10 Celebrities Who Grew Up Mormon

Quite a few celebrities have revealed that they were raised in a devout Mormon household, where they were taught to abstain from many things seen as sinful, like alcohol, tobacco, drugs and same-sex relationships. While most of these stars have now taken different paths and left those beliefs in the past, they still view their Mormon upbringing as an important part of who they are.

Find out what these stars had to say about their Mormon childhood…

Amy Adams was raised in the Mormon church until her parents got divorced when she was 11-years-old. Looking back, Amy says she was too young when they left to have really developed a “strong religious pull towards the church” and for her, it felt more like they were leaving a community.

“I grew up as a Mormon and that had more of an impact on my values than my beliefs,” she told The Telegraph. “I’m afraid I will always feel the weight of a lie. I’m very hard on myself anyway. Religious guilt carries over, too. You can’t really misbehave without feeling badly about it — at least I can’t…What I still feel and rely on from that kind of teaching, is how you can bring a lot of joy to the people around you by being positive and hopeful.”

Musician Benson Boone grew up as a part of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints but admits he never really resonated with the religion. Looking back on his younger years, he says he never had the same experiences as other people in the church.

“Growing up, a lot of people at church would talk about these experiences that they’ve had and these personal revelations and feelings and voices,” he told Rolling Stone. “I never felt it as physically present as they did, and so I was always confused and frustrated. I was always scared to bring that up to people because I just didn’t want to accept that, like, I wasn’t feeling what everyone else was feeling.”

Benson admits that he struggled with his thoughts until finally opening up to a friend who actually felt the same way. He now doesn’t want to be limited to just one religion and has his “own opinions” gathered from various religions and beliefs.

Katherine Heigl was raised Mormon while growing up in Connecticut. Looking back, she says her parents found the religion while they were dealing with the loss of her older brother, who was killed in a car accident. Katherine was just seven-years-old at the time her parents converted and has positive memories of the church. While she no longer considers herself a part of religion, she brought some practices into her adult life, like her decision not to live with her husband Josh Kelley before they got married.

“That [Mormon] structure and discipline was really good for me,” she told Good Housekeeping. “I had a childhood that was a childhood. I listened to my parents. I respected the rules.”

When Jewel was born in 1974, her parents were practicing Mormons and her father Antz was attending Brigham Young University. After graduation, the family moved to Alaska and Jewel was raised in a religious household until her parents divorced when she was eight-years-old. After her mother moved away from the family, her father was left to raise Jewel and her two brothers, and things changed drastically. When Antz eventually got another woman pregnant out of wedlock, he was excommunicated from the church.

“I grew up in a very traditional Mormon family. But everything changed when my mom left. My dad started drinking and being physically abusive, so like hitting us, and that’s what caused me to move out [at 15],” she told People. “He was in a lot of rage and a lot of yelling.”

David Archuleta grew up in Utah and was a part of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He even took a hiatus from the music industry to go on a mission trip to Chile. But as an adult, David says he began to have a “faith crisis” while figuring out his sexuality and his involvement in the church — and it led to depression and suicidal thoughts.

“In the church, they say homosexuality is a sin, it’s of the devil. I would think, ‘Oh, my gosh, I don’t want to be of the devil. So let me keep praying and fasting and trying to be obedient,” he told NBC News. “I thought ending my life would be better than becoming evil for allowing myself to fall in love with the same sex.”

Shortly after coming out as queer, David began the process of trying to reconcile his identity with the church’s beliefs. After having many conversations with church leaders about religion’s views on the LGBTQ community, he and his mother eventually decided to leave in 2022.

“Now, I just want to show people that I left the church and I’m happy,” David said. “A lot of times, when you’re in a more closed-off community, people try to make you feel like if you leave, you’re not going to be happy. But I’m happier where I am. I’m a lot happier.”

Ryan Gosling was raised in a small town in Canada and his family were practicing Mormons. In the early 2000s, Ryan called himself “religious but nondenominational” and acknowledged that being Mormons was still a great sense of pride for his mother and sister. But looking back later in life, Ryan shared that his family were not as devout as they used to be.

“We were brought up pretty religious,” he told The Guardian. “My mother admits it. She says, ‘You were raised by a religious zealot.’ She’s different now, but at the time, it was a part of everything – what they ate, how they thought.”

Siblings Derek and Julianne Hough, along with many other Dancing With The Stars pros, were raised in Utah as a part of the Mormon faith. While Derek and Julianne are no longer practicing Mormons, Julianne looks back fondly on that time in her life. She says she remembers family nights and spending time with the many other children who were part of the church.

“It is what it was. I didn’t know any different. I loved the social aspect, that was kind of how I was known as a kid — going into church and sitting on everybody’s lap and giving everybody hugs at, like, three. I was the little greeter,” she shared on the Armchair Expert podcast.

Julianne added that she recalls downsides to the religion as well, including the overarching strive for perfectionism. Women in particular were made to “follow the rules and obey and do everything” to make sure that your “family is the best and most perfect so that you can serve God and your husband because he’s the one in charge of providing.” Julianne eventually left the religion.

Eliza Dushku grew up in the Mormon church where politician Mitt Romney actually served as her bishop. As of 2012, she says she doesn’t consider herself to be “very Mormon,” particularly because of the religion’s stance on the LGBTQ+ community — but she is grateful for her upbringing in the church.

“There will always be that part of me that’s Mormon,” she told The Salt Lake Tribune.

Panic! at the Disco frontman Brendon Urie was raised in “a very, very strictly religious household” as part of the Mormon faith but began rebelling when he was a teenager. Looking back, he says he had to sit down with his parents when he was 16 and tell them that he had been going wild without their knowledge — partying, doing drugs and going to strip clubs. While he walked away from the faith, he says there “is so much instilled in [him] from growing up Mormon” and it still influences his music.

“I still use a lot of good values from growing up in the Church, and there was a sense of community. But you were also being heavily judged by people that wanted to look down on you for not being as great as they are,” Brendon said. “And that’s not the sense I get when I’m touring and just in music in general. So meeting fans and interacting with other bands has become a new religion to me, one that’s overwhelmingly beautiful and enlightening.”

Imagine Dragons singer Dan Reynolds grew up in a “really conservative” Mormon household. He even attended Brigham Young University and served a mission in Omaha, Nebraska. But he no longer considers himself a part of the Mormon faith and admits that he “always struggled” with religion. Looking back, he says he spent his 20s and early 30s “really angry” at religion, as he felt he’d “been duped.”

“There’s obviously parts of the Mormon religion that I feel pretty strongly are harmful, especially to our gay youth,” he told People. “At times I feel pretty isolated from my family, but I also love them and am close to them and see them, and there’s no animosity there. I’m on a different path. I have to love myself enough to follow my truth.”

He continued, “[I] saw a lot of the harm that came from it for me personally, but it also seemed to work incredibly well for my family, and they’re all healthy, happy individuals. As I’ve gotten older, I’m not angry about it anymore. If something works for someone, that’s really wonderful and rare, and I don’t want to mess with it.”