No longer a cult, but still dysfunctional

[Guest]

The Church's road out of being America's largest home-grown cult has been long and dark. Mainstreaming has come slowly, a piece at a time, the way a tree grows so slowly you don't notice it until one day it starts providing some shade.

Still, the church remains a deeply dysfunctional organization. It continues to inflict psychological damage upon its members, especially upon women and minorities. Utah leads the nation in depression. The unhealthy culture of perfectionism takes its hardest role on women, who are told from childhood that they have no other spiritually important role in life beyond being mothers/homemakers. When you have only one mission in life, the impact of the smallest failure in that mission is magnified. Not all women thrive as homemakers either, but feel pressure to conform even though their talents lie elsewhere. This can lead to bitterness and regret later in life. And god help the woman who is infertile. Every lesson on motherhood, and especially Mother's Day church services, becomes a living hell.

Members are told that they are superior to the rest of the world, and yet paradoxically nothing they do is ever good enough. The standard is perfection, and no one can meet it. Members are put under a heavy burden of guilt and shame for normal and often trivial human failings.

The damage inflicted on members of color is probably even greater. Most of the core racist teachings of the church through most of its existence have never been officially denounced, only quietly de-emphasized. The church leadership never apologizes, never admits error. Criticism, no matter how constructive, is never tolerated. Questioning doctrines too loudly will jeopardize your membership.

Technically the legal body of the church is a corporation - there is no actual church called The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It's the Corporation of the President, a corporation sole. Signs of a dysfunctional corporation include:

http://www.iim-edu.org/dysfunctionallea ... /index.htm

Dictatorial Leadership: Management that does not allow disagreements out of insecurity or arrogance.

No 360 Degrees Feedback: There is limited or no leadership performance feedback.

Personal Agendas: Recruitments, selections and promotions are based on internal political agenda, for example hiring friends to guarantee personal loyalty at the expense of other highly performing and more-qualified employees.

Probably the biggest deterrents to healthy change in the LDS corporation are the absolute control of the leaders over the corporation, and the complete shutdown of all feedback and criticism. As long as these unhealthy practices continue, the church will continue to improve only marginally at a slow rate - perhaps not quickly enough to stave off stagnation.

[_Tchild]

Great points all Buffalo.

I consider the church's puritanical and extremely unhealthy attitudes toward's normal and natural human sexuality to be its most dysfunctional aspect.

When women fall on the floor sobbing and crying, believing their whole world has ended because a husband has looked at porn, there is a dysfunction that needs serious attention.

[_Buffalo]

Great points all Buffalo.

I consider the church's puritanical and extremely unhealthy attitudes toward's normal and natural human sexuality to be its most dysfunctional aspect.

When women fall on the floor sobbing and crying, believing their whole world has ended because a husband has looked at porn, there is a dysfunction that needs serious attention.

Agreed. The church has a very unhealthy relationship with normal human sexuality. I remember during my honeymoon both my wife and I felt guilty after having sex (vanilla Mormon-approved sex). It had been drilled into our heads all our lives that sex is just a step down from murder.

[_stemelbow]

The Church's road out of being America's largest home-grown cult has been long and dark. Mainstreaming has come slowly, a piece at a time, the way a tree grows so slowly you don't notice it until one day it starts providing some shade.

Still, the church remains a deeply dysfunctional organization. It continues to inflict psychological damage upon its members, especially upon women and minorities.

That's of coruse disputable.

Utah leads the nation in depression.

The cause of that hasn't been known, and its disupted territory. Studies haven't determined that the Church is at fault for that. It'd be irresponsible to claim its because of the Church.

The unhealthy culture of perfectionism takes its hardest role on women, who are told from childhood that they have no other spiritually important role in life beyond being homemakers.

That's straight up fabrication, it seems.

Members are told that they are superior to the rest of the world, and yet paradoxically nothing they do is ever good enough. The standard is perfection, and no one can meet it. Members are put under a heavy burden of guilt and shame for normal and often trivial human failings.

Again disputed territory. I don't know if LDS agree with your characterization of us. It doesn't square with me.

The damage inflicted on members of color is probably even greater. Most of the core racist teachings of the church through most of its existence have never been officially denounced, only quietly de-emphasized. The church leadership never apologizes, never admits error. Criticism, no matter how constructive, is never tolerated. Questioning doctrines too loudly will jeopardize your membership.

