"How a Toe Led to Complete Forgiveness of Sin" . . .

It's great to have Tom Riskas here on our very own "Recovery from Mormonism" discussion board, where his impressive book, "Deconstrucing Mormonism," has been talked about with genuine interest, enthusiasm and appreciation.

Allow me to offer some background on Tom that comes from personally knowing and working with him--info which I hope you all will find interesting and that Tom won't find too humiliating. :)

Tom was a student of Daoism and a deep philosophical type before converting to Mormonism in his 20s. He remained a serious thinker throughout his time in Mormonism (which is a grievous sin in Mormonism). He was, like many of us, also a dedicated member of the Mormon faith--that is, until he realized in a personal epiphany of sorts that it made absolutely no sense, was demonstrably false and was insidiously destructive to personal well-being (read his book for the step-by-step details of how one can arrive at such a conclusion).

So, Tom did what any decent, honest, self-respecting and self-aware person would do: He deconverted some two decades into his failed experiment with LDS lunacy. Tom's book on all of this is a tour de force--a classic example of dissecting and rejecting the LDS Church through the application of unforgiving logic, power-driven fact and methodologically consistent reasoning.

As for myself, in a previous life I was a student at non-Dao BYU and a born-in-bunker TBM before eventually deconverting in 1993. What, in a nutshell, finally got me focused on re-considering my entrapment in the Mormon Church was talking to certain General Authorities behind closed doors where they answered questions I put to them in a way that starkly conflicted with Mormonism's public claims. (It didn't help the Mormon cause or my place in it for me to later see one of those GAS lie to the press, on the record, about what he had previously told me in private).

It also frustrated the Telestial Kingdom out of me when I repeatedly tried to get reliable replies to my questions on the Mormon Church's official position on organic evolution when communicating directly with its then-president, who wouldn't answer what I was asking. (It also didn't help when my grandfather told me to quit trying, saying it wasn't necessary for my salvation, even though he was the guy who had put me on to the Mormon president in the first place and who had told me it was important to get to the bottom of the this).

Finally, I determined that the Mormon temple ritual was an obvious, traceable rip-off from the off-the-shelf hocus-pocus of Freesmasonry, so I ditched my loony Mormon underwear for Fruit of the Loom. (Throw in Mormonism's historical sexism, racism, multi-wifery and other assorted bizarre and offensive doctrines, beliefs, policies and practices, and I was on my way out with an anti-Hosanna shout).

But back to the Tom/Steve story, if I may.

Tom is a good friend of mine from our days gone by in a Tempe, AZ, LDS ward where he was the ward mission leader and I was one of his ward missionaries. Tom was big on B.H. Roberts (whom he regarded at the time as being a leading Mormon intellectual), urging us to plow deeply into the Roberts' teachings on deity (I was too busy drawing cartoons to follow Tom's advice on that score).

Tom and I look back on those duped days--when we both were bamboozled by the Mormon mirage--and, well, we shake our heads and laugh while realizing what a destructive, dishonest fraud the Mormon Church truly is. (Tom refers to it as a cult, with which I concur).

With that as background, I would like to relate a story from our lives back then, in which Tom played a role. (I posted the following some years ago on RfM, being careful to keep Tom's name out of it; but now that he's here, in the clear and showing no fear, I'd like to retell the story--this time naming names, if he doesn't mind. (I hope he doesn't because I name myself, as well).

Off we go:

"How a Toe Led to Complete Forgiveness of Sin"

Priesthood blessings can surprise the hell out of you. Ask and ye shall receive--sometimes more than you asked for.

Back when I was still in the Mormon Church, I had a health scare. A large, flat mole had suddenly appeared on the inside of one of my toes. I showed it to my then-wife, mentioned it to my parents and they strongly recommended that I immediately fly to Salt Lake for examination by their friend and neighbor who happened to be a cancer specialist.

I agreed to go but before heading out of Phoenix for the Land of Desolation northward, I decided to ask for a priesthood blessing from a member of our ward who was a friend of mine. This fellow was the ward mission leader (under whom I had served as a missionary) and was very faithful and, shall we say, intense. He had joined the LDS Church as a California convert from Daoism, after having risen to top-level black belt status in the martial arts.

