Aligning Our Lives with Reality

 In the most recent general conference, Elder Joseph W. Sitati of the seventy said that "the onset of day and night is one daily reminder of realities that govern our lives that we cannot change. When we respect and align what we do with these eternal realities, we experience internal peace and harmony. When we don’t, we are unsettled, and things do not work as we expect."

 I think it's safe to say that our orientation is one of those realities in our lives that we cannot change.  So we need to respect an align our lives with this reality so that we can experience internal peace and harmony.  If the church requires us to do otherwise, we will be unsettled, and things won't work as expected.  Is it any wonder that so many LGBTQ+ members are feeling so unsettled in the church?

Tradition of Their Fathers

In section 93 of the Doctrine and Covenants, the Lord sets out His definition of truth, and the way to enlightenment and receiving of the fullness of the Father.  But then He gives a warning in verse 39.

"And that wicked one cometh and taketh away light and truth, through disobedience, from the children of men, and because of the tradition of their fathers."

I think it's fascinating that disobedience is only one of the ways we can be cut off from light and truth.  The other is the tradition of our fathers.  What traditions do we perpetuate that keep us from light and truth?  I propose that there are many.  Ideas of racial superiority/inferiority certainly apply here.  Traditions of slavery.  Traditions of women be subject to men, or even the property of men, definitely count.  These traditions are so strong that they have become part of scripture -- particularly the Law of Moses in the Old Testament and the epistles in the New Testament.  As the church has slowly shed these traditions, we have become more open to receiving light and truth from the Savior.

I believe that the ban on gay marriage may be another of our traditions that may be keeping us from light and truth.  The only places in the scriptures that proscribe homosexuality are in the Law of Moses and the epistles.  It's not even mentioned in the gospels, or anywhere in the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants, or the Pearl of Great Price.  And even where it is mentioned in the Bible, it's talking of gay promiscuity, not gay marriage.  Heterosexual promiscuity is also proscribed.

Could our opposition to gay marriage be keeping us from light and truth?  It seems to come from the tradition of our fathers, and not from scripture.

An Allegory

I recall hearing an interview with a paraplegic individual who was asked if they would like to turn back time and prevent the issue that caused their disability.  Their response was that while they would love to be healed, if the cost was to forget all the lessons they learned, it wouldn't be worth it.  The person they became was deeply intertwined with their experiences in overcoming their challenges, and they wouldn't want to lose who they became.

I feel similar in many ways.  The person I am has been greatly influenced by my experiences and overcoming my challenges and hardships.  I love my amazing wife and my wonderful children and I wouldn't want to give them up, or lose the lessons I learned along the way.  But taking the paraplegic analogy a little further, I never lost the use of my legs -- rather I was not allowed to use them.  I was required to either to live life in a wheelchair and let my legs atrophy despite their being perfectly healthy, or to leave my community -- alienate myself from my friends and family.  I think that's an apt description of what it feels like being a member of the Church of Jesus Christ, yet having a gay orientation.

Scriptures Out of Context

Sometimes it's interesting to take scriptures a little out of context and look at what they say.  These scriptures were generally written for a straight audience, and when we add the gay context, based on what the church teaches, it changes.

Mixed Messages

One of the goals I hope the church has is that they don't make second class citizens of any of their members.  Somehow there needs to be consistency in the way that everyone is treated.  But messages in For the Strength of Youth and also in the way the CES Honor Code is enforced tend to make second class citizens of their non-straight youth and members.

Let me explain.  The message to the straight youth is basically that things like holding hands, hugging, and things like that among boyfriend/girlfriend pairs and even occasional kissing is fine as long as it is kept chaste.  Save the heavier stuff for when you are married and you're great.  But if you're gay, well, any affection expressed at all is against the law of chastity.  The message, even if it's not meant that way, is basically that if you show affection toward those who you are attracted to, you've already broken the law of chastity.  The logical continuation is that since the law has already been broken, there's not really any incentive to avoid continuing on to the hot and heavy stuff.

