Faith, Christianity & Porn Addiction: Why Traditional Programs Fail—and a Better Way Forward

Many Christian men—including pastors and church leaders—are silently struggling with porn and sex addiction.

Traditional faith-based programs often miss the mark, focusing too much on “don’t do it” rules, demonizing the addict part, and defining success as perfect sobriety.

In this sex & porn addiction podcast, Coach Craig Perra shares why so many Christian men feel stuck, the hidden struggles pastors face, and how evidence-based models like Internal Family Systems (IFS) and The Mindful Habit® align beautifully with Christian faith. Discover a neuroscience-supported path rooted in grace, forgiveness, and systems that actually create lasting change.

If you’re a Christian man battling sex or porn addiction—or supporting someone who is—this episode will give you hope, clarity, and tools to lead yourself with faith and integrity.

👉 Need more help? Visit www.mindfulhabithelp.com


Jenna Reimersma’s Altogether You is a must-read for Christians battling sex and porn addiction—it beautifully connects neuroscience, Internal Family Systems, and faith.

xGet it here 👉 https://amzn.to/3KiuVHB







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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, Testing one two three four, Testing one two
three four.

Speaker 2 (00:09):
Hey what's up everybody? Hey, what's up everybody? Craig Perra here,
and you are listening to Sex Afflictions and Porn Addictions,
a podcast designed to help you create and sustain healthy
sexuality and a great life. Why because sobriety is not enough,

(00:31):
less than ten percent of the solution. I really, honestly
and genuinely think that welcome everybody. I have a really
special topic today, a sensitive topic that we're going to
talk about, and I want to talk about the biggest
concerns that my clients have shared with me over the

(00:51):
years about their faith based programs. And I'm sharing these
with you so you can say, hey, this is a
gap that I need to plug, or maybe you don't
connect with anything in this podcast and everything is going
right for you, and I hope it is. But if
you're listening, there's a great chance that things that there's

(01:12):
an opportunity to strengthen some weaknesses.

Speaker 1 (01:17):
So let me tell you specifically.

Speaker 2 (01:19):
So what we're going to talk about today is number
one why pastors and church leaders themselves are struggling. I
have the great privilege of working with leaders of large, large,
very large congregations, medium size, small, leaders from all fates,

(01:39):
all walks of life, all parts of the country. Probably
about sixty to seventy percent of my clients are Christians.
So we're first going to talk about that. The second
thing is that we're going to talk about the biggest
ways that faith based programs in the experience of my
clients unintentionally, unintentionally and sometimes make things worse. And finally,

(02:04):
the good news a model aligned with the Christian faith.
I'm going to talk a little bit about the internal
family systems model.

Speaker 1 (02:14):
Now, if you are new to the.

Speaker 2 (02:16):
Internal family systems model and you are a Christian, then
I highly highly recommend this book All Together You by
Jenna Ramersma. I recently had her on my podcast. She
is a se sat therapist and she has a very
interesting perspective on healthy sexuality in leading and loving your

(02:40):
attic part.

Speaker 1 (02:41):
So stay tuned for that.

Speaker 2 (02:43):
I am really really excited to release that podcast to you.
But this book is definitely mandatory reading. And let me
just say, for you brothers who are new to this program,
wouldn't it be wild if there was a neuroscientifically supported
behavior change model.

Speaker 1 (03:04):
That has.

Speaker 2 (03:07):
Beautiful overlap with your faith, Like, how cool would that be?

Speaker 1 (03:14):
Right? Well, guess what.

Speaker 2 (03:15):
According to Jenna Ramersma in this book and what I'm
going to talk about today, there is the internal family
systems model and the mindful habit system. So I want
to share some statistics involving pastors and leaders. And these

(03:37):
statistics come from the Barna Group. So if you search
the Barnas Study, the Barna Group is one of the
most respected Christian research organizations out there.

Speaker 1 (03:48):
And here's what they found. There's a lot of statistics.
We're only going to go through a few of them, but.

Speaker 2 (03:54):
I think they're important. Here's what one statistics said. Eighty
six percent of pastor's belief porn use is common among
other pastors. How's that for a self report?

Speaker 1 (04:08):
Right?

