{"id":4456,"date":"2018-03-30T22:04:36","date_gmt":"2018-03-30T22:04:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/peculiarpeople\/?p=4456"},"modified":"2018-03-30T22:04:36","modified_gmt":"2018-03-30T22:04:36","slug":"why-ill-no-longer-go-to-priesthood-interviews-alone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/peculiarpeople\/2018\/03\/why-ill-no-longer-go-to-priesthood-interviews-alone\/","title":{"rendered":"Why I’ll No Longer Go to Priesthood Interviews Alone"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"\"<\/a>
Stake Center in West Valley City, Utah \u2013 image obtained from WikiMedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The more stories break about women who\u2019ve been abused or sexually harassed by Mormon leaders, the more I realize how lucky I\u2019ve been.<\/p>\n

Still, a recent guest post at\u00a0The Exponent<\/a>\u00a0hit close to home because the writer, another Emily B, shares my first name and last initial. There are many Emily B\u2019s in the world, but reading this article by someone with my name felt like watching another version of myself through the looking glass. It underlined how easily I could have wound up in the same situation, writing the same type of story, if I\u2019d simply been unlucky in priesthood leaders.<\/p>\n

As I described in my last post<\/a>, I\u2019ve had a few rare negative experiences with priesthood leaders, but never anything of a sexual nature. Then again, I also never served a mission, in large part because I was wary of a culture that seemed to stress obedience above all else. I didn\u2019t want to enter into a culture where someone who is not a medical professional could refuse to let me see a doctor, a culture where even my personal decision not to wear makeup could be construed as unwillingness to follow the counsel of God\u2019s leaders (and I\u2019ve heard reports of that happening, despite the fact that the Church doesn\u2019t require<\/a> female missionaries to wear makeup). A culture where refusing to ride a bicycle while wearing a skirt is unheard of. In other words, a culture where refusing to toe the line in small, personal, insignificant matters could be deemed unrighteous.<\/p>\n

Even without serving a mission, I still could have encountered a similar situation if I\u2019d been less lucky with bishops and stake presidents. Growing up in the church, I was of course still subject to the culture that made it so difficult for this other Emily B to escape her mission president\u2019s sexual harassment. After describing his abuse, she poses the following questions:<\/p>\n

Why didn\u2019t we speak up or do something more to protect ourselves? Looking back, I am devastated by the question of why I didn\u2019t stand up for myself. Why did I stay frozen in my chair every month? Why enter the room with him in the first place? Why not tell my parents when I wrote them?<\/em><\/p>\n

The answer she provides is one that I think most Mormon women (or Mormons<\/a> in general) could have easily said:<\/p>\n

We had been conditioned to be seated and stay seated for male leadership from the time we were primary children. I was in a new place adjusting to a new culture while the man the church assigned to protect and guide was instead somebody who made me feel gross and violated. We were told that our mission president was called by God. We had to sustain him to go to the temple.He had all the keys to get me anywhere, literally and figuratively. To this day I can\u2019t imagine a scenario where I could have gotten help, had people believe me, and been able to finish my mission.<\/em><\/p>\n

While I haven\u2019t served a mission, I was indeed conditioned from a young age to stay seated for male leadership and defer to their authority. That conditioning is the reason why, when I asked a bishop whether I could receive my Endowment \u2013 as a 24-year-old grad student \u2013 and he said, \u201cNo,\u201d I didn\u2019t object. I didn\u2019t tell him, \u201cYou need to stop and pray about this decision instead of just dismissing me without a thought. The letter from the First Presidency advises to let single women receive their endowment in their \u2018mid-twenties,\u2019 not \u2018at age 25,\u2019 so their policy doesn\u2019t prevent me. I\u2019ve been praying about this question since I was 18 years old, and in more than six years, the answer has been \u2018not yet,\u2019 until this week, when the answer was finally \u2018yes, now is the time.\u2019 If I can spend 6 years praying to receive an answer, you can spend 6 minutes.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the reason I had to stop and sob on the way home but still refused to set up a follow-up appointment to argue my case.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the reason a relative was shocked when I told them that I had made a policy of not accepting any new calling before I had received my own witness that I should. He too had been conditioned to believe that members must defer to the authority of anyone higher than them in the Mormon hierarchy and couldn\u2019t understand why I went so far as to ask to be released from a calling that was making me physically ill.<\/p>\n

Yes, people like Joseph Bishop and the former mission president of this other Emily B are the exception. They\u2019re a few bad apples. But they\u2019re bad apples in a lunch line that actively discourages anyone from refusing the apple they\u2019re handed. Bad apples in a room where tossing the bad apple in the trash and refusing to eat it often means being expelled from the cafeteria altogether.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why we need meaningful reforms \u2013 some way of reporting bad apples to someone other than the apple vendors.<\/p>\n

Allowing members to have another adult present during a priesthood worthiness interview isn\u2019t quite enough, but it is an important step. And while I\u2019m not clear on whether the Church\u2019s updated policy<\/a> added that option or just made sure leaders knew about it, it\u2019s a step that I\u2019ve decided to embrace. Not because I ever expect to be abused or harassed by a priesthood leader, but because I want to promote a culture where choosing to bring another adult to the interview is seen positively. Where it won\u2019t be seen as an inherent accusation against the man interviewing.<\/p>\n

My temple recommend expires in May, and I will have my husband go with me for that interview. If I weren\u2019t married, I\u2019d ask a friend to join me. I\u2019ll also explain to my leaders why I\u2019ve made this decision \u2013 that it\u2019s not about them as individuals but about promoting an environment where these protections are seen as the norm.<\/p>\n

For any woman out there who is comfortable having a friend or family member present during those interviews, I\u2019d encourage you to do the same. The more of us who take leadership up on this policy, the more it will send a message that we\u2019re not going to sit still and accept anything and everything a priesthood leader says or does \u2013 that we have a right to place limits that can protect us from abuse.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The more stories break about women who\u2019ve been abused or sexually harassed by Mormon leaders, the more I realize how lucky I\u2019ve been. Still, a recent guest post at\u00a0The Exponent\u00a0hit close to home because the writer, another Emily B, shares my first name and last initial. There are many Emily B\u2019s in the world, but […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":911,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4456","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mormonism-politics-romney"],"yoast_head":"\nWhy I'll No Longer Go to Priesthood Interviews Alone<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The more stories break about women who've been abused or sexually harassed by Mormon leaders, the more I realize how lucky I've been. 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