He had also studied and believed in so-called "white magic;" was convinced that Joseph Smith was a practitioner of white magic himself as inspired by God to discover divine truth through its use; was a devoted fan of B.H. Roberts' notions on the nature of the Mormon Godhead; and (as I learned later from him in a private conversation) had actually built himself a temple altar in his master bedroom, where he would don his complete Mormon temple clothing set and kneel at it every evening to beseech heaven in the True Order of Prayer before retiring for the night.

On second thought, perhaps I shouldn't mention names here but I will say this: his initials were Tom Riskas.

Before flying up to Utah to have my toe tested, my Mormon ward brother and buddy Tom came over to the house to give me the requested blessing. He entered the premises solemn and soulful, having spent some time beforehand fasting and praying to properly prepare for this Momentous Mormon Moment.

(I mention all this simply to demonstrate that Tom's the real deal: He's been there, done that and rejected that).

Tom commenced with the blessing, slowly and deliberately anointing my head with oil, laying his hands upon my head and, in a firm and clarion voice, promising me that through the power of God's holy oom-pah-pah, I would be healthy and cancer-free.

Nice.

Then came the bombshell.

With his hands still on my head, Tom announced that God had forgiven me of all my sins.

Even nicer.

After the purging was completed, I politely thanked him and flew off to Zion, where my toe mole was excised and analyzed by my parents' oncologist and declared to be benign.

Make that triple-scoop nice.

Meanwhile, my sin-eradicating-blesser-friend Tom eventually got divorced; moved to Provo to work for Stephen Covey's mega self-help corporation as a consultant, lecturer and author; got tangled up in a messy lawsuit against Covey; left Mormonism; found a girlfriend, phoned me out of the blue peppering his language with F-this and F-that, then moved to Las Vegas, where I didn't heard from him--until now. (I remember, however, how his daughter--who had been one of our kid's best friends--called one day and told me how grateful she was that her dad was now normal).

By this time, I, too, had left Mormonism.

As they say, my, how things change.

But praise be to Elohim; At least my black-belted, white magic-minded, temple altar-building friend Tom had, through the power of the mighty priesthood, forgiven me of all my sins--before we both lost our lease in the Celestial Kingdom and fell from grace into rational thinking.

Jesus, sneeze us and ya just gotta believe us.

Tom, the time is now yours. :)



Edited 15 time(s). Last edit at 04/20/2013 07:00PM by Susan I/S.

Even more now, I'd like a blessing from Tom Riskas :)

Wow.

I have to ask a question for Tom, will DM come out as an ebook, or, better yet, an audible book?

ETA: DM = Deconstructing Mormonism



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/19/2013 09:29PM by spanner.

Short answer is I don't know. I've done an audible book before on a previous book. DM is nearly 500 pp. of very complex writing so I can't imagine an audible book for this, unless it was several discs.

Thanks for asking.

Steve, I actually remember the Toe story, and yes, it is more than a bit humiliating ;) Still, it's fun to be able to laugh at now, even though I would have severly chastened you then for being "light minded" and terribly "irreverant", right? On second thought, I hereby take back my "forgiveness of sins" blessing. Can an "apostate" do that?

All levity aside, Steve's experience with GAs confirmed what I suspected for some time but would never admit, even to myself, that they were in fact bereft of the knowledge, faith and power so many Mormons (and perhaps all active Mormons) were convinced they had.

This said, when Steve decided to call it quits I was still fully yoked to the faith, and I remembered how the news affected me. I had seen many members come and go, or go inactive over the years, but this was different. My reaction was interestingly one of astonishment. I was stunned. The news shook me to the core, and began no doubt to feed my own suppressed questions and real doubts that I had hitherto written off to "Satanic temptations," promptly "repented" of, and compensated for by doubling-down on scripture study, payer, church duties and Temple attandance.