Speaker 2 (04:09):
Two out of three pastors admit they've struggled with porn
themselves in a little more than that for the younger pastors.
The younger pastors have a higher struggle rate. But listen
to this disconnect. Listen to this disconnect. But only thirty
three percent of pastors think it's a major issue in
their congregations. That is a staggering discount disconnect because in reality,

(04:37):
seventy five percent of Christian men and forty percent of
Christian women report using porn. Now, let me be clear,
the porn that we're talking about today, we are not
talking about Christian couples who use a rodica as a
marital aid. Do you know there are actually adult Christian

(05:00):
content creators trying to teach people how to make love
because we've been so poisoned by porn. They exist, they
are out there, okay, but we're not talking about that.
We are talking about the lying, the hiding, and the sneaking, okay.

(05:20):
And that disconnect is so so massive because maybe if
we frame the problem from one perspective, is men watching
porn problematic? And you could have two different groups could
debate that, and they'd come to different conclusions. Although you
listening right might feel very strongly about it. Right, there

(05:41):
are debates happening. But when you frame the question a
little differently, is men being out of integrity regarding one
of the most powerful forces in human nature with their
life partner a problem?

Speaker 1 (05:58):
Yeah? Right, right, It's a massive, massive, massive problem.

Speaker 2 (06:03):
And let me tell you a story. And this is
an amalgamation of a couple of stories. This has happened
multiple times. So I'm not revealing any secrets. But I
coached a pastor of a large congregation who wanted to
lead differently. He wanted to be honest about his struggle

(06:23):
because he said to himself, son of a gun, I'm
doing everything right. I'm trying to do everything right at least,
and I'm struggling.

Speaker 1 (06:32):
Oh and by the way, everybody I talk to is struggling.

Speaker 2 (06:35):
Everybody I even talk to feel shame, feels like they're
out of integrity, feels like they're not with God, they
feels like they're not connected to their partners. We have
to address this proactively. Let's fight this head on. Let's
fight this with honesty, grace, forgiveness, and love. Let's come
up with some evidence based tools. Let's create some groups.

(06:56):
Let's do this. And he was so excited, and and
guess what what did the elders say. What did the
older members on the board of directors say? They said, no,
they said, we that's your business because if you admit
your struggle, if you admit that you're struggling with everyone

(07:20):
else is struggling with, that will undermine your credibility as
a leader. And that statistic is real because when people
were asked, would you support a pastor who is honest
about him struggling with porn, most of you said no, no.
So his fear, their fear of him undermining his credibility

(07:42):
as a leader, is legitimate, is real. And they said,
if you choose to take this approach, you're gonna lose
your job. And listen, when these guys lose their jobs,
they might have a house that the place provides for them,
their kids might be enrolled in school. And now you've

(08:03):
got the stigma of the guy who shared his poor
addiction as a leader of a church.

Speaker 1 (08:10):
So we stayed silent.

Speaker 2 (08:13):
Shame shut down the movement before it even began. But
let me just I want you to imagine this for
a second. I want you to do this with me.
I want you to close your eyes, and I want
you to imagine.

Speaker 1 (08:28):
The reality if.

Speaker 2 (08:32):
Our leaders were honest about their struggles. Can you imagine
how the conversation would change. Can you imagine the different
conversations with partners, the different conversations that guys would be
having each other instead of it in the dark and
the shadows and the shame.

Speaker 1 (08:53):
We're not wired for this man, We're not wired for this.
The AI girlfriend market is to grow to over twenty
eight billion dollars by twenty twenty eight.

Speaker 2 (09:05):
I think it's thirty percent year of a year growth.
We are not wired for this. And you would think,
at this point in our history, considering there's only one
thing that allows us to reproduce and that sex, that
we be better at talking about it.

Speaker 1 (09:20):
But we are not here. We are here. We are so.

Speaker 2 (09:24):
Anyway, I have compassion for you religious leaders who are
listening to this.

Speaker 1 (09:29):
I see you.

Speaker 2 (09:30):
I know how hard it is to be honest, keep
fighting the good fight. And now I want to talk
about the criticisms, constructive criticisms that my clients have shared
them over the years in regards to their faith based programs. Again,
this isn't saying my program's better than anybody else's program.
The God's honest truth is different people respond to different things. Okay,

(09:56):
so this isn't about mine's better than theirs. These are
the holes that I pluck, These are the things that
we think are important. So clients say, one of the
biggest problems with their faith based programs is that they
obsess over what not to do.

Speaker 1 (10:12):
So don't lust, don't.

Speaker 2 (10:15):
Touch yourself, and some of them at their extremes don't
even have the thought.

