https:\/\/www.mormoninterpreter.com\/barriers-to-belief-mental-distress-and-disaffection-from-the-church\/<\/a><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Here is the summary paragraph that precedes the published article:<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Abstract:<\/strong>\u00a0People leave the Church for a\u00a0variety of reasons. Of all the reasons why people leave, one that has attracted little or no attention is the influence of mental distress. People who experience anxiety or depression see things differently than those who do not. Recognizing that people with mental distress have a\u00a0different experience with church than others may help us to make adjustments that can prevent some amount of disaffection from the Church. This article takes a\u00a0first step in identifying ways that mental distress can affect church activity and in presenting some of the things that individuals, friends, family members and Church leaders can do to help make being a\u00a0member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter\u00a0day Saints a\u00a0little easier for those who experience mental distress.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Certain readers of the article \u2014 well, to be fully candid, I\u2019m not absolutely sure that they have<\/em> read the article and, in certain cases at least, I rather doubt that they have even glanced in its direction \u2014 have been mightily incensed at it because, they say, it claims that people leave the Church due to mental problems.<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Well, it does<\/em> suggest that \u2014 or, to be precise, it suggests that mental and\/or emotional problems might be factors in certain cases of departure from the Church. \u00a0And precision is very important here.<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Consider the proposition<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
(A) People die due to drunk driving.<\/em><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Strictly understood, this simply means that drunk driving is a factor in an unspecified number or proportion of deaths \u2014 a claim that is scarcely controversial. \u00a0(I myself lost a very, very close friend to a drunken driver, years ago.)<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
It would be wildly unjustified, however, to insist that (A) means<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
(B) \u00a0All people die due to drunk driving<\/em><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
For one thing, (A) simply doesn\u2019t say that. \u00a0Moreover, (B) is plainly false. \u00a0People die from a host<\/em> of causes, including disease, war, murder, falls from cliffs, botched surgeries, snakebite, drunk driving, food poisoning, drowning, airline crashes, and old age.<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Manifestly, the most plausible reading of (A), and a thoroughly defensible one, is<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
(C) \u00a0Some people die due to drunk driving.<\/em><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
In response to the Densley\/Giles article, one or two critics have simply defined religious belief as itself a mental illness or mass delusion. \u00a0But that\u2019s mere bargain-basement pop Freudianism, and not very interesting. \u00a0Others have declared, without offering statistical or other evidence in support of their assertion, that belief in the claims of the Restoration itself causes<\/em> mental illness.<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
A few critics, however, profess to find the Densley\/Giles article insulting and perhaps even legally defamatory because, they say, it argues that failure to believe Joseph Smith\u2019s claims or a decision to leave the Church is, flatly, a sign of mental illness. \u00a0Densley and Giles, these critics say, are inviting members of the Church to regard all who depart from it as mentally ill, even delusional, to stigmatize them as \u201cthe other,\u201d and encouraging family members of those who leave to treat them as psychologically defective. \u00a0One reliably malevolent misreader even suggests that the publication of the article illustrates the hilarious pleasure that I derive from ridiculing the mentally ill.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
But Densley and Giles certainly do not argue (in analogy to [B], above) \u00a0that all who leave the Church do so because they\u2019re emotionally disturbed and\/or psychogically disordered. \u00a0Rather, they contend (in analogy to [C], above) that some<\/em> who leave the Church may<\/em> do so in part<\/em> because of mental\/emotional challenges. \u00a0That\u2019s quite a different proposition.<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Even the abstract alone, quoted above, is enough to make this clear: \u00a0\u201cPeople leave the Church for a\u00a0variety of reasons<\/em>. . . . \u00a0[O]ne<\/em>\u00a0[of those reasons] . . . \u00a0is the influence of mental distress. . . . \u00a0[We may be able to make] adjustments that can prevent some amount<\/em> of disaffection from the Church . . . \u00a0[M]ental distress can<\/em> affect church activity.\u201d (emphasis mine).<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Moreover, the motivation of the authors is plainly neither to insult nor defame anybody, nor to stigmatize anyone, nor to \u201cother\u201d people who may be experiencing crises of faith. \u00a0Even if one disagrees with the argument made in the article, its authors (who plainly and frankly write as believing Latter-day Saints) have an unmistakably pastoral intent, representing their essay as\u00a0<\/em>\u201ca\u00a0first step in identifying ways that mental distress can affect church activity and in presenting some of the things that individuals, friends, family members and Church leaders can do to help make being a\u00a0member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter\u00a0day Saints a\u00a0little easier for those who experience mental distress.\u201d<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
To portray this as an attempt to stigmatize, marginalize, insult, or defame struggling members of the Church seems quite manifestly unjust.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
I encourage people who haven\u2019t read the article yet to do so, and I invite those who may have read it as malicious to read it again.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u00a0 \u00a0 Over the past few weeks, I\u2019ve watched with fascination \u2014 though, unfortunately, not altogether in surprise \u2014 at the reaction in a few places to the article by\u00a0Steven T. Densley, Jr.\u00a0and\u00a0Geret Giles that appeared in Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship on 18 January 2019. \u00a0It is entitled \u201cBarriers to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[701,1809,3556,975,114,2689,3547,3550,55,3553],"class_list":["post-70246","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-apostasy","tag-church-of-jesus-christ-of-latter-day-saints","tag-geret-giles","tag-interpreter","tag-interpreter-foundation","tag-leaving-the-church","tag-mental-health","tag-mental-illness","tag-mormonism","tag-steve-densley"],"yoast_head":"\n
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