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Miracle Of Forgiveness


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The language about rape in Miracle of Forgiveness has caused a lot of faithful LDS women great concern. I know a very faithful LDS woman who wrote several general authorities and talked with them about the language in the book not long after it came out. Thankfully, official church publications are no longer open to the interpretations that the Miracle of Forgiveness was on the subject of rape. I do agree that President Kimball, were he alive today, would agree with the Church's official position that victims of sexual assault are flatly without sin, without any requirement that they fight to the death or be willing or try to fight to the death.

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The book actually made me wonder if anyone really makes it. This book is far from the "Jesus makes up the slack" quote. I don't you can have the cake and eat it too here.

We don't actually know what it takes to "make it", though some think they do. Some belief systems are more works oriented than others. Taken in light of what I know to be true, we have the "No one cometh onto the father except through the son". Then we have "Faith is a gift of God", and later we have "faith without works is dead". So those critical passages taken together mean to me that Heavenly Father sought me out. He sought out a heart that would be willing to listen. Then He gave faith to support, and build belief, following that is the will to show gratefulness and as far as I know, the only way to do that is by sincere prayer and by loving one another as is prescribed in Jesus's two commandments. I plan to order this book you speak of.

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Listening to a podcast of a former polygamist turned LDS, turned non LDS Christian woman. I guess she was given the book "Miracle of Forgiveness" sometime while LDS, apparently she just bawled and said she'd never be good enough. Then she went into the fact that LDS don't hear often enough that all we need is the Saviour and to give him our sins. We don't understand that we can give it to the Lord, our sins were covered by him. Too often we think we need to be perfect. And when we mess up we keep thinking it's up to us to be perfect again. But we don't seem to be taking the offer from the Lord to accept His Grace. And feel sin no more. Give it to the Lord, put it at His feet. Why did I only hear this and truly have it shock my system, when I heard it once from a RS teacher that is southern? Did she grow up in a different religion and heard those words? How come we don't ever hear this in church? Is He not enough?

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Are you suggesting what might be truth for one reader of Miracle of Forgiveness could be falsity for another?

--Erik

In a sense, I agree. Moroni 7 says we each must judge by the spirit what brings us to Christ. Watching football on Sunday with my father who is not a member. I have judged that to be ok between me and the Lord. For others, watching Football may be a violation of the Sabbath. I no longer see the rules as black and white but rather I try to use Moroni 7. Murder, lying, theft, all have examples where they are directed or at least seemed approved by the Lord. If these have exceptions so do the others. So yes Truth for one person may be different then truth for another.

Edited by DBMormon
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Thanks Kevin. I need to learn your good grace in taking a different view to a church leader rather than 'railing' so often.

Do you have a source for those stats on homosexuality? (500 and 8 affairs/year?). Is that among men and women? Are you suggesting that being gay is caused by a sex addiction? Or that people who are gay are more likely to develop a sex addiction? My assumption (which may be wrong) would be that the culture leads to the addiction. If people are in a culture that enables and accepts promiscuity then it is more likely to happen. In some straight environments that level of promiscuity is also acceptable.

I'm not so sure promiscuity is so much a gay issue as a environmental one. Gay communities tend to be in that too. But I have a straight friend who socialises in a similar (but straight) community. She has lost count of the number of sexual partners she has had. She also doesn't consider complete fidelity in a relationship to be important. In her view, it's just sex.

I would imagine that if a gay person or couple associated with a community that didn't consider that level of promiscuity acceptable there would be less issues with it. I might be wrong.

And I agree, the addiction recovery program is one of the best church initiatives in many, many years.

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I'm not so sure promiscuity is so much a gay issue as a environmental one. Gay communities tend to be in that too. But I have a straight friend who socialises in a similar (but straight) community. She has lost count of the number of sexual partners she has had. She also doesn't consider complete fidelity in a relationship to be important. In her view, it's just sex.

Especially given Kevin's comment that "Shaming and secrecy are essential components of addictions." I have often wondered how we know it is not societies shaming and forced secrecy that drives the promiscuous behavior.