Speaker 1 (10:21):
Okay, But neuroscience is clear. You don't break a habit
by trying not to do it.

Speaker 2 (10:27):
You break a habit by meeting new habits that actually
meet those needs. Because the golden rule of behavior modification
is what to break a habit, you have to make
the right habit that meets the right needs.

Speaker 1 (10:42):
So too much break a habit not enough make a habit. Okay.
The other.

Speaker 2 (10:49):
Criticism in regards to the make a habit or the
break a habit is there are rules, but rules without
systems meaning. James Clear says it in chapter one Atomic Habits. Right,
this is something you must write down and figure out
for yourself. Embrace it, learn it. You must know this,

(11:10):
and you must live this reality. We do not rise
to the level of our goals. You fall to the
level of your systems. It's not about willpower, right, It's
about structure and discipline, the different areas in your life
that you focus on in order to create the output

(11:33):
of choice, healthy sexuality and a great life. And you know,
and here's the kicker, right, and why this too much
break a habit actually makes things worse because when you
try not to think about something, the stronger it grips you,
the more you say don't do it. There's an internal
mechanism inside saying do it. And if you don't believe me,

(11:57):
it's the old pink elephant test. Close your eyes and
try not to think of a pink elephant. You can't
because Golden rule of behavior modification number two, that which
you resist persists, and it's why focusing on only what
not to do fails. The real change comes from building

(12:19):
habits that meet your deepest needs and healthy ways, and
you've got the right guardrails in places to keep you
on track. Right, That's how you retrain your brain, and
that's how you create lasting freedom. And you cannot do
that when you are too heavy on the break a
habit side, Okay, And the reason why you can't do
that in summary, because to break a habit you have

(12:41):
to make the right habits that meet the right needs.
And number two, focusing on the negative violates Golden rule
of behavior modification number two, that which you resist persist.

Speaker 1 (12:54):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (12:54):
And last but not least, we talked about systems you
don't rise to the level of your goals all to
the level of your systems. You must be working on
building the systems that produce the output of choice over
extended periods of time, despite the inevitable challenges that life
is going to throw at you.

Speaker 1 (13:16):
You must have a system. Okay, So the.

Speaker 2 (13:20):
Second thing that I want to talk about is, gosh,
the obsession, not the obsession, because they're legitimate obsessions. But
let me just say with sobriety and sin. So in
what my clients have said, in many of these circles,
success only equals one thing.

Speaker 1 (13:41):
Perfect sobriety. But here's the thing.

Speaker 2 (13:44):
Okay, you can white knuckle it for a week, a month,
a year, years and still fail. And the reason for
that is because your brain has been trained over years,
over decades, since childhood, to use porn as a coping
strategy for to use one of the most powerful forces
in the human nature to deal with fear also known

(14:09):
as stress anxiety. Well, we'll add loneliness to that too,
fear of abandonment, not being good enough. So when you're
talking about using sex to regulate fear, it's not leus.
It's not even about sex. It's about survival. We've got
survival instincts, kicking in. And here's the thing.

Speaker 1 (14:31):
This.

Speaker 2 (14:32):
When you look at the amount of times that a
guy has used porn and masturbation to emotionally regulate since
they were a child, you're talking in the thousands and
the tens of thousands. The frequency is so high because
it works. It's a very effective coping strategy. There's a

(14:53):
way I teach mindfulness when you can, you know, can
you be as mindful doing something else as you are
when you are in that tunnel?

Speaker 1 (15:01):
Right? And so the sin.

Speaker 2 (15:09):
It's hard to address because there's a simple reality that
there is a capacity issue.

Speaker 1 (15:14):
You really can't help it. You don't mean to do it.

Speaker 2 (15:18):
And when you beat yourself up and you shame yourself
for making those mistakes, you only make it worse. You're
not addressing the capacity issues, and you are staining yourself
with shame, and you're ignoring the biology, you're ignoring the trauma,
you're ignoring the programming.

Speaker 1 (15:39):
And you cannot do that. Do ignore that at your peril. Right.

Speaker 2 (15:44):
The addict lacks capacity to make good choices consistently over
extended periods of time, which is why we need systems.
And here's the other thing that I want to talk
about is that in these programs they tend to be

(16:04):
all or nothing, so perfect sobriety perfect or not, or failure,
success or failure. But here's the thing, right, Let's say
somebody who is like a serious mental health problems, a
lot of childhood trauma, wants to be a better man
of faith and wants to make progress, and is stuck

(16:28):
in this cycle of going a few weeks and failing
and feeling like a piece of garbage and pulling himself
out of that hole.

