Boyd K Packer and Forgving Over and Over Again

Once upon a fourth dimension, my father and I attended priesthood session.  On our way in that location, my father commented how bad he felt for Boyd Yard. Packer because he e'er had to take the "chat to the immature men".  He was a inferior apostle at the fourth dimension and he assumed that the discussions of homosexuality and masturbation was handed down to him from everyone else who didn't want it.

However, Boyd K .Packer is at present the near senior apostle and he withal speaks most frequently about homosexuality and masturbation.  This lead me to chase down a scrap of why he talks about these things so frequently.

So I asked myself, what exercise the scriptures say about Masturbation?

Nothing.

That'southward correct, there is non a single instance of masturbation talk in the scriptures.  Not just the bible; but the scriptures for "our day" as well have no mention. There is one scripture nigh Onan who uses the pull out method of nascence command and dies from it, but having sexual practice with your brother's married woman (to fulfill a covenant) and masturbation are not even close to similar.

Then what did Joseph Smith say about Masturbation?

Nothing.

Well, almost nothing.  He wrote in his 1838 version of  the first vision that

"the foibles of homo nature; which, I am deplorable to say, led me into divers temptations, offensive in the sight of God TO THE GRATIFICATION OF MANY APPETITES."

— Times and Seasons, v. three pp. 748 – 749.

The adjacent verse, poesy 29, was added afterward after Smith's death, which says he was merely guilty of "levity".  The edit was made past Willard Richards, afraid it was besides obvious that information technology meant masturbation, which was unseemly for a prophet to do. (Hey, he was a fourteen-year-old boy)

And so when is the first mention of masturbation in the history of the LDS church?

18 June, 1870 –George A. Smith tells Table salt Lake Schoolhouse of the Prophets about "the evil of Masturbation" amongst Utah Mormons. Apostle Lorenzo Snow says that "Plural Marriage would tend to diminish this evil self-pollution,"  School of the Prophets tape quoted in D. Michael Quinn's "Extentions of Power" page 766)

A year later they discussed it once more, with polygamy existence the solution.  That'due south 40 years of church history with nary a mention fifty-fifty at the elevation.  So possibly they just didn't talk about sexual topics?

"During Brigham Young's day, Mormons were unabashed and outspoken in discussing sexual health and morality  problems such every bit adultery, fornication, and prostitution in print. For the starting time pioneer Mormons notwithstanding, the question of masturbation was never discussed in the church building press and the Mormon prophets took no official doctrinal position. No known early on Mormon doctrinal statements from this period exist specifically on the topic ."

http://www.mormonstudies.net/pdf/mormon_masturbation.pdf

I call back information technology should exist mentioned that a bishop thought it okay to group masturbate with teenage boys, for which he was excommunicated in 1886.  So there is some precedent, but even then no literature or formal advice was produced

In 1902 George Albert Smith again spoke on the evils of masturbation; but nothing was done

"the practise of masturbation was indulged in past many immature people in church schools. Pres. Smith remarked that this was a most damnable and pernicious practice, and the face of every apostle, president of a stake, and loftier council should be set as flint against it. The priesthood should be chosen together at the pale conferences and the brethren and parents should be instructed and warned in relation to this affair"" –1902 Mormon Apostle Rudger Clawson

Post-obit the bulk of the Brethren would have led ane to think there was nothing wrong with having a wank.

In the 1920-xxx'southward

Official church manuals endorsed secular books about sexuality and suggested that sexual interests be guided rather than inhibited. During this time masturbation did not always comport the same onus that information technology does in the popular Mormon literature of today. Rather than focusing on abstinence supervision as is practiced today with current church youth interviewing policies, lessons instead warned parents that they could create emotional problems in their adolescents by an "unintelligent" over response to their masturbation (Bush, 1993).

Prior to the 1950s the sparse church literature specifically mentioning masturbation generally agreed with moderate views of secular medical regime. http://www.mormonstudies.net/pdf/mormon_masturbation.pdf

Then nosotros're upwards to 120 years with no mention to the youth except to follow your doctor'southward recommendation.  It'southward not a sin, no youth talks, no pamphlets with grinning teenagers on them, nothing.

In fact, when medical science decided that masturbation did not cause insanity, the church published manuals stating "the pernicious fallacy that insanity is the result of excessive masturbation. The facts do not support whatsoever such view…."

So why is information technology a "sin" now?

In October 1953, [B.Y.U.] President Wilkinson, alarmed at the implications of Alfred Kinsey's reports on male person and female person sexual behavior, appointed a faculty commission to determine if the school'southward sex educational activity plan was providing a strong defense of guiltlessness … at least two kinesthesia committees were appointed to address the 'Masturbation Trouble'…." (Bergera & Priddis,1985, p.81).

