10/28/2021; Week 7: Response to "Culture and Psychology"

     In this week's lecture by Bro. Ivers, we learned about how cultural psychology can affect how we feel about ourselves and how it can influence our self-esteem. He explained how different cultures throughout the world place value on different attributes. For instance, as he mentioned, there were Native American tribes who believed it was beneath a man to farm. This was women's work. When their hunting lands were overrun with settlers and conquerors, they were forced to start farming and felt emasculated. This was harmful for many generations and probably still has some lingering effects that could account for the high alcohol and drug rates among the Native Americans. 

     While there are many cultural psychology differences between cultures of the world, we can also see differences within subsets of cultures. For instance, members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints have a culture all their own that is different from those whose communities they share. This is as it should be, as Peter of old himself said that we are a "peculiar people" (1 Peter 2:9). However, there are some issues that crop up that have had to be addressed by our leaders. A common cultural psychological problem is that many Mormon women feel that they are never enough and that they never do enough. The culture that has crept into the church is that Mormon women should always be serving, making bread, having children, bottling produce, gardening, being near perfect wives, and the list goes on and on. This set of beliefs can cause many women to feel they are not trying hard enough, that they should not rest, that they could do so much better. This in turn can cause depression and low self-esteem. This issue has been addressed many times by church leaders in an attempt to let women know that they are enough and that their efforts and sacrifices are valued by their Father in heaven. While we should always be trying to better ourselves, we, as members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, need to also recognize that our efforts are sanctified by God and written in the books of heaven, and that God is a loving and merciful God who knows our circumstances, and also our limits as human beings, and will judge us accordingly. 


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