What I didn't fully realize then, but acknowledge now, was the "symbolic" impact of Steve's decision on my faith, and no doubt on the faith of many others. Steve was not a "mutt" in the faith (i.e. a "convert" to the church) like I was. He was a full-blooded thoroughbred; a direct descendent of a Prophet of God! He had "the blood of the prophets" running through his veins? He was a knowledgeable and faithful member of the church who was raised in the faith, as well as a fellow missionary and defender of the faith. How could this be?

When I finally decided to leave the faith after a prolonged and agonizing deconversion process, I was done, and I knew it. But I can't imagine the courage it must have taken for Steve to leave, knowing as he must have at some level, the shock waves it would cause, and the flack he would take, and did take as I recall, from those who knew him best and loved him most, i.e. from those like me at the time, who didn't even think to ask and reflect on the simple question no-one dared to ask themselves, much less each other; the one question that begged to be asked by the faithful; the one question that could eventually topple their faith in Mormonism like the house of cards that it is and set them free: "What does the resignation (not excommunication!) of a faithful, knowledgable, committed, direct descendent of a Prophet of God say about the church?"

Talk about a BFO!

Yo, Steve, here's to you my friend!

To put it simply, I got fed up . . .

--with the Mormon Cult lying to me;

--with the Mormon Cult attempting to justify to me what was factually and morally indefensible, and

--with the Mormon Cult (and its lapdogs) not answering my questions in meaningful, consistent or direct ways, then trying to blame me for not liking that--(and, maybe worse, for saying so publicly).



Edited 8 time(s). Last edit at 04/20/2013 10:18PM by steve benson.

I can't imagine this being an audio book. How would one read all the footnotes? :)

Steve - nice story. I have come across one person who also did the whole pay-lay-ale alter thing at their house. In addition, they had a "celestial room."

Tom, I'm a little curious: if you had not already dipped into white magic and Daoism, would you have been less accepting of Joseph Smith's stories?

As part of the whole debunking, have you also given up *all* things "spiritual"?

Yes I have. I have no idea what "spiritual" means, or by what specific, verifiable criteria one could intelligibly distinguish -- without begging the question or resorting to "God-talk" (which I argue at great length is itself unintelligible and factually meaningless) -- a "spiritual" experience from a natural, human experience, or, perhaps more specifically and technically, an environmentally or self/other-induced affective,transferential, hallucinatory experience?

Yeah, I put "spiritual" in quotes because I don't know what that means either because I have never had an experience I would call "spiritual" in my 45+ years in the church. Yet I come across a lot of atheists who want to use the term "spiritual" to say that they don't believe in god, but they believe in "spiritual" experiences. So when I ask people if they're atheist, I tend to want to know a little deeper if they're aspiritual as well. Not that it's any of my business if someone is atheist or whatnot, but I figured (without having read the book yet) that you must have gone down the atheism track.

Damn, I'm excited about that book! I put the check in the mail today.

I agree. Atheists who still use religious terms (like "spiritual") likely have some therapeutic work to do. They are still likely infected.

I agree with Eller that we need to jettison the term
"spiritual" in relation to experience, and merely refer to our experiences as natural, biological "human experiences."

Yes, to follow up on that, I think we need a language for discussing "spiritual" feelings or experiences as a natural phenomena, one we can begin to construct by integrating the most recent work by neuroscience, social science, and even philosophy.

The best attempt I have seen of this kind of thinking is A General Theory of Love, by Lewis, Amini and Lannon. Their focus is on romantic love, but I think the approach they take might be extended into discussions of spirituality.

http://www.amazon.com/General-Theory-Thomas-Lannon-Richard/dp/0375709223

The issue I find is that many people who believe they experience spiritual transcendence, including many members of my family, refuse the notion that such a phenomenon can originate inside their own brains. What they experience is so extraordinary, it simply doesn't FEEL as if their brain can produce it, so they reject possible organic explanations out of hand.

So, that's another challenge, in my view. It's fun to find a place to discuss these things, though!

Oh, BTW SC, 16 books went out in the mail today. Yours was one of them. Let me know when you get it. Thanks so much for your interest.