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I do have a source for the stats at home. Historically, lesbian behavior was less extreme than gay male behavior in terms of numbers. The word gay itself is just a socially defined label, design to call attention to certain aspects of behavior, and not to others. I think it obvious that sex addiction underlies a great deal of behavior. And most addicts don't know what the problem is. Most assume, "this is just the way I am," whether their acting out is gay, straight, a mix, alone, or online. I would not say that being gay is caused by sex addiction, but that sex addiction is certainly manifest widely in behavior in the community that bears that label. There is also a great deal of undiagnosed straight sex addiction. Just how a person gets pointed in a direction is a complex topic. I would not suggest any one size fits all solution. I know people who were abused as children, or who encountered porn, or who just felt an unexpected response when kissed. I know one woman who was abused by a father, who left her husband for a woman, that one for another one, that one for another one, and that one for a disabled man, and that one for another man which is a temple marriage. Groups like SA do not distinguish between the direction of a persons acting out, whether with another person or either gender, or self, or porn, but focus on the compulsion to act out in whatever form. Some cultures do support addiction, though the reasons for enabling may vary. I doubt if it ever involves a decision to sit around a table and rationally agree to enable one another.

Causes of addictions are complex. Both the shaming and the shameless sectors of culture play their part in nourishing addiction, but, not, alas, in the diagnosis and healing.

The simple fact is that addiction is an actual disease involving observable brain damage and characteristic behaviors. it is not just a socially defined label. It is progressive when untreated. And there is a treatment that works to heal the damage and change the behaviors..

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Pittsburgh, PA

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I was the addiction recovery coordinator for the Church for 8 years in my area (about 19 stakes). I don't know any counselor in LDS Family Services (or any other LDS therapist) who recommends the Miracle of Forgiveness. I do not know any recovering addict (regardless of the addiction) who found that book helpful. The reasons are along the lines so eloquently stated by Kevin.

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I'm the Addiction Recovery Representative in my Stake. For the past year, I've seen a very strong commitment to 12 Step recovery Principles being offered through the church. organization. Miracle of Forgiveness is not canon. It is just one book. If you don't like it, read another book. Read 2 Nephi 5 or Alma 26, or Alma 29, or 3 Nephi. I also recommend Colleen Harrison's He Did Deliver Me From Bondage. It is the first LDS 12 step book, and it shows that 12 Recovery is inherent in the Book of Mormon. The passages supporting the 12 Steps in the Book of Mormon strike me as better and clearer than those supporting it found in the Bible.

Some impressions on why I do not recommend The Miracle of Forgiveness based on my reading a few years ago.

While I was determined to get something from it, I did have several issues with it. Things like, in interpreting the story of the woman brought for stoning, he leaves out the phrases, "Where are thine accusers?" and "neither do I condemn thee..." He lets fly some startlingly harsh language at times. Reading it while the Elizabeth Smart trial was going on, I could not help but feel that the radiant and inspiring Elizabeth and her family did not seem to exemplify the attitude in Miracle of Forgiveness of better dead than impure. Counseling a young couple, he tells them that he finds their actions "disgusting." Not helpful. Shaming and secrecy are essential components of addictions. 12 step recovery requires an environment in which secrets can be shared without the shame.

He also misreads the Parable of the Prodigal Son. Joseph Smith said that his key to interpreting any parable is the question that drew it out, and in this case, in Luke 15, what draws it out is the comment by pharisees that Jesus is hanging out with publicans and sinners. Then comes the first try. The parable of the lost sheep, with the protagonist demonstrating a joy response. The hearers don't get it. Okay, how about the woman with the lost coin, who also shows a joy response. Still don't get it. Okay.. how about this one. The character who shows the joy response is the Father, who is, as a recent discussion I read points out, is prodigal with his love, spreading it freely. The first son tells his father that he wants his inheritance now. Which translated into family relationship terms means, I don't want to wait till you are physically dead. You are dead to me now, and I want out. When he comes back, the father runs to meet him, gives a ring, a cloak, shoes (all of which say that is not a servant, but family), and a feast. The father is demonstrating the same joy response as the protagonists of the first two parables, which joy he wants to share with others, just as the shepherd and the woman do. Yet the other son sulks and says, it's not fair. I have served you. (Which the recent article notes, is servant-master language, not son-to-father language.) He refers to "your son", not to "my brother", which also has implications for how the second son defines the relationships. The father invites the second son to feel joy, and the parables ends unresolved, not telling whether the second son "gets it". In MoF, we get a defense of the second son, saying his pettiness and complaints are in no way comparable to the sins of the wandering son (and giving no reference to the previous chapter's quotations on the spiritual dangers of withholding forgiveness) and claims that while forgiven, the first son has irredeemably lost his portion of the inheritance. There are economics to consider. If the father shares all he has with everyone, how could there be enough to go around? Does the creator have a limited bank account, limited possessions, only so much to give, and not more? That is a reading in which the found son is not really forgiven. Just tolerated and placed over there somewhere, so as not to be an embarressment. Never mind the symbolism of the ring, coat, and shoes, let alone, the feast, and above all, the joy of a father runs and embraces him, and who says that one who was lost and dead has been found. The father does not, glare down at the son, saying, "So you've come crawling back. Well, I suppose I could use a pig swiller." After all, fair is fair. Mercy cannot rob justice. The parable should be read as about father with two sons who is prodigal with his love and joy. It challenges notions of fairness, trumping them with love. The parable is not about the lost son, but about the father. The parable is addressed directly to the attitude of the pharisees, as represented in the parable as the second son.