Speaker 1 (16:35):
What if? What if we realize when we looked at
his numbers that when he gave effort, he cut it.

Speaker 3 (16:43):
In half fifty He cut it fifty percent. He reduced
frequency fifty percent in the first week. And instead of
celebrating that, instead of analyzing, what did you do to
reduce it fifty percent?

Speaker 1 (17:00):
What did you do? What did you think?

Speaker 2 (17:02):
What belief systems inspired you to reduce it fifty percent?
So in any other part of the world, in business
and self improvement, you have success. But when you have
the all or nothing approach, what happens is and what
that means is and I'm going to say it is
attainability is controversial. People get into debate abstinence versus harm reduction. Listen,

(17:28):
this isn't abstinence versus harm reduction. It's reality reality, And
the reality is that you only had the capacity to
reduce it fifty percent. What if you did that again,
What if you did that again? What if you were
building on the successes? And when you are in the
all or nothing approach, you rob yourself of that ability.

(17:51):
You rob yourself of celebrating those successes and figuring out
what works and building on what works, and you're stuck
in a neck a cycle that keeps things worse. And
this is when I get on my soapbox, and I'm
gonna get off my soapboxes. I never want to be
anything other than kind. But like, I am sorry that

(18:14):
reality is controversial in your world. And I really mean that, Like,
I am really sorry that reality is controversial in your world.
Because when you start addressing attainability, you start creating results,

(18:36):
you start being successful, you start winning. Instead of believing
that your wife's anger in your shame is sufficient to rewire,
decades of programming, rooted in childhood, rooted in natural biology,

(18:59):
rooted in natural biology, reinforce environmentally over the course of
thousands of times in a lifespan, and guys, I have
had men come to meet bokin feeling such deep and
profound shame. Seriously, they disregulated from an abstinence program and

(19:22):
instead of focusing on emotional regulation, self care, basic mindfulness,
you know, underlying mental health issues, this guy just felt
like a worthless piece of crap until I said, let's
take sobriety off the table for a week now, now, now, no,
just listen. What if we get to where you want

(19:45):
to go, but in a different way. That's a lot
kinder that produces a lot better results, that deals with reality.
How about instead of like the vendors that cycle that
you keep putting yourself in, what if we reduce frequency
and save already twenty five percent.

Speaker 1 (20:02):
And actually, in the case I'm thinking of, we took
it off the table.

Speaker 2 (20:06):
Because there were things that needed to get done before
his system could produce the output of good decision making,
identity based decision making over extended periods of time.

Speaker 1 (20:17):
All right, here is the last thing that I want
to talk about.

Speaker 2 (20:20):
So one of the other primary criticisms that a lot
of clients have, and this is I think due to
you know, maybe misinterpretation of twelve steps, but a lot
of people, especially my Christian brothers, demonize their addict part. So, Hi,

(20:41):
my name is Craig. I'm a sex addict. I have
the disease of sex addiction. And what do you want
to do with the disease. You want to kill that disease, right,
what do you want to do with those diseased cells?
You want to kill those cells. So there is this,
and then you add faith to that, and there is
the tency to demonize the attic part. And so you

(21:04):
guys go back and watch some of my other videos
or listen to my podcast on parts work to learn
more about the internal family systems model. Again, I will
reference the book Whoop Altogether You by Jenna Ramersema's right
next to me, because I just had her on my podcast.

Speaker 1 (21:20):
She was a wonderful guest.

Speaker 2 (21:23):
And you guys are really really gonna dig it to
find a neuroscientifically supported model in alignment with your faith,
Like goodness gracious, could you ask for anything better of that?
And by the way, it is inconsistent or at least
doc trinally consistent with aspects of twelve step identifying as
an addict now, because Jenna knows what she's doing. She's

(21:45):
able to educate her clients. And you learn in the
book on How to Be Mindful that you know this
is just a part of you. But a lot of
Christians demonize.

Speaker 1 (21:58):
Their attic part.

Speaker 2 (21:59):
They want want to kill their attic part, they want
to destroy their attic part. They want to do what
you do to demons. Right, But here's the problem. Here
is the problem that addict that part of you that
runs the pleasure to escape pain for years, maybe decades,
That part of you that has helped you regulate fear, stress, loneliness,

(22:29):
and anxiety, this oasis, this escape, this this reward first
learned in childhood, and often those learnings in childhood were
shrouded by shame and unhealthy childhood sexual experiences.

