A Conversation with Valerie Hamaker

Ian and Jim are joined by Valerie Hamaker, host of the Latter Day Struggles podcast. She discusses her faith journey, her podcast, and the events that led to her resignation from the Church. 

Episode Transcript

SPEAKER_01 (00:00):
Welcome to Inside Out, the podcast offering a

(00:18):
pragmatic perspective on theMormon church and faith.
We explore both the strengthsand weaknesses of the church and
We acknowledge its positivecontributions while also
addressing challenges and areasfor potential growth.
I'm your co-host, Ian Wilkes,and as always, I'm joined here
by the right, honorable Mr.

(00:38):
Jim Bennett.
Jim, how are you today?

SPEAKER_00 (00:41):
I'm both right and honorable.
Probably more right thanhonorable.
I'm not sure where the balanceis.

SPEAKER_01 (00:48):
I thought I'd give you that title because I've been
watching a lot of Britishpolitics and there's a lot of
right honorable titles thatthese people have.
So today we have a wonderful andvery special guest.
Welcome, Valerie Hamaker.

SPEAKER_02 (01:04):
Hi, how are you today?
Good to be here.

SPEAKER_01 (01:06):
Really good, Valerie.
It's wonderful to have you withus.
Did I pronounce your last namecorrectly?

SPEAKER_02 (01:11):
Hammacher, I wish you hadn't, but you did.
Yes, it's evolved away from alittle bit more of a dignified
German sounding last name, butHammacher it is in 2025.

SPEAKER_01 (01:23):
Wonderful.
And I'm not sure if I mess it upwith my British accent.
I've got a British accent goingon here.

SPEAKER_02 (01:28):
You made it sound better.
So

SPEAKER_01 (01:30):
I like it.
Well, there you go.
Well, Vara, it's absolutelywonderful to have you here with
us.
And of course, to have Jim bewith us today.
We're looking forward to a veryinteresting and comfortable, but
also lively conversation withyou.
We've got you for a fairlylimited piece of time.
So if I can jump straight intoit, could you give us a little

(01:50):
bit of, and you've been askedthese questions many, many
times.
This will be straightforward.
forward, I think.
Could you share us a bit ofbackground about yourself,
growing up in the church, yourexperience, a bit about your
family, a bit about your workand your counselling, etc.
Your podcast, your experiencesof late and where you are right
now in the situation that you'rein.
And again, your podcast and yourwork that you've done is

(02:11):
extraordinary work.
And I did watch your podcast, Ithink it was on Mormon Stories,
and it's wonderful what you'vebeen doing to help people.
But you got yourself into, youand your husband got yourself
into a interesting situationwith the church, if I can say
that.
So if you could just kind ofwalk us through a bit of a
timeline, that would bewonderful.
And then Jim and I will jump inat some points and we'll have

(02:33):
this conversation.

SPEAKER_02 (02:35):
Okay, sounds good.
So you just want a big sweepingoverall timeline.
I can give that and then if you,I'm assuming you're going to
want us to go backwards and be alittle more granular.
I am from the Salt Lake Cityarea and specific to those who
are from that area, part of thecountry.
I'm from Centerville, Utah, bornin holiday, raised in

(02:58):
Centerville.
My mother still actually has ahome in Centerville, but she
spends some time there with, Iam one of six children, the
second of six children.
And most of my siblings stilllive in the Intermountain area
for the most part, short ofmyself.
I have lived in the Kansas City,Missouri area for 22 years, give

(03:20):
or take.
And before that, about fiveyears in Houston, Texas.
I have, I think I had a prettytraditional Mormon childhood.
My family on both sides areLatter-day Saints, most of whom
still are, extended family-wiseand such.
I, yeah, I went to junior highand high school in Utah, went to

(03:44):
Weber State University for myfirst year, then transferred
down to BYU.
And Went two more years at BYU,then I paused and served a
mission for the church.
At the time, it was called theOakland, California Mission,
Spanish speaking.
It's expanded and contractedseveral times in the last 25

(04:05):
years.
I don't know what it's calledright now, but I loved it.
It was, like I said, Spanishspeaking.
I served in the visitor centerfor a portion of that time, did
lots of proselyting as well.
And as a bonus, I met my husbandthere.
Nathan was my First, well, maybenot my first, but he was my zone
leader at one point in time.
And yeah, we crossed paths backand forth several times over the

(04:28):
mission, came home.
He came home first and weexchanged maybe one letter and I
had my eye on him from the gate.
He's a little more reticent tomake that confession, but I'm
not reticent at all.
I thought he was good lookingfrom the very first time I saw
him.
My heart was not evidentlylocked quite enough, but I
really thought he was prettygood looking and I really wanted

(04:50):
to, I was very hopeful that Icould see him afterwards.
So he was home quite a whilebefore I was.
As luck would have it, he wasstill single when I got home and
we started dating, dated for twoyears.
And both of us finished up atBYU and got married and went
immediately to Houston where hewent to the University of Texas.

(05:12):
Houston branch of medicalschool.
And we were four years in Texas,where he is from, and had our
first two children out there andthen came up to Kansas City for
him to participate in hisresidency program as an eye
surgeon up here in Kansas City.
We thought this would be just atemporary stop and had two more

(05:33):
children while we were here.
And towards the end of hisresidency, both of us
independently had impressionsthat it would be good to stay
here and raise our children herein the Kansas City area.
And so we stayed here and did.
We stayed here and raised ourchildren.
And we have one left at home,three young adult children, two

(05:53):
of whom are daughters and thentwo sons.
The two daughters are one justgraduated from college at Utah
Valley, and she is serving withthe Peace Corps right now.
Yeah, very proud of her.
She's wonderful.
And second, well, they're allwonderful.
I better say that from the gatelest I somehow communicate that
she is more wonderful.

(06:13):
My second daughter is graduatingfrom the University of Missouri.
Mizzou is what we call it herein the Midwest.
And she is starting a graduateprogram at the UCSD, University
of California, San Diego in thefall.
And then I have my first bornson.
is serving in the Modesto,California mission, which he was

(06:34):
very excited about.
That's like, I don't know, 90minutes, two hours out of San
Francisco.
So he was tickled, but he getsto serve right by mom and dad
where we were because we've beentelling him and all of the
children mission stories sincethey were very small.
And then our youngest is ajunior in high school, another
son.
And so that's the family.
When we got up here to KansasCity, Nathan was in medical or

(07:01):
residency, and I started agraduate program at the
University of Missouri, and Ifinished a master's degree in
English, thinking I might wantto do some sort of a third world
country literacy sort ofsituation, which deep into the
program decided I didn'tparticularly like that, but I
got good at writing papers andfinished that up because I'd

(07:22):
started it.
And then a realized what Ireally wanted to be when I grew
up, and it was to be a marriageand family counselor.
And so that happened and startedthat when my youngest was
starting kindergarten and didthat.
And after I graduated fromcounseling school, I started a

(07:43):
private practice in my home.
We did a renovation and createda separate entrance and that
kind of a situation so that Icould work at home and have a
lot of autonomy.
I trained a lot of graduatestudents, did a little bit of
teaching at the university, andmy practice was successful quite

(08:05):
early on.
There were a lot of needs aroundhere, especially I got plugged
into the Latter-day Saint familyservices situation and was
referred to by many, many abishop and stake president.
I had some special training in aWe were calling it at the time
sexual addiction.
I know that's a name that's notas commonly used anymore.