I also noticed the passages in MoF that talked about how LDS should rather see their loved ones dead rather than excommunicated. How is that supposed to help anyone through the disciplinary process? Telling them they they are worse than dead?

In the same sex chapter, besides the harsh language, he also refers to a "successful treatment program," which, to judge by the timeframe, would be the infamously unsuccessful reparative therapy, which attempted to treat addictive behavior by trying to point it at something else. (Don't obsess about this gender. Obsess aboutthat one. Perhaps electric shocks will help. Very B. H. Skinner. In light of later experience, very wrong.) Of course, when he wrote the book, sex addiction had not been thought of, and the first sex addiction recovery group was not even formed until 1979. And it was decades before the medical community took notice and realized what was going on, and realized that the addicts were ahead of them in comprehending the nature of the problem.. Patrick Carnes did his work by going to the recovering addicts in such groups and asking them how they did it. Not by telling them that they shouldn't try to change, and that they were born that way, and should accept themselves as they are with unconditional love. Love should be willing to state the conditions of life. Given that statistics in homosexual communities show that gay men average 500 partners during their life times, and that in the most stable long term male partnerships, there are an average of eight affairs a year, it's reasonable to suggest that addiction and the widespread enabling of addictive behaviors are a major, if not dominant, feature of the Gay and Lesbian communities. A few years ago, I read through Steven Fales' Confessions of a Mormon Boy in Sunstone. When this then wife, Emily asks him if he's been acting out, he confesses. When she asks how many, he says, "Dozens." When he leaves, he rationalizes that he's doing her a favor, leaving her to find someone who will "ravish her." Not love, notice. Lust. The benefits to children aren't mentioned. And then the play depicts him going to New York City to work as a male escort, while yelling "Validate me!". Addiction could not be more obvious to those who know how to recognize it, yet, the Confessions spends its time telling a horror story about Reparative therapy at BYU. It's the shell game, 3 Card Monte, a technique of misdirection. Pointing at oppression, and a "born that way" message. Seeking an enabling culture (that is, one that protects him from the negative consequences of his behavior) when the real solution could be found should be found in a recovery culture.

A few more thoughts on what is wrong with MoF. There is a famous chapter on trying till you have bloody knuckles. At the U of U in the 70s I remember reading a long essay called "A Case of Bloody Knuckles." The problem is not the durability of our knuckles, but not having a key that opens the door. MoF neither diagnoses, nor treats addiction. It means well, and tries, and has some of what we need, but not everything that makes a working key. The article on addiction on the LDS sponsored site says, after explaining the dopamine and seratonin and other chemical exchanges, and growth and shrinkage of different parts of the brain, showing in explicit terms how and why the addiction is a real disease involving observable damage to the brain, says, that "only be recognizing the behavior as an addiction can we treat it with the respect that it deserves." MoF neither diagnoses, nor treats addiction. It points us at a wall. And it blames its failures on us for not being able to open a door on grounds that we didn't torture ourselves long enough.

But there is is a key that works. It does not depend on torture, but 12 steps. The LDS church, via LDS social services, and a growing number of recovery support groups and resources, is fully committed to this approach. The past few years have provided the technology that shows that following the 12 steps actually heals the damage to the brain. Recovery isn't about changing one's orientation, but the obsession. Addiction is a disease that affects choice. The brain has been convinced that the object of obsession is equivalent to survival. Rather than weighing costs and benefits and rationally behaving, the mid brain instructs the shrunken area of the cortext to rationalize behavior. Addiction convinces a person that they cannot live without something, the object of addiction. Recovery restores the conciousness that a person can, and over time, heals the damage, delivering the captive from bondage.

