I think most ward-members overlook or are in denial. They assume other ward-members are like them striving to get by and show a good face in church.

But I think the big smiles and chirpy chatter can hide a darker side. There might be abusive marriages, child porn, child abuse and polygamists hidden in the ranks. Everyone overlooks the red flags because they are overwhelmed with doing their callings and covering up their own imperfections.

The LDS religion is a perfect cover for perverts. I expect there are several perverts in every Ward.

The LDS church is a breeding ground for perverts, con-men, liars, and all other types of ugly. Put on a white shirt and tie, put your tithing envelope in a front pocket for all to see at meetings, let all those within ear shot hear you say you have a meeting with the bishop to renew your recommend, be seen at the temple, hold a influential calling and one can easily hide one's darkest side. And that's just the tip of the ice berg.

Newsflash:

All of us can be perverted at times... and it's OK to admit that.

(that doesn't mean we are pedophiles however)

But we ALL are capable of a dirty mind, or have problems in other areas.

Your statement is like going to a hospital and snickering and saying under your breath "I bet there are people with heart problems in this building! Can you believe it!!!"

It's a hospital... there's gonna be sick people there.

Same with churches... any church. Lots of people go to church because they have problems... that's why they go to begin with.

No one is perfect but polygamists and perverts are few and far between and the mormon church has more than most organizations.

Not all polygamists are perverts and not all perverts are Mormon but they do have more than their fair share.

If you don't want the church love bombing and constantly knocking on your door go get a second wife. Visits will stop immediately.

Interestingly: When I filled out an immigration form one of the questions was; Are you coming to the US to practice polygamy. Found that question quite amusing for a country that professes religious freedom.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/12/2017 05:01PM by John Mc.

Since Mormonism was founded by a serial child sexual abuser and polygamist, maybe it provides a higher comfort level for those who are so inclined.

Any organization that turns people into sheep for its own gain is a magnet for wolves.

Combine that with sexual repression, and you get all kinds of weird. No reason to be surprised when the SWAT team surrounds a ward member's house and hauls them off for child porn and molestation. This actually happened in my former ward.

^ Bingo! +1. You nailed it.

You are absolutely right that the hyperbolic rhetoric about sexual purity, combined with the mixed messages of the TSCC's past leadership's sexual monkey biz. makes for some really screwed up people.

Imagine if you took a child and did the same kind mind screw to him/her, but with cookies instead of sex. "Don't touch the cookies"... "Even thinking about cookies is sinful"... "Cookies are only to be eaten by adults and only in the proper confines of GOD approved consumption."... "Cover up the cookies and practice cookie modesty"...

We instinctively know that a significant number of kids raised in that environment would have forbidden cookies hidden in every dark corner of the house and would likely suffer from more types of cookie related dysfunction that one could imagine.

Yes, definitely. Because you combine gullible people with the "virtue" of having a good image rather than a good character and you are bound to attract perverts. Especially like someone mentioned, with the weird sexual repression. (That Sons of Helaman group out in Utah? Seriously.) Perverts can keep a good public face by doing their church stuff while gaining access to those they can exploit. Other groups may have their weirdos too but Mormonism is like a fertile field v. dry, unwatered land elsewhere. Some places just lend themselves to better growing of certain "plants."

The church is divided into 2 categories, the Sheep & the Wolves. The main difference between the church and the animal kingdom is that, in the animal kingdom, the sheep can recognize the wolves.

ABSOLUTELY!!!!

I know of a child molester (sexually molested his two daughters while he was a member of the Bishopric) who was disfellowshipped. As we all know, disfellowshipped members are told to continue attending their church meetings, pay tithing, etc., as part of the repentance process while they work towards reinstatement. Since the repentance process is confidential, only a select few members were aware that this child molesting bastard ward member was sitting in their midst. Hey, he might have been sitting in the row behind you during sacrament meeting eying your young daughter. Chew on that for a bit.

One ward in the Preston UK Stake had three people jailed in two instances for child abuse. One was jailed for sex offences against his own children, the other for 'child abuse' but not sure the extent of the offences - his wife was jailed too for covering it up.

Then in a ward in the West Midlands, another guy remained active despite child rape and forced child sex. Apparently he'd 'repented' and had been unable to take the sacrament for a long time - but no criminal charges were ever filed.

