These are personal accounts of the negative consequences that inappropriate interviews have had on people.
I am currently a member of the LDS church. Growing up I had many great leaders in the church that taught me a lot of good. I can’t imagine how difficult the calling of a bishop would be. I know there are a lot of sacrifices made in this calling. I do, however, feel very…
I was sexualized when I was 14 by an adult female, “Helen”. She was in her mid-20s. At the same time I was also given drugs——not a soft drug, like marijuana, but “acid”, or LSD. (This is a long story and I won’t go into it here, only to say that this is what basically…
I was a teenager in the LDS church in the late 70s and 80s. My parents never had “the talk” with me or told me anything about human sexuality. We didn’t own a TV and I was pretty sheltered. So basically my introduction to human sexuality was from my bishop interviews. When I was 14,…
My mother was inactive LDS growing up. My dad was of another faith. I didn’t go to church often, but would at times go play basketball with neighborhood friends who were LDS. At one of these shootarounds when I was thirteen, I was pulled into the bishop’s office without either of my parent’s consent or…
I’ve written about a hundred pages worth of material trying to figure out what I want to say and get it down to something less than a thousand words. This is around two thousand. My difficulty in being succinct is perhaps evidence of the severity of the trauma and my need to talk about it.…
When I was 16, I was sure I was in love with my boyfriend. Evenings were spent cuddling watching tv. As often happens the line kept being crossed, just a little at a time and I soon found myself in the bishops office. He listened as I uncomfortably explained that I had gone “too far.”…
My mother taught me that it was wrong to touch my private parts. I was afraid to sin and was very careful not to ever touch myself, even as a young child. At some point I began to masturbate, as a young teen or perhaps sooner. I did not know what it was that I…
As a young 13 year old girl, this was a very uncomfortable, if not traumatizing situation for me speaking to an older man about my sexual “transgressions.” This, in combination with the church’s many lessons about chastity and comparing me to a chewed piece of gum for losing my virginity shattered me as a person.…
There was a time a little girl was happy, at least she tried to pretend she was, because she did not know what was going on.
I was sexually abused by an uncle when I was three. He made me touch his penis. We were in the same ward growing up and he was later called as a bishop when I was a teenager. I remember being so sad and confused that someone like him could be called. Why would priesthood…