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Pittsburgh, PA

I have heard it said that the brain heals itself from addiction, except where it's like alcohol or drugs or something, so say someone gets addicted to buying shoes or playing video games it alters the brain overtime but if you are in recovery your brain gets back to where it should have been in the first place, have you ever heard of something like that?

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I have heard it said that the brain heals itself from addiction, except where it's like alcohol or drugs or something, so say someone gets addicted to buying shoes or playing video games it alters the brain overtime but if you are in recovery your brain gets back to where it should have been in the first place, have you ever heard of something like that?

All addictions use the same neural pathways, and if a person has one addiction, other addictions can then use the same pathway. Bill W. who started A.A. died of emphysema, thanks to his cigarette addiction. Most addicts have more than one addiction and may have to do recovery for each one, if they want full recovery. Addicts trying to come off one addiction, say, alcohol, may experience cravings for other substances or activities that would stimulate the dopamine production to compensate. On the other hand, other addicts report that working recovery ends other cravings. Colleen Harrison reports that she worked recovery for codependence, and incidentally lost a lot of weight without trying. One of my local friends got into recovery for sex addiction, and realized that he had stopped chewing his fingernails, and was finally able to put on weight he needed.

The damage that shows up in brain scans and the healing that shows up after recovery is remarkably similar, whether the addiction involves cocaine or obesity, or whatever. That is an interesting finding in the new science of addiction. Although there are definitely some particularly nasty drugs out there that do damage that is permanent. Some after a single use. One of the most effective Recovery Group leaders in our area can show you the scar from his liver transplant, courtesy of his time with alcohol. That is something that recovery won't change.

The most important brain chemical in addiction is dopamine, which is part of the desire for pleasure. It is supposed to work with learning, coming into play when we encounter an experience that is better than expected. Dopamine is emitted as part of a message that says, "Remember this... this is better than I thought." That kind of learning is involved in the more malleable parts of the brain. In addiction, the purpose of learning and pleasure reward gets subverted. Over-production of dopamine (in seeking pleasure) is countered by the receptors resetting a thermostat, requiring more dopamine for the same hit. So the while dopamine receptors compensate by enlarging, the other side of the neural pathway in the cortex shrinks, which has the consequence of impeding rational judgement. For addicts, the object of desire feels as though it is as essential as survival, and just the way I am.

I like to show a DVD called Pleasure Unwoven: The Science of Addiction. It is not LDS but was actually filmed in Utah a few years ago. It uses Utah landscapes as metaphors for different parts of the brain. The first time I showed it to a group of addicts in recovery, they were all so stunned that they wanted to take it home to show to their wives.

Best,

Kevin Christensen

Pittsburgh, PA

Edited by Kevin Christensen
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All addictions use the same neural pathways, and if a person has one addiction, other addictions can then use the same pathway. Bill W. who started A.A. died of emphysema, thanks to his cigarette addiction. Most addicts have more than one addiction and may have to do recovery for each one, if they want full recovery. Addicts trying to come off one addiction, say, alcohol, may experience cravings for other substances or activities that would stimulate the dopamine production to compensate. On the other hand, other addicts report that working recovery ends other cravings. Colleen Harrison reports that she worked recovery for codependence, and incidentally lost a lot of weight without trying. One of my local friends got into recovery for sex addiction, and realized that he had stopped chewing his fingernails, and was finally able to put on weight he needed.

The damage that shows up in brain scans and the healing that shows up after recovery is remarkably similar, whether the addiction involves cocaine or obesity, or whatever. That is an interesting finding in the new science of addiction. Although there are definitely some particularly nasty drugs out there that do damage that is permanent. Some after a single use. One of the most effective Recovery Group leaders in our area can show you the scar from his liver transplant, courtesy of his time with alcohol. That is something that recovery won't change.

The most important brain chemical in addiction is dopamine, which is part of the desire for pleasure. It is supposed to work with learning, coming into play when we encounter an experience that is better than expected. Dopamine is emitted as part of a message that says, "Remember this... this is better than I thought." That kind of learning is involved in the more malleable parts of the brain. In addiction, the purpose of learning and pleasure reward gets subverted. Over-production of dopamine (in seeking pleasure) is countered by the receptors resetting a thermostat, requiring more dopamine for the same hit. So the while dopamine receptors compensate by enlarging, the other side of the neural pathway in the cortex shrinks, which has the consequence of impeding rational judgement. For addicts, the object of desire feels as though it is as essential as survival, and just the way I am.

