Mormonism's NDE Cult

[Kishkumen]

When I was younger, I purchased a collection of Near Death Experiences by members of the LDS Church at a local Mormon bookstore. It was the kind of thing I thought was really fascinating and faith promoting at the time. Later, I came to be highly skeptical of some of these reported experiences. What happened was that I encountered the published NDE stories of two people I actually knew.

One was by my aunt, who suffered from mental illness and yet claimed to have experienced an NDE that she conveniently did not report at the time it happened. My mother was present with my aunt in the hospital when aunt nearly died, and she did not reveal anything about the NDE. My aunt was not a well person, and I have reason to doubt that her account was not a fabrication. Then a fellow in my home ward shared his NDE in one of these books. He was a philanderer and a liar, and I had a lot of doubt that his story was anything but a fabrication.

Now I am listening to MoSto's recent episodes on Thom Harrison, the SLC psychologist who was in the same ward as Elder Maxwell. Harrison told his NDE story to John Pontius, an LDS author, and Pontius saw to it that it was published as Visions of Glory, a novel-memoir that has taken the fringe LDS world by storm. According to the research divulged on MoSto, this wacko book inspired the recent list of infamous culty Mormon crazies responsible for destroying the lives of innocent people: Chad Daybell, Laurie Vallow, Tom Ballard, Jodi Hildebrandt--all of these nuts who have harmed so many people are devoted to this book.

I am afraid this problem is very widespread. Harrison, the guy behind the main character Spencer, is a big wig in Utah Mormon psychology circles. He is a member in good standing, is or was a bishop, consults the LDS Church on the mental health of applicants for missions, and he is a man who was allegedly personally counseling the list of accused persons listed above. I have always looked upon NDEs as a curiosity, but it seems that the phenomenon has taken on the rather frightening dimensions of an entrenched cult that comes very close to the halls of power in the LDS Church. The line separating the Daybells from the leaders of the LDS Church may not be as sharply defined as one would hope.

[Res Ipsa]

We've been discussing the same thing in this thread:viewtopic.php?f=7&t=158000

I listened to all eight hours of the podcast, which was a collaboration between MoSto and Hidden True Crime. I highly recommend it.

I just finished listening to Visions of Glory, and I am sickened.

Thom Harrison has a masters in social work. He was the Director of the Joint Child Sexual Abuse Team and the Child Abuse Team at the Primary Children's Hospital for 12 years. He taught in the Masters of Social Work Program at the University of Utah for 30 years. Visions of Glory describes how his views of how therapy should be conducted became increasingly in conflict with with those of his co-workers and academics. One suggested that he had a problem with mental illness. He quit his position at the hospital and opened his own practice. Eventually, he quit teaching at the U. He went on to found an organization promoting God-centered therapy.

This man, whose linked in page claims he treated 4000 physically and sexually abused children at the Primary Children's Hospital, describes how he was surrounded by angels who told him what to do to care for his patients. He proclaims that he discovered that his calling from God was to treat the damage physical and sexual abuse had done to children by bringing them to the light of Christ. His description of the apocalypse is a bizarre melding of science fiction with right-wing paranoia.

And his book has produced an NDE-Visionary-Apocalyptic Cult of Mormons. And the leadership knows. It's why they cut Tim Ballard loose the way they did.

I feel angry and sick.

ETA: I linked to other thread for reference only, not to suggest that this thread is duplicative.

[Kishkumen]

We've been discussing the same thing in this thread:viewtopic.php?f=7&t=158000

I listened to all eight hours of the podcast, which was a collaboration between MoSto and Hidden True Crime. I highly recommend it.

I just finished listening to Visions of Glory, and I am sickened.

