Ryan Gardner

Briggs
English 2010; T, R 1:00
March 15, 2015
The God Complex
A Memoir

18 May, 2011. Before entering the Latter-day Saint, Bountiful, Utah,

temple, the most serious and monumental moment in a young Mormons
life. This picture was taken before my waltz with Satan or was it the
tango?

The most severe battles that I have read about tend to have been civil, just as the most severe
battles the person experiences are often internal. Religion rages a spiritual warfare in many people. The
Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition, the French Wars of Religion, the Thirty Years War, and even the United
States Revolutionary War were battles carried out by religious beliefs. The Arabic word jihad means
struggle. The September 11 attacks in New York City have been seen, by radical Islamists, as a jihad
against the Great Satan America. The internal battles that a person undoubtedly experiences at least
once in their lifetime on this lonely planet are emotionally brutal. My experiences with religion have not
been very benefitting as far as I can tell. One thing that I must owe to religion is that it has given me the
sense of responsibility to be informed, educated, and skeptical. And this is how my journey goes:

I am standing atop a small hill overlooking the puny hamlet of Ganado, Arizona. The cloudless
cerulean skies give me a sense of awe. All it takes is a glide of the eyes downward to the adjacent mesa to
notice my current residence to bring me back to reality remembering that the Navajo Indian Reservation
is no place that a bilagana (white man) can comfortably call home. The red mesas are a beautiful sight to
behold, especially with the darker vegetation bringing contrast to the scene. I see four buildings in the
distance: the gas station, the post office across the way, the Hubbell Trading Post, and the small Mormon
chapel where my home (a trailer) is situated in the parking lot. All four of these buildings are right off
highway 264 which divides the landscape in two for as far as the unwilling eye can see. In fact, you could
watch your dog run away for a week out here theres nothing better to do.
My black missionary badge sparkles with pride. I am on the Lords errand, we missionaries
constantly remind ourselves. We bolster our humility by reminding ourselves that our authority is above
that of kings of the earth a quote from the Mormon apostle, Elder Bruce R. McConkie, which we
recite every Thursday at our weekly missionary meetings.
Today is Thursday. My companion, Elder Andrew Blakely from Woodbridge, Virginia, has lived
here in Ganado for only a month longer than I have. Our shirts are worn yellow. My lovely red-and-white
striped tie is stained with spaghetti sauce this is my candy cane tie, my favorite tie. My shoes are
battered. My beautiful baby-bottom-soft hands have callused over from chopping our firewood everyday.
And Im not quite sure which glistens more in the brilliant almost harsh sun, our badges or our moist skin.
Much more to the immediate point, I am standing atop of the hill desperate for a sign from heaven.
Why am I out here? I ask Elder Blakely.
Why am I out here? he repeated, running his hands through his thick black hair. The length of
his hair is a sign we have loosened our obedience to all of the rules of being a Mormon missionary. It

wasnt too long, but what the Latter-day Saint (LDS) Church calls long is something a hippie would
frown upon.
My religious beliefs hang by a thread. And that thread has a name: Duty. The landscape does not
provide the reinforcement I am looking for. Duty is laying out in the sun everyday and she is withering
dry. It is the duty of every worthy young male to go on a mission for the Mormon Church.
We signed up for this, I replied to my friend. This served as a quick reminder to my own
question. Elder Blakely would become more intimately known as Andy as the years pass by. Our
friendship still holds strong. Neither of us knew what we were getting ourselves into signing our lives
over for two years for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Elder Blakely simply turned to our
Chevy Colorado and hopped in. I followed. The truck is actually white when its not bathed in mud.
We make our way down the hill, bruising our hindquarters from the rugged dirt roads, and get on
the 264 eastbound to get to Barbara Yazzies hogan. We met Barbara when we were hogan hunting, our
quite literal name for knocking doors. Her hogan is a humble little hut. Its walls are bare plywood. Its
roof

is

held

cinderblocks.
middle

by

And it is in the
of

in the middle of
sagebrush.

down

nowhere, except
a

bunch

of

Barbara Yazzies hogan. This picture is rather generous to both the hut
and the reflection of my white shirt.

