Mormon Newsroom

I was browsing around the Mormon Newsroom, mostly because I'm a gluton of punishment. But I stumbled upon this gem, and I don't know how to handle my feelings...

It opens up with this statement, "On 7 June 2006 ABC’s Nightline ran a story on members and former members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who struggle with same-gender attraction. This issue is one that evokes strong emotions and, unfortunately, often perpetuates negative stereotypes on both sides of the debate. Nightline’s story contained some comments that do not reflect the views and teachings of the Church and its leaders."

Here are the comments:

Daniel Holsinger: “There is a very strong notion that I am a sinner — fundamentally who I am is hated and reviled by God. I am alone; there is no one else like me.”

Morgan Smith: “We’re not recovering from God, but we are recovering from the put-downs, the discrimination, the people that come along and say that if you’re gay, you’re not good.”

Russ Gorringe: “There is no place for me in the gospel as a person who never married.”

*sigh*

It's not the bloody comments that are contrary to the teachings of the Church! It's the behavior of the members towards these people! For all of our talk about being a Church of love and compassion, the LGBT members of our wards and stakes have a hard time finding them in our congregations.

Why do you think that Daniel feels hated? Because there are members of the Church that do! Not all, but there are enough. We hear all about the "homosexuals"... from everyone but LGBT people. We see statements like this made by the First Presidency in 1970, “Homosexuals can be assured that in spite of all they may have heard from other sources, they can overcome and return to normal, happy living,” as if my life isn't already normal and fulfilling. We are compared to bank robbers by Elder Mark E. Peterson in 1978, “Since homosexuals have become a nationwide entity, and have come out of hiding to demand their place in the sun, many of them claim that they are what they are because they were born that way and cannot help it. How ridiculous is such a claim. It was not God who made them that way, any more than He made bank robbers the way they are.” And we are (frankly) belittled by President Spencer W. Kimball in 1978, “’God made me that way,’ some say [i.e., homosexual] … This is blasphemy. Is man not made in the image of God, and does he think God to be ‘that way’?” When I see these things, I feel hated and unwanted... by the membership, as well as the leadership.

Morgan feels put down, and every single LGBT person has been, whether it's direct or indirect. Can you blame us? Bishop Keith McMullin of the Presiding Bishopric said this in 2010, “If someone seeking your help says to you, ‘I am a homosexual,’ or, ‘I am lesbian,’ or, ‘I am gay,’ correct this miscasting… it is simply not true. To speak this way seeds a doubt and deceit about who we really are.” That makes me feel put down! You are ignoring my trust in you to tell you something this personal about me, and you shut me down and tell me that I'm wrong? When you clearly have never gone through what I'm going through?! Or how about the douzy in 2010 from President Boyd K. Packer, “Some suppose that they were pre-set and cannot overcome what they feel are inborn tendencies toward the impure and unnatural. Not so! Why would our Heavenly Father do that to anyone? Remember, He is our Father.” You're telling me that I am impure and unnatural... sounds like a put down to me. From the membership and local leadership, I've heard them all... from little things like being called a "dyke" to being told there is an evil spirit residing inside of me. They are hurtful, plain and simple.

The Church has made SO many steps in the right direction since the 1960's, and since 2006, when this article was published. But if you think for one second that we are "at the forefront at having love and compassion", you are horribly mistaken.

Just Be There

A couple of months ago I went to BYU in Provo, to help with a video that USGA (Understanding Same Gender Attraction) was shooting about suicide awareness among LGBT Mormons, especially those at BYU. Although I am not a BYU student, I went and participated, because this is something that I have dealt with in the past, and it's something that is important to me. Suicide rates are high among LGBT teens and young adults, and even more so when they come from conservative religious backgrounds. It needs to stop.

Stories like these, and talks like the one given by Elder Jeffery R. Holland in General Conference, will help us on this journey. Things are changing.

Without further ado....

Journal Entry 2 December 2011

It's three weeks before Christmas... And for the fifth year in a row, I'm alone... again. My family doesn't want me. God doesn't want me. Nobody wants me. I'm nobody's somebody.

I get why my parents hate me. I get why they don't want me around. They don't even know that I'm gay, but I'm a bad enough person that my gayness doesn't even need to be mentioned for me to be expelled from the family.

I get why God hates me. God hates me because I'm gay. That's a pretty good reason. It's cut and dry... Plain and simple. God loves straight people. God loves people who can "multiply and replenish the earth." God loves people who are pure of heart. But that's not me. I have impure, immoral, and unnatural thoughts all the time. I'm dirty, and repulsive. No unclean thing can enter God's presence. No unclean thing can go to heaven. But no matter how hard I scrub my skin, no matter how much, and how sincerely I pray... I'm still impure. God can't possibly love someone like me.

