I hesitate to write this post for more reasons than I care to list. I long ago stopped describing myself as an active member of the LDS church (and I'm unsure if I describe myself as Mormon at all), and I don't feel I can speak for those LDSSAers who do fall into that category. In fact, I don't claim to speak for anybody else in the LDSSA- this is purely about my experience. Furthermore, I don't want to scare off any prospective Yalies who are strong members of the church. Even so, my with Yale's LDSSA has been a defining aspect of my experience here, and I think it can inform the decision of high school students as they make some difficult and important choices.
First, the facts. My name is Max, and I'm a member of the Yale LDSSA. I'm about six weeks from graduating with a degree in math. I haven't regularly attended church in three years at this point, but I'm still very much a part of Yale's LDSSA. (More on that in a moment.) Without a doubt, Yale has been the most difficult four years of my life. In particular, I've frequently felt isolated socially. Every single one of my defining characteristics has put me in the minority at Yale: my quantitative mind, my pride in being from Utah, my discomfort with alcohol, my Mormon background, my love for the outdoors, my politics, and so on. To make matters worse, I had to take a year away from campus for health reasons. I've made some good friends, but only recently have I started to feel that I have an actual group of friends rather than just a set of individuals.
Even when I've felt the most isolated, though, I've always had the LDSSA. I got to know them freshman year, when I was going to church more or less every Sunday. After church, we would (and still do) gather in the TD dining hall and have dinner together. Those dinners were the highlight of my week. The conversations we had were wonderful and covered quite the range of topics. Sometimes we just gossiped, by which I mean talked about all the people from home we knew who were getting married at incredibly young ages. We also talked about classes and extracurriculars and movies and our affection for Cafe Rio and anything else that might come up.
At times, our discussions were far more serious. The other LDSSA members gave me advice on trying to have a social life without drinking. We had serious conversations about church doctrine and culture, always being careful to draw the distinction between the two. Many of us (including me) were struggling with the church in one way or another. Our challenges varied quite a bit, but I'd say that questions of faith, sexuality, and the role of women in the church were some of the most common themes. I'll be honest: about half of the people who were typically at those dinners freshman year are no longer active members of the church. On the other hand, I think that for the other half, those conversations helped clarify their own beliefs and ultimately strengthened their testimonies. (My apologies for the unclear antecedents in the previous sentence. However, I am not sorry enough to go back and fix them.)
By sophomore year, I was no longer going to church. I think at many places, this would have severed my connection with the LDS community. At Yale, though, I actually saw those relationships strengthen. For whatever reason, my friendships with other members of the LDSSA really blossomed that year. I'm not going to use names, but my weekly lunch with K, which still occurs, dates back to sophomore year. Every time I walked into the Calhoun dining hall, I'd look around for J (and usually M, if I was lucky) and at least once or twice a week I'd end up eating with them. I'd also make a point of saying hi to any of the other LDSSAers whenever I saw them, and when I ran into them in dining halls I'd more often than not join them to eat. I also saw them at semi-regular social events- movie nights, game nights, Easter breakfast, and so on. In short, Yale's LDSSA was both a source of close friends and a solid community at a time when I was in desperate need of both.
I got quite sick at the end of my sophomore year- sick in a kind of way that leads to a lot of time thinking about mortality and religion- and ultimately had to take junior year away from Yale as I regained my strength. (I realize I'm being vague, but my own health issues aren't relevant to this post. If you're curious, clicking through my blogger profile will make what happened pretty clear.) An obvious result was that I saw the LDSSA much less than I had back when I, you know, lived in the same city as the rest of them. Even so, two experiences stand out to me. The first was accidentally being copied on the email that J sent out when she was planning a care package for me--and then receiving some truly touching notes when that package arrived a couple weeks later. I also remember visiting campus for about 24 hours in early December and still managing to see just about every member of the LDSSA who was here, including staying up til 4 talking with T, S, and some non-LDS freshmen on the couch in T's suite.
As a senior who has been looking back on my Yale experience quite a bit recently, I have to say that I'm grateful for the LDS community here, which has provided some wonderful friends. Despite my own spiritual odyssey (and the fact that many of them have gone through a similar process) my place in the community has never been jeopardized. As one final anecdote, I got a text from K last Sunday. It was Easter, and he asked me if I wanted to go to church with him. We walked over together. When we got there, the other LDSSA members (and branch members) greeted us with typical warmth. There was no pressure from the rest of them- no "See you next week!" or "Be sure to stay for Sunday School!" I have no doubt that they would be happy to see me go to church every week and become an active member of the church instead of whatever I am now. But they understand that I've thought long and hard about the decision I've made, and from what I can tell they respect it. As a result, I felt comfortable making a trip to church on Easter Sunday and satisfying my spirituality in my own way. For me, that's the most amazing thing about Yale's LDSSA.