So the Law of Chastity doesn't mean the same thing to straight vs. gay members.  Second class citizens.

Or worse, when the doctrinal mastery scripture is invoked -- the natural man is an enemy to God.  Gay kids need to choose to reject their nature.  People's misuse of that scripture can imply that straight members aren't enemies to God like gay members are.  See?  Second class citizens.

The question that church leaders need to ask is how the church can comply with God's insistence that He is no respecter of persons.  Because the current policies of the church tend (intentionally or not) to lead to different standards for different citizens of the kingdom.

Avoid the Appearance of Sin

There is a strong emphasis given by church leaders to avoid even the appearance of sin, and members take this very much to heart, sometimes to the exclusion of showing Christlike love.  I mentioned that in my last post, and it was brought to my attention that people may not understand what I mean.  So let me provide an example.

Suppose a member of the church admits to a second member that their orientation is gay.  The first question the second member asks is "but you surely don't act on it, do you?".  The church has a policy that a gay orientation is not a sin, only acting on it is.  So that second member is deciding how to interact with the first based on whether or not they are sinning.  That second member wants to make it abundantly clear that they don't approve of sin.  It can seem so important to them to make sure nobody thinks they approve of sinning that they make sure that anyone who knows they befriended the first member also knows that the first member was not acting on their orientation.

Do we do this with other sins?  When we interact with other members, do we make sure to let them know that our member friends do actually obey the word of wisdom?  If a friend introduces their spouse and children, do we ask whether the children were born in wedlock so we can properly make it known that we disapprove of having children out of wedlock?

Avoiding the appearance of sin is important.  We should not be skirting the line, pretending for social reasons that we are happy to share a drink with friends even if we slyly avoid actually drinking.  Taking a bold stand is good.  But that's dealing with our own choices.  When we take it to the extreme of shunning others to appear to disapprove of sin, then we are out of line with the teachings of the Savior.

Raw Honesty

Before I begin, let me make one thing clear.  I love my wife and my family and I do not want to do anything to lose them.  That being said, life can be very difficult.  I feel the desire for the romantic love of another man every single day.  It's something that remains painfully unfulfilled in my psyche and I have no hope of ever being able to fill that void.

Why, you may ask, would I choose to go the route that I did?  I had male friends my age who left the church to satisfy their desire to develop relationships with other men.  I have friends and family recently who, despite not being gay themselves, have left the church because of its stand against gay marriage.  Believe me, I get it.  I feel it every...single...day.  It doesn't go away.

I choose to stay in the church because I have had powerful spiritual experiences from a very young age.  I'm not talking about some burning in the bosom.  It's not something that was prompted by a church lesson or a leader.  It was just me pleading with the Lord.  And my prayers were answered in a powerful way.  I know the church is Christ's.  But it's still so hard.

The church doesn't minister to me.  How can it?  I can't tell them about my struggles because I fear the judgments of the members.  My ministering brothers occasionally might ask how I'm doing and I tell them I'm fine.  What else could I say?  But I feel extremely lonely.  Who else living in this sphere can I confide in?  I can talk about it with my wife, but not really with anyone else.  And as much as I feel loved and supported by her, it's hard to feel truly understood.

And there's nobody else.

Am I the only one?  I can't imagine that I'm this rare special flower and there's almost nobody like me.  But those who are like me are probably just as secretive.  So the church can't minister to them, either.  As long as there is such a powerful stigma against gay oriented people in the church, it will fail at its mandate to minister to the members who need it.  As long as the rhetoric is so much on avoiding the appearance of evil at the expense of lifting the hands that hang down, the church will fail its gay oriented members. 

We are here, but nobody wants to know.  We have testimonies of the divinity of the work.  We want to help build the church.  But we can't let anyone know about our struggles.

The Family Proclamation

I'd like to carefully read the proclamation on the family one paragraph at a time.  My aim is not some authoritative interpretation but an attempt to examine my current thoughts about it.