We taught Ms. Yazzie that day about the Book of Mormon, the distinguishing text of the LDS
Church. I cannot pretend to remember everything about that day. However, I do feel certain enough to say
that teaching Mormon doctrine day after day to as many people as possible, I was seriously considering
snipping Duty once and for all. I felt this way after seeing the glimmer of hope in Ms. Yazzie s eyes after
hearing our message.
But heres the dilemma: I didnt even know if I believed in what I was saying myself. Am I giving
her false hope? Am I telling her its okay to be content with minimalism and that it will all be okay in the
end? I could put on a nice smile and represent the Mormon church to the best of my abilities though.
I baptized Ms. Yazzie one month later.
Some of the darkest times of my life are sealed within that wretched little hamlet, Ganado. The
skies would blacken with the monsoon season. The snow would freeze the clay roads. The cold wasn t
due to the wind, but the loneliness. I checked at the post office everyday in high hopes for a letter from
someone anyone. I got used to not hearing from anybody as often as I would have liked. Though, Kee
Curley called us to a local hospital to give him a blessing on Christmas Eve of 2011. He died that night. I
am selfishly adding that Elder Blakely and I both were both overtaken by some serious symptoms of
simultaneously vomiting and diarrhea the next day. It was a race to the bathroom. Thank Zeus the bathtub
was right next to the toilet.
But I digress. Im not done with death.

Kurt Tsosie was found burnt alive in his car out in a small town near Ganado called Kaibeto. It
was an alleged murder. We tried to comfort his family, but they wouldnt have it. They cursed us and we
never saw them again after the funeral.
Mr. McCabe was found dead in early January, 2012. Drunk, McCabe passed out on the side of his
hogan and froze to death. His brother, Jerry McCabe a member of the leadership council of the church,
a man I knew well was devastated. We suspected he turned to alcohol to cope.
I dont know what it is about the Navajo Indian Reservation, but death runs without a leash down
there.
I became intimate with that hill. Its where I pondered things such as religion, politics, education,
and the quality of life. I was surrounded by what I knew I didnt want in life. So how do I avoid this type
of lifestyle? I worked out that it was education that brought quality when I was about ten. I didnt practice
that maxim until college, regretfully. But standing in the midst of poverty, sickness, and drunkards (such
is the life of a missionary. This is not exclusive to the Navajo Indian Reservation), was your proverbial
whack! over the head with a two-by-four. Education was something to be valued. It is a privilege. I had
the opportunity of driving back down that hill, find a Quran, and read that puppy. Albeit, there wasnt
many places near by to find any books, let alone the Quran, so it took me a couple of months to get a hold
of my first copy. But I wanted to learn as much as I possibly could. What better time to learn all you can
about religion than on a religious errand?
The pain of being away from friends, family, and the familiarities of my personal life never went
away. But reading numbed the pain. Theres a difference between reading while sitting back with a nice
cup of coffee in your recliner, or in the atmosphere of a school library, and reading in the presence of
fundamentally a third world country and being involved in such communities at that. It does a couple
of things for the reader: 1) You get really good at becoming entranced in whatever world you re reading

about, and 2) It makes you want to excel in your endeavors. I read as much as I possibly could. I learned
to take good notes. I learned to decipher words and their meanings. I learned to be excited about cracking
open a book called The Origin of Species. I read the United States Constitution and the Declaration of
Independence. I confirmed in my mind that knowledge is indeed power. To obtain lasting knowledge, I
couldnt half-ass things anymore, like I did in high school.

Farmington, New MexicoThe night before I left to return home from

my LDS mission.
Myself,

From left to right:

,

And there it was.

I dont know what Im doing out here. Ive seen things I cant erase from my memories. Ive felt
things I cant forget. I have no friends. I miss you mom. These stubby sentences were the last words
written in my journal before returning home early from my mission. I snipped Duty. It was the scariest
thing I have ever done. Some regretful choices were made in my darkest of days. These decisions cost me
friends and, yes, family.

Leaving the flock here in Utah is committing social suicide in your small sphere of
acquaintances. There are many flocks around the world. My experience is not unique; in fact, even
dismal in comparison to some societies. For a Christian society, Utahn culture is pretty brutal for those
who are deemed the black sheep. And thats what I was. I officially left the LDS Church. I couldnt
commit to something that I didnt believe in any longer. How could I? How could anyone? As this was the
scariest thing Id ever done, it was
equally painful. I grew up with this
tradition. Abandoning it was a difficult
decision, but one that had to be made.

