The feature art for this post is “Abraham” by Lorenzo Monaco (Piero di Giovanni) Italian, ca. 1408–10.

When Your Choice to Follow a Prophet Disintegrates Your Family

This American Life recently featured an intriguing episode created by journalist Zach Mack about a bet Zach’s father wagered. If ten prophecies by Julie Green, his dad’s preferred prophet, were fulfilled as she predicted in 2024, Zach would owe his dad $10,000, But if these prophecies weren’t fulfilled, his dad would owe him $10,000. As Zach describes, Julie Green is “part of a growing movement within Christianity that emphasizes spiritual warfare and politics. It’s all very Trumpy and full of prophecies.” To give you an example of the prophecies, they include things like, “Barack Obama will be convicted of treason, Joe Biden will be convicted of treason, Nancy Pelosi convicted of treason, the Clintons convicted of treason and murder.”

As you can already tell, Zach’s Dad lost the bet and paid up. Did this experience make him think twice about his trust in Julie Green’s assertions as the “great revelator” she claims to be? Not at all. He just made the excuse that these things are still yet to come and still feels certain they will happen soon. Part of the problem with making sacrifices to please prophets is that there is always a creative albeit absurd way to justify the outcome being different than you once believed. Gave up all your property and money to please a prophet and it turns out the world didn’t end? You might just end up believing your righteous obedience saved the world instead of seeing the reality that you have behaved foolishly.

When Zach’s parents got married, his dad wasn’t religious, but over the years he became invested in conservative, politically-focused forms of Christian faith. His family respectfully made space for his evolving worldviews, but things started getting more and more strained as he started following online prophets. This loyalty led to new big financial decisions, which he often made without his wife’s consent. Around this time, his daughter came out to him as gay.  Zach’s dad made it clear didn’t respect her identity or path and that he felt certain a gay life was not what God willed for his daughter. The daughter stopped visiting home. His wife communicated that she would not tolerate him investing in survivalist purchases without her permission. He wasn’t willing to adjust his behaviors and they decided to separate just before Zach came home for Christmas. He lost his bet with Zach at the end of December. Even after all these losses, Zach’s dad asserts utter confidence he sees things from a superior, unquestionably right perspective due to the spiritual experiences he’s had. He isn’t open to correcting ways his beliefs and loyalties damaged his nuclear family. (It seems to me underneath the surface, Julie Green’s voice is so important to him because it speaks to and validates his personal anger and alienation as person, and that he has chosen to make this way of addressing personal wounds and anxieties his top priority in life, even at the cost of family.)

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ Q15 are not making predictions about political celebrities, but they do stand on platforms that encourage members to take a conservative high ground and act like confident cultural warriors. They, like the voices Zach’s dad was listening too, contribute to homophobia and transphobia festering within and harming families. They also motivate behaviors they desire in other people by asserting esoteric knowledge about the imminence of the events wrapped up into Jesus’ coming. They, like other prophets, demand great loyalty and sacrifices from their adherents. At a stake conference a year ago, my stake president shared something straight out of a top-down directive. He told members to listen to the GAs instead of academic research, resources, voices and communities online, or even personal thoughts and feelings. We were reassured LDS prophets are actually not out of touch with our life experiences. I wondered how I could stomach future stake conferences if this is the direction they are taking. I’m very concerned they tend to put upholding their own authority over the well-being and growth of members, a symptom of arrogance and self-importance, a temptation for all prophets.

I see religious and prophetic loyalty causing the same kind of damage happening in Zach’s family happening in Mormon families around me. As women around me are coming out to family members about no longer participating in church, loved ones who prioritize church loyalty respond with disrespect and arrogant spiritual judgments. You’re deceived by the philosophies of men. You’re choosing for your kids to be denied exaltation. You’ve been led away by the evil one. Religious certainty is wreaking havoc in parent-child relationships especially.

Putting total trust in prophets who claim unquestionable knowledge is hazardous to relationships. Such an approach simply doesn’t make sufficient space for human agency or for respect for differences of belief or practice. Stances of superiority and certainty are found across many prophet-led and other conservative religious worldviews. Take Islam. I recently learned the bizarre fact that Muslim converts are often actually called “reverts” because of Mohammed’s teaching that every pre-created human self promised Allah to conform to Islam. It’s a common belief that everyone is born Muslim and that human newborns have an in-born affinity for Islamic faith, but demons and parents with false traditions lead the world’s children spiritually astray. While I appreciate how many Islamic practices help people lead more meaningful lives, I would argue these superiority-touting teachings aren’t healthy or at all optimal for relationships within families or relations across faith and cultures, esp. in today’s globalized world. Latter-day Saints and so many other groups are no better as we also teach that others will need to conform to our rituals and ways of thinking to return to God’s presence.

Healthy, horizontal relationships look more like, yes we see things differently and our identities are different, but none of us is superior or completely certain of things as they really are. No one knows or sees everything. Let’s respect each others’ differences and choices and treat each other as equals. Let’s make decisions that affect all of us together whenever possible while trying to make space for everyone’s needs. 

A Faith That Works: Wisdom from the Twelve Steps

Recently I chatted with a fellow Mormon feminist about our discontent at church. Neither of us feel spiritually fed there. Many current messages fail to resonate as helpful or grate upon the values and principles we want to live by. We discussed our fatigue with endless claims to be the one true, authoritative faith and promises we’ll find fulfillment by adhering to the words of General Authorities. We’re not invested in farming out our personal spiritual authority anymore, and we don’t feel LDS prophets are supporting women properly. What can I trust in? I asked her. How can I move forward from my old ways of thinking and keep making meaning while building on my past faith and spiritual experiences? When Church itself has become riddled with anxiety, anger, and disappointment, how can I maintain a faith that works? 

