We were ‘serving our own people’ — Popular podcasters explain why they left an LDS Church they love

Valerie and Nathan Hamaker wanted to help fellow members grappling with their faith and their place in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

So Valerie, a mental health counselor in Kansas City, Missouri, and Nathan launched a podcast, called “Latter Day Struggles,” to address some of their issues and find peace.

Their show drew wide appeal and came to the attention of their local Latter-day Saint leaders. After numerous conversations, they say, those lay leaders summoned the couple to a disciplinary council. Expecting to be formally tossed out of the faith, the Hamakers instead chose to resign their membership.

Since news of their resignation became public, the Hamakers have heard from thousands of friends and supporters.

Here are lightly edited excerpts from The Salt Lake Tribune’s “Mormon Land” podcast in which the couple share their experience, their interactions in their congregation, their views of church discipline, their decision to leave, their efforts to help fellow Latter-day Saints, and whether they would consider rejoining the fold when their local leadership changes.

Why did you focus your practice on Latter-day Saints?

Valerie • There are not a lot of mental health counselors in my demographic. When I graduated and started my practice, I was heavily referred through LDS Family Services. We do this because we have a profound loyalty and love for our faith and for our people. I was starting to see patterns, and people in a lot of pain, and as much as I didn’t want to admit it, earlier in my faith journey, I could see that the trends were such that they were related to their faith. So it was the most ethical thing to do to address candidly and respectfully what is actually going on to help our people heal and, in so doing, to offer feedback publicly about what I think could help us all, as a tradition, understand ourselves better.

Therapists can’t really dictate to clients what they should do about their crises, right? What do you do if people ask you, “Should I stay in the church”?

Valerie • I’m so glad you asked it because that is actually probably the driving force behind where we find ourselves right now. As a professional, I was being put in a position consistently to where I was being instructed, directly and otherwise, that I needed to tell everybody on the podcast, who are not obviously my clients, to follow the prophet. [Local Latter-day Saint leaders] seemed to be OK if I practiced what was comfortable for me as a mental health worker in private. Nathan and I, we took exception to that. …I will never tell somebody how to live their lives, what to practice, how to govern themselves, how to stay or whether to leave anything, a relationship, a church or otherwise. One of the reasons the “Latter Day Struggles” platform is thriving is because we offer people their autonomy and we trust them and help them learn how to trust themselves as spiritual beings. We respect where they choose to go as they become healthy, whether it be affiliated and attending or distancing themselves or disaffiliating.

Nathan • Mental health professionals throughout the church are either leaving on their own accord or being driven out because leaders of the church are treating them as if they were supposed to be like bishops, telling people to keep their covenants, obey the commandments, stay in their lanes. Mental health professionals are not bishops. One of the leaders who interviewed us before we got our invitation to the [disciplinary council] said to Valerie, “Look, show me a podcast where you tell people to stay in the church, and that will be very helpful.” And Valerie said, “I can’t have a podcast that tells people to stay in the church. I don’t have a podcast that tells people to leave the church. I have a podcast that presents mental health issues, and I invite people to make that choice for themselves.” So the leaders get very confused by this. I have grace for them because they haven’t been through mental health training. In their minds, they don’t know the difference between a spiritual guide and a mental health counselor.

How do you see the podcast relative to others that deal with faith crises like John Dehlin’s “Mormon Stories”?

Nathan • We try to focus on what we’re for, what we would like to see happen. We’re not trying to criticize or tear down or destroy anybody’s faith or anybody’s belief system, but rather focus on where do we go from here? Like, how can we be more inclusive of our women? How can we be more inclusive of our LGBTQ individuals? How can we keep this younger generation in the church without pointing fingers or saying, “Gosh, we did all this wrong.”

Was there any particular thing you said or did on the podcast that triggered the church action, or was it an ongoing conversation?

Valerie • I don’t think it was one thing. I think it was an accumulation of our having a lot of independent thoughts and them not liking that. … We are not going to ever say something like “women need to have the priesthood.” That’s never left my mouth. What we will do, however, is a deep dive into what happens in a marriage that is born of inequality and what goes on there at all of the various levels of development. We will walk people through the psychological and spiritual harm that comes from practices that are not good for the soul, good for the relationship or good for the growth of human beings.

Nathan • We went into the bishop’s office together to get a temple recommend interview, and he specifically cited a couple of podcasts where we had been talking about our concerns with the church’s Securities and Exchange Commission scandal, and what we thought was kind of a lack of accountability. …We said in that podcast that Valerie and I believe that God’s church is made up of all good organizations and all good people across the planet, and that, at least for a while, until the church is more accountable, we choose to pay our tithing to other worthy organizations that are still blessing God’s children in meaningful ways across the world. And that didn’t sit well with our bishop, and he specifically cited that.

Ultimately, it was your decision to resign. Is it correct to say you were forced out? Why not make the leaders make that call?

Nathan • It’s a great question. For one thing, the leaders already had been given a chance to make that call. I had multiple meetings with both the bishop and the stake [regional] president where they said to me, ‘We’re just trying to learn your heart. We want to see where your heart is. We haven’t made any decisions about a disciplinary council.” And so Valerie had a couple of meetings. We’d met with bishops. We’d met with the prior stake president. So for one thing, there was nothing left to discuss. There wasn’t going to be a new piece of information.

Valerie • I felt strongly that it was an exploitation of power for them to be dictating for me how I was to practice my own profession. I never practiced against my ethics. I did not do it on church property. I did not do it on a Sunday morning at church. And, furthermore, I couldn’t tell them in enough different ways that what I was doing actually was serving the very church that they were trying to protect and so that, to me, was problematic to stand before 15 men and try, once again, to explain I am on your side. I care about this church. It is because I care about this church that I am doing this. I am serving our own people. … Nathan and I, quite frankly, don’t give them the power to judge us.

Your issue seems to be with your local leaders. When they are replaced, would you consider rejoining?

Nathan • I’ll answer for myself, and the answer is yes. There are things about the church that I really love. All of our families on both sides are still very active in the church. If we found ourselves in an environment where there were people who were more understanding and would look at us and say, “Yeah, I don’t think that you’ve committed apostasy,” I personally would consider coming back.

Valerie • I think I would, too, if I was allowed to live in my integrity. I refuse to enter back into a situation where I feel as if I am being censored or edited. Because what I do and who I am and how I serve God is very important to me, and I will not put myself in a position where someone can tell me who I need to be and how I need to be in relationship with God. And so if we can come into a place where everyone who matters is respectful of that, and I can be fully who I am, then I will. And if that doesn’t happen, the fact of the matter is, I am a Mormon in my DNA, and I don’t feel very different just because somebody pushed a button on South Temple. That really doesn’t actually change very much about who I am, what I stand for, and how I see myself in the world.

To hear the full podcast, go to sltrib.com/podcasts/mormonland. To receive full “Mormon Land” transcripts, along with our complete newsletter and access to all Tribune religion content, support us at Patreon.com/mormonland.

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