(08:25):
But I did a lot of publicspeaking in the ward, stake, and
regional level all over thegreater Kansas City and beyond
area for the church, helpingcouples better understand sexual
health.
And I think it might have beenthrough that.
I'm trying to really trace thebreadcrumbs backwards to where I
evolved as...

(08:48):
As someone who became a littlebit more interested in the
reform side of our faith, Ithink it was just so gradual,
it's kind of hard to put myfinger on it.
As I learned my trade and wasdoing more and more clinical
work, I was personally growing.
I think I was becoming a morecomplex thinker.
I was falling more deeply inlove with the healing profession

(09:14):
and enjoying it profoundly.
And I...
I guess I just started havingthe ability to look at suffering
and trace back its origins in away that was authentic and
honest.
And sometimes it had nothing todo with the faith, and sometimes
it had to do with the faith.

(09:34):
And I was willing to sort ofstart seeing, okay, this has
been helpful, something that aLatter-day Saint has learned or
integrated into their lives, andsometimes it wasn't so much.
And so I...
I just started being able tosort of see and discern what was

(09:54):
working and what wasn't.
And I think furthermore, I was aclinical supervisor for several
years, and I started gaining abetter skill set, being able to
conceptualize issues,relationships, systems,
problems, to sort of be able totake apart complex things.

(10:14):
I guess things is a weird word.
Relationships or ideas.
And I just started reallynoticing things.
And I remember one night I wastalking to my husband and I'd
done some collaborative podcastswith other podcasters.
And Nathan said to me, you know,you and so-and-so, a colleague

(10:35):
of mine, he says, you two oughtto start a podcast actually
talking about what you'renoticing so that you can help
people of our faith heal andhelp them feel like they're not
crazy or that there's nothingwrong with them and just help
them understand what's going onbecause sometimes people are
suffering and they don't knowwhy and that's like the worst

(10:56):
thing of all and so talked to mycolleague uh he thought it was a
great idea we started thistogether and a couple months in
uh he he was kind of ambivalenti think because we i think we
could tell from the gate thiswas um needed and necessary and
that this this had legs and hewasn't quite sure if this was
like the actual direction hewanted to go so he very

(11:19):
graciously spoke with me told mehe didn't feel like this was
where he wanted to go but hewanted to really support me I
was terrified I actually almostdropped the whole thing I didn't
really want to do it by myself Iwas very aware of how daring and
taboo and scary this was and todo it by myself felt terrifying
and And yet I'd had someexperiences by that point in

(11:40):
time that I felt like this wasfor me.
It was for me.
It was something I needed to do.
And by the grace of God, I havea husband who is not a
therapist, but he's very wiseand he's articulate and he's
very supportive.
And he loves to read books andwe love to go on long walks and
talk about things.
And it just sort of weirdlyevolved.
And next thing I know, he wasthe guest on a podcast once.

(12:02):
And I was like, that was fun.
You did a beautiful job.
Let's do that again.
And so he sort of slowlyintegrated into the flow of the
work.
And then the podcast explodedalmost immediately.
There was clearly just such aneed.
And I think I still haven'tquite figured it all out, but I

(12:22):
have some ideas.
I think there was somethingunique that I offered from the
perspective of candor, respect,love for the church, but also an
ability and a willingness totalk about problems, talk about
things that inadvertently harmor hurt people.

(12:44):
But they could tell that I didit from a place of love.
And so that resonated with acertain demographic of the
faith.
And from there, I had sometraining in running groups and
facilitating groups.
And I saw immediately the needwas so great because of all the
letters that were coming in.
And I just sort of like floateda test support and processing

(13:07):
group and it immediately filledup and from there I think I've
just kind of been I don't knowhalf-assing it's probably safe
to say just sort of putting thenext thing together and the next
thing and and that leads us to Idon't know if this is as far as
you want to go.
Maybe we'll pause here because Ifeel like I did my assignment.
I gave you the big overview andmaybe we'll pause and let you

(13:29):
say something.

SPEAKER_01 (13:30):
You got an A plus there.
Good.

SPEAKER_02 (13:32):
Thank you.
I want A pluses.

SPEAKER_01 (13:34):
It's an extraordinary journey.
And I want to just connect backon the timeline that you've just
spoke to.
So please keep that in mindbecause there's a whole series
of questions.
It's extraordinary.
Thank you for that.
Before we get into it anyfurther, could you describe, if
you will, because I think thisis an important baseline, yours
and Nathan's commitment anddevotion to the gospel.

(13:57):
Can you give some examples wherethat was clearly very much in
place and through callings, etcetera?
Can you speak to that?

SPEAKER_02 (14:06):
Sure, yeah.
So as I mentioned, thefoundation of our relationship,
ironically, is we weremissionaries.
And we, from the very beginning,were missionaries.
very committed to the church.
I think both of us have asomewhat complicated background,
which I don't want to go intoparticularly, but I think for

(14:27):
us, as we started our family,there is something very safe and
stabilizing about sort ofplugging yourself into something
and realizing that like, if theycan just tell me what to do, I
don't know how to do this.
This is all new.
And so we really, from the verybeginning, we, we were committed

(14:48):
to what we felt would really,really help our family thrive.
And Nathan and I are both how tosay this.
Um, we're very highly motivatedand we're, we're, we're, we're
deep feelers and thinkers.
And from when our oldest was 18months old, we, we started

(15:08):
having family home evening withher and I, and, and, uh, To this
day, we have one child at homeand almost every evening we do a
devotional.
Our children have been raisedwith some very beautiful gospel
rhythms.
And it kind of made me smile.
A month or two ago, we weretalking to our second daughter,

(15:30):
the 22-year-old in college, andshe said, you know, Mom and Dad,
I will sit down with myroommates and I will want to
have deep philosophicalconversations with And they look
at me like I have three eyeballsbecause I guess they weren't
raised doing that.
She said, we've always done thatsince we were little, where we
would take a topic from thescriptures or whatever.