She suggested I might find some clarity by studying the wisdom of the Twelve Steps Program, which teaches that part of healing is placing trust in the divine instead of other humans. Humans will always let us down at some point. They are limited, biased, and possibly mentally ill, ill-informed, selfish, controlling, or misled, and they will mess up and hurt us at some point. Humans can’t deserve our total trust and confidence. As one woman shares in the S-Anon Twelve Steps handbook my friend sent my some pages from (all quotes come from this source):

“Today I know that human beings have diseases and that they fail, but God does not fail. As long as I continue to trust my Higher Power with my life, I believe that I will be OK.”

Another passage says:

“We are familiar with dependence; in the past we depended upon other people as our source of security, validation and comfort. We see that it does not work for us to depend emotionally and spiritually on another. Now, instead, we can depend upon a Higher Power with the strength to guide us in times of need and indecision. We can be confident that God is always there for us and always desires the greatest good for us. Anyone can begin to tap into this source.”

The program teaches individuals to give up unhealthy ways of attaching to people, frameworks, and institutions they have clung to for a sense of safety, certainty, or a sense of worthiness. One prompt I found in the handbook asks:

“What thing, person, belief, or way of life might I be clinging to desperately? Being rigorously honest, what am I most afraid to surrender?”

The program also teaches participants to turn away from putting too much pressure on ourselves to fix ourselves and our lives, other people and institutions. Ultimately, we don’t put total trust in our own capacities or discernment either:

“For many of us who thought we could only trust ourselves, the concept of surrender seemed truly frightening. Yet through obsessing about others’ opinions and clinging to unrealistic expectations for ourselves and them, had we not essentially turned over our will and lives to the care of other people?…Now we can…let go of desperately trying to play God in our lives.”

The only being in the universe that deserves total trust, and in which case total trust is healthy and helpful for us, is God (or a Higher Power). My friend encouraged me to see that I already have a healthy and supportive relationship with God. She invited me to lean into this relationship more fully just as people in AA groups do. 

Step three of the Twelve Step Program is all about changing our stance such that instead of giving complete trust to people, we hand this trust to God. We trust that no matter what happens, God is there for us. God will help. We will make it through, and we can spiritually grow and find healing and peace with God’s accompaniment, come what may. Here is what 12 step participants have to say about the choice to truly put trust in God rather than humans:

“Surrendering to my Higher Power was the only way to feel calm, clear, serene, and safe. Step Three told me that I was not alone and that regardless of circumstances, I would be O.K. I could trust that my Higher Power had a plan for me that was better than I could imagine.”

“The only solution to my fear, my desire to control, and my feelings of victimization has been to live one minute at a time and to act as if I trust God”

“I trust my Higher Power to alert me to what I need to know.”

“We learned to depend upon a real Higher Power—one with the strength and wisdom to help up in times of need and indecision.”

“I’m grateful that I can trust that I will always be in the care of my Higher Power whose perspective is so much wider than my own, and that with each decision I face, I can choose His will for my life with confidence.”

To be absolutely clear here, we’re talking about personal, direct spiritual connection with the divine here, not any content dictated by religious organizations or leaders. 

This alternative approach offers the possibility of resilient faith that can work and thrive in the face of so much that has gone amok in institutional religious life. I love how this literature describes how step three can reshape our perspectives about God:

“As we were willing to make this leap of faith (step 3), we began to believe in a God who is loving, forgiving, and encouraging to us. We felt free to shed old concepts of God that made us feel ‘apart from’ or unworthy, and we began to understand new and hopeful spiritual concepts.”

The program also teaches the importance of detaching from dependence on things and people we have been too reliant on (or codependent with). To me, this seems applicable for all of us who our in some kind of transition in our relationships with the institutional church:

“Detachment–letting go of our need to control people–enhances all our relationships. It opens the door to the best possible outcome. It reduces our frustration level, and frees us and others to live in peace and harmony.”

“Detachment means we care about ourselves and others. It frees us to make the best possible decision. It enables us to set the boundaries we need to set with people. It allows us to have our feelings, to stop reacting and initiate a positive course of action. It encourages others to do the same. It allows our High Power to step in and work.”

Healthy detachment from our dependencies allows us to be closer and more attuned to God, and to find more peace in the face of past wounds and all that is wrong around us. In sharing this, I don’t mean we all need to leave the Church or cut off all connection with Church leaders in order to heal, but I do mean part of moving forward and growing requires doing things like setting boundaries such that the Church is not given authority to determine our worthiness, relationships, roles, project or life purpose. It’s a matter of recognizing ultimately, spiritual authority and power need to rest in God’s and our hands in our lives, not in the hands of other humans.

I also like how the Twelve Steps encourages people to focus just on their own healing and growth process with God rather than on trying to fix other people:

“As we focus on our own recovery…one day at a time, and (not on others’ recoveries) we will soon begin to see the benefits, including God’s gift of serenity.”

I’m hoping to find more peace and less suffering in my relationship with the institutional church and more strength, meaning and power in my personal connection with God as I move forward. May everyone find direction and peace in their journeys of spiritual growth and expansion, and spiritual serenity in difficult times.