I love the Tao Te Ching, but consider it in terms of creativity in side of my self and not as a guide to the universe. Even though it presents itself as a guide to the powers of the universe, it is a good way to think about art.

I missed your first question about magic, Daoism and Joseph Smith. Actually, I didn't dabble in magic before becoming a Mormon. I was fascinated, however, by JS's use of "seer stones" (and actually favorably affected by Quinn's book later) and later found myself at the alter praying for my own seer stone, and finding one (by revelation, of course) after being directed (by the spirit, of course) to Sedona, AZ, where I purchased the designated stone for me among many others (of course), and afterward consulted in seeking many worderous visions (of course).

Truth-to-tell, I wanted to experience every wonderous spiritual experience JS did, including revelations, visions, dreams and visitations, and ensured that I did (translation of gold plates excepted, of course)

(NOTE: See my earlier reply to your second question re: "spirituality". BTW, if anything I wrote above intrigues you or other readers on this thread, and you, or they, want to know more about my "wonderous" spiritual experiences, then you, or they, are not fully out of the faith, or are still infected and vulnerable to "spirituality" (i.e. superstitious nonsense), and my book (and many others cited in it) will hopefully play the essential therapeutic role it was written in part to play.)

As for Daoism, I'm not sure what role it played in my ultimate conversion to Mormonism. I studie Daoism because I was a martial artist for many years and was naturally drawn to Oriental mysticism; a trait that no doubt pre-disposed me to Mormonism.

SC, I hadn't read your reply to my post on "spirituality" before including you in the "NOTE" to this reply. Clearly you're not in need of any therapy for residue "spirituality sickness." ;)

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/thinkatheist/2011/10/17/episode-30-mr-thomas-riskas-oct-16-2011

Tom Riskas did a podcast on Think Atheist about a year ago. I've provided the link it is a good listen.

I especially like what happened at the end. The interviewer knew very little about Mormonism and primarily referenced South Park's "All About Mormons" as his source for specific discussion about Mormonism. Most of the interview was about philosophical tools and general and specific discrediting of God, Mormonism, and faith in the presence of knowledge. Back to the end, the faux Mormon friend in the South Park Episode explains that he knows a lot of things about Mormonism are weird, but he loves his family, they love each other, and they are happy.

Here's the quote from the South Park episode, can't find just the clip. It's powerful and the way many Mormons will defend their faith at the time the religion is reduced to nothing like its' former self.

[last lines]
Gary Harrison: [to Stan] Look, maybe us Mormons do believe in crazy stories that make absolutely no sense, and maybe Joseph Smith did make it all up, but I have a great life, and a great family, and I have the Book of Mormon to thank for that. The truth is, I don't care if Joseph Smith made it all up, because what the church teaches now is loving your family, being nice and helping people. And even though people in this town might think that's stupid, I still choose to believe in it. All I ever did was try to be your friend, Stan, but you're so high and mighty you couldn't look past my religion and just be my friend back. You've got a lot of growing up to do, buddy. Suck my balls.
[turns around and walks off]
Eric Cartman: Damn, that kid is cool, huh?



The interviewer asks Tom how would he reply to that and he does a great job of discussing how the price the Mormon family exacts is the individual, and that as soon as an individual steps out of the program, the concept of the Mormon family falls apart.

He states the Mormon family is a fraud. I have been saying the Mormon church is a fraud, but maybe more importantly the Mormon family is a fraud that sacrifices the individuals of the family at the alter of Mormonism in order to show devotion. Submissive Pseudo-Abrahams and passive Pseudo-Sarahs birth and give over their children to Mormonism so that they can hope that at some time in eternity all wrongs will be made right by their Mormon sacrifice and God will do them happy.

Great point. The only real issue I would take with a point in the podcast was about Mormonism constrained within itself would be acceptable, but it inserts itself in the issues of non-believers and evangelizes. This could have been poorly stated or not considered critical, but I do think that Mormon parents making Mormons out of their babies is wrong, for the very reason Tom is critical of Mormonism. It is a ridiculous, authoritarian belief system that at its' core exploits its' membership.