(15:53):
And of course, it was far moretraditional when we were younger
parents.
And then it became a little bitmore of an open field where we
would do something thatresonated with us, even if it
wasn't sort of correlated,right?
And now we're completelyuncorrelated, but we still do
it.
And our daughters...
And our sons just that wasnormal for them.
And so the gospel, we call itscripture study, which, you

(16:16):
know, scripture was broadly usedfrom the very beginning.
We've always done family prayerwhere every member of our family
prays at night still to thisday.
Last night we did it with thethree of us.
We've always attended templerecommend holding.
Just very not only committedfrom the like the cultural side,
but a sense, a felt sense thatif we tethered ourselves to

(16:40):
something that bonded us to God,that it would help our family.
And, you know, things haveevolved and changed clearly.
And yet at the same time, Nathanand I have not changed in many
ways in that we take moreownership of what this looks
like, but it has absolutely beenfundamental to our lives and to

(17:01):
how we have parented.
And You know, we've had to dosome repair work with some of
the ways we taught or some ofthe things that we taught.
Not good ideas now that we lookback.
And certainly our daughters havebeen the most gracious of the
children who probably got thebrunt of our rigidity and
things.
But fundamentally, as far as therhythms of family, of how we

(17:26):
chose to allow the gospel to...
sort of help us structure timetogether and how to talk about
important things.
I, I'm grateful for that to thisday.
I, no regrets whatsoever fromthat perspective.

SPEAKER_01 (17:43):
Right.
Rom, that's, um, clearly youwere absolutely devoted,
committed.
You followed the program and youenjoyed and continue to enjoy
the blessings of, um, uh, andJim and I can relate to this
cause it's, it's been, you know,been our experience.
Um, We and I talked on the phonebefore we set up this
conversation today.

(18:05):
I mentioned that I'd been aformer bishop and a former
member of the state presidency.
And you'll have workedextensively with bishops, branch
presidents, and members of thestate presidency.
And on these podcasts, since welaunched this a couple years ago
now, I've made frequentreference to the difficulty I
experienced as a bishop.
where individuals would come tome, and Jim and I have talked

(18:27):
about this, they'd come to me asa bishop, a very young bishop
actually, and with no formaltraining, coming to me with very
serious issues relating tosexual health, let's describe it
as that.
There were other sexualassault-related experiences,
many other sexual drug-relatedchallenges and issues that these

(18:48):
individuals had been carried.
Some individuals had carriedthese issues and pain and
suffering for an entire life.
It was...
incredibly emotionally draining.
And as a bishop, I feltcompletely inadequate,
overwhelmed.
And when I went to the statepresident as a bishop, and I've
seen this on a state presidencyas well, very little or no

(19:10):
training in terms of how to dealwith this.
And the default position, mydefault position was, which I
think is quite common, is ifindividuals had a problem, then
they could pray through it.
They could fast through it.
They could read the scriptures.
They could turn to God.
I was never the bishop.
And unfortunately, there arebishops that have said this.

(19:32):
And I want to say that in myexperience, most of the leaders
of the church have beenextraordinary, wonderful, kind,
loving, well-intent individuals.
But there are certainindividuals, bishops, perhaps
with good intent, who connectsomeone's depression or anxiety
with iniquity.
In fact...
It's in the scriptures.
It's actually referenced in thescriptures, as you know.

(19:52):
My question is, and I want toget Jim's perspective on this as
well, is when going back to yourcounseling training, you
graduate as a professionalcounselor, you got involved with
the church as a professionalcounselor.
I do want to connect later withyour podcast coming up, but when
you were working with the churchthrough, I presume there's some
screening, accreditation, someequalization of your skills.

(20:14):
What was that process like?
in terms of the churchpre-approving you.
And can you speak to some of theexperiences they had with the
bishops and take presence whensomeone came to them and they
needed to refer them toyourself?
Could you speak a little bitabout that, Barbara?
That would be great.
Thanks.

SPEAKER_02 (20:32):
Yes.
Yeah, I have.
Oh, gosh, I have a lot I can sayabout that.
So I guess I want to lead with.
I have an enormous amount ofcompassion for what a bishop is
asked to do.
because they are not trained andso they are being asked to do
something for which they cannotbe expected to do well and the

(20:57):
the most successful bishop is inmy opinion is the one who knows
that he doesn't know and i'verun into the most problems
personally as i have witnessedsome well-meaning ecclesiastical
leaders who in an in a you knowan excess of zeal shall we say

(21:19):
think that if they sort of leandeeply enough into their
stewardship or their mantle ortheir priesthood power that
somehow or other they can like idon't know like riff off of the
universe a skill set that that ahuman being can't have and
unless and until they have gonethrough the adequate training

(21:39):
process and so My initialthought process is the system is
broken in that way because itrequires and invites an
interaction between somebody ina great deal of pain and
somebody who is very, verywell-meaning and incompetent,

(22:02):
incapable of offering to thesepeople what is actually needed.
And both parties in thistransaction wants something from
the other and are sort of hopingand expecting that something
will happen that just isn't, notonly is it not likely, but 99
times out of 100, it's not evenpossible because the

(22:24):
well-meaning bishop doesn't havethe skill set and the person has
been sort of set up to believethat you are my leader, you are
my spiritual director or thefather of the ward or the guru
or And so they come expectingsomething that is not going to
be given.
So that's my point number one.

(22:45):
And so to speak deeper intothat, experientially, I have
seen the entire spectrum,meaning that I have seen people
who finally end up in my office.
Sometimes they may have beenreferred by a bishop or an

(23:05):
ecclesiastical leader.
only after like so much damagewas done that I needed to sort
of clean up, like pick up thepieces or they'd kind of given
up or they didn't know what todo.
Sometimes they had just come ontheir own because they had tried
and all of the, you know,seminary Sunday school answers
had failed, right?

(23:25):
And oftentimes that actuallyevoked in and of itself its own
deeper crisis because not onlywere they suffering for what
their primary issue was, such asperhaps a a painful relationship
or some unresolved trauma orsome kind of abuse or something.
But now you layer on top of thatsomeone feeling like as if they
are a failure or the shameassociated.

(23:48):
Well, if I were faithful enough,then my praying or scripture
studying this away would havehealed me.
And so it's like there's anamplifying of issues.
And so I've definitely seenthat.
And then I've also beenfortunate enough to see
ecclesiastical leaders who knowvery well the moment they are
outside of their lane and wouldrefer quite quickly, right?

(24:11):
They would recognize andexercise the humility and the
ego structure to go, you knowwhat?
I do not know.
I am not a marriage counselor.
I do not know what to do here.
I can tell there's a lot of painhere.
I want well by you.
Let's send you to someone whoseskill set is is prepared to meet
your needs.

(24:31):
And I'm proud to report that myvery favorite bishop that I
ever, ever worked with happenedto be an elder that was also in
my mission and ended up, weirdlyenough, in the Midwest where
Nathan and I were and frequentlysent people from his stake.
And the thing that I was sotouched by is I will always hear
the reports back from peopleabout what was said.

(24:52):
I've heard the good, the bad,and the ugly, and this
particular bishop said, wouldsit with the people and would
tell them, I love you.
You are loved.
Nothing you can do will ever,ever, ever change that.
And also, let's get you help.
You're suffering clearly.

