14

February 2018


The Expert Panel on Religious Freedom
C/O Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet
PO Box 6500
Canberra ACT 2600
Email: religiousfreedom@pmc.gov.au

Delivered via Online Submission

Re: Religious freedom review submission – concerns about abusive practices towards children in the
Mormon church

INTRODUCTION
Firstly, I apologise for not identifying myself to the Expert Panel on Religious Freedom (the Panel). For reasons
relating to the sensitivity of the subject matter of my submission, I would prefer to remain anonymous at this
time.

My submission is made in response to the review’s Terms of Reference and responds to the scope provided.

My submission relates to my concerns about the abusive practices towards children in the Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-Day Saints (the Mormons) in Australia and around the world. In making my submission, I call
upon the Panel to suspend any recommendations for additional rights for religious groups in Australia until
this matter is fully investigated and understood.

Given the seriousness of this matter, I would be extremely concerned and disappointed if recommendations
were made by the Panel to increase the powers of religious groups. Increasing powers and protections for
authoritarian and hierarchical institutions like the Mormon church will facilitate the ongoing harmful practices
the church inflicts upon its child aged members, as highlighted below.

ABUSIVE PRACTICES TOWARDS CHILDREN IN THE MORMON CHURCH
I would like to present to the Panel my submission about a
seemingly benign process which is undertaken by local clergy
in the Mormon church known as ‘worthiness interviews’.
Similar to a Catholic confession (but far more insidious,
calculated and controlling – in my opinion), worthiness
interviews consist of regular private conversations between
adult clergymen in the Mormon church known as Bishops and
with children as young as seven years old.

In these interviews, Bishops (or one of their assistants known
as counsellors) meet with children aged seven to seventeen years old alone and behind closed doors in order
to ask the child questions about their dedication to their leaders, the status of their faith, their compliance
with the compulsory contributions scheme known as ‘tithing’ and most disturbingly about their adherence to
the ‘Law of Chastity’ otherwise known as God’s law of sexual purity. As an overview, the Church has published
the following resource for youth aged children (12 to 17 year olds) about sexual purity:

https://www.lds.org/youth/for-the-strength-of-youth/sexual-purity?lang=eng

Anonymous Submission to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet

Religious Freedom Review – February 2018

1
Former LDS Prophet, Spencer W Kimball gave an insight into the modus operandi used by church leaders to
obtain confessions of greater significance from children. He said that young people tend to ‘crack’ under the
strain of repeated probing questioning over a series of weeks.

“One young man came to me to be interviewed for a mission. He admitted
nothing wrong except what he called a "little" masturbation. I had him come
again. In the meantime, his conscience had pricked "a little." The next week he
admitted he had done a "little" petting, nothing more. In subsequent visits he
admitted one error after another, until finally he had admitted fornication.”
Spencer W. Kimball, The Miracle of Forgiveness, p.25.

In an address to the young men of the church, another prominent church leader asked the boys to imagine the
shame if everyone knew of their habits such as pornography use and masturbation. He told the boys of the
church to imagine their names were on a big scroll, for all to read, if they had masturbated.

“I am going to use a visual aid tonight. But we don’t have one, so, in your
mind’s eye, wherever you are across the far corners of the earth, would you
picture a huge scroll sliding down from the ceiling? On it are listed the names of
those who purchased pornographic literature. The list is large enough so that all
may see. Is your name on the list?

Did you buy some pornographic literature?

Now suppose those names are removed, and the names of all those who
attended or viewed x-rated movies are presented so that all who are in the
congregation may see. Again, is your name on the list?

Now, my young friends, and I am sorry to say, many adults, how about all those
of you who have a masturbation problem? If the names of those who had the
problem were projected across this big, huge scroll, would your name be
there(?)”
Vaughn J. Featherstone, A Self Inflicted Purging.

Mormonism indeed has an ugly culture of guilt and public shaming, as shown in the extracts from church
leaders above.

Worthiness interviews between male leaders and children occur in the church meetinghouse behind closed
doors. The Bishop follows a set of standard questions, but is free to deviate from the script as he feels so
‘moved’ by the spirit.

Given the interviews occur in private and behind closed doors, the Bishop is able to ask any probing question
he wishes in order to clarify the child’s compliance with the ‘Law of Chastity.’ Bishops are free to ask the child
clarifying questions about their sexual intimacy with others. Bishops are free to ask a child if they masturbate
or use pornography for sexual arousal.