I recommend the podcast, good listen.



Edited 7 time(s). Last edit at 08/26/2013 04:53AM by gentlestrength.

Thanks for your thoughts on this, gentlestrength. This subject is at the heart of my indignation and contempt toward mormonism, as well as my greatest regret in joining the church. It is also the source of my greatest sadness.

I address this concern throughout my book, if you have a copy. (See pp. lxxi-lxxii, 318-26, 355-9, and 385-92).

If you're interested, I thought I'd also share an appropriate excerpt from a personal letter to one of my adult sons who is still in the faith. This excerpt is in reply to a letter from him making a case for his 'Mormon life', apart from whether or not the theological claims are "true", or even whether there is a god.

(My excerpt begins) "In your letter you write: 'But what I want to say to you today is that I am happy. I love my life and I feel I am able to experience it just as fully as anyone else. ...Even if we get to the end of our lives and I realize that I am wrong and there is no God I will never look back and regret the life I have lived, it has been filled with love, joy, happiness, friendship, and a loving family.'

"Normally, such a disclosure would be comforting to a parent. But sadly it is not to me, given my first-hand knowledge of the nature and source of such "happiness" (i.e. the pathology of one-sided and contrived "happiness", "love", and "joy" that attends mormonism) and what you likely consider experiencing your life "as fully as anyone else" to be. In this regard, please allow me to share again what you apparently did not read in my [initial] letter [accompanying the book]:

(Excerpt from the my previous letter) [W]hat my reasons are based on – both for writing and publishing this book, and for urging each of you to read it – is my carefully determined conclusion that theistic religion in general, and Mormonism in particular, is detrimental to personal and social well-being. Consequently, and in this context, my greatest hope and desire is that each of you, and your companions, will eventually somehow find the courage and the will to completely “cut the cord” of all religious ties and be free.

Before you oversimplify or react to this disclosed hope and desire, if you do, please allow me to briefly explain what it means and doesn't mean to me to be “free”, and what such freedom entails and requires as I understand it.

The freedom I greatly desire for you has nothing to do with what I consider to be the baseless notions of fate or destiny. Nor does it have anything to do with the established illusion of free will (or “free agency”), or with the mere ability to make determined choices or decisions.

Rather, the freedom I have in mind essentially amounts to a fundamental condition or state of being that can be characterized as an authentic (real, honest, unpretentious), mature relatedness to oneself, others, and the world. One who is free in this sense responsibly lives one’s life with intellectual integrity as a free thinker, on one’s own terms and in one’s own way in pursuit of one’s ultimate self-interests on the sole basis of one’s autonomous, internal voice of authority.

The italicized words are not gratuitous, and should not be glossed over or treated lightly. They have profound significance that defies popular or familiar meanings.More specifically, and for each of you and others who have been well-conditioned and indoctrinated in the Mormon faith, such freedom implies being free from the programmed desire to be “obedient”, “worthy”, “faithful”, “selfless” and “righteous”. It also implies being free from self-censure and the corresponding need to continually (and perhaps obsessively) guard against, or suppress, what you have been conditioned and indoctrinated to regard as “unworthy” thoughts, feelings and desires. The freedom I have in mind is essentially the psychological freedom to fully accept yourselves as the unique and natural individuals you are, apart from institutional and self or other-imposed pressure to conform or behave in socially or culturally acceptable ways. It is also freedom from the compulsion to obey or do what is expected or considered “right” or “good” to feel good about yourselves and be accepted and approved by significant others, especially your believed parent-‘God’. Beyond that, such freedom would imply that you be free from the insidious social pressure to be “happy”; pressure that can and does paradoxically lead to depression, particularly as documented in the Mormon faith among women. Implicit in such pressure is the shared belief – and judgment – that if you’re not “happy” there’s something wrong with you. You’re not being or doing “good”, or living the faith as prescribed and required. Relatedly, such freedom would entail that you be free from the shame-based neediness characterized in part by the co-dependent compulsion to “lose yourself” in service to others (and the Church), and from the confused belief that by putting ‘God’s’ will and others’ needs and concerns above your own you are somehow finding yourself and attending to your needs and ‘eternal’ welfare.

