“This is a great fight. This is the plague of our time,” said President Emily Belle Freeman, Young Women general president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, in the closing plenary remarks at the Utah Coalition Against Pornography Saturday in Sandy, Utah.
The issues surrounding pornography consumption will touch every individual and family, she said. “That is the reality of the time in which we live.”
“But there are tools. There is protection. There is armor. We don’t fight this battle alone. And the Lord will be there with us in it.”
President Freeman spoke about disconnection, isolation and healing.
‘Jamming communication’
Pornography “creates a disconnection from God, from spouse and even from self identity,” President Freeman said, referencing President Boyd K. Packer’s teaching as a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles that a “trend to more noise” was “not coincidental nor innocent.”
“The first order issued by a commander mounting a military invasion,” President Packer said, “is the jamming of the channels of communication of those he intends to conquer.”
“Think about that for a minute,” President Freeman said — how pornography and social media generally do “such a good job of jamming those lines of communication.”
Surrounded by people promoting their philosophies on sourdough bread and so much more, she said, “We really have become tutored by the influencers of the world.”
And answers come “instantly,” she said. “We are getting used to that,” asking: How many had used digital technology “within the past week? How many in the past day? How many in the past hour ... the last 15 minutes?”
By comparison, she asked, “How many in the past week turned to the scriptures with as much intensity as you turn to social media? How many in the past 24 hours? How many in the past hour? How many in the last 10 minutes?”
A family inventory
She described how the Freeman family regularly “cleans out” media with one rule of thumb:
- If what you are looking at on your phone causes you to question your convictions …
- If it causes you to doubt in God or in yourself …
- If it causes you to question your worth (or) feel discouraged or less satisfied with your own life …
- If it causes you to question another person’s worth (and) disrespect one of God’s children …
Then they “unfollow or turn it off.”
“I am actually the boss of this device. This is not the boss of me,” she said. “That’s something we actually have to be teaching to our families.” President Freeman suggested that we ask ourselves: “What am I allowing myself to be influenced by, and what do I need to remove right now?”
That might be shows, social media accounts or music “not teaching principles about how we care for each other as children of God,” she said.
“And for the women and the young women in this audience, it might be the books you’re reading,” President Freeman added.
“There are books you should not be reading. And the Spirit will tell you that. Listen.”
A family plan
Pornographic habits, she said, are “maintained or kept alive by shame, discomfort, unmet needs, loneliness and isolation.”
She recounted once being almost paralyzed by surprise as a family when a fire erupted that they never anticipated — prompting new plans for such emergencies.
“What is the plan if someone sees pornography?” she asked. “Do your kids know what the plan is for your house?”
Describing a friend’s family, she said if something comes up on a computer or a phone, their plan is that the person first walks away. Next, they go to someone else and say, “This just popped up on my phone or my computer screen or my iPad. Will you go turn it off?”
This reminds family members that “sometimes pornography is going to show up in unexpected places,” she said, “and that is the reality of the world we live in.”
A family culture
When it’s “just a part of our family culture” to speak openly about moments like this,” President Freeman said — especially when so many children will “see pornography at a much earlier age than we would anticipate” — it “takes away the shame that sometimes comes when someone sees pornography, because the whole family is now involved in the conversation.”
“There are going to be mistakes. And what is more important than the mistake is how we recover from the mistake.”
“As we create emotionally safe homes … places to have these conversations, change will come,” she said. Rather than only asking, “Have you ever seen pornography?” she suggested asking, “How can I support you in avoiding (or) overcoming this?”
Jesus removes chains
When Jesus met a man “dragging chains behind him,” President Freeman highlighted his first question: “What is your name?”
Jesus knows his name, she said, but “maybe he is trying to remind this man who he is” — especially since he responds, “My name is Legion, which suggests 6,000 armed and strong warriors of evil.”
“That’s how the man sees himself.” But “that’s not what Jesus sees.”
After healing him, Christ says, “Return to your own house and show how great things God hath done to thee.”
“There is great power,” President Freeman said, in “helping other people see that your healing came through Christ.”
“I love knowing that we have a captain in this great warfare, who can strengthen our hearts, who can make us brave,” she said. “And through him, we can be the means of helping others heal.”
“But he will be the one who heals them.”