Thom Harrison has a masters in social work. He was the Director of the Joint Child Sexual Abuse Team and the Child Abuse Team at the Primary Children's Hospital for 12 years. He taught in the Masters of Social Work Program at the University of Utah for 30 years. Visions of Glory describes how his views of how therapy should be conducted became increasingly in conflict with with those of his co-workers and academics. One suggested that he had a problem with mental illness. He quit his position at the hospital and opened his own practice. Eventually, he quit teaching at the U. He went on to found an organization promoting God-centered therapy.

This man, whose linked in page claims he treated 4000 physically and sexually abused children at the Primary Children's Hospital, describes how he was surrounded by angels who told him what to do to care for his patients. He proclaims that he discovered that his calling from God was to treat the damage physical and sexual abuse had done to children by bringing them to the light of Christ. His description of the apocalypse is a bizarre melding of science fiction with right-wing paranoia.

And his book has produced an NDE-Visionary-Apocalyptic Cult of Mormons. And the leadership knows. It's why they cut Tim Ballard loose the way they did.

I feel angry and sick.

ETA: I linked to other thread for reference only, not to suggest that this thread is duplicative.

Thank you, RI! I did briefly visit Harrison's LinkedIn page to make sure I had his name right. I had no idea he is an MSW, and not a PhD psychologist. The connections and power he had in the LDS world are astounding and frightening. He should not be consulted about anything to do with mental health. It would be perilously irresponsible to let him be involved in anyone's mental health.

Thanks for the link to the other thread. It is important to cross-reference these. I did not post in that thread because I wanted to discuss the Mormon angle here, and I thought it was best for me not to distract from the appropriate focus on the victims and the crimes in the other thread.

[Kishkumen]

One of the things I find truly fascinating about this NDE cult is how it carries on already existing threads in LDS culture. You combine the apocalyptic focus with NDEs and BOOM, an entirely new vernacular Mormon cult in the American West. What is striking to me is that this stuff has always been here. The interest in NDEs, the fringe politics, the doomsday obsessions. I grew up with this stuff, but it was always on the periphery of my awareness. It is funny to think of how we have followed DCP's discussion of NDEs on his blog. I wonder what he thinks of Harrison's book, and what he thinks about this unfortunate development. He has to be horrified.

The appeal of NDEs is that, for those who put stock in them, they seem to be a remaining thread of substance to their spiritual beliefs that has a whiff of seeming scientific validity. But, wow, you look at Harrison's work, and it is clear that this guy cribbed earlier books on the same topic. The scenario in which Spencer visited a bar in spirit was ripped right out of another popular NDE book published decades ago. I swear that the two NDE accounts from people I knew were fabrications. In my view, the whole genre of NDE literature is dodgy in the extreme. What was the big one in the 1990s? Wasn't that receiving a similar kind of adulation from Mormons?

Finally, I am convinced that my former professor who started his own little group among his student assistants was pulling from the same system of nutty beliefs. Especially in his teachings about polygamy, his views really resonate with what I was hearing about Harrison's beliefs. And all of this raises a lot of red flags for me. How far into the LDS Church itself did these things reach? Is Elder Ballard a believer in the doctrines of Visions of Glory? Who else might be? (Not suggesting DCP is, because I am certain he is not.)

[Everybody Wang Chung]

It doesn't help that DCP has been spreading his very own NDE all over the internet:

As the surgeon and the nurses worked to re-start my cholesterol filled heart, I floated above the operating table and found myself looking down on the entire scene. I noticed then that the surgeon wasn't LDS because he was wearing a yamaka. After my recovery, I made sure to give him a 1 Star review on Yelp, but I digress.

Soon, I was passing through a long tunnel of light. At the end of it, I saw all my deceased relatives dressed in white polyester/acrylic-blend temple robes, waiting for me and beckoning lovingly, with the exception of Uncle Bob, who had died before my mission. My Uncle Bob said, “Whoa, someone’s put on a few pounds.” I said, “Excuse me?” And he said, “I’m surprised you could make it through the light tunnel with those hips. Also, what's with your fake accent?”