1.  We, the First Presidency and the Council of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, solemnly proclaim that marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God and that the family is central to the Creator’s plan for the eternal destiny of His children.

This seems fairly obvious.  This is a main point of church doctrine that refutes some ideas in many Christian traditions that marriage is lesser than celibacy.   Families are more important.

2.  All human beings—male and female—are created in the image of God. Each is a beloved spirit son or daughter of heavenly parents, and, as such, each has a divine nature and destiny. Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.

This one is interesting.  It's about gender identity.  Gender extends to the spirit world.  We know that this world is imperfect and flawed.   There are definitely cases of physiological gender ambiguity, and that means that spiritual gender does not always translate perfectly to birth gender.  So it seems to me that it's possible that there could be mismatches between birth gender and physical gender.  Maybe this could be one cause of gender dysphoria.

3.  In the premortal realm, spirit sons and daughters knew and worshipped God as their Eternal Father and accepted His plan by which His children could obtain a physical body and gain earthly experience to progress toward perfection and ultimately realize their divine destiny as heirs of eternal life. The divine plan of happiness enables family relationships to be perpetuated beyond the grave. Sacred ordinances and covenants available in holy temples make it possible for individuals to return to the presence of God and for families to be united eternally.

This is pretty straightforward explanation of doctrine.  It's unfortunate that many people have been denied the blessings of temple ordinances for a variety of reasons.  Life's unfair that way.  But if life were always fair, we wouldn't have to learn patience and longsuffering, and thus wouldn't be able to become like our Father in Heaven.  And in the end, everyone will have ample opportunities, even if they are denied in the short term.

4.  The first commandment that God gave to Adam and Eve pertained to their potential for parenthood as husband and wife. We declare that God’s commandment for His children to multiply and replenish the earth remains in force. We further declare that God has commanded that the sacred powers of procreation are to be employed only between man and woman, lawfully wedded as husband and wife.

This is the first paragraph that deals directly with the Law of Chastity.  I noticed that it is worded to make sure plural marriage is not disallowed.  There is ample evidence in the scriptures that chastity is extremely important to Christ, and those that feel the church should "stay out of the bedroom" haven't carefully studied Christ's teachings.  However, the "only between man and woman" part is modern doctrine, or at least newly explained policy.  The references to homosexuality in the Bible are all in places where cultural context makes their modern applicability questionable.  And there are no references to homosexuality at all in the other standard works.  Either homosexuality is a new problem that didn't exist back then or the Lord didn't feel it was important enough to comment on it in the past, which is possible.  It could be a misinterpretation, or possibly it's just a doctrine for today.  The word of wisdom is such a doctrine, as there is nothing inherently immoral about drinking alcohol.  Christ himself drank wine.  The word of wisdom is a commandment for our day, given "In consequence of evils and designs which do and will exist in the hearts of conspiring men in the last days."  In all honesty, the commandment against homosexuality feels more like the ban on those of African heritage from holding the Priesthood than an eternal doctrine.  Maybe it could be lifted.  I don't know.  Even if it is lifted, the Law of Chastity would still be in force and proscribe sex outside of marriage.

5.  We declare the means by which mortal life is created to be divinely appointed. We affirm the sanctity of life and of its importance in God’s eternal plan.

This is an important distinction of doctrine, because it flies in the face of much of traditional Christianity where sexual intercourse is vilified and marriage is a punishment for those who don't practice celibacy.  The phrase "born in sin" is usually a reference to this tradition.

6.  Husband and wife have a solemn responsibility to love and care for each other and for their children. “Children are an heritage of the Lord” (Psalm 127:3). Parents have a sacred duty to rear their children in love and righteousness, to provide for their physical and spiritual needs, and to teach them to love and serve one another, observe the commandments of God, and be law-abiding citizens wherever they live. Husbands and wives—mothers and fathers—will be held accountable before God for the discharge of these obligations.

If parents bring children into the world, they have an obligation to provide for them, not just physically but also emotionally, socially, intellectually, and spiritually.   The neglect of these obligations is morally reprehensible.  Parents of LGBTQ+ children are not excepted from this duty.