Should a child confess to any of these sins, a Bishop is expected to probe for further details in order to ‘help’
the child overcome the sin. How often do you masturbate? What were you wearing when you masturbated
last? Did you orgasm? Was pornography involved? Do you need me to explain to you what masturbation
and orgasm are? Do you have any homosexual thoughts when you masturbate? Have you ever engaged in
sexual activity with a boy or girl of the same sex? And so on.

Once a Bishop has obtained a confession, he is then in a position to issue a consequence or punishment for the
child, which often includes ritual public humiliation methods. Children who ‘mess up’ are told to not
participate in church ordinances such as taking the sacrament or attending the temple. I can attest that when
you are told you cannot participate in the sacrament (a public meeting), it is as though the eyes of the world
are on you and the entire community is judging you for your sin. The Bishop may also hold a child back from
their progression through expected milestones of the Priesthood program for boys and through the Young
Women’s program for girls. Again, being held back results in a similar feeling for a child being publicly
humiliated.

Anonymous Submission to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet

Religious Freedom Review – February 2018

2

This would be an appropriate time to point out that Bishops are considered the ‘lay-clergy’ of the church and
are not trained counsellors, psychologists or child welfare specialists. They often hold regular 9-5 jobs such as
office worker, dentist, engineer or pharmacist. Bishops have no training in dealing with child sexual
development, yet are regularly immersed in such matters.

Bishops interviews occur at least annually, but more often occur either semi-annually or quarterly. A child’s
advancement through the ranks of the church depends on the outcome of these interviews and a Bishop’s
declaration that the child is ‘worthy’. Mormon children are taught that they will not be welcomed into God’s
kingdom in the next life if they are declared unworthy by their leaders in this life. Mormon children are taught
that sexual sin is as serious as murder.

Image: A middle aged man meeting with a child alone and behind closed doors leaves the child open to
grooming behaviours and sexual abuse

As you can see, there is a great deal of pressure on the Bishop and the child to comply with the church’s
mandate to examine the worthiness of its members.

When the child reaches adulthood, these interviews continue on a regular basis. I am of the opinion that the
church carries out the interview process with younger children as a grooming technique to ensure compliance
with the church’s strict standards (which include large and regular cash donations) from childhood through to
adulthood.

Parents are discouraged from attending these interviews so in most cases, a child faces their bishop alone in a
one-on-one setting. There is no provision in the church’s Handbook of Instructions 1 which shows any
encouragement for a parent to attend an interview with their child. In fact, the standard procedure is for the
Bishop’s assistant known as an ‘Executive Secretary’ to remove a child from their Sunday School class away
from their peers, summon the child to the Bishop’s office and for the Bishop to conduct the interview without
notice. I submit that the process is archaic and the interviews are abusive. I submit that children are not able
to legally, emotionally or psychologically consent.

Why does the church put its frontline leaders, such as Bishops, in harm’s way by requiring them to meet with
children to discuss their sexuality? Why does the church willingly put children at risk by placing them in an
isolated situation away from their parent? How does a child give consent? What recourse does a child have if a
Bishop oversteps the mark? How does a child even know that a trusted adult has overstepped the mark? How

Anonymous Submission to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet

Religious Freedom Review – February 2018

3
does the Mormon church ensure that child predators and paedophiles do not end up in one-on-one settings
with children? How can the church assure the Australian community that the men who hold these meetings
with children do not intentionally embarrass or humiliate the child for their own twisted self-gratification?

I submit to the Panel that the church’s pattern of questioning children and teens about their sexual behaviour
is utterly inappropriate. I submit to the panel that when a middle-aged man closes the door of his office to
meet privately with a child to discuss their sexual behaviours including masturbation, that the child is at
extreme risk of grooming and sexual abuse. I was subjected to the harassment and abuse of church leaders
behind closed doors as a child in an Australian Mormon church. I have been asked to confess the last time I
masturbated. I was taught about the concept of masturbation by a middle aged stranger in a one-on-one
setting, behind closed doors. I have been asked if I have raped or participated in bestiality. I have been asked if
I am a sexual deviant. I have been degraded in every way imaginable within that setting, yet I had no voice
because the person in authority in that office was the Bishop – not me.

To illustrate my submission further, I present some of the disturbing stories provided by survivors of abuse in
the LDS church to the Protect LDS Children campaign, which is currently bringing this issue to light on a global
scale. Refer to Appendix A.

How is it that religions such as the Mormon church demand greater religious freedom and protection from the
Commonwealth Government, when it so grossly exploits the freedoms it is already in possession of?

Prior to providing any recommendations to the Prime Minister and his Cabinet, I urge the panel to consider the
serious negative impacts that authoritative, hierarchical religions like the Mormon Church have on their
members – particularly children.

