I was a missionary in several areas in Brazil. One of the areas was Santa Felicidade. While there I was "teaching" a family who had a new born baby. The baby was very ill. There were questions about its survival. I recommended that they take the baby to the doctor, which they did. They also took the baby to a curandero or Brazilian spiritual healer. The doctor told them that the baby had a severe lactose intolerance and needed milk replacement. The spiritual healer told them that he had cast a spell and the baby would be fine. I was asked to give a blessing to the baby after both had rendered an opinion.

I blessed the baby that if the parents followed the instructions of the doctor the baby would live. If they followed the instructions of the curendero it would die. As I left I told my companion that I had "blessed" the baby to die. Less than a week later we attended the funeral of the infant. The following week the family was baptized because I had predicted the outcome.

For years I questioned myself and felt that I had caused the death of an infant because of the blessing. I had the power of the Priesthood.

Years later (after leaving Mormonism) I realize I had a basic understanding of medicine. I knew the people I was dealing with and knew they would feel the curandero could heal the infant. The child died because of the parent's choices. I knew what they would chose and predicted their actions. I simply laid out the events that would occur if they followed the course I knew they would follow. In short correlation is not causation. Anyone with a modicum of intelligence would have come to the same conclusion as I had. It took me years to forgive myself for the death of the infant.

Mormonism is deceitful on so many levels. It becomes ingrained in your core self. Recovery is a process of realizations of perception and reality.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 06/19/2012 06:59PM by Jim Huston.

That's a touching story. It's very sad that a family would be so superstitious that they would not follow medical advice.

Of course, millions of people pay tithing every month hoping it will improve their finances. This is what religion and superstition teach.