Before I could explain that learning perfect German on my mission had changed my accent permanently, my life began flashing before my eyes: me as a baby in my mother's arms while she read me a soothing book by William F. Buckley, me as a toddler sitting in a wagon screaming and throwing rocks at people until someone finally pulled me around, and of course me as a six-year-old getting a copy of "Added Upon" for my birthday.

It was going along like that— flash, flash—until my life stopped in high school, when I had just been elected Student Body president, best dressed, coolest and most likely to succeed. I saw my opponent sitting on a bench crying over the crushing defeat I had just handed him a few hours earlier. I had to relive that awful scene: the crushed and dejected crying of my opponent and my raging anger over his cry-baby behavior ruining my well-deserved victory. What an inconsiderate jerk he was. Then, myself as a teenager recklessly speeding down the highway with my arm around my girlfriend. And, watching myself get a speeding ticket which I smugly and deservedly got dismissed all because the judge was Mormon. Good times.

Then suddenly, intense surges of feelings I've never experienced before. Utter and complete unconditional love and acceptance coursed through me as if I were being bathed in a warm, healing light. For the first time, I loved myself and all living beings, even Kish, Shades, Drumdude, IHAQ, Moksha and Dr. Scratch.

Before I had a chance to bathe and luxuriate in these new emotions, I felt an intense pull. And then, suddenly, I was back in that grubby little hospital room, feeling like my crappy self. Not even a beef pizza could cheer me up. I'm thinking of suing the hospital and the doctor.

[Res Ipsa]

One of the things I find truly fascinating about this NDE cult is how it carries on already existing threads in LDS culture. You combine the apocalyptic focus with NDEs and BOOM, an entirely new vernacular Mormon cult in the American West. What is striking to me is that this stuff has always been here. The interest in NDEs, the fringe politics, the doomsday obsessions. I grew up with this stuff, but it was always on the periphery of my awareness. It is funny to think of how we have followed DCP's discussion of NDEs on his blog. I wonder what he thinks of Harrison's book, and what he thinks about this unfortunate development. He has to be horrified.

The appeal of NDEs is that, for those who put stock in them, they seem to be a remaining thread of substance to their spiritual beliefs that has a whiff of seeming scientific validity. But, wow, you look at Harrison's work, and it is clear that this guy cribbed earlier books on the same topic. The scenario in which Spencer visited a bar in spirit was ripped right out of another popular NDE book published decades ago. I swear that the two NDE accounts from people I knew were fabrications. In my view, the whole genre of NDE literature is dodgy in the extreme. What was the big one in the 1990s? Wasn't that receiving a similar kind of adulation from Mormons?

Finally, I am convinced that my former professor who started his own little group among his student assistants was pulling from the same system of nutty beliefs. Especially in his teachings about polygamy, his views really resonate with what I was hearing about Harrison's beliefs. And all of this raises a lot of red flags for me. How far into the LDS Church itself did these things reach? Is Elder Ballard a believer in the doctrines of Visions of Glory? Who else might be? (Not suggesting DCP is, because I am certain he is not.)

I thought of Peterson's interest in NDEs as I was watching the video. I don't know him, but he doesn't seem to have the link to visions or the apocalyptic vision of Christ's return being imminent. He reads posts here, so perhaps he'll comment at SeN.

Harrison cribbed a ton of stuff. The book's author was a kindred spirit who was also into NDEs and visions. The book's appendix contains other similar accounts, which the author thinks is independent corroboration. For the role of Cardston, Alberta in Harrison's visions come right from an earlier book. Harrison and Pontius are both part of an insular, self reinforcing culture. I haven't registered at AVOW-LDS because it requires a membership fee, but it is one of the online sites where people in the culture share their visions and obsess over signs of the second coming. You can see a fair amount of it at the LDSFF for no cost or need to register.