ASSESSMENT OF THE CHURCH’S ABUSIVE PRACTICES AGAINST THE UN RIGHTS OF THE CHILD
The church’s abusive practice of interviewing children alone and interrogating them about their sexuality is
assessed against selected articles of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, as below:

Table 1: Assessment

Article Response

Mormon worthiness interviews involve a major power

disparity between the clergyman and the child. The church
leader known as a Bishop will often start the interview saying
that he is a representative of Christ and may follow up the
statement with the question “would you lie to Jesus?”
The level of punishment for a sin is often unknown to the child
and is made up by the Bishop on the spot. The child has no
power or recourse to speak up against a Bishop’s decision.
In determining the sinfulness of a child’s sexual activity, a
Bishop refers to a secret handbook which the child is not
allowed to see. The child’s power and voice is completely
disregarded, as the child is unaware of the contents of the
handbook.
The child has no control over what the Bishop does with the
information he has collected about the child’s sexual
behaviours. Is the Bishop sharing the information with other
men in leadership and power? Is the information being shared
with the child’s parent without consent? All is unknown to the
child. The child is in no position to ask questions of the Bishop.
A prominent Mormon leader, Dallin H. Oaks, once said “it’s
wrong to criticize leaders of the church, even if the criticism is
true.” In this context, how could a child feel empowered
enough to ask a simple question of a Bishop such as ‘what will
you do with the information I have confessed to you?’

Anonymous Submission to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet

Religious Freedom Review – February 2018

4
 Article Response

The worthiness interview process puts great pressure on

children to declare their belief of the church’s doctrines and
support of leaders to a Bishop. This occurs in a high pressure
situation alone and behind closed doors.
Parents are not invited to worthiness interviews with children.
Worthiness interviews often occur without a parent’s
knowledge. In Mormonism, parental authority is removed and
replaced by ecclesiastical authority when it comes to matters
of sexuality.

The Panel should make no recommendation to the Prime

Minister and his Cabinet to increase the powers of religious
organisations to meet with children alone to discuss sexuality
and masturbation.
The government should put pressure on the Church to end the
practice of interviewing children alone behind closed doors.
Children taken behind closed doors are left vulnerable to
grooming and sexual abuse.

Children who suffer from institutional abuse should be

protected from harm. Worthiness interviews harm children by
giving them false ideas about trust and authority.

On this matter, licenced marriage and family therapist Natasha
Helfer Parker said “(w)hen an institution decides that a certain
aspect of normal, sexual human behaviour is a sin (such as
masturbation or same sex sexuality), it creates an artificial
problem for its members to grapple with.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PF8BYINOny0

The Mormon church should not be afforded any additional

privileges as a result of the Religious Freedom Review. The
Mormon church should publicly apologise to all Australians
that it has harmed as a result of worthiness interviews with
Bishops.


CONCLUSION
As demonstrated above, the church’s practice of interviewing children about sexuality and masturbation
behind closed doors can be described as nothing less than abusive. As a result of this submission, the Mormon
church should no longer be viewed as a cute US curiosity. It is a dangerous institution which preys on the good
will of the innocent. It does little to demonstrate any public benefit and has no noteworthy charitable arm in
Australia. Members donate 10% of their gross income to the church. The funds are sent directly to church HQ
in Salt Lake City, Utah. Very little money returns from HQ to local parishes for programs and activities.
Members are required to clean the church’s toilets.

I have no reason to doubt the Panel’s understanding of the church’s wealth and influence in Australia and
worldwide. I am entirely confident, however, that I am not alone. There are thousands of active and former
Mormons in Australia who have been subjected to the practices outlined in this letter and have been damaged
by it.

I ask the Panel to pause and reflect upon this submission prior to recommending any additional rights and
powers for religions such as the Mormon church. As we saw just recently, the Catholic church made false
declarations about its overall wealth and property holdings to the Royal Commission into Institutional

Anonymous Submission to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet

Religious Freedom Review – February 2018

5
Responses to Child Sex Abuse. I ask that the Panel not make the same mistake by taking any of the Mormon
church’s claims and submissions at face value. The church does interview children alone and behind closed
doors. Middle aged church leaders do ask children probing questions about their sexuality, including
masturbation. Children are left vulnerable and confused. Children are left vulnerable to grooming and sexual
abuse.