I like to show a DVD called Pleasure Unwoven: The Science of Addiction. It is not LDS but was actually filmed in Utah a few years ago. It uses Utah landscapes as metaphors for different parts of the brain. The first time I showed it to a group of addicts in recovery, they were all so stunned that they wanted to take it home to show to their wives.

Best,

Kevin Christensen

Pittsburgh, PA

very interesting! Thank you!

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Did she grow up in a different religion and heard those words? How come we don't ever hear this in church? Is He not enough?

I grew up in the LDS faith, probably in about 15 different wards and branches over the years and I hear it taught in each one. I don't know why some people's experience is different. It never occurred to me to think we taught something else until I started hearing this from a few others awhile back on the boards (though Robinson's Believing Christ has a variation on this theme about not understanding the Atonement as it is taught in our faith for some reason).
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The most important brain chemical in addiction is dopamine, which is part of the desire for pleasure. It is supposed to work with learning, coming into play when we encounter an experience that is better than expected. Dopamine is emitted as part of a message that says, "Remember this... this is better than I thought." That kind of learning is involved in the more malleable parts of the brain. In addiction, the purpose of learning and pleasure reward gets subverted. Over-production of dopamine (in seeking pleasure) is countered by the receptors resetting a thermostat, requiring more dopamine for the same hit. So the while dopamine receptors compensate by enlarging, the other side of the neural pathway in the cortex shrinks, which has the consequence of impeding rational judgement.

You've got me really wondering now how this might play out for people with low levels of dopamine...my sleep disorder is likely caused by such...and if that means we are less likely to become addicted or more or less likely to find things pleasurable or more sensitive to small changes so more likely.....just when I thought I had caught up on all possible current research in the area....sigh.
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You've got me really wondering now how this might play out for people with low levels of dopamine...my sleep disorder is likely caused by such...and if that means we are less likely to become addicted or more or less likely to find things pleasurable or more sensitive to small changes so more likely.....just when I thought I had caught up on all possible current research in the area....sigh.

A doctor in our Ward told us about one of the seratonin levelers used to treat depression. One of the warnings that comes with that particular drug (I can't remember the name) is that users become vulnerable to gambling addictions. Sometimes the same drugs help other people stop. Remember in the film, As Good as It Gets, Nicholsen's character stops his OCD behaviors by talking pills, which can really happen with OCD.

It's a complicated world, to be sure. But interesting.

Best,

Kevin Christensen

Bethel Park, PA

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I remember when Prozac first came out, a man went to court and protested he was forced to solicit men for his wife because she had become a sex addict. I don't remember what the verdict was though....whether they charged him with pimping or not.

Mirapex--an anti-Parkinson drug that is supposed to raise dopamine levels, is well known for causing gambling and eating disorders among those of us who take it for RLS (at about 1/10 of the Parkinson dose IIRC), haven't heard much about sex addiction with it though. RLSers are probably too tired to do much of that, lol.

Sometimes I feel like life is one big chemistry experiment.

Edited by calmoriah
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I'm the Addiction Recovery Representative in my Stake. For the past year, I've seen a very strong commitment to 12 Step recovery Principles being offered through the church. organization. Miracle of Forgiveness is not canon. It is just one book. If you don't like it, read another book. Read 2 Nephi 5 or Alma 26, or Alma 29, or 3 Nephi. I also recommend Colleen Harrison's He Did Deliver Me From Bondage. It is the first LDS 12 step book, and it shows that 12 Recovery is inherent in the Book of Mormon. The passages supporting the 12 Steps in the Book of Mormon strike me as better and clearer than those supporting it found in the Bible.

Some impressions on why I do not recommend The Miracle of Forgiveness based on my reading a few years ago.

While I was determined to get something from it, I did have several issues with it. Things like, in interpreting the story of the woman brought for stoning, he leaves out the phrases, "Where are thine accusers?" and "neither do I condemn thee..." He lets fly some startlingly harsh language at times. Reading it while the Elizabeth Smart trial was going on, I could not help but feel that the radiant and inspiring Elizabeth and her family did not seem to exemplify the attitude in Miracle of Forgiveness of better dead than impure. Counseling a young couple, he tells them that he finds their actions "disgusting." Not helpful. Shaming and secrecy are essential components of addictions. 12 step recovery requires an environment in which secrets can be shared without the shame.