The basic pre-requisite for attaining and experiencing the freedom I have in mind requires one to break his or her “fantasy bond” with parents and all parent surrogates (i.e. siblings, mates, leaders, mentors, and gods) and essentially grow-up and psychologically “leave home”, or individuate. This requirement entails letting go, in this case, of one’s regressive attachment to both the nuclear and extended “Mormon Family” in which one is a part, and one’s likewise regressive or infantile (and baseless) beliefs in the existence of an all-powerful, good, loving, and nurturing parent-‘God’, and in ‘salvation’, ‘immortality’, and ‘eternal life’. It also entails the exercise of intellectual integrity in objectively subjecting, with reasonable skepticism, your religious beliefs – whatever they might be – to the tests presented and advocated in the Introduction and Preface, explained in Chapters 1 and 2, and conducted and recapped in Chapters 3-8.

Also, such freedom would require one to strive to continually create one’s own meaning and purpose in life on the sole basis of what is of most value to one as a as a mature, free-thinking individual. This last requirement, which I touch on in Chapter 4 of the book and treat in some depth in the Epilogue, can, as I see it, only be satisfied by creatively and ethically attending to the personal need and mandate for essential experience in life – whatever that might be – without foreclosing on such experience through conditioned fear response, or by circumscribing such experience within the confining bounds of externally imposed, self-sacrificing ‘covenants’ and ‘commandments’.

Because of the implications to your well-being of my above disclosed hope and desire, and because, as I argue at length in the book, it is highly unlikely at least – and most likely not possible in actuality – for indoctrinated Mormons (and their children) to truly experience such freedom and avoid being harmed by their religion while still in the faith, I urge those of you still active in the faith to try and put aside any resistance you might feel to this book (or perhaps to me or my views and way of thinking) and read it, and others like it, as carefully, openly, and objectively as possible. Even if the freedom I desire for you is too scary or of no interest or value to you at this time in your lives or as briefly characterized above, or even if you think you have such freedom and/or have not been harmed by – or will not harm your children by – your religious beliefs and commitments, I still urge you to read the book, even if merely out of curiosity or your respect for me as a person who loves you and has intimate, first-hand knowledge of how you were raised and of the faith you embrace. I know this is a lot to ask and hope for, but I ask and hope nonetheless. Although I have written this book for all honest and questioning investigators, believers and nonbelievers of Mormonism, and have the same concerns, hope and desire for them, I have written it primarily for each of you as individuals and parents (or perhaps parents to be), and for your children – my grandchildren. (End of excerpt from previous letter.)

Tom,

I am currently reading your book and was VERY impressed by the "spirtual experience" (vision) you retell. Have any TBMs or priesthood leaders warned you that you will be a son of perdition since you had such a powerful witness from the spirit, and yet turned against it? If so, how many times have you heard this threat?

My psychological "meta-conversion" experience was not widely known, and to my knowledge was not known by any in the hierarchy. Still, I address your point in the Appendix on pp. 413-16 with accompanying footnotes. My reasons for including this Appendix in my book are presented in the Prefatory Note.

I also conclude, as you know if you've read the entire Appendix, that such experience was (and is), from my perspective, a specific manifestation of mental illness (422) suffered at the time, and explain in some depth the basis of such a conclusion.

From my perspective, all such dramatic conversion and other such hallucinatory "religious" experiences are characteristic of a dissociated, delusional and, in more extreme cases, psychotic state of mind.

I am a bit curious about your reaction to being "VERY impressed". What is it about this (or any like) experience that 'impresses' you?

I was impressed because it was such a detailed and vivid vision. Most "spiritual experiences" are very weak tea in comparison, typically limited to impressions, warm feelings, clear thoughts, dreams, coincidences, etc. My parents and siblings are still in the Church and rely on such weak experiences as the basis for ignoring my "information sharing"--my brother, for example, describes how he had a "quickening" in his mind when praying about the BoM, which is the basis for his testimony. I had a similar "quickening" when I awoke one morning and clearly "knew" the Church was false after weeks of studying the problems with Church history and its foundational events.