Sincerely,

Anonymous Submitter


Encl: Appendix A – Stories of Abuse in the Mormon Church – Worthiness Interviews

Anonymous Submission to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet

Religious Freedom Review – February 2018

6
APPENDIX A: STORIES OF ABUSE IN THE MORMON CHURCH – WORTHINESS INTERVIEWS

#336 Derek G. CS: 1,2,3,6,7,8
When I turned 12 I had a really cool bishop. During interviews he would basically say “I don’t want to
know what you did just don’t do it again”. He was awesome. Then when I turned 16 they released the
cool bishop and put in a bishop that was the complete opposite. This guy wanted to know everything.
Even the stuff that had been “taken care of” with the previous bishop.
I was a pretty regular, normal teenager in that I had been fairly active sexually. I almost always had a
girlfriend and we did normal teenager stuff but I was still a virgin. I felt pretty guilty about this stuff and
decided I needed to confess to the bishop so I could go on a mission. He wanted to know every dirty
little detail. He asked me questions like whether I had used my fingers on my girlfriends and if so how
many fingers were used? Did they like it? Did I like it? Did either of us orgasm? How many times did
this happen? He asked about oral sex in a very detailed way. What were their names, phone numbers
and where did they live? I figure he wanted to tell their bishops but fortunately for me none of them
were LDS. He wanted to know everything. He asked so many invasive questions it’s almost
unbelievable to think about now.
Anyway I basically came out of that interview feeling like the worst human alive. It messed me up for a
long time even after I was married in the temple. I was afraid of sex in many ways because I had been
taught that it was so sinful in my youth.

#330 Kik G. CS: 1,2,3,4,7,8
On many more than one occasion, I was subjected to inappropriate interviewing that effected me
even into my adulthood. From around the age of 12 to about age 19, I tried to correct what I was told
were my immoral actions. First was masturbation. At the age of 12, I clued my current bishop at the
time, from the Vernal, UT area, to my “problems” with masturbation. I was asked various questions on
how I would touch myself, or what kinds of thoughts were going through my mind at the time I was
masturbating.
I looked up to these men as leaders and because of the way I was brought up, taught to not question
motives or actions of church leadership. As I grew older, I added into the masturbation mix, the added
pleasure for the church of me being gay. Then the questions started to include how another boy (was
under the age of 16 at the time) would suck on my penis. What would lead up to that happening. How
would he play with my balls? How would he deep throat me? Stuff that I didn’t even fully understand
myself at the time. I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t simply say that I was experiencing gay
thoughts and was responding in kind to those thoughts. But my leaders wanted to know more. They
wanted the nitty-gritty of the encounters that I was experiencing. The question is…why? I was an
adolescent youth growing up and experiencing very normal things that I was asked in details, like
when he stuck his tongue in your mouth, did you enjoy it? Did you reciprocate with your tongue? Did
you just keep it in your mouth, or did you also suck on his lips? Did you nibble on his ear? Did you like
that? Questions that seemed endless and just painfully ongoing. I still recall those moments when,
one on one, I would sit with the leadership. At the time I thought it was my immoral actions that were
creating the angst in my life at the time, but I now understand that I was simply growing, in a very
healthy way, that I needed guidance rather than shame and guilt. I dealt with that angst and guilt for
more that 7 years within the church, and countless years after. I am now 36, going on 37, and those
experience still shake me to my core. Fill me with grief and sadness for what I was subjected to as a
youth…under the guise of help.

#328 Name Hidden. CS: 1,4,6
As a child, I wish I had known about the grooming processes that sexual predators use. The way they
gain a child’s trust, maybe even their parents’ trust, before attempting anything inappropriate. Instead,
the church indoctrinated me to believe that men have the absolute authority and the power to act in
God’s name. I was taught to trust men who disregard my personal boundaries. I remember older men
shaking my hand and pulling me in for a hug that lasted too long and the bishop calling me and my
sisters “trophy wives”. Too many forced handshakes, hugs and words. Unwanted attention from older
men became normal and routine. Saying ‘no’ was an option I didn’t know I had. Kids, especially girls,
are not encouraged to refuse or disobey an adult, especially a respected member of the church. I had
a babysitter who would tickle me so roughly that he would leave my skin red and sore. He made me
so uncomfortable, but so did the men at church that everyone trusted and even worshiped, so I
suffered silently through it. That babysitter was later on sent to prison for child porn and attempted
kidnapping. I believe the church made me unaware of what is socially acceptable and appropriate
behavior between a child and adult.
Interviews with bishops have always been uncomfortable. At age 12 I was left alone in a room with a
middle-aged man, who was not a therapist or psychologist, to talk about sex and masturbation. I didn’t
even know what masturbation was, so hearing about this for the first time alone in a room from a man
was very scary. I was pulled into an interview, with another untrained middle-aged man, when I was in
college. I had a boyfriend at the time and the bishop, wanted to know every detail of my sex life. I
gave him honest information and thought the interview would end there, as it should have. He began
to interrogate me further: Were you on top or bottom while kissing? Where were your hands? Did he
penetrate you with his fingers? Do you pleasure each other orally? Do you pleasure each other with
objects? Do you pleasure each other until you orgasm? Have you tried anal sex? Even at the time, I
found his questions disturbing and invasive. I had already divulged private information, but it wasn’t
enough for him. He pushed me for explicit details.
Some members have told me that bishops are prompted by god to ask certain questions. So, did god
prompt the bishop to ask a teenage girl about what she does with her anus?
Because of Mormonism’s systematic mental/sexual abuse and oppression, I removed my name from
church records.