(25:13):
And so from his core, he knewthat his role was to love, which
is the way I see the role andresponsibility of of a bishop,
which is just to help reflectGod's love to the people in the
congregation, and then if theyhave psychological needs, to

(25:34):
send them elsewhere.
And so I've seen a little bit ofall of that.
I think I'll pause right now,and I know you asked several
parts of that question.
How can we move from here?

SPEAKER_00 (25:44):
Well, I'm very curious, because I know you've
been tracking an awful lot ofattention for The controversy
surrounding your decision towithdraw your membership from
the church or to resign yourmembership in lieu of what they
now call membership withdrawal,which is, I think, a softer,

(26:07):
prettier term forexcommunication because that's
what we're talking about.
I don't know that changing theterm changes the impact of what
happens.
But I've listened to you discussthis.
I listened particularly to yourdiscussion on the Mormon Land
podcast with the Salt LakeTribune.
And my heart just goes out toyou because it's so obvious to

(26:29):
anybody who listens to you, toanybody who's listened to you in
this podcast, but in everydiscussion that you've had, it's
so painfully obvious that youstill love the church, that you
are still a person of faith, andthat this must have been just an
absolutely wrenching decision.
So I would love to hear youdiscuss that As much as you are

(26:53):
comfortable discussing it,because I think that's an
extraordinarily personaldecision and whatever you want
to say or not say about it wouldbe appropriate.
But now we're, I don't know howmany, we're a couple of weeks
removed from that decision now.
Yeah.
Can you tell us as much aboutthat as you'd like to share?

SPEAKER_02 (27:16):
Sure.
Yeah.
I think it surprises a lot ofpeople how...
calm and peaceful I feel aboutthe unfolding of the events.
Not because I've always feltcalm and peaceful or because I'm
in some sort of shock or numbabout it.
I don't think that's the case atall.
As a matter of fact, I've beenvery calculated about the

(27:44):
choices that have unfolded inthe last three years.
And this is interesting becausein some ways it feels like so
much has happened and And if Imay say, we have done a great
deal of good already in just asmall period of time, myself and
my husband and the people whoI'm so privileged to work with
on the Latter-day Strugglespodcast, all of my guest

(28:04):
speakers and the theologians andauthors and things like that.
But I was not naive enough tobegin this process without
knowing that it was possiblethat we would be punished.

(28:27):
That was a decision that I madeabsolutely intentionally from
the very first drop of thepodcast.
I felt prepared to do this andhad several very powerful

(28:59):
personal experiences inviting meinto this space.
It was never a compulsion.
It was never you have to dothis.
It felt very clearly from afeminine divine.
And the words that came to mymind one time I remember very

(29:26):
specifically were, right now, Idon't have a voice, but you do.
Will you use it?
And the sense I had was that Iwould be okay if I didn't, if
this was too scary.
It was okay.
They would love me just thesame, right?
But also, I felt that as Ilooked back at my life and

(29:50):
looked at a variety of eventsthat had unfolded, I had...
a unique skill set.
I'm a decent public speaker.
I'm pretty motivated.
I understand healing.
I understand organizations.
I have a supportive partner whohappens to very luckily be

(30:11):
around the same space where I amin the faith journey.
So I'm not alone in this.
I also have a love of thetradition because it's in my
DNA.
But I'm also a critical enoughthinker that I recognize that
this isn't going to impact myrelationship with God, even if
the worst thing happened.

(30:31):
And I have differentiated myselfenough from the institution of
the church to recognize that ifGod cares about this tradition
and the healing of people in myfaith system, someone needs to
be a voice and actually talkabout what's going on.

(30:53):
And many people are able to dothis behind closed doors, which
became kind of a point ofconflict with my local
priesthood leaders.
Do whatever you want, just do itquiet.
We just don't want you doingthis on a microphone in front of
thousands of people because whatyou're doing is exposing on a
grander scale some of the issuesthat we don't want to

(31:15):
acknowledge are actuallyhappening.
And so I knew when I enteredinto this that it may be that
the institution would be unhappywith this.
But to me, I was not concernedabout the institution.

(31:39):
I was interested in my integritybetween myself and my higher
powers.
And it is in the service ofhelping the institution if it
chooses to be served and helpedby professionals like myself.
And yet at the same time, I feelgrateful every day of my life

(32:03):
that independent of whether ornot they appreciate me or
understand me, there arehundreds and hundreds and even I
would say thousands of peoplebased on my numbers that are
absolutely different people.
and are evolving and changingand expanding and healing and
their marriages are healing andtheir mental health is better.

(32:23):
And so when I look at the costbenefit ratio of this, it
doesn't even, I don't even pausefor a half second because I know
what I'm about and I know who Iam and I know what I'm doing.
And I have all of the validationI need from the sources that
matter to me.

SPEAKER_00 (32:43):
Well, so can I ask you, maybe this is sort of a
philosophical question, becausethere are an awful lot of people
in the therapy space thatoverlaps with the church space,
and some of them have beenexcommunicated.
Some have kind of gotten a pass.

(33:04):
I mean, it's very much sort of aleadership roulette sort of
thing.
And I think it's getting harderand harder to sort of pin down
where the line is.
And I'd be very interested inhearing where you think the line
is, or if there is a line, or ifit's just so fuzzy or so

(33:26):
difficult to define that nobodyreally knows if there's a line.
I mean, I have an opinion onthat.
I think there are some reallysort of hard lines that are
drawn out there, but I thinkthere are others that are a
whole lot fuzzier.
Where do you think the line is?

SPEAKER_02 (33:44):
I think that this is complicated because, as you
mentioned before, it's variable.
It really depends on thetemperament of the congregation
and the leadership, as at leastwas our situation.
So for those who are hearing mystory for the first time, it was

(34:07):
leadership roulette multipliedby local leadership.
I guess we could sayco-congregants, people in my
warden stake that sort ofreported their concern in larger
numbers than...
Well, all I can speak to is whatwe were told by our local
leadership that this washappening.
To this day, I don't reallyactually know who...

(34:29):
I have some ideas, but I'llnever know.
We'll never know.
And so when we were told thatthis was happening, of course,
one...
starts to feel a little bituncomfortable coming and going
from church from week to week,right?
And so I think that's a piece ofit.

