Episode 393: Leaving the LDS Church | feat. Kighley Medrano

When Kighley Medrano's six-year-old daughter asked if the family could attend church with dad instead of mom one Sunday, Kighley agreed — she had always wanted her children to choose their faith freely, not feel forced into it like she had. That Sunday, the sermon at Harris Creek was about Kobe Bryant's death and the online debate over whether he was a Christian. Kighley left the auditorium feeling "like crap." She had no idea that within a week, everything she believed would unravel.

Growing Up Mormon in East Texas

Kighley was raised in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Gilmer, East Texas — a pocket of the state with a significant LDS community. She grew up thinking everyone was Mormon. She didn't realize other Bibles were thinner until she saw one and asked, "Why are y'all's scriptures so skinny?" Her mother took the family to church every Sunday and to seminary classes in the mornings. The goal of Mormonism, Kighley explains, is to be "sealed in the temple to your family for time and all eternity" — a ritual that requires a temple recommend, which in turn requires obeying the "word of wisdom" (no tea, coffee, alcohol, or drugs) and passing worthiness interviews.