7.  The family is ordained of God. Marriage between man and woman is essential to His eternal plan. Children are entitled to birth within the bonds of matrimony, and to be reared by a father and a mother who honor marital vows with complete fidelity. Happiness in family life is most likely to be achieved when founded upon the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ. Successful marriages and families are established and maintained on principles of faith, prayer, repentance, forgiveness, respect, love, compassion, work, and wholesome recreational activities. By divine design, fathers are to preside over their families in love and righteousness and are responsible to provide the necessities of life and protection for their families. Mothers are primarily responsible for the nurture of their children. In these sacred responsibilities, fathers and mothers are obligated to help one another as equal partners. Disability, death, or other circumstances may necessitate individual adaptation. Extended families should lend support when needed.

I mean, if children are important and chastity is important, marriages between men and women are rather essential.  However, there are many couples who are incapable of having children.  Their marriages shouldn't be relegated to side-note status.  Ideally, children will be born to parents who are faithful to each other and care for their needs.  But in this fallen world, there are broken marriages, orphans, neglected children, etc.  Single parents, adoptive parents, and other alternate care-giving situations deserve strong support from members of the church if the well-being of children is truly valued.

8.  We warn that individuals who violate covenants of chastity, who abuse spouse or offspring, or who fail to fulfill family responsibilities will one day stand accountable before God. Further, we warn that the disintegration of the family will bring upon individuals, communities, and nations the calamities foretold by ancient and modern prophets.

Again, parents of LGBTQ+ children who fail in their obligation to care for those children will stand accountable before God.  The breakdown of the family is of definite concern to members of the church, but I think it's easy to be distracted by the "gay marriage movement."  That movement does little to contribute to the breakdown of the family as compared to things like children being born outside of marriage, spousal abuse, spousal infidelity, and other such problems.  Yet the first thing I often hear about in Elder's Quorum when the breakdown of the family is mentioned is gay marriage.

9.  We call upon responsible citizens and officers of government everywhere to promote those measures designed to maintain and strengthen the family as the fundamental unit of society.

I am wholly behind strengthening families, as they are the fundamental unit of society.

In general, the family proclamation is very reasonable and a succinct statement on the value placed on families by the church.  I question the focus put on fighting gay marriage, but I see where it is coming from.  In many eyes, couples living together having children outside of marriage is remediable simply by encouraging them to get married, so it's seen as not as bad as gay marriage; but I think that's misguided because of the propensity for children to be harmed in the former rather than the latter.

Members who use the proclamation as their reason for opposing gay marriage need to read the whole document and take a look at where their efforts would be best used.  Activism against "abuse [of] spouse or offspring" gets short shrift compared to the efforts of members decrying homosexuality, and that's too bad.

Chastity

I know some people feel that the law of chastity is a form of bondage.  But for those who think that the church should abandon it, don't hold your breath.  It's not going to happen.  That's as much a part of religion as "Thou shalt not steal."

When it comes to confirmed doctrine, chastity is right up there near the top.  However, there is not much doctrinally about homosexuality.  It shows up a couple of times in the Bible, but only in context with things that aren't doctrinal.  It doesn't show up in the Book of Mormon or other canonical scripture at all.

Is it possible that gay marriage and the modern model of homosexuality could be compatible with the law of chastity?  Culturally, our model of homosexuality is deeply entwined with the "free love" movement that came to prominence in the 60s and 70s.  That is rather antithetical to the law of chastity.  So until our current cultural iteration of homosexuality and free love are disentangled, it probably can't be reconciled with chastity, and hence the church can't embrace it.

Maybe things will change in the future.  But in order for change to happen in the church, I think that the cultural basis for our current sociological structure of homosexuality will need to be upended.  I'm not sure such a change would be popular or generally accepted.  But that's also a staple of religion in the past.