#308 Name Hidden. CS: 1,2,3,4,6,7,8

Local church leaders conduct worthiness interviews with their members, even the children. Every
child in a Mormon congregation will have at least one interview with the presiding member of their
congregation (Bishop or branch president) at age 7-8, and several more from the age of 11 to 18 prior
to temple attendance or full-time missionary work, or for other reasons. These interviews continue into
adulthood as “temple recommend interviews” and, for students at Church Universities and Colleges,
their are additional “ecclesiastical endorsement” interviews. The practice consists of having
unsupervised 1-on-1 meetings with a local man believed to be chosen by and called of God to have
stewardship over them, meaning he, because of his priesthood calling, can have the Lord’s will
concerning them revealed to him, called revelation, and encourage or command them to act on it or
obey direction.
Considering the predatory and sex-obsessed characters that founded and have led the religion, I
wouldn’t be surprised if, from the beginning, abusive and predatory men have used these worthiness
interviews as cover, justification, and opportunity for shaming, controlling, grooming, and abusing
children and other members. When you grow up believing a church leader can and will ask you
anything and that you should answer truthfully under threat of eternal torment, you don’t think much of
it when it’s happening to your or another’s children. I don’t know for certain, but I believe that more
Mormon children are born than are converted, most often to Mormon-born parents. There’s a
generations-old practice of blindly sending children alone behind closed doors with men in church
leadership positions. This is the perfect storm for children to be abused, for damaging ideas about
self, masturbation, sexuality, sin, and guilt to be taught as gospel and propagated, and for criminals to
remain hidden.
I have suffered shame, and feelings of guilt, worthlessness, weakness, and dread. I thought I had
poor moral character, lacked any fortitude, and had resigned myself to a life plagued with hidden
shame and an eternity of anguish and regret, all as a teenage boy, over my natural sex drive (the
Book of Mormon states that “the natural man is an enemy to God”), for masturbating, and for being
too ashamed of myself to confess — lying in interviews about whether I had “sinned.”
Reading the stories of others makes me realize I may have dodged actual abuse because I felt too
ashamed to confess to sexual thoughts and “self-abuse.” Would that I had been taught as a child to
respect my body and self as my own, and to appreciate my nature as normal, natural, important, even
as something to be honored, instead of hated, feared, controlled, and overcome.
Even as a young adult, both as a full-time missionary and a student at a church college, I, was
brainwashed to believe that I was accountable to another adult, a leader, for my personal actions and
private thoughts. Because it had always been this way, I didn’t understand the abusive dynamic of the
leader-member relationship until after I left the church. And only recently, because of this movement,
have I even considered the dangers of the practice of unsupervised worthiness interviews with regard
to children and teenagers. I should never have been asked by an adult, especially as a minor, if I had
masturbated or had sexual thoughts. Nevertheless, I was, and it is common among Mormons.
Mormon leaders have a history of sexual abuse and impropriety, a history of polygamy and child
marriages. Mormons trust their leaders and make a practice of sustaining them, meaning “that
[members] stand behind them, pray for them, accept assignments and callings from them, hearken to
their counsel, and refrain from criticizing them.” Any and all writings critical of the Church, it’s leaders,
or it’s practices are considered “Anti-Mormon literature,” a danger to be feared and avoided, not read.
These stories, stories of members and former members, are “anti-Mormon” literature.

There is a good chance most Mormons won’t read these “anti-Mormon” stories. Mormon children are
at risk of abuse. The combination of reverence for leaders, the practice of conducting unsupervised
worthiness interviews, and the reported overtly sexual and probing nature of these interviews
conducted alone with children should be cause for great concern. I join with others in calling for the
complete cessation of unsupervised meetings with children and church leaders. A parent should be
present if their child is interviewed, and church leaders should never be first to ask questions or even
mention anything sexual in nature when speaking with a child.