I agree with you on the race issue. I wish it was never an issue at all. To not apologize seems stupid. But I criticized right there and no problems at all. I've been tolerated for disagreement often.

Dictatorial Leadership: Management that does not allow disagreements out of insecurity or arrogance

While I hear what you're saying, I roll my eyes a little. This is definitely over-stated by you.

No 360 Degrees Feedback: There is limited or no leadership performance feedback.

Sure there is.

Personal Agendas: Recruitments, selections and promotions are based on internal political agenda, for example hiring friends to guarantee personal loyalty at the expense of other highly performing and more-qualified employees.

If it exists its a personal thing. Its not a church thing.

Probably the biggest deterrents to healthy change in the LDS corporation are the absolute control of the leaders over the corporation, and the complete shutdown of all feedback and criticism. As long as these unhealthy practices continue, the church will continue to improve only marginally at a slow rate - perhaps not quickly enough to stave off stagnation.

I guess we'll see. What constitutes stagnation in your view?

[_Buffalo]

The Church's road out of being America's largest home-grown cult has been long and dark. Mainstreaming has come slowly, a piece at a time, the way a tree grows so slowly you don't notice it until one day it starts providing some shade.

Still, the church remains a deeply dysfunctional organization. It continues to inflict psychological damage upon its members, especially upon women and minorities.

That's of coruse disputable.

This is why I don't often write long posts. Responding to multiple lines of thought at once is very time consuming. I'll take these as I have time.

Of course it's disputable. Almost everything is. As I listen to more and more stories of Mormons harmed by the church (both those still believing and those who have left), I'd say it's hard to dispute that at least the LDS church is not a positive influence on all of its members.

[_stemelbow]

This is why I don't often write long posts. Responding to multiple lines of thought at once is very time consuming. I'll take these as I have time.

Of course it's disputable. Almost everything is. As I listen to more and more stories of Mormons harmed by the church (both those still believing and those who have left), I'd say it's hard to dispute that at least the LDS church is not a positive influence on all of its members.

I can go with that, as you put it. The Church isn't for everyone. Of course its hard to prove the Church is at fault for not being a positive influence for every member.

[_DrW]

No longer a cult, but still dysfunctional?

Second part is true. Not so sure that the first part is correct, however.

If one looks at the attributes of a cult, as defined by any number of instruments, the LDS Church still ranks very high indeed. And in some aspects, the Church now is more cult-like than it was a few decades ago.

As society in general moves forward, begins to consider science and reason as a more important bases for a worldview than the unfounded belief of religion, it seem the more Church leadership feels they need to tighten the screws.

I have noticed a number of examples of this over the last few years.

One attribute of a cult is that its members are required to work for the cult without compensation. In other words, they are required to donate labor. The recent change in Church policy, wherein every member was expected to clean the meeting houses, even though they may already be full (and substantial) tithe payers, seems to me to be a large and highly visible step in the direction of cultism, not away from it.

Also consider the recent:

- Insistence on uniform dress, appearance and behavior (ear rings facial hair and flip-flops).

- PR campaigns to recruit members that are misleading about LDS Church norms, aims and practices.

- Failure to disclose the full truth about the Church to prospective members (LDS speak: milk before meat).

Unfortunately, there are many more examples of the Church adapting or moving toward more closed, cult like practices.

IMHO, the LDS Church is not moving away from its cultism, but (whether by design or unintended consequence) deeper into it.

[_Buffalo]

Utah leads the nation in depression.

The cause of that hasn't been known, and its disupted territory. Studies haven't determined that the Church is at fault for that. It'd be irresponsible to claim its because of the Church.

Can you at least admit that the fact that the state with the most Mormons per capita is also the most depressed state could have troubling implications for Mormonism?

[_zeezrom]

my wife and I took a picture of ourselves nude on the balcony of our honeymoon hotel. The picture captured our backsides as we enjoyed the sunset. A month later at a family party, SIL was going through our photos and started screaming. Somehow, she found the photo hidden in the back of the book. Curious, many others started asking if they could see as well. It caused a big commotion.

Somehow, after all the negative sexual training at church during our youth, we still managed to do something normal.

[_stemelbow]

Can you at least admit that the fact that the state with the most Mormons per capita is also the most depressed state could have troubling implications for Mormonism?

If its indeed true that Utah is the most depressed state, then of coruse your propisition is a possibility.