Staying in the Closet

I am firmly in the closet.  It's not a particularly great place to be, but I'm entrenched.  And I have to ask myself why I stay here.

Human beings have incredible imaginations.  It's what really separates us from any other living thing.  I can imagine any number of things that might go wrong with coming out.  However, I need to try to be realistic.  Here are some of the reasons that I often discuss with myself.

I'm not a young millennial, so my peers are not of the generation that is predominately accepting of less common orientations.  However, I'm not a baby boomer either.  I suspect that many of my peers would be fine with knowing my orientation.

My family (the family I grew up in) would have a hard time with it.  Now let me be clear.  I grew up in a loving and healthy family, and I have no doubt that they would love me just as much as ever if they knew my orientation, but I don't have faith that they would be truly understanding.  It's hard enough, sometimes, to deal with typical family drama, and I don't feel like adding that much to the mix.

I live in an extremely conservative community and my coming out could have implications for my children who also live in this community.  This is still a place where leaders claim that "boys will be boys" to excuse small bouts of bullying in scouting and church activities.  I don't want to add any reason for bullies to target my kids.

I'm really quite worried about how others will react.  I worry that people will recontextualize everything I've done in the past in a new way.  People will identify any weird quirk I have with my orientation, rather than it just being me.  I'm a youth leader and teacher in my ward, and I worry parents will wonder what negative effects I must have had on their children.  People will complain to the Bishop that it's immoral to let me keep my callings. 

Interestingly, I work in the Temple, and I have no concerns that I would be rejected there.  My orientation has nothing to do with the work that goes on there, and coming out of the closet would not likely change much there.

On the other hand, my employer is run by a very conservative organization, and I could face real consequences to my employment upon coming out.  Officially, there should be no problem, but my workplace is run by people, and people can allow biases to negatively affect others despite official rules that supposedly provide protection.

I also fear the reaction of the LGBTQ+ community.  I'm married to someone of the opposite gender, despite my orientation, and many in that community feel as endangered by my choices as conservatives feel their families are endangered by gay marriage.  I don't want to have to put up with the constant pressure of justifying my marriage to people who will insist that it's wrong.

There are problems with staying in the closet, of course.  For example, I have a hard time speaking up when people in church make off-hand derisive remarks about homosexuality.  I don't always succeed at curtailing it (although I often try).  It would be easier to insist people stop that if I were out of the closet.

I worry that I can't be of help to others who may be in the closet if I myself am also there.  I don't really know of anybody in the closet like me.  It's lonely for me and I'm sure it's lonely for others.

I think it would be good for others in my ward, work, and social communities to have a colleague or friend who publicly has a different orientation.  I want to foster more communication and compassion from all parties.

But I don't think I'm ready to face the burdens and problems that I foresee.  So, at least for now, I'll stay firmly in the closet.

Busy

I have not been posting lately.  Sorry about that.  It's just that I've become much busier than ever before and don't have as much time to spend writing blog posts or reading blogs.  When life lightens up a little I hope I can find the time to write more.

Overreaction

When some people are opposed to a book or movie, if they overreact and make a big deal of it, they just serve to promote the book or movie they opposed.  I am worried that the same thing is happening with Kim Davis.  Think of how it must feel to be her.  She is expressing a view that, twenty years ago, was held by a majority of Americans.  Suddenly she is accused of hate crimes for holding that view.  She feels persecuted, and what's more, she feels persecuted for doing what she feels is right.  It provides fuel to those who quote Matthew 5:10, "Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."

When people exaggerate the seriousness of her crime, it tends to add fuel to the fire rather than mend things.  It would not have been hard to accommodate her, and allow an assistant to issue the licenses.  But now things are out of hand.  Those vitriolic posts and comments that accuse her of obscene bigotry are adding fuel to the fires of hate and intolerance themselves.  The "I'm going to make your life miserable until you change your mind" plan is not a very effective one.  A much better plan would have been to accommodate her, and let people feel she was being insensitive and immature, rather than belabor the point and make her a martyr, a rallying point for those with whom you disagree.