Pervert - depending upon what one considers a pervert, probably. If 'pervert' is translated as one who cannot confine his practices, whatever they may be, to the ranks of adults who consent to his practices, almost for sure.

As far as polygamists go, I would think it depends upon where one's ward is. While there may very well be a few polygamists attending regular LDS wards anywhere, I think by and large, the likelihood of having a polygamist attending one's ward is greatly increased by one's living either in the morridor or in a few places where the known polygamist groups own land. There's supposedly a polygamist group at the base of the Sierra foothills east of Sacramento in a town named Rocklin. As far as I know, those polygamists keep to themselves and don't attend conventional LDS wards. I don't know of any other groups of polygamists in California, but i'm not sure I would know.

That was about ten years ago I think. I'll bet the one guy was from the group you mentioned. The other man and his wife were running their own little extended family group out of their home and torturing their daughters in their makeshift "Celestial Room."

I told my bishop that my father had abused me. It didn't keep him from being a veil worker at the temple, but it get his ward calling changed to working in the PRIMARY. You know, so he could learn to better understand children.

Ahhh, the joys of lay clergy.

I worked as a parole officer in Utah for many years and worked on Utah's sex offender registration. YES! there are plenty of perverts to make sure every ward has at least one convicted sex offender, the key word is "convicted".

Paging Dr. Mark K. Anderson, DDS (Woodland, Ca).

Dr. Anderson, stand up and take a bow:


"A dentist accused of fondling the breasts of 27 female patients is trying to keep his dental license by arguing that chest massages are an appropriate procedure in certain cases. Mark Anderson's lawyer says dental journals discuss the need to massage the pectoral muscles to treat a common jaw problem."

(article)
http://palominas.blogspot.com/2007/10/and-now-for-something-completely.html

(reader's comments)
http://www.topix.com/forum/business/dental/TVCNGHUM5QPG0OODV


The good doctor was sentenced to 6 years in the slammer (circa April 24, 2009):

http://www.dailydemocrat.com/general-news/20090424/woodland-dentist-sentenced-to-6-years-in-prison

Let me guess...not one of his male patients had this jaw problem that required chest massage.

Woodland is near Sacramento. Perhaps there's something in the water up there. In any event, as weird as southern California supposedly is, northern california has the larger number of high-profile weird sex crime cases.

Yes, Mormons are weird around here. We had one at an area ward who had children sit on his lap for a piece of candy. He did this in the church foyer, and the members thought it was okay. Each child had to sit in his lap and no adolescents. He would actually growl at the older children.

are also in many wards. Some counties in Utah have mostly polygamists like Juab for example. Polygamists can wear pioneer clothes and funny hairdos, others don't. They don't talk about their plural marriages if they don't want it known.

As for perverts, I knew of them in the ward where I grew up and heard about them as I moved from place to place. They tend to keep quiet and cover up their dirty deeds.

I know of one person who thought his childhood ward was a happy place with no such antics. Years later, he discovered he had been good friends with a girl whose father was raping her regularly. All is not what it seems in these "boring" clean cut wards throughout the church, in every state and every country.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/11/2017 10:29PM by Cheryl.

I would not be surprised probably more than we think, I'd imagine even the happily married ones seem suspect in my opinion.

DH Went to ward only once. Said he had arrested too many people in that ward for molesting their own children.

Next ward. Primary teacher went to prison for groping his patients while he believed they were under anesthesia.

Next ward. Older bishop rented homes on same property to single moms w one child.

I always wondered.

My "home" ward, the ward that I attended most as an adult and the ward that I was attending before I quit MORmONISM, DID have both a predatory pervert and a polygamist in it, a person every bit as mentally ill and predatory as ......well you just take your pick out of any of the players of the MORmON looney bin starting with good old pervert Joe Smith whose MORmON religion has such an integral role in this story.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vjc9Gk379wE

I think most wards probably do.

Past incidents I personally know of:

1) A man from the bishopric fleeing town for committing adultery.

2) My seminary teacher being driven from town by men with guns for committing adultery with the men's kinswoman.

3) A teen I went to church with ending up in prison for rape.

4) A female cousin of mine married a man who was raised by polygamists.