Leaving the Mormon Church with Jordan and McKay

Reclaiming the Garden

In this episode, we have a conversation with ex-Mormon (or “exmo”) YouTubers Jordan and McKay! They share their journey of growing up in the Mormon/LDS church and the things that caused them to doubt until their “shelves” of faith broke and they decided to leave (the disturbing history of Joseph Smith marrying women as young as 14, the practices and lack of informed consent in the Temple, among other things). All of us discuss what we were taught about the other’s faith tradition–Anna and April were taught that Mormonism was a cult and that Mormons were going to hell, and *gasp* they believed in a Heavenly Mother as well as Father; and Jordan and McKay were taught that, although Mormons tried to do work in partnership with other denominations, those denominations were a distorted mirror compared to Joseph Smith’s restored church. April talks about how her church’s support of Mitt Romney was the first crack in her evangelical faith (because if he’s going to hell as they taught her all Mormons are, then why are they voting for him?). We also talk about the tension in Mormon culture of being very patriotic but also having a distrust of “big government.”

You can find Jordan and Mckay on their YouTube channel here, and you can find them on Instagram and TikTok @jordanandmckay. You can support them on Patreon and can buy their sticker merch here and clothing merch here.

Resources:

The CES Letter: https://cesletter.org/

https://quitmormon.com/

April’s new newsletter, Butterflies in the Wilderness: https://aprilthewriter.substack.com/

We have merch! Get your Bible Dyke Energy Tee or mug here: https://reclaiming-the-garden.creator-spring.com/

Our social media: @reclaimingthegarden on Insta, @RtGardenPodcast on Twitter, and Reclaiming the Garden on Facebook. Our personal accounts: @thatpunchabletheaternerd, @April_TheWriter (April is on Twitter and Insta). Also, our podcast account follows a bunch of awesome folks + podcasts in the exvangelical/deconstruction world and progressive Christian world, so if you’re looking for more resources, that’s a great place to start!