I still hold my temple recommend... But I know that I shouldn't. Someone gave a talk in Sacrament meeting last week about morality, and told us that if we feel rotten in our hearts about something that we have done, it means that we've sinned, and that we need to reevaluate our temple worthiness. I know that I shouldn't have it. But I need to go to the temple one last time... And then I'll figure out what to do. But I have to go just one last time.
 

I'm wearing out the carpet in my room from pacing and kneeling in prayer. I've never prayed about anything more intently, or with more sincerity than this. I was told I would be blessed when I joined the Church... And the only blessing I want is for me to be cured... I want to be straight. Yet God is silent. I've been taught that He will always answer our prayers... but to me, He is silent. He doesn't love me. He can't love me.

I'm Speaking At Affirmation!

Yep! You heard it! I'm speaking at the Affirmation Conference on September 13-15 in Salt Lake City, Utah. I'm participating with one of the workshops on Saturday morning (Sept. 14) titled: Restoring Our Relationship with the Restored Church and Gospel. John Gustav-Wrathall will also be presenting, as well as a few others who have yet to be announced. I will also be featured in Daniel Parkinson's presentation, God's Affirmation, which highlights people's stories of receiving personal revelation, and inspiration of God's affirmation of our orientation, and our lifestyles.

If you have't registared for Affirmation yet, DO IT! Here's the link to the registration website.

I personally am really excited to attend the conference (it's my first one!), and obviously am humbled that John has asked me to participate. So come on out!! You won't regret it!

To See The Face Of God

How many of you have heard a story of a family kicking their kid out of the house because they found out their son or daughter was gay or transgender? How many stories have you heard about a teenager or young adult committing suicide... And finding out that the primary reason was because they were gay?

How many of them were Mormon?

The more I ponder this horrendous trend in the culture of my faith, the more I ponder this question: How can the "true church" of Christ, with their beliefs, practices, and doctrines contribute to so many suicides and homeless teenagers?

There's really no good answer. A lot of Mormons I know would answer with something like this, "The Church is true, but the people are NOT!" In it's most simplistic form, this statement would be correct. But the problem appears when we notice that it has become culturally acceptable to interpret the statement, "I know the Church is true," to mean "I know the Church leaders and membership are always perfect." They are far from equivalent.

So the question really is more like this: Is it the doctrines of the Church that contribute to suicides and homelessness? Or is it the culturally accepted beliefs of the members and leadership?

While the Church's doctrine and beliefs are not directly to blame, it is dishonest not to acknowledge that the Church has policies about LGBT people that have caused deep despair, as well as emotional and spiritual harm. Add in the human interpretation of these policies, and you have a very unstable mental and emotional compound.

We are taught that the family is the foundation of the Plan of Salvation, and that the only place more sacred than the temple is the home. Yet parents are cutting their kids out of their families in the name of purity and righteousness, and are using these doctrines and policies to justify their actions.

The Church came out with the website mormonsandgays.org in late 2012. While this is far short of what most LGBT Mormons and their allies need from the Church, it is the first small step towards love, acceptance and equality for the LGBT Mormon community.

While I have mixed feelings about the site in general, I have pulled some good out of it. Elder Quentin L. Cook has a video interview that's towards the middle of the page, and he says some really great things. This quote warms my heart, "[As] a Church nobody should be more loving and compassionate. No family who has anybody who has a same-gender issue should exclude them from the family circle. They need to be a part of the family circle. [Let] us be at the forefront in terms of expressing love, compassion, and outreach to those who choose a different lifestyle as a result of their feelings about their own gender. I'm sorry, I feel very strongly about this as you can tell. I think it's a very important principle." Elder D. Todd Christofferson also does a video interview, near the top, about the purpose of the website, "You'll see in these experiences that some people state what you could call the position of the Church—it coincides perfectly—and others not. But again, they're all very authentic, and as we listen to one another and strive to understand, things can only get better." This quote stood out to me because he is acknowledging that there are people in the Church who have chosen a different path than what the Church teaches, and he acknowledges those experiences and feelings as authentic.

This is coming from the mouth of two men we sustain as Apostles of the Lord, and personally, two of my favorite General Authorities. But because mormonsandgays.org  isn't listed on the Church's official website lds.org, no one knows about it. So can we place all of the blame on the members and local leadership for the hurtful rhetoric they teach? No. Because no one has taught them otherwise.

As members of the LGBT community, and as allies of this community, we need to bring attention to the site (even with all its flaws). We need to tell people in our Sunday School classes, Relief Society, Elder's Quorum, Young Men's and Young Women's to cut the crap when they talk badly about homosexuality and gay people. We need to correct them, and tell them about the Church's website when they believe that Church doctrine and policy allows them to hold such hurtful opinions. We, as the membership of the Church, need to speak out about against kicking children out of their homes. We need to reach out to those who are marginalized, and hurt. We need to offer a hand of friendship to those in need. We need to consciously ask ourselves in every situation, "What would Jesus do?" 