He also misreads the Parable of the Prodigal Son. Joseph Smith said that his key to interpreting any parable is the question that drew it out, and in this case, in Luke 15, what draws it out is the comment by pharisees that Jesus is hanging out with publicans and sinners. Then comes the first try. The parable of the lost sheep, with the protagonist demonstrating a joy response. The hearers don't get it. Okay, how about the woman with the lost coin, who also shows a joy response. Still don't get it. Okay.. how about this one. The character who shows the joy response is the Father, who is, as a recent discussion I read points out, is prodigal with his love, spreading it freely. The first son tells his father that he wants his inheritance now. Which translated into family relationship terms means, I don't want to wait till you are physically dead. You are dead to me now, and I want out. When he comes back, the father runs to meet him, gives a ring, a cloak, shoes (all of which say that is not a servant, but family), and a feast. The father is demonstrating the same joy response as the protagonists of the first two parables, which joy he wants to share with others, just as the shepherd and the woman do. Yet the other son sulks and says, it's not fair. I have served you. (Which the recent article notes, is servant-master language, not son-to-father language.) He refers to "your son", not to "my brother", which also has implications for how the second son defines the relationships. The father invites the second son to feel joy, and the parables ends unresolved, not telling whether the second son "gets it". In MoF, we get a defense of the second son, saying his pettiness and complaints are in no way comparable to the sins of the wandering son (and giving no reference to the previous chapter's quotations on the spiritual dangers of withholding forgiveness) and claims that while forgiven, the first son has irredeemably lost his portion of the inheritance. There are economics to consider. If the father shares all he has with everyone, how could there be enough to go around? Does the creator have a limited bank account, limited possessions, only so much to give, and not more? That is a reading in which the found son is not really forgiven. Just tolerated and placed over there somewhere, so as not to be an embarressment. Never mind the symbolism of the ring, coat, and shoes, let alone, the feast, and above all, the joy of a father runs and embraces him, and who says that one who was lost and dead has been found. The father does not, glare down at the son, saying, "So you've come crawling back. Well, I suppose I could use a pig swiller." After all, fair is fair. Mercy cannot rob justice. The parable should be read as about father with two sons who is prodigal with his love and joy. It challenges notions of fairness, trumping them with love. The parable is not about the lost son, but about the father. The parable is addressed directly to the attitude of the pharisees, as represented in the parable as the second son.

I also noticed the passages in MoF that talked about how LDS should rather see their loved ones dead rather than excommunicated. How is that supposed to help anyone through the disciplinary process? Telling them they they are worse than dead?

In the same sex chapter, besides the harsh language, he also refers to a "successful treatment program," which, to judge by the time frame, would be the infamously unsuccessful reparative therapy, which attempted to treat addictive behavior by trying to point it at something else. (Don't obsess about this gender. Obsess about that one. Perhaps electric shocks will help. Very B. H. Skinner. In light of later experience, very wrong.) Of course, when he wrote the book, sex addiction had not been thought of, and the first sex addiction recovery group was not even formed until 1979. And it was decades before the medical community took notice and realized what was going on, and realized that the addicts were ahead of them in comprehending the nature of the problem.. Patrick Carnes did his work by going to the recovering addicts in such groups and asking them how they did it. Not by telling them that they shouldn't try to change, and that they were born that way, and should accept themselves as they are with unconditional love. Love should be willing to state the conditions of life. Given that statistics in homosexual communities show that gay men average 500 partners during their life times, and that in the most stable long term male partnerships, there are an average of eight affairs a year, it's reasonable to suggest that addiction and the widespread enabling of addictive behaviors are a major, if not dominant, feature of the Gay and Lesbian communities. A few years ago, I read through Steven Fales' Confessions of a Mormon Boy in Sunstone. When his then wife, Emily asks him if he's been acting out, he confesses. When she asks how many, he says, "Dozens." When he leaves, he rationalizes that he's doing her a favor, leaving her to find someone who will "ravish her." Not love, notice. Lust. The benefits to children aren't mentioned. And then the play depicts him going to New York City to work as a male escort, while yelling "Validate me!". Addiction could not be more obvious to those who know how to recognize it, yet, the Confessions spends its time telling a horror story about Reparative therapy at BYU. It's the shell game, 3 Card Monte, a technique of misdirection. Pointing at oppression, and a "born that way" message. Seeking an enabling culture (that is, one that protects him from the negative consequences of his behavior) when the real solution could be found should be found in a recovery culture.