(34:49):
After we kind of went publicwith what we've been through,
I'm really touched to have notonly like an ocean of support
coming in from all over theworld, from people who have been
grateful for our work, but adecent number of warden
stakeholders priesthood leadersreaching out and saying, this is

(35:13):
appalling.
Like, I'm so sorry you wentthrough this.
Like, this would have neverhappened.
And where they were presiding,and I even have a dear friend
that's 30 minutes across thestate line.
I live quite close to the stateline, and she's pretty confident
that, you know, she may havebeen slightly joking, but she

(35:34):
said, I wouldn't be surprised ifmy bishop and based on the way
they sort of operate and the wayher stake is run.
And so, I mean, there is thatpiece of it that I think is
always up in the air.
I think there are geographicalcomponents to look at, but at

(35:57):
the same time also, I even thinkthat's quite tricky because one
of the most liberal areas in thecountry, well, you think of the
coasts, right?
I know I'm being very, very, youknow, I'm being probably too
generic about this, but youthink, okay, you got the coasts
that are probably going to bemore liberal, at least in the
United States.
And then the more you kind of goinland, it's going to become

(36:19):
more conservative and in theSouth, of course, right?
And so, of course, the jokewe've always said since we've
lived here is you couldn't befarther away from an ocean if
you tried than in Kansas City,right?
We are almost as smack in themiddle of the United States as
one can get and have some of theMidwestern influence, but also
quite a bit of Southerninfluence here.
And then you layer on top ofthat, we're in Jackson County,

(36:40):
Missouri.
So we were not set up to succeedin this particular situation.

SPEAKER_00 (36:45):
Not to interrupt, but do you get people that come
to Jackson County, Missouri whohave this special calling
because they have to be therewhen the second coming is going
to come next Tuesday?

SPEAKER_02 (36:55):
It's happened consistently the entire 20 years
we've lived here.
And I wouldn't say it's drovesof people, but there's a trickle
in and out of that we will hearof people that have experiences
that lead them this way.
And so we will never know to thedegree that all of these factors
play in.
It's just, to me, as I sort ofthink about the big picture,

(37:17):
that I think it's worth at leastconsidering, right?
And so there's that thing.
I mean, I will say, too, though,that I've worked very closely
with people on the West Coastand the East Coast who have
very, very, I would consider,devout Orthodox beliefs.
wards and I've also worked withpeople in the Midwest who have
very liberal wards.
So I just don't think you can, Idon't think you can definitely

(37:40):
like narrow it down that, uh,sort of simplistically.
I will also say in the, um, inthe current culture that we are
living in, I think there is ahypersensitivity around, uh, how

(38:01):
one speaks about authority umand i am inclined to believe
it's actually more significantthan it even used to be five and
ten years ago that there issomething going on i well i have
i definitely have my theoriesbut that's for another podcast
but i think that there are thereare things going on that make uh

(38:26):
there's sensitivity aroundsaying anything or even alluding
to anything that suggests thatgeneral leadership is not right.
We can say that profits areinfallible as long as we're
very, very general about thatprinciple.
That's generally what one willsay, but as soon as we start

(38:48):
talking about a specific topic,it feels like it gets very,
very...
the energy in the air changesand it's not okay.
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (39:00):
You said infallible, but you mean fallible, right?
I'm

SPEAKER_02 (39:04):
sorry.
Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 (39:06):
We can't specifically say anything
they've done wrong.
From my experience, that's theline that I consistently draw is
that I really think that thereis a much greater latitude to
believe heretical or unorthodoxthings than people realize, but
there is much, much lesslatitude to for any criticism of

(39:29):
a specific leader than peoplerealize.
The way I put it is, I couldtalk about Heavenly Mother all
day long, but I'd get in troubleif I start talking about an
apostle who wears ugly ties.
Something really insignificant.
But just singling out a leaderfor criticism can really get you

(39:50):
into trouble.
Do you feel like that's what'sgotten you

SPEAKER_02 (39:54):
into trouble?
The answer, quite frankly, no.
And the reason why, well, I'mgoing to say yes and no.
And let me explain.
Nathan and I never talked aboutleaders disrespectfully or
critically.
That was part of my fundamentalbaseline value system is that I
truly believe that human beingsare in general are good.

(40:18):
We all are, like when I say Godloves each and every one of us
and we all get to go home, thatmeans everybody.
And I believe that people meanwell.
And therefore, I believe that ofthe leadership of this church
because they are my brothers.
I believe intent.
People try to do their best.

(40:39):
I believe people are earnest.
And so when I began thispodcast, there were a couple of
just foundational things valuesthat I rested my work on quite
intentionally and it was that Iwant to persuade with love and I
want to persuade by looking atthose who are harmed or those

(41:02):
who are wounded and I want to berespectful and I want to be
gracious and give people thebenefit of the doubt.
So We look at situations.
We look at what's going on inthe lives of people on the
ground, in the hours and hoursand hours I've spent with
people.
And then what I do is I talkabout beliefs or practices that

(41:25):
cause suffering, that causemental health issues, that cause
harm, that cause relationshipdistress, that cause
suicidality.
And so what I do is I'm lookingat actual experiences of people
and then I use myconceptualization skills to sort
of look at theology andpsychology and Christian history

(41:50):
and relationship health.
And I sort of meld thesetogether so that we can
understand what is going on andhow can we look at our own
system to help people within thesystem thrive.
And so I will look at ideas, andI will look at teachings, and I

(42:13):
will never say, this is whatneeds to happen, or this leader
does this, and shame on them,they're a bad person.
I've never done that, and Inever plan to do that moving
forward.
It's not who I am.
However, I will say, forexample, if someone is told,
that they are not allowed totake the sacraments in their

(42:36):
congregation with their partnerand children, they will feel
shame.
And shame wounds the soul.
And if one is led to believethat there is something
fundamentally wrong with themand it's a public setting, it
will hurt them.
And this is not what isconducive to leading someone who
is already suffering to healing.

(42:58):
It will hurt them more.
And so that's just one examplethat I give and that we talk
about on the podcast.
And what we do is we just lookat what is conducive to the
thriving of the soul becausehealthy psychology and healthy
theology actually go together.
And so we will talk about thesethings.
And by default, are we talkingabout theological principles

(43:23):
that are not, in my opinion, inthe keeping of the nature of
God?
The answer to that question isyes.
We will talk about that, but wenever will disrespectfully talk
about a human being or theirintent.
And I'm very careful about mytone.
I also think that tone mattersbecause I want to be a healer.
I want to persuade people tofeel that I do care about the

(43:46):
tradition that they love.
And that's one of the thingsthat I've heard over and over
again, which is I can tell youcare about the church.
But I can also tell that you arecommitted to healing and to God.
And so you're holding space forsomething that's really tricky.
And that's why I trust you.
And so I think that's sort ofthe tightrope I walk in order to

(44:08):
help people feel that they cantrust me, but also that I will
offer to them validation that ifyou're feeling pain for
something and you don't havewords for it and you don't know
why and you feel guilty orafraid to acknowledge it, I'll
go ahead and just acknowledgeit.
with you because if you'refeeling it and i'm talking about
it it's because i have workedwith people for hours and hours

(44:29):
and hours and hours who arefeeling and suffering in the
same way and so we just need tobe um in like we need to in my
opinion discipleship and evenlike the concept of like um
sustaining the church and itsleaders is about offering
informed loving feedback Whensomething isn't working and it

(44:50):
doesn't feel good, it evolvesand changes.
That's actually how systems andcountries and worlds and
churches work.
It's not that there's any needto feel shame or get defensive.
It's how we evolve as childrenof God.
We get more intel.
We see what's helping and nothelping.
We talk about it, and then wegrow.

