In fast and story telling meeting on Sunday a young girl (17, almost 18) got up and told of her "struggles" with "Satan". As I listened, I believe she was talking about some sort of addiction, like alcohol use, maybe some drugs. She is an acquantance of my daughter who is the same age. My daughter later told me she (the 17 year old girl in fast and story telling meeting) was living with a 21 year old man and would post on facebook about getting drunk and such. Her family is TBM. Anyway she made reference how her dad cast satan out in a blessing and how "he's gone, but not all the way". Now when I heard her say those things I thought she was deluded. She believes an invisible boogey man was "poking her" trying to get her to do things she shouldn't be doing. On this occasion, listening to her, I thought this was very strange and indicated a (common) belief among Mormons that Satan was out to get them. I'd say that is a sign of a community mental illness. In fact there are many other things we (here) could state that would or could be taken as a sign of mental illness/conditions among many Mormons. I am a sufferer of depression and OCD and take medication, so when I talk about this I am not being cavalier or trying to be funny. I think there is a widespread, low grade, mental illness among many Mormons, which manifests itself in many behaviours and on many occasions.

I have read the recently posted Tom Phillips interview with John Dehlin. Actually I had read it before so I was re-reading it. I would say that Tom, like many of us, and many other Mormons, lived in a fairy tale world with very unrealistic views of reality. I am not throwing stones, we all (most of us) fell victim to this syndrome. We were in a cult, many of us from birth, and our chances of getting out and thinking straight and having a "normal life" were low. Somehow we are out now, but we have loved ones left inside the cells, locked up. I actually wonder if Mr. Dehlin's real purpose is to help the Mormon culture/people deal with a slow and successful disengagement from a cult and the associated mental illnesses that many suffer from because of their association with Mormonism. He is a Phd candidate in psychology, as I understand it. Mormonism is disintegrating, slowly, but surely. There will be a great need to help, professionally, many who exit the Mormon cult. Seriously, no joking here. In reading the Tom Phillips interview, and recalling a talk Holland gave a while back, it seems like his wife or he or both are suffering from depression or something. That much came across unwritten in the text of the interview and in his conference talk. Maybe they (the Holland's) are suffering from the massive personal devastation that comes from realizing it is all a fraud? I am just guessing, but the tea leaves seem to indicate this...

At any rate, there is a fairly large mental health issue bubbling just below the surface in large predominately Mormon areas. The actual social cohesion of many communities could unravel in unpredictable and undesirable ways as the Mormon pot boils over. This is a bit of a slow motion event, but there is going to be a real need to help many more people as they exit in the coming years....

I've known mormon women who have went over the edge. I suppose you could call it psychotic breaks.

They became incoherent. Babbling about God, Satan, and all their fears of going to hell.

They were hospitalized. Only one stayed. She was so far gone that she never came out of the hospital before she died.

She was the gospel doctrine teacher for years. She had some very crazy ideas and beliefs. She had no problem teaching them as gospel truths. She had the most read and marked up scriptures i've ever seen. She was obsessed with mormonism. It never left her mind. She even lived next door to the church.

These women are the saddest thing i've ever seen. Nobody seemed to see how their religion literally drove them insane. Nope, they were referred to as ill, and given blessing after useless blessing.

I agree with you to a large extent because of my sample of one, lifetime experience.
There is an incredible amount of magical thinking in mormonism, and by its fanatic believers.
My MIL is schizophrenic and has very similar in scope delusions about the world. Different, yet oh so familiar.

Did you feel the spirit?
Did you see the faeries?

Mormonism has done a better job capitalizing on shared human experiences like elevation to convince its adherents that mormonism presents the REAL reasons for the causes of the many all too human experiences most of us share in to some degree.

Many cultures have tales of fairies or magic beings, but not too many people actually believe they see them. My MIL has passed on her schizophrenia to one of her daughters, yet they don't have shared delusions.
MIL asked me, "If you saw faeries in your magic faery garden, would you tell me?"
Clearly trying to find out if I was on "her side".
I bypassed the question. "I won't see any faeries, that is just a shade garden, they are easy to maintain."

Well, you know Utah leads (or at one time did) the nation in anti-depressant use among women, IIRC. Teen suicide was very high in Utah. A number of measures of well being (emotionally) seem to indicate that Utah has some very real problems in much greater numbers than elsewhere. Mormons, understandably, get defensive when this is brought up, but Mormonism and its possible effect on these issues should not be ignored. The responsible practitioner would be neglectful if he/she ignored the predominate forces shaping the culture in trying to determine cause/reasons for the issues that arise in Utah in terms of mental health.

world view (including their own doubts or information that challenges their beliefs) as temptation from the devil, or as information concocted by those who are influenced by him.

This creates an extreme fear of those doubts, instead of allowing people to explore them and resolve them. Of course, this is a good tactic to keep members in line, because usually doubts about the Mormon church can ONLY be resolved by suppressing them or "putting them on the shelf".

I remember being afraid of the devil when I was a TBM (even as an adult), and a couple of times, I thought I felt a dark presence and it absolutely terrified me, having heard stories about people in situations like that. I prayed really hard to be protected, and somehow, I survived it ;-), although I found little comfort by praying.

I've never felt that kind of fear since leaving the church, well over a decade ago.

I now look at those fears as evidence that my mind was hacked. I was an adult, and I actually believed that God was the invisible protector from the imaginary devil boogeyman (who He created). And they both wielded imaginary magic powers. And the weirdest part is that I believed that I could actually lose my power to act, to choose, or to have faith if the devil took me over. And somehow, God, the 'good guy', would actually ALLOW that to happen if I didn't do everything I was told, or if I entertained doubts? God would withdraw his spirit and protection for any small infraction.

How messed up is that?

*nods understandingly*

I read this along time ago as a Mormon trying to make sense about why I could not pursue my inner convictions and why I had to blindly obey... Evil religions produce mental health issues.

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People of the Lie

First published in 1983, People of the Lie: The Hope For Healing Human Evil (ISBN 0 7126 1857 0) followed on from Peck's first book. Peck describes the stories of several people who came to him whom he found particularly resistant to any form of help. He came to think of them as evil and goes on to describe the characteristics of evil in psychological terms, proposing that it could become a psychiatric diagnosis.
Evil

Peck discusses evil in his book People of the Lie: The Hope for Healing Human Evil,[7] and also in a chapter of The Road Less Traveled.[6] Peck characterizes evil as a malignant type of self-righteousness in which there is an active rather than passive refusal to tolerate imperfection (sin) and its consequent guilt.[6][7] This syndrome results in a projection of evil onto selected specific innocent victims (often children), which is the paradoxical mechanism by which the People of the Lie commit their evil.[7] Peck argues that these people are the most difficult of all to deal with, and extremely hard to identify.[7] He describes in some detail several individual cases involving his patients. In one case which Peck considers as the most typical because of its subtlety, he describes Roger, a depressed teenage son of respected, well off parents.[7] In a series of parental decisions justified by often subtle distortions of the truth, they exhibit a consistent disregard for their son's feelings, and a consistent willingness to destroy his growth. With false rationality and normality, they aggressively refuse to consider that they are in any way responsible for his resultant depression, eventually suggesting his condition must be incurable and genetic.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M._Scott_Peck

Did you ever see the movie "Jesus Camp?" They are very big on Satan.