1 June, 2014Frary Peak, Antelope Island. Photo courtesy: My best

friend, Rachel Tanner.

I am sitting on Frary Peak, the

highest point of Antelope Island in the
Great Salt Lake. Before me is the
blinding fiery orb sinking behind the
western horizon. The threads of light
spread across the horizon, dyeing the sky a mixture of orange, red, yellow, and blue hues. The ripples in
the lake below me bring the most calming sensation. I can feel a light breeze upon my face. The chirping
of birds signal that the end of the day is near. A small snake slithers by me below the jagged rock I am
perched upon. I am here to take pictures of what would be the most impressionable sunset I can
remember.
It is in this peaceful environment that I realized the beauty of nature. I felt appreciation flush
through my heart. It is this, nature, the beauty of our universe, that I felt a sense of commitment to. A

commitment to learn about the mechanics and the journey that it is to learn of the workings of our world.
I knew at that time, at one of the most peaceful experiences I have felt, that I wanted to commit myself to
science. There is so much beauty, especially before me at that very moment, to see, feel, hear, touch, (I
suppose taste, if you take to the taste of dirt), and most of all, understand. I felt the release of the spiritual
tension in my mind to let go of the things that cannot be known and to cling to what can be known and
appreciated. There is too much of nature and reality to admire before I return to concerning myself with
metaphysics.
Watching as the last of the suns desperate rays try to stay afloat and sinking behind the
silhouetted mountains, I turn behind me to the east to see the lofty Wasatch mountain range and the
stretching cities which hug its feet. The twinkling lights glimmer in the distance. There, across the lake,
lies a unique civilization embedded in a bowl of mountains. In societies such as the one before me, I think
to myself, lies a turbulent conflict between science and religion. In the midst of those lights lives
someone like me who feels like theyve mingled with the forbidden Capulet family. Maybe they feel that
theyve entertained the Dark Side of the Force. Undoubtedly, they are in the minority. But thankfully they
have a Constitution which governs the country in which they live protecting their rights as a minority.
It is now getting dark and I still have to hike down to my car. But the engaging thought process
sent me back to my little hill in Ganado. I began thinking about politics again: the freedoms of the
peoples of my country, the religious conflicts in society, and the hand that religion casts into the education
system. These concerns occupied my thoughts the entire drive home. But what impressed upon my mind
all the more was the beauty and treasures that await me in science. I can simply stand in wonder of a
sunset, or I can marvel and understand the workings of what is happening before me. I choose the latter.
The most important thing I took from the island that night was that an understanding of science
and its espoused method can rid the world of a lot of problems. Nature undercuts all deceit and any lies.
The scientific method is a method that is fool proof, one that allows for an understanding of nature.

As I drive across the causeway to the mainland, one quote from an Oxford evolutionary biologist,
Dr. Richard Dawkins, comes to mind, It [science] works. Planes fly. Cars drive. Computers compute.
When you base medicine on science you cure people. If you base the design of a plane on science you fly.
If you base the design of a rocket on science you reach the moon. It works. I couldn't think of a better
thing to dedicate my life to.
Gripping the steering wheel, coasting along in silence, it seemed awfully strange to me that
people would want to eradicate the teaching of scientific discoveries, like evolution, in schools. It was a
strange thought that people wanted to implement religion more and more into the public school system. It
seemed strange to me that people wanted to wholly involve religion in the politics of our country. These
notions seemed dangerous, especially if applied on a large scale.
My journey with religion, science, and the social sphere of Utah has no doubt been painful. But I
have found peace and solace in taking the effort to expand my knowledge of the world I live in. I can
better my life, and the lives of those around me. It may seem trite: but I can make a difference.
This realization has impacted my life tremendously and has sparked a flame to push myself in
whatever I put my shoulder to. I have decided to major in physics and mathematics, and this is a large feat
to accomplish, especially for myself. But I have the right mindset to accomplish such a task. This mindset
was

contemplated

and realized in

the

unlikely

places: On a hill

of

most

in the middle of

the

Indian

Reservation

while

serving

Navajo

time as an LDS

missionary.

The hill.