SPEAKER_01 (45:08):
It's just fascinating.
I'm listening and hearing youfrom one perspective I have as a
bishop and a member of the statepresidency.
And I want to go back to the,just connect to the point that
Jim said about the question,what is the line?
And you've connected a lot ofdots for me from that
perspective.
And there's a few thoughts thatcome to mind.

(45:31):
If I may, I'll hazard a guess, Ithink a reliable guess as to
where and how this went wrongfor you in terms of, you know,
your situation right now wherethey, it sounds like they were,
again, correct me if I'm wrong,that there was evidence that
they were going to organize a,It used to be called a
disciplinary meeting, but amembership review meeting.

(45:51):
I just want to touch upon thatin a few minutes.
But my point is I want toconnect that up beyond
leadership roulette, because asa bishop, I could tell you that
in a state presidency, you canbe as liberal as you need to be
or can be in a stake or a ward,but at a certain point, that's
taken away from that leader.

(46:11):
I don't know if you know that,but when there's a problem, when
the problem gets big enough andthe state presidency is not
dealing with it, and the statepresident is the king, he's the
key holder, most things thathappen in units and stakes
happen at the state presidencylevel.
Anything extremely serious thatwhere the state presence is too
liberal, I could tell you thatthe leadership, the senior

(46:32):
leadership will take over andthey will release that state
present if they need to be.
I think where it went wrong isthat your podcast was
successful.
That was a problem.
You resonated and reachedthousands of people on issues
that were very, very importantto them.
Two, three, these individualswere getting an extraordinary
amount of help and benefit fromlistening to the podcast.

(46:55):
You were taking over orreplacing fundamental church
services and the professionalcounselling in the church is a
fundamental bedrock of thechurch where the see the bishop
the church controls the entireprocess and also makes the
referral to the professionalcounselor who's a active

(47:18):
upstanding member in the churchideally with the temple
recommend etc these are veryestablished very important
processes that the churchprotects and by the way when I
was interviewed called and setapart by Elder Oaks Dallin H
Oaks and Elder Cook firstquestion he asked me was have I
done anything in my, is thereanything in my history or
background that could be broughtto the service that could damage

(47:41):
the church?
Fortunately, there wasn't, butthat was the first question.
Protect the institution, protectthe policies, protect the
processes.
And I think where it started togo pear-shaped was that you were
helping thousands of people in away that the church couldn't or
wasn't able to do to the extentthat you could.

(48:02):
You were dealing with issuesthat the church doesn't want to
be public, not to a big, broaderaudience.
And you were going out there byyourself with good intent,
trying to help people, doingsomething that the church
couldn't or wouldn't do, helpingall these people.
The church felt it had nocontrol over you.
You weren't in the system, inthe process.
You weren't following the lane,if you like.

(48:25):
He felt threatened.
And when he feels threatened,especially when thousands of
people are involved and he can'tcontrol that, when he gets
threatened, and we see thatright now, the church makes a
beeline and guns for people asthey were.
I understand they were going todo that with me.
I resigned.
Fortunately, I resigned becauseI was going to resign anyhow.
But I took that power away fromhim and I made that decision.

(48:46):
Am I...
close, do you think?
Am I close to some of thereasons why you think that
happened?
And the other thing is, if wecan, before we end the podcast a
bit later, just to plant this inyour mind, I'm interested in
getting your perspective on therelationship between individual

(49:06):
personal challenges of anxietyand depression and other
personal issues that come to thebishop and the doctrine and the
policies of the church.
And I mention that right nowbecause we're coming up probably
the next 15 minutes to the hourthat we've got with you.
But I think there is acorrelation between either a
problem that's created becauseof the doctrine.
You talked about shame.

(49:27):
and guilt and the need to livewith perfection and to live this
certain standard and peoplecan't do that and therefore they
feel like a failure.
There's a doctrinalrelationship, a policy
relationship that you speak to alittle bit later.
But going back to my pointsthere, trying to connect the
dots, do you think, and beyondroulette and beyond this liberal

(49:48):
orthodox role that some leadersplay, etc., do you think I'm on
the mark there?
Do you think that those are someof the factors as to why you
took the decision to remove yourmembership, that's something you
foresaw.
Do you think I'm close or not inregards to those points?

SPEAKER_02 (50:11):
I like your analysis.
I think that's really savvy.
I hadn't thought about it thatway, but what you're saying,
like tracks, I guess where I...
The reason why I hadn't thoughtof it the way you're describing
is that you've been in all ofthese leadership callings and I
haven't, right?
I don't know how the sausage ismade exactly from a warden stake

(50:33):
level.
I will say that we didn't pursueconversation with warden stake
leaders and had no problems forthe first year and a half.
Well, I say we had no, I don'tknow what problems they were
having with us, but nobody wastalking to us.
We were at the tail end of onestate president who had been a
personal friend, and you can,there's more that I say about

(50:54):
that in the earlier, in some ofthe other, the Tribune article
and things, but by the time wehit the second, the new state
president, I think a couple offactors were at play.
First of all, I think that whenHe invited us to come in with

(51:16):
his whole state presidency andmy bishop.
We immediately were aware thatlike, OK, hmm, that's that's
irregular.
Right.
And so we knew that that wasproblematic.
And so we we started this thisseries of conversations and I
had spent the first portion ofthe time talking to my first

(51:41):
state president from a place offear.
And kind of like I'd had my handcaught in the cookie jar and I
was sort of like projecting thedisapproval that he was feeling
for me on myself.
The old, I guess the formerOrthodox version of me was
really able to take in exactlyhow I was being seen.

(52:04):
And I was feeling very defensiveand frightened because again, I
think that there's a tabooassociated with being called
into not only the principal, butlike the whole upper management
of the, you know, of theelementary school to use that
metaphor.
And so, so that was a part of itearlier on.
And then as I found my, I feellike God has like carried me in

(52:26):
the hollow of their hands asthis has unfolded because I
moved into this space ofconfidence and and of
reassurance that I will engagein conversation with these
gentlemen, and I will act as ifI am not doing anything wrong,
because the deeper into theprocess I went, the more I knew

(52:47):
I wasn't doing anything wrong.
And so I pursued conversation,and I pursued, we went as, I
don't think I've mentioned thisanywhere else, but in an effort
to support our son to go to thetemple, we went, We went all the
way up.
We talked to our Area Authority70.
We had a friend of a friend whoconnected us, at least.

