Nov 9, 2011

1: A Conversation with John and Zilpha

John and Zilpha discuss their joint exodus from the church.

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By Heather C. Podcast 32 Comments

jackson

You are and is an impressive and courageous couple.
Heather C.

RE: Marks in the garments.

I remember as a kid thinking the marks on the chest region of my parents’ garments were just normal underwear markings. (I never noticed the mark on the leg.) I just assumed all underwear had markings like that. Then, when I was a teenager and heard about marks the on garments, I would search my parents garments while folding laundry, trying to find these oh-so-secret marks.

Did I ever mention I wasn’t necessarily a bright child? haha.
Jenn Reed

Great job, Heather, John, and Zilpha. Looking forward to many more Episodes
Larrin

I’m having a hard time finding the episode through iTunes on my iPod. Am I looking in the wrong place or is it not there?

Anonymous

Hi Larrin. We’re having technical difficulty with the itunes feed. Until it’s fixed the episodes are only available online. Once we get the feed sorted out you’ll be able to download it. John and I were talking about cross-posting on ME until then. I’ll let you know.
Anonymous

Larrin, everything should be up and running. Let me know if you’re still not finding it.

Daniel Shirley

I found it.

Eric

I was so stoked to hear Zilpha talk about NPR. NPR was the genesis of my eventual non-belief (Terry Gross’s 3/16/2004, re-broadcast on 2/11/2005, interview of Brian Greene on Fresh Air to be exact). That interview, and NPR in general, exposed me to a world that was so much more complex and interesting than my insular Mormon worldview.

http://www.richardharris.no Richard of Norway

Here’s a link to that Fresh Air episode, for those who are interested.

http://profiles.google.com/lifelongguy james hafen

Get your game on! I love it.
Anonymous

RE: Marks in the garments.

I remember as a kid thinking the marks on the chest region of my parents’ garments were just normal underwear markings. (I never noticed the mark on the leg.) I just assumed all underwear had markings like that. Then, when I was a teenager and heard about marks the on garments, I would search my parents garments while folding laundry, trying to find these oh-so-secret marks.

Did I ever mention I wasn’t necessarily a bright child? haha.

http://www.richardharris.no Richard of Norway

Well, you sure have made up for it over time. You’re easily one of the most eloquent, thoughtful people I have the privileged of knowing. And you play a mean game of Michigan Rummy.

http://profiles.google.com/kyroha Kyle Harris

“You can’t obey all the rules”
Thank you so much for saying this John. The reason why my mission was so miserable.
Jean Bodie

I tried the liberal Mormon way for three months – I’m not THAT liberal.
I’m so glad you two did this (and you Heather) so that we can all get to know you better. I heard so many things in this podcast that resonated with me and things that were similar in the way we experienced things. We too have 2 adopted children.
This was great!
Anonymous

Yay! Loved this premiere episode of ME Voices. McCall’s music sets the tone and concludes beautifully. Can’t wait to hear more.
http://nathankennard.com Nathan R Kennard

I second what Robyn said about McCall Erickson’s song, ‘A Better Me’. The trailer music fit perfectly and I love her music.

The discussion is insightful whenever I hear John and Zilpha. Thanks for sharing. Heather, moderating this voices podcast will bring about meaningful iconoclasm. Keep it up.
Anonymous

Door knobs?!!!! You guys crack me up.

But seriously, my oldest is nine and I have no real clue what sexual ethics I want to teach him and his siblings. I think I’m going to go for the “here’s the facts…here’s how to protect yourself…and don’t even THINK about doing it in the backseat of my car…” approach.
Stan

John, Zilpha I have a large library of books. Many of them are beautiful, leather bound and expensive. You can tell which ones I’ve read due to the water stains on the gilding. The tub is the perfect place to read books! I now even read my Nook in the tub, I built a little desk so I could use my laptop in the tub. Don’t knock it John! =:)
Kevin

Really enjoyed the podcast. Excellent thoughts. Thanks. My only double take was when John was talking about masturbation and said “But that’s my thing.”

Well hey, live and let.

As for morality, I agree that almost everyone we meet has an apparently intuitive sense of basic right and wrong. Depending on where you think this sense might come from, it can be taken as an indicator of either the moral redundancy of religion or the presence of an Overarching Moral Presence.