Because when we love another, we see the face of God.

Journal Entry, 12 November 2011

Today I envy the heterosexual. I envy being "normal". I envy being wholesome and clean. I envy the girls that swoon over men like Channing Tatum and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. I envy the desire to date men. I envy the 95%.

I want to find men attractive. I want to view sex with men as enticing, and desirable. I want to find a temple worthy man to see me as an elect daughter of God. I want to have butterflies in my stomach when a guy smiles at me. I want to blush, and have that cute embarrassed look on my face. But I don't. I have the shame in the pit of my stomach instead.

I love Grey's Anatomy. It's my absolute favorite TV show. I wish that I could be Meredith Grey. She's straight, and she's beautiful. Meredith is awesome. Being straight is awesome. But I'm not Meredith. I'm not awesome. And I'm not straight.

The Mormon universe and the Gay universe swirl and collide in my head. They try to mix, but they are like oil and water. They touch, but they aren't the same. One is less than the other.

Why would God do this to me? Was I rebellious in the Pre-Mortal life? Was I displeasing to God? Am I unnatural? Am I sinful? I'm a virgin... But I'm considered to be immoral and virtue-less. How can I be immoral if I'm a virgin? How could I have lost my virtue if it's still physically (and emotionally) intact? Does God hate me?

I can't change. It's not lack of willpower. It's not lack of faith, or trust in God. I wasn't abused as a child, and I had good parents. Parents who didn't understand me, but they were good parents. They didn't do anything to make me the way I am. But I did. I ruined my life before it even started.

Should I end it in the same fashion?

Gay v. Same-Sex-Attracted

I've gotten a lot of flak from a variety of people about my choice of words when I identify myself. Which is annoying, but whatever.

I identify as a lesbian, though sometimes I will use the word gay... simply because I don't believe the term exclusively belongs to gay males. I use the words "gay" and "lesbian" because it defines me as a person. It points me out as someone who's confident with who I am, and that I am open to others asking questions, and that I welcome an honest dialogue. I prefer to use it in a Church context too, because it's clear. It leaves no room for error. I'm not going through a phase, nor am I looking to enter into a heterosexual relationship. I'm confident in myself. I don't want to have a label that tells people otherwise.

On the other hand, the Church, and by extension it's leaders, will almost exclusively use the terms "Same-Sex Attracted" (SSA) or "Same-Gender Attracted" (SGA). Church leaders have stated that the words homosexual, lesbian, and gay should be used as adjectives to describe thoughts, feelings or behaviors, and never as nouns to describe people. Their reasoning is that using these words imply that a person has no choice in regards to sexual behavior. The Church has since declared that homosexuality is not a choice, but as late as 1992, the Church was still teaching that homosexual problems could be overcome "through faith in God, sincere repentance, and persistent effort." In the October 2010 General Conference, President Boyd K. Packer is quoted saying, "Some suppose that they were preset, and cannot overcome what they feel are inborn tendencies toward the impure and unnatural. Not so. Why would our Heavenly Father do that to anyone? Remember, He is our Father."

This is sending a plethora of mixed messages to LGBT Mormons. They ask, "Is it ok to be gay? Am I born this way? Is this normal? Can I change my attractions?" Since the American Psychiatric Association declassified homosexuality as a mental disorder in 1973, and the American Psychological Association followed in 1975, they would say, "Yes, it is ok to be gay. You were born this way, and it is normal. You cannot change your attractions because there is no need to change. You are wonderful just the way you are." But most Bishops and Stake Presidents will tell them to keep it to themselves, and these feelings aren't really a part of them, but simply an "earthly affliction" that they "suffer from" in this fallen world, and that upon the moment of death, this sordid affliction will be lifted in the next life, because they'll be in paradise (at least, that's been my experience in the past.)

In short, the terms Same-Sex Attracted, and Same-Gender Attracted infuriate me, and I am quick to correct anyone who uses them to describe me. I feel that they're diminishing, and demeaning. They are very clinical, and give the perception that I have a condition, that needs to be remedied and fixed. And I am perfect just the way that I am.

Let me state unequivocally... If you are lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender, there is nothing wrong with you. Nothing. You do not have a disease. You do not need to cure yourself. And you are not inherently sinful. You are created in our heavenly parents' image. You don't have to accept the "same-gender attracted" label that the Church and it's members give you... not unless you want it. Your sexual orientation does not have to define you. I made the choice to have it define me, because I am comfortable with it, and I welcome shouldering the mantle of stares and judgement. I will do it, so you don't have to. If the terms that people use for you hurt you in any way, SPEAK UP! We are beautiful people, and we deserve respect.