(53:10):
Well, I never had a personalconversation, but those
testimonials that were read onthe first podcast the day that
we went public with thissupposedly ended up in the inbox
of one of the Twelve Apostles,who then kicked it down to a 70.
I mean, we were pursuing...
advocacy at every level ofleadership because we were doing

(53:30):
good work.
We were helping the church.
And it got kicked up and downthe hierarchy.
And soon, of course, we realizedwe have no one.
No one is going to help us.
And so what I kind of think is,and it all landed in the lap of
the God bless him.
I think he means well.

(53:51):
I truly, truly do.
And of all the gentlemen wetalked to, he did not understand
what we were experiencing, whatwe were doing.
He just didn't.
And I think sometimes whensomeone is—this circles us back
to the first part of ourconversation—when someone is
really just out of their paygrade and they're being asked to
do something and to discussissues that are just—

(54:14):
fundamentally not inside of whatthey understand.
It'd be sort of like somebodytrying to sit down with me and
ask me how to teach themcalculus.
At least I would have the wisdomto say, I don't know.
But I think these gentlemen wantto know.
They want to be able to do whatthey've been asked to do.
And so in an effort to try tomanage us, We ended up in these

(54:40):
sort of circular conversationsthat always led to follow the
prophet and covenant path.
And every time I tried to engagethem or him in anything with
even just a modicum ofcomplexity, like what's really
happening on the ground, asopposed to like sort of
theoretical ideas aboutdoctrine, it went nowhere.

(55:02):
And so I think in his effort todiligently do what he thought
was right, he saw he was, Ithink, overwhelmed.
And I think he sort of justdiminished it down to sort of
the binary black and white.
Is she, are they formallyfollowing the prophet?
And I mean, I guess one wouldhave to say under the

(55:25):
circumstances that this is not aguess, no question.
I would say, yes, we aresustaining the growth of the
church and giving information.
We are trying to help ourbrothers and sisters.
We're on the same team.
If I got a nickel for every timeI said that to a priesthood
leader in the last 18 months,quit my job.
We are on the same team.
We are helping.
We are doing good things here.
They didn't want us to do, well,let me say it differently.

(55:48):
Addressing the fact that we weredoing good things and people
were healing would require themto acknowledge that there was a
problem.
And we couldn't even get paststep A, step one, right?
And so I think what happened atthe end of the day was in their
overwhelm that it seemed veryclear to them that Valerie and

(56:09):
Nathan Hamaker were not going tostop the Latter-day Struggles
podcast.
I was respectful, but I madethat very clear.
This is a call that I havereceived.
It's a vocation.
It is my job, but it's also acall.
I feel deeply about this and I'mgoing to keep doing it.
And I'm going straight to God onthis one.
I'm not needing your validationand approval.
And I think in their effort tolike, managed something that

(56:32):
felt very overwhelming,specifically from a woman who
isn't afraid, who's treatingthem like equals, trying to be
collegial and have anegalitarian, let's have a
conversation.
It was so out of their realm.
My sense is the simplest way tomake this go away was to make us

(56:55):
go away.

SPEAKER_00 (56:58):
Do you think it would be different if you were a
man?

SPEAKER_02 (57:05):
don't know.
I don't know.
My first guess is probably not,but the sense I got, and again,
this is just my interpretation,so I maintain we can never know
what's going on in the minds ofanybody else, but the sense I
got in the interactions that wehad was that Nathan had betrayed

(57:30):
the brotherhood and I was justout of line because I was not
behaving the way a woman shouldbehave at a patriarchal system.
And so, and I will say with someof the priesthood leaders that I
worked with, I was treated veryrespectfully.
I didn't feel a sense of sort ofone down superiority.

(57:52):
I will say with one of them, Ifelt very one down as if, how
dare you?
What are you doing?
You should not, like what, likethe fact that I even, had a
voice and confidence and a senseof of who i am and what i'm
doing i i did get the feelingfrom one of them that like even
that was very off-putting forfor him and again i can't really

(58:15):
know but i'm just sensing i feellike i'm a pretty intuitive
person and some of the gentlemenwere uncomfortable but they were
very respectful and i could tellthat they i didn't feel um a
problem um around my being awoman but with with certainly
with with one i did

SPEAKER_01 (58:30):
We're coming up to the hour that we've got with
you.
We're so grateful to have youwith us.
But I want to go back to thequestion I asked earlier.
If you can just speak briefly orhowever much time you've got
between the relationship betweenthe doctrine of the church, the
policy of the church.
You spoke a bit about thepatriarchy.

(58:50):
That's the whole of theconversation that I'd love to
have with you and Jim.
But could you speak to, is therea relationship between anxiety,
depression, people's personalrelationship issues and specific
doctrine and policies.
You mentioned in the sacramentwhere people sometimes are
instructed by bishops not totake the sacrament and it's a

(59:11):
public setting and that bringsan awful lot of shame.
Can you speak to thoserelationships between doctrine
and policy and those traditions?

SPEAKER_02 (59:19):
So I think that this is a complicated phenomenon
because we all know and lovepeople who have been and are and
will continue perhaps maintain avery, very rich, positive,
life-giving relationship withthe church, this church or other

(59:41):
churches, right?
And it just, it works for them.
It's just resonant with them andthey just don't see the problem.
And when somebody else has aproblem, they can't fathom
what's going on, right?
And then I think you have otherpeople who have either other
temperaments or otherexperiences that that evoke an
enormous amount of pain andsuffering.

(01:00:03):
Anyone who has any tendenciestowards anxiety that channels
itself in any sort of like ascrupulosity or OCD sort of
thing, they're going to verylikely feel a lot of pain and
suffering in a high demandreligion that is very sort of

(01:00:24):
rules oriented and has a highmeasuring stick towards
Obedience multiplied by any kindof a God image that is scary and
punitive.
These are the kind of peoplethat are sort of set up to feel
a great deal of anxiety anddepression and just a lot of

(01:00:46):
internal agony, some of themevery day of their lives for a
very, very long time until theyunhook themselves.
from these internalized beliefsabout themselves and about God
and about sin and punishment.
And so it's interesting becauseit has a lot to do not only with
some of the doctrine, but italso has to do with the

(01:01:07):
temperament of the individuals.
Now, to set that aside, I'll sayjust a little bit about
something else that I feelpassionate about.
And you mentioned we ought tomaybe have another conversation.
So I'll just give just a tinylittle taste of what I feel.
is that I am very, veryinterested in issues of gender
and sexuality.
I feel that some of the greatestshadows that we are, I and

(01:01:31):
others that I love in this spaceare endeavoring to address is
the shadows of our issues aroundgender, sexuality, and power
here in the Church of JesusChrist of Latter-day Saints.
And it's a big one.
And it really does inform a lotof the pain and suffering that
people have if they have painand suffering connected to the

(01:01:53):
church.
And so just recently, Nathan andI really dug deeply into, and
we're still kind of doing theseseries off and on, how much
patriarchy and systems, likeformalized systems of gender
inequality harm humans.
Now, we...

