this idea is the use of the word “struggle.” Any time the word “struggle” is used, the description surrounding the word is full of negative connotations. “I struggled. I left the Church in my early 20’s.” And another example: “God was able to see past this struggling girl.” And another one: “Matt really struggles with the race issue.” In each example, the language and the tone used to describe a “struggle” indicates a perceived weakness or irreparable brokenness rather than an opportunity or even a choice to experience personal growth.
In these narratives, the certainty in the language seems to indicate that they could perceive only two available choices: to be completely certain and faithful, or to have doubts and leave the Church. They describe their experience in terms which, in many cases, in turn, reflect the belief that there is no place for them in the church if they had any questions, doubts, or behavioral habits that weren’t ideal. Even if this impossibly high standard isn’t based on Church doctrine, their language indicates a belief that they had to be completely full of faith or they had to remove themselves from the church.
Ironically, this type of thinking is simultaneously comforting and limiting. On the one hand, because there are only two options, there is less uncertainty and less ambiguity. One narrator’s language seems to indicate that he only saw two possibilities for his faith–believe or unbelief with no in-between: “I came to decide about my belief or disbelief in God.” Again, in this type of language there is a massive divide between the choices that Sam felt were available to him. There’s no in between. He had to either believe or disbelieve in God. There doesn’t seem to be as much awareness that just having “the desire to believe” that Alma describes might be enough (Alma 32:11). Within this type of limited linguistic framework, there are only two options for belief and behavior alike. The narrators use language to describe how they are either perfect in every way–always going to church, never doubting–or they have questions and doubts which render them so flawed that they are an alien or an “other” who no longer belongs within the Church community. The language creates a world of opposites-good or bad, completely believing or completely doubting, completely certain or completely uncertain. And if they found themselves on the “bad” or the “negative” side of the world, they felt like they had to leave the Church and their faith.
While of course language may not always limit our perceptions, it can sometimes create a framework which may limit not only self-perception, but the perception of God. One other issue with this type of thinking is that it may limit the perceived possibility of growth and development. It may also limit the understanding of rich, complex doctrine. Reflecting this type of perception, some of our narrators felt that they had to be “perfect” in order to be loved by God.
While there are several ways to interpret the use of specific language in these narratives, the main idea behind our various conclusions is about choice. Our examination of these linguistic patterns helps us see when the language we use can limit perceived possibilities for change, growth, and progression. Thankfully, these are the stories about people who moved beyond limiting language and perceptions in both their thinking and their behavior. Many of our narrators learned to see the nuances and to grapple with uncertainty as they allowed themselves to come back to the Church and to see that they did belong there.
By highlighting the language used by our narrators as they describe the period before they left the church, perhaps we can prevent someone from feeling like they have to leave the church. Perhaps we can encourage them to see more options for the way they describe, label, and see themselves and the Church.
These observations serve a dual purpose: 1) Through becoming aware of how limited language can sometimes create feelings of alienation and unworthiness, we can promote language that places value on effort rather than final “perfection,” and 2) We can praise and encourage those who aren’t certain and who aren’t yet perfect (which would include all of us) and help them see how our efforts–even when they’re not perfect–can be a vehicle towards obtaining even deeper faith. We can work harder to be aware of how our language affects our perceptions about our faith, which will them help us to understand and to accept that faith is often a work in progress.
By highlighting the language used by our narrators as they describe the period before they left the church, perhaps we can also prevent someone from feeling like they must leave the Church to resolve whatever tension they are feeling. Perhaps we can encourage them to see more options for the way they describe, label, and see themselves and the Church. Perhaps we can encourage parents and families and leaders to be more sensitive and accepting when those they love have questions and doubts and make choices that don’t seem to line up with their descriptions and perceptions of how a believer behaves.
Our goal is to help members of the Church of Jesus Christ see that we can all be committed to the ideals of the Church even if we aren’t living them perfectly. We want to help members see that they don’t have to leave the Church if they aren’t living up to ideal expectations about faith and belief. We want them to see that like a seed–faith is a living, growing, and sometimes struggling mightily.
In conclusion. the way we talk about our faith and our faithful behaviors can frame and even limit what we perceive to be our possibilities as we attempt to live a life of faith. In an especially potent moment in one our Faith Is Not Blind podcasts, Janae thoughtfully observed that, “The pattern that I had seen was that you believe, then you have doubts, then you leave the Church. I didn’t hear the stories of people where it was ‘I have my beliefs. I have my doubts. I choose to stay. ‘I know it’s happened, but it’s not a story that’s told.” In her experience, she was only “allowed” to make one of two choices. And that choice was predetermined by whether she was a “believer” or a “doubter.” If she was a “believer” she could stay in the church. But if she was a “doubter,” her only choice was to leave. While that may not have been true, it felt true to her.
These Reconversion Stories illustrate a strikingly similar pattern to the one Janae observed–the words we use and the way we think can lead to perceptions, attitudes and behaviors that color a whole worldview, especially concerning the way we see ourselves in a community of faith. And that worldview can limit possibilities. However, as we will see in our further analysis, once the possibility for a return to faith is perceived, miracles can happen.
Happily though, as we expand our vocabulary, we can also expand our understanding. The Latter-day Saint scholar mentioned in the introduction to this section continues his thoughts about vocabulary and faith with this hopeful insight: “When we feel speechless because of our growing pains, and we wonder if something is wrong. Would that mean we are also faithless? Probably not—but we might need a more complete vocabulary” (Faith Is Not Blind p. 5). So the question becomes, “What can we do to create and recognize a more expansive, complete vocabulary?”
First of all, we can enhance our vocabulary simply by increasing our awareness of the language we use and the implications of that language. The wonderful news about studying rhetorical patterns, especially those patterns employed by a specific group of people, is that becoming aware of these patterns helps us to use language more deliberately and to understand some of the implications behind our rhetorical choices. And as we understand these patterns, we can begin to make changes in our linguistic patterns that will allow people to express themselves with more complexity, more nuance, and more hope. Rather than lumping our religious experiences into overly simplistic categories or expecting that there is only one way to live a life of faith, we can start to recognize and express a whole beautiful spectrum of possibilities for what our experiences may look like. These expanded rhetorical choices will then help us transform a limited perception of choices into an expansive, unlimited one.
As stated in the beginning of this section, our goal is to help members of the Church of Jesus Christ see that we can all be committed to the ideals of the Church even if we aren’t living them perfectly. We want to help members see that they don’t have to leave the Church if they aren’t living up to ideal expectations about faith and belief. We want them to see that like a seed–faith is a living, growing, and sometimes struggling entity. We hope to help people see that faith is full of possibilities, even if those possibilities aren’t always seen.