Speaker 1 (22:46):
Shame. So that attic part that you're demonizing, that's that's
not right, that that's actually making it worse. When any program.

Speaker 2 (23:02):
Tells you that that part is evil, that it's the flesh,
that it's the enemy, you internalize the fight, and when
you demonize a part, you demonize yourself. The way you
feel about a part is the way you feel about yourself.
And I would argue respectfully that that approach yours is

(23:22):
how the demon comes in by demonizing a part. Okay,
and Jenna talks about this in her book, And.

Speaker 1 (23:33):
What does that do makes it worse?

Speaker 2 (23:36):
That isn't I did something bad, that is I am
something bad. And that's why Parts work is so incredibly awesome.
And I you know, can't say mandatory because different people
respond to different things. But having a framework to lead
these wayward parts sound familiar is incredibly valuable. And there's

(24:02):
this psychological model, and I'll talk just a little bit
of it, the internal family systems model, where at the
center is this Jiminy Cricket like essence. Different psychologies and
spiritualities have a different name for it, but there's this
I remember describing it.

Speaker 1 (24:19):
To a client.

Speaker 2 (24:20):
He said, oh, you mean the Holy Spirit? He said, oh,
does it feel like that? A lot of clients connect
with that. Or Jenna describes in her book the fingerprint
of God the divine spark. And there are a number
of other different terms that you might use. So you're
telling me there is a psychological model that there's this
thing in the center of us that has the ability

(24:43):
and capacity and the power to lead these wayward parts
with not shame, not anger, not condemnation, not contempt, not cruelty,
but grace, forgiveness and love.

Speaker 1 (25:08):
Yeah, that's science. There is a model out there that
gives you the tools and the framework to lead these
parts with grace, compassion, forgiveness, and love, because to do
anything else would be demonizing the part, rejecting the.

Speaker 2 (25:27):
Part that which you resist persists. To break a habit,
you have to make the right habit that meets the
right needs. So I think that, of course, I think
it's wonderful. So thank you, thank you, thank you, thank
you for listening. I am really excited to teach this model.

(25:47):
And one thing I like to say, if you stuck
around this far, you might be in a place where
the mindful habit has just launched its first ever leadership
and professional old development program.

Speaker 1 (26:02):
Okay, this is for leaders and leaders who.

Speaker 2 (26:07):
Want professional development, have a company that has a professional
development budget. I partnered with Brett Perkins, author of the
book Papercuts, founder of three X Bold. You can check
them out. Experienced former you know, business owner, seven eight
figure businesses, all that stuff. But he's got an amazing

(26:29):
heart and he's established in this space, and we have
partnered to do a ten week program. We are doing
a ten week leadership and professional development program. And this
is for the guy who's not going to go to therapy,
who's not going to go, you know, join as sex
or porn addiction program, but will does want to grow
and of course, you know, a great professional development program

(26:52):
impacts you in a deep way personally. This is for burnout,
This is for poor coping strategies. So if you're listening
to this and if you are a leader struggling with
burnout and poor coping strategies, let me know, or if
you know somebody the other reason that we've built it
in the way that we built it so people can
refer it without revealing that you have this dark secret.

Speaker 1 (27:14):
So this is an exciting time for Michelle and I.

Speaker 2 (27:19):
We're really doing some super cool things and we'll keep
you posted around them. So thank you, Thank you for listening.
Visit the website, dial the number, leave your name and
number and we'll get back to you, or you can
email me at Craig at Themindfulhabit dot com. This kickoff
is October fourteenth. I'm going to put the link in

(27:40):
the chat. So I'm super super excited about that. I
have known for over a decade that the Mindful Habit
system had application and could bring great value to leadership
and professional development. And then I realized that I'm doing
leadership and professional development the entire time. It just happened
to have a massive impact on guys' families and healthy sexuality.

Speaker 1 (28:03):
So check it out. Thank you for listening.

Speaker 2 (28:06):
Visit Mindfulhabit heelp dot com if you need more help,
remember embrace your power of choice and feed the right
wolf inside you. We'll actually feed both of them. They're important,
but you're just going to learn to feed it in
the right way. Thanks for listening. That's all I got.
Good Night, everybody. Bye.