The Road to Baptism

Closing the LDS Chapter of my life and opening a new one

Baptism by Midjourney AI - but not at all what it actually looked like!

The road to Baptism feels like it has been a long journey, but one that has also passed in the blink of an eye. No part of it has been more emotionally difficult, however, than in the last couple of months leading up to it.

My spiritual father warned me that as baptism approached, things would become more difficult for me. When he told me that, I wasn’t surprised; after all, as LDS missionaries, we recognized and told people the same thing. As a result, I didn’t take his warning as seriously as I should have.

It started with bad dreams, which I wrote about below…

Demonic Warfare

Then came the doubts and confusion. Intellectually, I knew that the Orthodox Church was the only church remaining that was faithful to the body of Christ as left to us by the original twelve apostles—or at least more so than anything else. But while my Head was certain of the veracity of the Orthodox Church, my Heart was on a dizzying rollercoaster ride.

Am I doing the right thing? It’s one thing to say you are going to convert; it’s quite another thing when you do - how will my family react? How will my children react? Am I making myself an outsider in my own family? What if I’m wrong? Maybe it doesn’t matter at all which church you are in as long as you try to live a Christ-like life - so should I really take the risk of alienating my family? Do you really want to be excluded from participating in the LDS temple sealing when your kids get married? You’ll never be able to baptize your grandchildren or give them blessings; are you prepared to give that up?

I also had symbolic associations in my mind, built up from a lifetime of LDS membership, that made this harder. This is difficult to explain, but here are some examples. When I would see light radiating down from the sky through the clouds or imagine Christ in celestial glory, my mind would immediately bring up thoughts of the LDS temple or the Christos in Salt Lake City. Sometimes, I’d think about something, and my mind would bring up thoughts of unique LDS doctrines, like the pre-existence. At first, these associations hovered just below my awareness, causing me a lot of confusion. As I became aware of them, I started consciously reframing them. I also recognized that all of my doubts stemmed from external concerns - how would others react, and what would I have to sacrifice? None of them had to do with the truth of the Orthodox Church, which I was already certain of.

Recognizing all of these things helped but didn’t make the process any less difficult, and that’s significant because I’ve been a practicing Buddhist for the last ten years, did the triple gem and everything, and completely inactive in the LDS church for the last five years. You’d think that after all this time, I’d be over it - that’s certainly what I thought going into this process.