I recall the NDE story you're talking about, but the name escapes me. Lori Vallow invented an NDE that nobody had heard of before she described it her sentencing hearing. I'm skeptical of NDEs as well. Stories that catch public attention shape the experience of those who hear them. Early reports of UFOs in modern times described cigar-shaped objects, until a pilot publicly described saucer-shaped objects near Mt. Rainier in Washington. After that, UFO reports became so consistently saucer-shaped that the term "flying saucer" became the term. The abduction of Betty and Barney Hill set the template for both aliens and alien abductions through a best-selling novel and made for TV movie. So did Whitley Striber's Communion, with a large alien face on the cover.

I also remember visions and signs of the end times being around when I was raised in the church. But they were at the periphery. I think the internet has had a huge effect on the development of the NDE-Visionary-End Times-Prepper subculture among Mormons. Now their visions and and sleuthing of signs can be widely shared within an insular subculture. And as long as prominent members of that subculture avoid Tim Ballard's mistake, LDS leadership seems to be fine with letting it fester.

[BeNotDeceived]

99% of all NDE's have one goal in mind... making money off their book.

[Kishkumen]

I thought of Peterson's interest in NDEs as I was watching the video. I don't know him, but he doesn't seem to have the link to visions or the apocalyptic vision of Christ's return being imminent. He reads posts here, so perhaps he'll comment at SeN.

No, he does not have that same doomsday obsession. But his interest in NDEs does show how these things can lend credibility to the other looney stuff. I think one can have a genuine intellectual or even scientific interest in NDEs, but these people substituted them for priesthood authority. They constructed legitimacy by having an NDE, namedropping GAs, and freaking people out about the end of the world.

Harrison cribbed a ton of stuff. The book's author was a kindred spirit who was also into NDEs and visions. The book's appendix contains other similar accounts, which the author thinks is independent corroboration. For the role of Cardston, Alberta in Harrison's visions come right from an earlier book. Harrison and Pontius are both part of an insular, self reinforcing culture. I haven't registered at AVOW-LDS because it requires a membership fee, but it is one of the online sites where people in the culture share their visions and obsess over signs of the second coming. You can see a fair amount of it at the LDSFF for no cost or need to register.

It is amazing how technology and new kinds of communities fuel these para-ecclesiastical structures. Cardston, eh? One of my family lines came through Cardston. I wouldn’t doubt that I have relatives into this stuff.

I recall the NDE story you're talking about, but the name escapes me. Lori Vallow invented an NDE that nobody had heard of before she described it her sentencing hearing. I'm skeptical of NDEs as well. Stories that catch public attention shape the experience of those who hear them. Early reports of UFOs in modern times described cigar-shaped objects, until a pilot publicly described saucer-shaped objects near Mt. Rainier in Washington. After that, UFO reports became so consistently saucer-shaped that the term "flying saucer" became the term. The abduction of Betty and Barney Hill set the template for both aliens and alien abductions through a best-selling novel and made for TV movie. So did Whitley Striber's Communion, with a large alien face on the cover.

I read a great book on the UFO phenomenon that works just as well for this phenomenon and the Satanic panic narratives. It was called Abducted, by Susan Clancy, a psychologist and academic. Great stuff that helped me understand conversion a lot better.

I also remember visions and signs of the end times being around when I was raised in the church. But they were at the periphery. I think the internet has had a huge effect on the development of the NDE-Visionary-End Times-Prepper subculture among Mormons. Now their visions and and sleuthing of signs can be widely shared within an insular subculture. And as long as prominent members of that subculture avoid Tim Ballard's mistake, LDS leadership seems to be fine with letting it fester.

Christopher Blythe wrote a good book that helps me understand all of this a lot better.

[Res Ipsa]

Both sides of my family come from Raymond. One side is LDS. I never have caught a whiff of anything like this. But that's also part of cultishness -- they only share with other insiders. The book Abducted sounds familiar to me. Blythe sounds interesting. Is the book Terrible Revolution?

[Moksha]

Is this where Dr. Daniel Peterson's fervent belief in NDEs stems from?

Could the case of Lazarus be considered an NDE?