Mormons and Shame: When You Don’t Measure Up to the LDS Ideal

[Third Hour]

This article by Jule de Azevedo Hanks first appeared at Meridian Magazine. The following is an excerpt.  In the LDS Church, we have high expectations and high ideals. Leaders do not shy away from teaching a very specific ideal family constellation, sexual purity before marriage, and patterning our life after the Savior’s life in every possible way. There is nothing wrong with teaching ideals and one could argue that that is the primary job of religious institutions. However, in real life, holding up ideals often leaves members never feeling “good enough” because they have not achieved the ideal righteous Mormon life. Chronic feelings of “never good enough” because your life doesn’t look like an Ensign magazine cover, your child has left the Church, your spouse isn’t committed to church callings, you’re struggling with the word of wisdom, you’re having difficulty forgiving someone, you’re not a good provider, or you’re not an attentive mother or father, can erode our whole sense of self. What is shame? Shame is a universal emotion defined...

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[Guest]

Gee, we're playing with words again.  Wonderful.

[The Folk Prophet]

I consider  Brené Brown, PhD's definition of "shame" a bit narrow. That's certainly "a" way to define it. It is not, by any means, the universal exclusive meaning of it, which is not so narrow. For example, Oxford's dictionary gives it:

a painful feeling of humiliation or distress caused by the consciousness of wrong or foolish behavior

Much better.

Yep. Playing with words.

Edited January 17, 2017 by The Folk Prophet

[Vort]

I have to agree with Carb and TFP. Well-intentioned though the article (and the PhD) might have been, when we give a special definition to a word and then flog away at that definition -- that's a strawman and nothing more. Shame is perfectly appropriate when you have acted shamefully. When you haven't, it's not appropriate. It's pretty much that simple.

[prisonchaplain]

I was going to say that I don't understand the big deal.  After all, I live up to the LDS ideal,* and I'm not even LDS.

* Of course, this assumes I am okay with my higher criticism approach to the Word of Wisdom, which contends that the prohibition against coffee was meant as allegory, representing our personal struggle towards godly spirituality (kinda like jihad), and was never meant to be taken literally. 

[Guest]

43 minutes ago, prisonchaplain said:

I don't understand the big deal.

What were you referring to when you say "big deal"?

[prisonchaplain]

Measuring up to the LDS ideal--as in, it's not really that hard ... of course then I followed with a lame excuse as to why I did not really do so, perhaps suggesting, tongue-in-cheek, that even if one fails to fully live up to the standards, there's always some semi-humorous interpretating that can excuse away the shortcomings.

Edited January 19, 2017 by prisonchaplain

[Guest]

47 minutes ago, prisonchaplain said:

I was going to say that I don't understand the big deal.  After all, I live up to the LDS ideal,* and I'm not even LDS.

I actually have little doubt as to the veracity of that statement.  But we all know how many people are struggling.  Heck, I'm struggling.  Although I'm considered "temple worthy", there are so many weaknesses I wish I didn't have to deal with.  I'm not getting down on myself here.  I'm just making an observation (and I even hope this was the point of the article) that when we've stated our goal is "perfection", it is very easy to see all of our faults and nothing else.

That's what the big deal is.

[prisonchaplain]

I get the big deal. We see this in our churches, when the "altar call" is made, and so many of our truly dedicated, hard-working, godly saints will come forward to request prayer for seemingly inconsequential 'failures,' while those who truly need to repent and get right with God sit back and wonder what's wrong with the folks going up.  Yes, it is a serious struggle and concern. I had hoped that the tongue sticking out of my cheek on my post was prominent enough, and that my attempt at introducing some levity to the difficult topic would prove useful.