Mormonism, like most religions, has many teachings about sex and intimacy. But, like everything else, teachings interact with persons, each with her or his own temperaments and autobiographies. As a result, the same teaching can strike each of us differently. For some, messages about embodied Gods, male and female, is incredibly empowering, even a help to them in developing positive attitudes toward their own sexuality. For others, the same teaching (and all its extensions) can trigger negative reactions as they imagine lives of eternal sex and childbearing, or find other extensions of the teaching problematic and disempowering. For some people, the Law of Chastity becomes an important element in their value system, leading them to take a healthy look at and make empowering choices regarding their sexual desires and actions. For others, it becomes a burden, something imposed upon them, and they end up making choices about sexual practice out of fear—fear of God, parents, church leaders—and as attempts to please others. Name the topic, and we Mormons, like everyone else, can end up in all sorts of emotional and spiritual spaces regarding sexuality: many positive, but many quite confused and inhibiting to intimacy in general, and/or an enjoyable and empowering sex life.
In this two-part episode, a wonderful panel of marriage and family counselors who also have certifications in and/or a great deal of experience with sex therapy—Natasha Helfer Parker, Shannon Hickman, Kristin Hodson, and Kristin Marie Bennion—join Mormon Matters host Dan Wotherspoon for a terrific discussion of the issues surrounding sex that are quite common in Mormonism, and among the general public. But, as the title of the episode suggests, the main focus is on the sex-positive messaging that exists in Mormonism, and how we can better include it in our own thinking about and experiences of desire and physical intimacy. How can we create a gospel-based value system that incorporates LDS teachings about the goodness of our bodies, and that sex is not just about procreation but also pleasure and connection and relational intimacy? How do we incorporate and find the proper balance between messaging about the spiritual aspects of human sexuality and the intense and bodily driven emotions and activities that are a key element of sexual fulfillment? The panelists also address LDS teachings about pornography, as well as finding healthy ways to integrate our sexual pasts with our present sex lives—everything from the messaging we grew up with and absorbed into our views about ourselves and our bodies, to guilt over past sexual experimentation, to healing from unwanted sexual advances, even abuse.
This is a powerful episode. Please listen and then join in the discussion in the comments section below!
Links to Items and Events Mentioned in this Episode:
“Intimacy in Mormon Marriage” Workshop, 28 December 2015, Orem, Utah. Co-sponsored by Mormon Matters and A Thoughtful Faith podcasts.
The workshop information and registration links are about half-way down front page. You can also learn about the workshop and register here.
Related writings by Natasha Helfer Parker:
“Sexuality and the Mormon Marriage,” Segullah blog, 31 January 2011
“Teaching Chastity to the Relief Society,” Mormon Therapist blog, 21 September 2013
The Healing Group, Kristin Hodson’s therapy practice website
Kristin Hodson, et al, Real Intimacy: A Couple’s Guide to Healthy, Genuine Sexuality (Cedar Fort, 2012)
“Who Moved My Desire?“: A Support Group Exploring Female Desire
Dallin H. Oaks, “Recovering from the Trap of Pornography,” Ensign, Ocober 2015
“What Should I Do When I See Pornography?“, LDS.org video for children
Kristin Hodson, “Ten Sex Positive Things Worth Noting in the LDS Church Video on Talking to Your Kids About Pornography,” Cultural Hall Podcast blog, 16 November 2015
Intimate Connections Counseling, Kristin Marie Bennion’s therapy practice website
Shannon Hickman Counseling, Shannon Hickman’s therapy practice website
“The Birds and the Bees: Parent Education Event” flyer for Shannon Hickman workshop to be held 11 January 2016 in West Jordan, Utah
Taylor Petrey, “Toward a Post-Heterosexual Mormon Theology,” Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, Winter 2011
Utah Sex Therapy Association website
AASECT: American Association of Sexuality Educators, Counselors, and Therapists website
Comments 6
I appreciate the positive tone you are taking with this podcast. There is much to admire in the church and its support of sexual responsibility– “abstinence before marriage and fidelity after.” I have been blessed to have been spared the heartache that comes with confusion about sexual boundaries, largely because of my upbringing in the church.
So why is it that the vast majority of my close friends have been sexually abused, many by active, believing members? Why is it that I have heard so many stories of inappropriate behavior by church leaders in confidential worthiness interviews? I have not sought for these stories, but the sheer numbers seem to be evidence of a systemic problem.