I get it, thanks facs3.

Nice to have your insights Tom and personal concerns.

How are things going with TBMs opening up to thinking critically about their belief system and whether they should teach it as directed to their children or qualify it as a belief system of many that they as parents and adults prefer to all others.

Shamefully for Mormons and most, there is no conscious choice of self, but an assignment by birth. Even us former Mormons were wired as children such as to make it next to impossible to not be aware that our expressions and choices are to not follow our wiring and our programming that were Mormon, but to find what is our biochemistry and what is our adaptation to existence by genetics. This effort for me can be painful and I have just had to accept that for now, the absence of awareness of Mormonism in my being is not achievable, but maybe another day.

Hope ways can be found, I chose not to make TBM children, but I do have TBMs that I care about, that will never concern themselves with what they believe or why they believe, but that they believe as directed and they believe well.

Having genetics back to the beginning of Mormonism, as do so many others here, I suspect there might be something that makes Mormonism work biochemically somehow, that the need to feel right, is more important than being right. That somehow seems to work biochemically for Mormons, but then as you point out a lot of the metrics that would show healthy people do not support Mormonism as healthy. Maybe the biochemistry of Mormonism is just unhealthy either way, but less unhealthy deluded as a Mormon.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 08/26/2013 03:00PM by gentlestrength.

What makes the analytical work I do (hopefully) therapeutic is the creation of "real doubt" through the blocking of all defensive, cognitive retreats. The wonderful thing about real doubt is that it doesn't have to be acknowledged as such (or at all) to exist and do its work. it works beneath the surface of cognitive awareness like a computer virus that gradually infects the brain.

Beyond analytical therapy, psycho-dynamic and cognitive therapy might be indicated.

Social conditioning and indoctrination from birth is indeed difficult to undo, but can be done sufficient to eradicate regressive religious belief (and therefore all religious attachments to parent-gods) through individuation.

First we must see and feel the problem.

There is, to my mind, nothing of any physical, psychological or social value or benefit to mormon (or any religious or theistic) belief and devotion that cannot be experienced and enjoyed by Atheists.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/26/2013 03:09PM by tomriskas.

tomriskas Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> There is, to my mind, nothing of any physical,
> psychological or social value or benefit to mormon
> (or any religious or theistic) belief and devotion
> that cannot be experienced and enjoyed by
> Atheists.

On its' own this sounds correct.

Unfortunately to me, Mormonism can insert itself into family relations in such a way that for an individual to step away from Mormonism and reject it entirely, at its' core, with no doubts or reservations will experience an extended family life polluted by Mormonism. We read here of grandmothers insisting on indoctrinating grandchildren, in-laws undermining family relations, and the examples are infinite. To resolve that life is an individual journey is not philosophically wrong to me, but it is also emotionally dispiriting because I do sense that those who are able to walk alone, but with loving allies in the area have a greater sense of connection that makes biochemical sense.

Mormonism is a fraud cult, but it has our families and it will kill them if we leave. I left, a long time ago, 1988, but still find it oozing into my life in the most unwelcome of ways.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/26/2013 04:02PM by gentlestrength.

I don't disagree. An Atheist stuck in a Mormon family system would most likely be miserable. Even psychologically differentiating from the mormon family system doesn't make it easier, if possible at all other than perhaps on a very superficial basis.

As for the unwelcomed after-effects, that is certainly understandable. Mormonism, like all theistic religions, exploits and trades on the regressive tendencies inherent in our "basic biological situation." These tendencies, in my experience, lose much of their primal potency through individuation, but are still part of our humanity, and are still tied by association to "mormon family" conditioning, even after the spell is broken and we no longer believe, but wholly reject the faith.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/26/2013 07:58PM by tomriskas.

As an engineer I have the stereotypical mechanistic mind set and wouldn't have thought about the fasting, prayer, and meditation approach.

I would have just called a a toe truck.

:)