My husband left the church for this very reason. He confessed his sin (one he'd been feeling immense guilt over for years) to his Bishop in preparation for his mission. He wanted to out himself to the whole ward (he felt he'd done them all wrong by blessing sacrament w/ his dirty hands). The Bishop said, "it's no big deal. Every man struggles with this."
After having this horrible sin dismissed as something insignificant, my husband declined his mission and left the church.

cue "it's no crazier than any other religion".

you know what? Dems are too big of pussies to make Mormonism an issue in the general. And that's too bad. Because Karl Rove sure as fuck would.

Not masturbating causes cancer. God totally wants you to live in frustration and then die of cancer. Yup, that guy's a bastard.

I have a couple of ex-mormon friends, they'd confess stuff to their bishop, even when they hadn't done anything, just to freak him out. Catholics had the same experience with confession and again I know plenty of people who didn't confess stuff they did and did confess stuff just to freak the priests out. When I was a teenage the evangelical protestant churches were big on hauling teenage couples in front of their churches and making take vows not to do drugs and to remain "chaste" until marriage. After church the kids would roast a bowl and screw in their cars.

I don't see how this is very secret, shocking, or limited to the Mormon Church.

Religion perverts. Period. What's really sad is how people put this on their own children. Fucked up! But they now have the internet and I suspect more than a few eyes are being opened.

If knowing the response to admitting your sins is being publicly shamed, why the hell would you do it? Also, why bother with closed doors if he's just going to turn around and tell everyone about it anyway? And what form does this public shaming take?

My boss--and friend--is a Bishop in the LDS church and he's got more than he can handle dealing with kids who have very real drug issues, come from homes with very real physical and emotional abuse and kids who he's trying to help stay in school. Every religion has its fringes, but the reality is usually far more mundane.

That said, IMO Cee Lo Green had it right.

So instead of Policy Wonks the Romney administration will have a Wanking Policy?

"Mormon bishops are, for the most part, married male church members"

David-- just to be clear, the "married" part is a good thing right? Imagine if these private interviews had been conducted with adult men who had sworn a life of celibacy.

@7 Aw, you used logic! How quaint.

As a former Catholic, I can say that though God may not be real, religious organizations are, along with alienation and depression. I can also tell you that I have never felt so utterly alone than when I attended Easter mass on a warm sunny day surrounded by hundreds of people and my extended family. I worried about reactions, about how long I would or could maintain the charade. And the best part? My family, middle-class New Englanders that they are, are relatively permissive on the national scale. All of that is small comfort to a teenager who worries about being isolated from people he has trusted for social (and yes, economic) support his entire life.

It's sociology, not geometry.

10: Yes! It's nice they're married. But they're also just laymen schmucks.

9: You win!

Onan the Barbarian.

But the local buses tell me that Mormons are just regular people?

So should the billboards read "I'm a Mormon. So I don't masturbate, or I will have to confess my sin to my Bishop, who will publicly shame me."

Doesn't quite carry the same being-a-Mormon-is-so-totally-normal spin to it.

Almost as bad? Buying INTO the bullshit as a Mormon teen and not jerking off even once until you are in your mid 20s-- or beyond.

@4 Why would God create cancer if he doesn't want us to get it?

You don't masturbate, you die from cancer and you go to hell because you're a Jew. The system works!

It seems one or two sinful omissions could counteract a whole lot of sinful emissions.

Having grown up Mormon, I confessed to masturbating a few times to my bishop, once the traditional annual interview started (after I turned 12, I think). It was horrible and awkward, and neither of us questioned the creepy exercise at all. You guys need to understand: when you grow up Mormon, you grow up cult. No questioning, no objectivity, period. It's not like growing up Baptist or Catholic. It's on another level.

Every time I tell my boyfriend about things like this from my Mormon past, he shits himself and says "That is NOT ok!" It's interesting to see these horrible things from the outside in, because when you grow up Mormon, this kind of creepy thing just seems totes normal.