A few more thoughts on what is wrong with MoF. There is a famous chapter on trying till you have bloody knuckles. At the U of U in the 70s I remember reading a long essay called "A Case of Bloody Knuckles." The problem is not the durability of our knuckles, but not having a key that opens the door. MoF neither diagnoses, nor treats addiction. It means well, and tries, and has some of what we need, but not everything that makes a working key. The article on addiction on the LDS sponsored site says, after explaining the dopamine and seratonin and other chemical exchanges, and growth and shrinkage of different parts of the brain, showing in explicit terms how and why the addiction is a real disease involving observable damage to the brain, says, that "only be recognizing the behavior as an addiction can we treat it with the respect that it deserves." MoF neither diagnoses, nor treats addiction. It points us at a wall. And it blames its failures on us for not being able to open a door on grounds that we didn't torture ourselves long enough.

But there is is a key that works. It does not depend on torture, but 12 steps. The LDS church, via LDS social services, and a growing number of recovery support groups and resources, is fully committed to this approach. The past few years have provided the technology that shows that following the 12 steps actually heals the damage to the brain. Recovery isn't about changing one's orientation, but the obsession. Addiction is a disease that affects choice. The brain has been convinced that the object of obsession is equivalent to survival. Rather than weighing costs and benefits and rationally behaving, the mid brain instructs the shrunken area of the cortext to rationalize behavior. Addiction convinces a person that they cannot live without something, the object of addiction. Recovery restores the conciousness that a person can, and over time, heals the damage, delivering the captive from bondage.

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Pittsburgh, PA

This is a excellent and insightful posting. Thank you.

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I believe that to be the key. Not to beat a dead horse or anything, but something P. Kimball said in a 77 Conference address (again, straight out of his book), speaks truth to me. I don't disagree with any of it.

http://www.lds.org/g...usness?lang=eng

We hear more and more each day about the sins of adultery, homosexuality, and lesbianism. Homosexuality is an ugly sin, but because of its prevalence, the need to warn the uninitiated, and the desire to help those who may already be involved with it, it must be brought into the open.

It is the sin of the ages. It was present in Israel’s wandering as well as after and before. It was tolerated by the Greeks. It was prevalent in decaying Rome. The ancient cities of Sodom and Gomorrah are symbols of wretched wickedness more especially related to this perversion, as the incident of Lot’s visitors indicates.

There is today a strong clamor to make such practices legal by passing legislation. Some would also legislate to legalize prostitution. They have legalized abortion, seeking to remove from this heinous crime the stigma of sin.

We do not hesitate to tell the world that the cure for these evils is not in surrender.

Edit to add that this theme has been taught by many prophets since P. Kimball.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion. Even prophets.

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This is a excellent and insightful posting. Thank you.

This is an excellent article on the history of AA:

Wired Magazine: The Secret of AA: After 75 Years, We Don't Know How It Works

(the board won't let me link to it for some reason, so just Google it for the whole article)

It’s all quite an achievement for a onetime broken-down drunk. And Wilson’s success is even more impressive when you consider that AA and its steps have become ubiquitous despite the fact that no one is quite sure how—or, for that matter, how well—they work. The organization is notoriously difficult to study, thanks to its insistence on anonymity and its fluid membership. And AA’s method, which requires “surrender” to a vaguely defined “higher power,” involves the kind of spiritual revelations that neuroscientists have only begun to explore.

What we do know, however, is that despite all we’ve learned over the past few decades about psychology, neurology, and human behavior, contemporary medicine has yet to devise anything that works markedly better. “In my 20 years of treating addicts, I’ve never seen anything else that comes close to the 12 steps,” says Drew Pinsky, the addiction-medicine specialist who hosts VH1′s

Celebrity Rehab. “In my world, if someone says they don’t want to do the 12 steps, I know they aren’t going to get better.”

Wilson may have operated on intuition, but somehow he managed to tap into mechanisms that counter the complex psychological and neurological processes through which addiction wreaks havoc. And while AA’s ability to accomplish this remarkable feat is not yet understood, modern research into behavior dynamics and neuroscience is beginning to provide some tantalizing clues.

One thing is certain, though: AA doesn’t work for everybody. In fact, it doesn’t work for the vast majority of people who try it. And understanding more about who it does help, and why, is likely our best shot at finally developing a system that improves on Wilson’s amateur scheme for living without the bottle.

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