West Point Mormon Questions Church & Military Service - Austin Wheeler | Ep. 1987
Mormon Stories Podcast
Dr. John Dehlin
4.5 • 5.7K Ratings
🗓️ 27 January 2025
⏱️ 238 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Austin Wheeler shares his personal journey navigating Mormonism, military culture, and faith deconstruction. He recounts growing up in the church, his early experiences with trauma, and how Mormonism influenced his views on violence and masculinity. After a series of life events—ranging from military service at West Point to his mission in Taiwan—he confronts the toxic elements of both the military and the church, including dehumanization and harmful beliefs. Ultimately, he reflects on how his experiences shaped his disillusionment with Mormonism, his struggles with identity, and the deep questions about purpose and meaning that arose as a result.
00:01:55 Introductions
00:08:55 His parents divorced when he was in seventh grade
00:10:00 He was sexually assaulted by a ward member and doubled down in his belief
00:31:00 How his High School shaped his identity
00:42:15 Prepper culture associated with the military culture
00:58:55 The Mormon culture is that they are going to build you in OUR image
01:20:00 Experiences at the Mormon Singles Ward
01:23:37 Called to the Tawaiian mission
01:36:00 He started a fight club in the MTC
01:45:00 Mormon culture makes a lot of people weird
01:50:35 His mission president thought he was sick because he had sinned
01:53:15 They sent him home for worthiness reasons, not because he was sick
02:03:45 He went back on his mission
02:24:00 Meeting his wife
02:42:00 Authority and obedience in the church and in the military
02:56:20 Opening his mind to the reality that the church had a lot of shortcomings
03:07:10 How did his military career end?
03:19:45 How did his military service end?
03:27:35 Because he was never deployed is he happy or sad? Broken or healed?
03:36:35 If you want to connect with people who have been in the military
03:48:30 Nihilistic views and the emptiness of existence
03:53:20 Final thoughts
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello everyone and welcome to another show Mormon stories podcast. I'm your host John DeLinn. It's |
| 0:04.9 | January 15th, 2025. And today we are continuing our series on Mormon stories about Mormons in the military. |
| 0:14.1 | We are super excited to have with us in studio, Austin Wheeler. Hey, Austin. Hey, how you doing, John? So glad you |
| 0:20.5 | could join us. Austin served |
| 0:22.9 | full-time in the military for about six and a half years, including attending West Point. He was in the Army. |
| 0:30.6 | He also wants to share his perspective on, you know, Christianity, Mormonism, military service, you know, issues like violence, but also, you know, Christian nationalism. |
| 0:45.5 | And I assume kind of the Desnat culture, but also just, you know, modern themes around aggression and violence and that sort of thing. |
| 0:58.7 | And there's also many traditional themes around faith and, you know, Mormon church culture, etc. |
| 1:07.9 | So you're in for a real treat today. |
| 1:14.4 | There's also, just as a trigger warning, there's also some themes of abuse in this story. And it's going to be a great episode. I've got Margie here |
| 1:21.3 | with me in studio. Hey, Margie. Hi, Margie. And we're ready to roll. So, Austin, did I forget |
| 1:26.6 | anything in the intro in terms of major themes? |
| 1:29.3 | No, no. |
| 1:30.2 | Anything to clarify, I'm sure I'll do as I'm talking through the story. |
| 1:35.6 | Okay. |
| 1:36.1 | All right. |
| 1:37.3 | We were asking you right before, kind of if there were any specific interviews on Mormon Stories podcast that made you interested in applying. |
| 1:47.0 | And if I remember right, you mentioned specifically the Paul brothers. |
| 1:51.0 | You kind of had some strong feelings around that interview, specifically when I asked them |
| 1:58.0 | the question about Christian nationalism. |
| 2:00.0 | And then you also mentioned growing up with Jesse Hildebrand. |
| 2:05.1 | And so that also was influential to you. |
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