At 8 years, Joe Masek, originally from Minnesota (United States), was first exposed to pornography and fought against addiction to it for 23 years. Through a series of actions he finally achieved freedom and, after experiencing a call to help other men, founded a ministry called The Freedom Group (The Libertad Group) in 2023.
Since then, about 100 men have passed through the Ministry program every year. The group uses a 12 -month training system, as well as additional courses and retreats, to help men free themselves from pornography addiction.
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The Porn Free training system includes weekly calls from coaching With a freedom coach, group called coaching, coaching of performance and mentality, simple daily habits to build discipline and rhythm, access to an application to connect and monitor progress, and more. There are also several courses that help individuals understand the neurological aspect of addiction and how to reconfigure the brain.
Based in twin cities, The Freedom Group also offers the opportunity to attend retreats in nature, where they are encouraged to meet God and themselves in a deeper way. Through guided reflections, group sessions, time alone and physical adventures, participants learn to live free from their addiction and root in their true purpose.
Masek, now 32, said it was first exposed to pornography while using Limewire, a program to download audio files that was used in the early 2000s. Believing that I was downloading a music file, it ended up downloading a video file that contained pornographic images.
Around the same time, Masek was also sexually abused by an older partner.
“As a 7 or 8 year old boy, I experienced all the symptoms (which) now I understand and that we understand as adults that we try to help other people in the same way: a lot of disconnection in my own experience of who I am and feel dirty and useless, but also looking for him and beginning to have search behaviors,” he said in an interview with CNA, an English agency of Ewtn News.
He shared that the rest of his upbringing was “really good.” He grew up in a middle class family that attended the Church every Sunday and he was very involved in the group of young people. But as it grew, it began to experience a “growing dichotomy between the life of faith and this hidden life.”
It was not until the university that Masek found himself in a group of men who addressed sexual issues and was able to share his history in depth, releasing the “10,000 pound gorilla from my back.”
“So this was my first introduction to shame coming out through the main door of my heart and it was something huge for me,” he recalled.
Shortly after he went to a retirement and had his first confession in years, which he described as “a powerful experience.”
However, Masek continued to fight, experiencing periods of sobriety and then returning to his addiction. After years of trying everything I could, he began to gather everything he was learning and experimenting in what is now the approach used in The Freedom Group.
“In a period of three months, I went from a cycle of two to three weeks in which I felt that I collided with a wall and could not move forward, to the point where I did not even have an inclination to use (pornography) when family triggers appeared,” he said.
Then he began leading a National Ministry of Marriage and Family, and the longer he spent with young husbands and parents, the more he saw this as a “central problem” and decided to leave that ministry to found The Freedom Group.
Masek shared that approximately 85% of the men with whom their group works are believers, whether Catholics or evangelicals. Therefore, faith does play a role in the program, but “you really live in experience.”
He explained that “any addiction is an intimacy disorder.” So The Freedom Group speaks of intimacy in four dimensions: me and God, me and myself, me and others, and me and nature, or creation. These intimacy connections begin to change as the brain begins to change.
Masek gave the example of a man with whom he worked that “he had lived the Christian life model.” He worked at the University Ministry, married young and had a family. However, he suffered from anxiety, he was disconnected from himself and did not experience connections in any of the four dimensions of intimacy. Three months after starting the process, this man shared with Masek that he had come out to walk and sat for 30 minutes in total stillness and felt the presence of God.
“For me, that is the greatest testimony that I could receive because I know the difference between ‘I am trying to do the right Before others, the way you see yourself from that connection. ”
A motto of The Freedom Group is “pain is the way. Disposure is your teacher.” Masek explained how this emphasizes that life is difficult, but we are called to load our crosses.
“We only experience the resurrection on the other side of our hug to the suffering that has been given in a unique way, and that is the invitation of our life: to be able to do it,” he said.
He added that true healing and transformation begin to become visible when the individual also embraces the suffering that has been given and sees good in it.
“That is our desire for this whole process: that men, at the end of their trip with us, regardless of how long they spend with us, reach that point in their own lives. It goes from attraction or desire for something disorderly to the point where they want to choose good in good and bad times,” he said.
“I always tell the boys, this is the worst possible year – if you are in our process of coaching– To have the best year of your life because you will not learn much, “Masek added.” The goal is to have difficult things and stay in them and welcome them as something with purpose and see what happens, because Jesus said: ‘Take your cross and follow me’. And promised that it would change us and even lead us to freedom. ”
Translated and adapted by the ACI Press team. Originally published in CNA.
Francesca Purchio Fenton
Francesca Pollio Fenton is responsible for social networks of Catholic News Agency. He received his degree in communications with emphasis on digital media from the University of Colorado, in Denver (United States).