Ah, you meet at that place was this guy, Kinsey, and he ran some studies on what is "Normal sexual beliefs" as well as what was aberrant, and he publisehd in 1948 (men) and 1953 (women).  Just the normal behavior became sin when BYU president read the report that women did it too.

What follows is a set of speeches by apostles that ban more than and more of the "normal" mentioned by the Kinsey Report:

"Petting is indecent and sinful, and the person who attempts to pet with you is himself both indecent and sinful and is likewise lustful… Is that what you want? Will you non call back that in the category of crime, God says sex sin is side by side to murder?" -Apostle Marking Due east. Petersen, General Conference, 3 Oct 1956

"To keep the Children of State of israel from committing these sins, the Lord proceeds to proper name them and to prescribe penalties for their commission. I am going to name a few of them. Get-go is incest. I am not enlarging on information technology. In the constabulary incest included more we now ascribe to information technology. Information technology included marriage between people inside prohibited relationships. The penalization for incest was decease to both parties. Fornication-sometimes adultery and fornication are used interchangeably. Just for virtually kinds of fornication, the penalization was decease. For adultery, information technology was death for both parties. For homosexuality, it was decease to the male and the prescription or penalty for the female person I practice non know." – Apostle J. Reuben Clark, Jr., Conference Address, April viii, 1957.

"How like the mistletoe is immorality. The killer institute starts with a sticky sweet berry. Little indiscretions are the berries — indiscretions like sex thoughts sex discussions, passionate kissing, pornography. The leaves and little twigs are masturbation and necking and such, growing with every exercise. The full-grown plant is petting and sex activity looseness. Information technology confounds, frustrates, and destroys like the parasite if it is not cutting out and destroyed, for, in time information technology robs the tree, bleeds its life, and leaves it arid and dry out; and, strangely enough, the parasite dies with its host." – Prophet Spencer West. Kimball, General Briefing Address, April i, 1967.

1967

That's right, in 1967 masturbation is as "wrong as necking".  Most 140 years of the church'southward history and information technology barely gets a mention.

So why were we chosen to live in an era with a "new sin".  In 1975 Vaugh J. Featherstone gave a talk on masturbation at BYU.

Enter this guy, who takes information technology from "A stepping rock" to inventing a whole new sin"

In 1976, Boyd G. Packer gave a speech communication in priesthood session that was and then printed out and distributed to immature men entitled "To Young Men Merely" (Still hosted on LDS.org).  To exist articulate, Boyd 1000. claims that the Lord has given young men powers to procreate but to be used with their wives, a new doctrine not before stated by scripture, or any of the other brethren in the history of the church building.  He is entitled to his opinions, but his decision to promote or proselyte them is in question.

This pamphlet is famous for the "little factories" analogy.

In 1980 Spencer W. Kimball gave a talk near information technology every bit well.  As a side notation presently after  LDS Psychiatrist Cantril Nielsen found himself defenseless between his conflicting religious and professional oaths. Nielsen paid a sizable wrongful death malpractice settlement in the masturbation-shame suicide of 16-yr-old Kip Eliason. The lawsuit alleged that Nielsen violated professional standards of psychiatric care by prescribing that his patient should follow his Mormon bishop's advice to abjure from masturbation in club to be "worthy," rather than basing treatment on empirical medical bear witness required past medical ethics. Medical experts in the case verified the empirical evidence that masturbation is not merely harmless, only that masturbation abstinence has a documented history of suicidal risk (Eliason, 1983; Steckel, 1917/1953).

Despite a death and lawsuit inSep 1981 – Branch presidents at the Missionary Training Middle in Provo receive 21-point handout to help "both male and female person" missionaries avoid masturbation.

From 1976 on, the human activity of masturbation became a "Sin" pretty much completely put into the minds of the LDS by recent leadership.  Further lawsuits of suicide victims discussing the feeling of unworthiness would come and yet do confronting the church building or specific local leaders over this invented sin.

For a consummate listing of talks regarding this sin since 1975: https://world wide web.lds.org/search?q=masturbation&lang=eng&domains=general-conference&sort=date-one-time

Conclusion

Later on the church constitute out something was normal, and that women also enjoyed their bodies, the apostles started to discourage the practice that Joseph Smith himself thought no big deal, and God seems to not care about.  Boyd K. Packer,  pushed the correlation section to print out pamphlets that invented a sin, and and then the leadership talked about it at almost every conference with Boyd Thou. being the foremost speaker for the rest of his life upwardly until this bespeak.

Death, shame, guilt for a "sin" so vile that God never mentioned information technology, and church history most never speaks of it.  Now, who should be excommunicated for misleading members with personal doctrine?

More history bachelor hither: http://world wide web.mormonstudies.cyberspace/pdf/mormon_masturbation.pdf

sellersstenly.blogspot.com

Source: https://exploringmormonism.com/boyd-k-packer-and-a-whole-new-sin/

Share this post