(01:02:14):
talk about women's issues, and Ilove talking about women's
issues, and yet at the sametime, not very many people in
the Mormon discourse world talka lot about how men are wounded
by issues of patriarchy.
And yet they are profoundlywounded in their psychological
and spiritual development bybeing a part of a system that

(01:02:34):
teaches them from very early intheir consciousness that they
are superior to half of the, youknow, rest of the world and so
there are psychological impactsthat that women and men are
going to experience because ofthe structure and theology of

(01:02:58):
the church and again some peopleare not going to feel it very
strongly maybe they haven't beenexposed to harm as much as
others or maybe theirtemperaments are such that it
there it doesn't it doesn't umtouch them as much.
But for some, it does.

(01:03:18):
And I think in 2025, in this dayand age where we're living in a
world that is more and moreacknowledging the harm done in
systems of oppression, there aremany women and men that are
awakening to the reality thatalmost anywhere you go in the

(01:03:40):
Western world, women are treatedequally.
And people that are on a faithjourney or that are
psychologically developing, thatare working through stages of
moral development, male andfemale are interested in the
growth of the soul and inoffering flourishing

(01:04:00):
environments for others as well.
And so I definitely ampassionate about that.
And I know that that in this dayand age is, um, is again, that's
taboo and that actuallypatriarchy and structures of
power also segue themselvesright into issues of LGBTQ plus

(01:04:21):
because patriarchy teachespeople, women and men, how one
must behave to sort of, um,belong to a patriarchal system.
And so women are told how theybehave and, um, Gender and
sexual minorities also are sortof implicitly or explicitly told
what the rules of engagementare.
And anybody that transgressesthose rules will be punished.

(01:04:43):
And so that's sort of whatsystemically we are taught in a
sort of white, cisgender,heterosexual culture.
And then if you just layer ontop of that a church system that
now has endorsed it as liketheological mandate, you know,
with God's stamp of approval.
You have a petri dish for painand suffering if somebody
doesn't sort of obey the rulesof engagement according to that

(01:05:07):
system.
And so I do talk about thatbecause I care deeply about our
people.
I love my Latter-day Saintheritage people.
I am one of you, and I don'tcare what the records say.
That doesn't change.
I am...

(01:05:27):
deeply committed to doing thework of God.
And where I formally stand,honestly, I think I don't even
really think about it.
It doesn't resonate with me asfar as my feeling like I belong
or don't belong, because I thinkwhen one belongs to themselves,

(01:05:48):
they belong wherever they want.
And that's why I think I'm justas committed as ever.
I I'm just grateful that I getto do this and that I get to be
in some way instrumental inhelping my Latter-day Saint
heritage brothers and sistersfind God and find themselves and

(01:06:13):
find peace.

SPEAKER_01 (01:06:16):
Valerie, thank you so much for that.
I want to just give some time toyou, Jim.
Any closing remarks from yourexperience perspective and then
I just want to go back to youValerie as we close here I want
to ask you is there anysummarizing or final messages
that you would deliver to thefirst presidency if they were
listening to this podcast and weunderstand that Some of the

(01:06:37):
leaders of the church, perhapsnot the first presidency, do
listen to the Inside Outpodcast.
We understand from time to time,you know, what message you have
for the leadership of the churchand what they would change.
But Jim, just a minute or sowith you to provide any closing
remarks from your end.

SPEAKER_00 (01:06:54):
Well, all I want to do is thank you so much,
Valerie, for sharing all thiswith us.
I think you've given meparticularly an awful lot to
think about.
I'm going to listen to this, Ithink, multiple times because
you've said so many things thatare so insightful and that have
sort of given me a differentperspective on some of these
issues that I really want torevisit it and think it through.

(01:07:16):
But I am just so grateful thatyou're out there I'm so grateful
that you feel called to do thisand that you are doing this
because I think you are blessedmore lives than you could
possibly know.
And so I just...
I'm sorry that this has beenwhatever the circumstance is.

(01:07:37):
It still seems quiteheartbreaking to me.
But I just want you to knowthat...
Certainly, I appreciate whatyou're doing.
I think there are many of usthat are still in the church
that very much appreciate whatyou're doing.
And I hope you are able tocontinue doing it for a very,
very long time.

SPEAKER_02 (01:07:57):
Thank you very much.

SPEAKER_01 (01:08:00):
Thank you, Jim.
Valerie, I echo what Jim said.
I won't add to that.
It's how I feel.
I've learned so much from you.
Even if we weren't, we were justhaving the three of us having a
conversation.
I've learned so much from you.
You're an extraordinary,courageous, incredibly
insightful woman and individualand professional counselor
helping so many people.
Don't stop, even though you'renot Remember, that makes no

(01:08:23):
difference whatsoever.
That does not define you, doesnot control you.
You are an extraordinaryindividual helping so many
people.
Don't stop.
Keep helping people.
I know you will.
I know you will continue to dothat.
Any final comments, messagesthat you want to share,
including what would you tellthe leadership of the church to
do differently?

SPEAKER_02 (01:08:43):
I think if I had just one thing to say...
I think what I would want tocommunicate is that there's
nothing wrong with needing toevolve.
And I've given this so muchthought because it's the same

(01:09:08):
with individuals as it is withsystems, which is that when one
knows at their core that they'regood, They don't have a problem
or they don't feel afraid orshame or anger or threat when
they receive feedback thatevolution is important and

(01:09:31):
necessary.
And to the degree that one feelsshame or feels that there's
something scary that needs to behidden, it is then that they
become afraid and aggressive.
What I would love for them toknow is that it's okay to be

(01:09:54):
messy.
It's okay for a human or achurch system to have messy, to
not have it all figured out, tonot have the perfect theology or
the pristine history.
It's okay to acknowledge that weare all growing together.

(01:10:16):
And if we truly believe, this isthe thing, it's built into our
theology.
We believe in this concept ofrestoration.
If we could just allow ourselvesto look at ourselves and say,
hmm, we used to do it this way.
It hurts people.
Let's look at it.

(01:10:37):
Let's take some feedback fromthe smart people all around us
and from their experiences andfrom their suffering and from
you know, the successes and thefailures of the system.
And let's just take all of thisin and collaboratively grow
together so that we can trulysupport individuals and
families.

(01:10:58):
And I think if that mentalitywere embraced, then this
wouldn't be a threat and itwouldn't be so scary because I
think when we are afraid, that'swhen we act aggressively.
But if we have no fear becausewe know who we are and we know
we're good as a church or ahuman, then we just let things

(01:11:18):
come in and we learn and we growand we collaborate.
And then violent situations likewhat Nathan and I have been
through would never happen.

SPEAKER_01 (01:11:27):
Jim, thank you.
Valerie, thank you.

SPEAKER_02 (01:11:32):
You're welcome.

SPEAKER_00 (01:11:33):
Thank you very much, Valerie.
And thank you, Ian.

UNKNOWN (01:11:36):
Thank you.