It Will Never Happen

I feel I have basically made peace with the LDS Church.  I commented to Mark before our Maui trip that it seemed to me to be like a place I had left that was growing increasingly distant in my rearview mirror.

Yet, it will always be there – in my memory, in my psyche, in my family.

I recently had an opportunity to talk about the Church in the unlikeliest of places – on a clothing-optional beach in Hawaii, with several guys that we happened to meet there who are all gay and who were all formerly Mormon.  

I wrote a bit about this while in Maui.  About the couple who live here in Salt Lake, both of whom were raised in the Church, both of whom served missions.  About the couple who now live in Canada – one of whom was raised in the church here in Salt Lake, while the other joined the church as a young man in France and served in the same mission I did a couple of years before me (I was an old missionary).  They had met and lived in Salt Lake for a number of years before moving to Canada.

All of these guys expressed basically the same thing: the Church is irrelevant to them now.  It is part of a distant past.  Yet it lives on in each of them, in one way or another, to one degree or another.  Not the faith, mind you, but the culturization, the scars of trying to be a faithful Mormon while not hating who you are.

I have seen a lot of gay ex-Mormons get really angry at the Church.  I have tried to avoid this.  Mark has wondered aloud at times why I am not more angry than I am because of what the Church did to me in the past and what it does to other young people today – both gay and straight – how it channels them, limits them, scars them.

The day of my baptism in May 1983

When we arrived home, there was an email waiting for me from a guy I know who lives elsewhere in the state who is about my age, is married (to a woman) and is gay.  We have corresponded for well over a year, and I met and chatted briefly with him last fall at a conference I helped organize for gay Mormons.  By way of background, he was raised in the Church, but knew he was gay.  He came out for a number of years, but then met a woman with whom he felt he could make a life and “live the Plan of Happiness” (i.e., be a devout heterosexual Mormon).  They got married and had children.  Now, however, though he loves his wife, he feels trapped.

“I was cleaning out some old magazines and books,” he wrote, “when I came across an issue of the Ensign [Church magazine] dated November 1980 (conference issue).”  For the benefit of non-Mormon readers, the Church holds a worldwide conference twice a year at which all of the leaders of the Church – most importantly, its prophet/president – speak on various subjects.  The proceedings of these conferences are then treated as scripture, especially when spoken by the “prophet.”  

“On page 94,” he continued, there is an article by President Spencer W. Kimball [president of the Church at that time] entitled "President Kimball Speaks Out on Morality."  I want to quote some parts.”  

This friend then went on to quote extracts of President Kimball’s address.  At this point, I should explain that it is difficult to overemphasize the role that the Prophet plays in the lives of all devout Church members, particularly the youth.  He is revered as God’s mouthpiece, His spokesperson on earth.  When the Prophet speaks, “Thus saith the Lord” – at least to faithful Church members.

Me in the Missionary Training Center, Summer 1984.
Note I am the only one wearing a white shirt. Sigh.

President Kimball, though feeble, was president of the Church when I joined in May 1983.  His books, sermons and other writings and pronouncements were extremely influential in my early days and years in the Church, as they were to countless other men of my generation who either were raised in or joined the Church during the 70’s and early 80’s.

Though I was familiar with President Kimball’s teachings, and though I have, during the past 18 months, reviewed many statements about homosexuality made by leaders of the Mormon Church over the last 50 years, I do not recall reading this address that my friend referred to in his email.   I want to quote from it at length because it so clearly reveals the teachings of the Church regarding homosexuality during this period, teachings which dramatically affected me, my friend and tens of thousands of other young Mormon men (and women).

“The unholy transgression of homosexuality is either rapidly growing or tolerance is giving it wider publicity. If one has such desires and tendencies, he overcomes them the same as if he had the urge toward petting or fornication or adultery. The Lord condemns and forbids this practice with a vigor equal to his condemnation of adultery and other such sex acts. And the Church will excommunicate as readily any unrepentant addict. 

“Again, contrary to the belief and statement of many people, this sin, like fornication, is overcomable and forgivable, but again, only upon a deep and abiding repentance, which means total abandonment and complete transformation of thought and act. The fact that some governments and some churches and numerous corrupted individuals have tried to reduce such behavior from criminal offense to personal privilege does not change the nature nor the seriousness of the practice. Good men, wise men, God-fearing men everywhere still denounce the practice as being unworthy of sons and daughters of God; and Christ’s church denounces it and condemns it so long as men and women have bodies which can be defiled … 

“This heinous homosexual sin is of the ages. Many cities and civilizations have gone out of existence because of it. It was present in Israel’s wandering days, tolerated by the Greeks, and found in the baths of corrupt Rome. 

“This is a most unpleasant subject to dwell upon, but I am pressed to speak of it boldly so that no youth in the Church will ever have any question in his mind as to the illicit and diabolical nature of this perverse program. Again, Lucifer deceives and prompts logic and rationalization which will destroy men and women and make them servants of Satan forever …  

“‘God made me that way,’ some say, as they rationalize and excuse themselves for their perversions. ‘I can’t help it,’ they add. This is blasphemy. Is man not made in the image of God, and does he think God to be ‘that way’? Man is responsible for his own sins. It is possible that he may rationalize and excuse himself until the groove is so deep he cannot get out without great difficulty, but this he can do …” 

The day I left for France, with my sister Karen and her then-husband

My friend had highlighted numerous objectionable terms used by President Kimball, but if I were to do that, the entire passage would be highlighted.

He continued:

“I could go on.  This makes me sick and I started shaking when I read it again for the first time in many years.  Is it any wonder so many of us fought with ourselves for so long?  Is it any wonder we put on the mask and thought if we acted the way we were told to that eventually we could be cured?  

“If the church really wanted to change, really wanted to heal wounds, then they would recant these types of messages and extend an olive branch to the downtrodden.  Instead we just get a general "love the sinner but not the sin."  Or the equally loving "hey, you're OK just they way you are, just don't act on it."  

“Anyway, it does make me realize how hard I fought, and why I fought.  I wanted to please the prophet, my prophet.  In the end I was just betrayed.  "I'm sorry" could go a long way towards healing old wounds, but it won't happen.”

He’s right:  it will never happen.  Even worse, it infuriates us to hear Church leaders today soft-pedal rhetoric like that of President Kimball – a man revered within the Church as a prophet, seer and revelator.  At the time of Kimball’s address, Church leaders – both local and general – encouraged young men who “confessed” to homosexual “inclinations” to go ahead and marry (but not to tell their prospective wives anything), claiming that once they did so and experienced heterosexual sex, they’d be cured.  Now, apostles of the Church claim that this counsel was never given and that the Church is interested in protecting “the choice daughters of God.”  Well, they sure weren’t 30 years ago.

There will be no apology because to do so would be to admit that President Kimball – and many other leaders recognized as prophets – were wrong.  And that will never happen, because to do so undercuts the core essential belief of the Church that these men are inspired and speak for God and act in His name. 

It will never happen.