I wonder why none of the podcasts under the umbrella of The Open Stories Foundation have yet to fully tackle the underbelly of sexual abuse and its subsequent cover-up within the church. Someone once told me that sexual abuse follows patriarchal systems as predictably as night follows day. She said that, demographically, you can predict where sexual abuse will become systemic by determining the level of patriarchy in a given area. There is substantial evidence that is the case here.
I just watched the movie Spotlight about the Boston Globe’s exposure of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church. It is well done and highly recommended. I cried during that movie. The stories of the victims sounded familiar to me. Many of the dynamics that led to this abuse within the Catholic Church exist, I believe, in the LDS church. In one instance, I know of a family with extensive, systemic, multi generational abuse that became known by church leaders but nothing was done about it on the church level. Cover-up is the other side of the coin that perpetuates this disturbing behavior.
As a corollary, the practice in the church of sexually invasive priesthood interviews is evidence of a tragic lack of understanding of the psychology of sexuality that, I believe, points to a deeper problem which, paradoxically, coexists with the positive messages you highlight in this podcast. I have spoken to many women (and I’m sure there are men) who have experienced a subtle, but still traumatic, abuse within those interviews. I believe it goes much further. Moreover, plural “marriage” as it was practiced and the legacy it has left was and is sexually traumatic (which, unless it is disavowed by the leadership, does not give the church a solid moral high ground to be in a proper position relative to homosexuality or sexuality, in general). All of these issues need to be discussed as part of any overall examination of the church’s doctrines, practices, and policies related to sexuality. Certainly we can point out where the church gets it right, as you have done in this podcast, but the whole story has not been told.
I am proposing that this information come out, not to place blame or to condemn or to vilify, but as useful information. One of the participants in this podcast (not sure who it was) said at about minute 48:45, “The more you know what’s in your luggage [past sexual trauma and its source] . . . , the better.” This information and understanding of its scope, I believe, is necessary for the church to move past it and more powerfully teach healthy sexual behavior.
I believe it is time to bring this to light.
Thank you for this podcast! I’d love to hear it become a series of sorts delving into these topics with roundtables of male and female therapists that work with individuals and families. Also, have any of these folks done a review of the church’s addiction recovery program? I have family members participating in it and want to be supportive in a healthy way while recognizing that it may be just a step in their healing — and maybe not the end all be all program for them. Most of my family is anxious to not step outside of church recommended healing routes and I’ve seen the harm that causes.
An enjoyable podcast. Several years ago, as I began to face the realities of my own sexless marriage, I really began to look at the dialog we have in the Church around sex and sexuality. At that time, I recall imagining a hypothetical Priesthood lesson on chastity. After discussing all of the “evils” of sexuality (probably including segments on pornography, adultery, entertainment, and modesty), I tried to imagine ending the lesson with something like “After discussing all of these evils, does anyone have any good and positive to say about sex and sexuality?” I tended to imagine this segment as being fairly quiet, but it was also a useful thought process to imagine. Sometimes it seems to me that our dialog around sexuality is so focused on the evils, that it is good to remind ourselves of the good things we believe about our sexuality.
The sex-positive podcast is primarily a rebuttal to the predominant negative messages from mormonism, as in “see, it’s not all bad”. However, mormonism is predominately sex-negative. Mormonism’s primary concern about sex is rules, controlling, silence, judging, shaming, and shunning. Mormonism has a long history of this religiously and culturally: masturbation, porn, skinny dipping, french kissing, necking, petting, “unnatural” sex, or anything sexual outside of marriage, blah, blah, blah. That’s why podcasts about sex in mormonism are often about its negative sex messages, or in this case, a spin by way of rebuttal that mormonism is sex positive, but primarily it’s not. Yet believers have already made up their mind; they’ve already drawn their presumptions and conclusions, and will spin the facts to fit their presumptions and conclusions that mormonism is sex positive.
Not to beat up just on mormonism on this topic. Sex negativity is problem with religion generally, especially with fundamentalist types, and it seems the more fundamentalist it is, the weirder it is about sex. Catholics, muslims, mormons, evangelicals, baptists, etc, all have weird sex problems and hang-ups in their community. Here’s a novel idea: (r)eject religious control of sex. Empowering individual autonomy along with education and fostering healthy relationships is generally what’s needed for healthy sexuality. Overall, religion hurts, not helps, sexuality. Holy/divine god(dess(es))/ghost are not needed to foster healthy sexuality. There are compelling individual and social reasons enough without resorting to otherworldly things.
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