But I think we should be careful about assuming that our intuitive sense of morality is especially universal, deeply rooted, or powerful. I suspect that more of it is cultural than we may feel comfortable admitting. When we live in a relatively comfortable, open, and peaceful environment like middle-class America, it’s generally not too difficult to buy into values like compassion, honesty, and generosity. (If Glenn Ostlund reads this, I hope he appreciates my use of three-patterns.)

Other cultures have had — and continue to have — very different concepts of morality, as any historian or anthropologist will attest. Even in our culture, you don’t have to look awfully hard to find people who place the highest moral value on the advancement of self, family, social group, nation, race, etc.

To me, it seems that religion is not so much a source of morality as it is a sort of morality magnifier. Religious and quasi-religious belief systems can motivate people to acts of heroic virtue or horrifying evil, all in the name of a higher power or first principle.

Religion is therefore not inherently good or bad. It is no better or worse than the people who practice it.

Anonymous

I think you’re right, Kevin. I was listening to an evangelical talk show as I was driving around town on errands this past weekend. The topic of discussion was whether or not a person can have morals if they don’t believe in God. First of all, it seems like a pointless discussion to me because you’ll never get the believer to consider whether or not morals can exist outside of the god concept. So they’ll never meet you in the middle. But, to their point, if it were the case that religion was the source of morals, then religious people should be, by in large, more moral people. But they aren’t. Some religious people have affairs. Some atheists stay monogamous and married for their entire adult lives. Some pastors molest children. Some punk rockers with mohawks and dog collars around their necks never do a scintilla of harm to a child. There are good people in and out of religion. There are bad people in and out of religion. So the dividing line ISN’T religion. It’s something else. Something inherent to being a human being. Morality is inherent within us all.

Buffalo

This was super fascinating! Thanks for doing this. Like John, I stopped believing in God too before I ever started looking at the problems with the church.
Anonymous

A couple of comments.

I’m one of the people who stays out of the open group because I’m not there yet. Not living out loud.

The stuff about the mission very much hit home with me.

Same with the temple stuff. People need preparation for that.

I’m glad for your example of living out loud. Thanks guys.
Jacob Brown

Great interview!

I love to read books in the tub. It’s a good way to make sure the kids leave you alone.
The whole time I was listening to John and Zilpha going back and forth I was so impressed with the energy and playfulness they share. (Or was that the result of alcohol?) What a wonderful example of a celestial marriage. (Unless that was alcohol.) In some ways it really reminds me how much I miss out being in a part-member family. (Now I want some alcohol.) Tierza’s blog “A Housed Divided by Two” is a much better description of the tension and emptiness I bounce between daily. (Alcohol is so disappointing! It tastes like cough medicine!)

Anonymous

No alcohol. Unless they got soused before hand. If you listen closely you can hear the sound of crumpled plastic from time to time because John was fidgeting with a bottle of water.

Bryce

Very nice. Thank you.
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Brad

Great first episode!
One thing I would have loved to have heard, since I am at this point myself, is how the conversation went down with Zilpha and John’s parents and family?
How did they find out, what did you tell them etc?
Alf O’Mega

Regarding the origin of Zilpha’s name, I always assumed it was a mistranscription of Leah’s handmaid Zilpah (Gen. 29:24), the same way Oprah is a mistranscription of Ruth’s sister-in-law Orpah (Ruth 1:4).

And books are not aquatic creatures.
FullyWashable

Is that your actual wedding picture? You guys look so funny!
Joy

Love the new podcast! (Love the old podcast, too.) More ways to get my Mormon Expression fix. And thanks for posting the picture of John and Zilpha as newlyweds….so fun to see!
Nancy

Like you I adopted my children from LDS Services and during my 7 years of waiting to become a mother, the most hurtful remarks came from church. I was told that I must have done something really bad in the pre-existence to be punished with infertility; that remark came when I was serving as Young Women’s President and I was devoting all my free time to that calling.
Kris Fielding

I totally agree with John in regards to owning your identity. I think there is a power there when you see something associated with a real person and not an alias. Not everyone is in the position to do that, but I think it does break the stereotype of the “anti-.”

1: A Conversation with John and Zilpha

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