An 11 Page Summation

** Don’t start this essay unless you have 40 uninterrupted minutes to finish it. **

Topic: “Why there are no words in the Mormon Church as devoid of meaning as the words ‘unconditional love’.”

(Written as a letter to my 25-year-old son who is terribly conflicted over his love for the church and his love for his father, and cannot see how his devotion to the church minimizes the life of his father. A great deal of this will not make a lot of sense unless you are deep into Mormon theology and have lived at the “street level” behind the “Zion Curtain”.)


Dear P----- (and a little further into this letter, everybody else):

I know this letter is extremely long, but you have to read every word in order to understand the emptiness when an active Mormon uses the words “unconditional love” when speaking to an inactive Mormon (or one who has faced church discipline). It is critical that you get down off your ramiumptom (how the heck do you spell that?) and look at this from my side. I’m going to great lengths to help you do this, so please read the entire letter and make a sincere effort.

P-----, I hope you don’t mind, but I’m going to copy the entire family in on this response to your specific letter. Still, my answer to you is the one I care about the most.

I cannot tell you how many times I’ve read the phrase “unconditional love” over the past five days. In the Mormon Church there is no phrase that is more meaningless when looked at from my side of the fence. In the Mormon Church, everything, and I mean absolutely everything is conditional on one thing: “How does this affect my eternal family?”

Any action that impacts eternal salvation creates a “condition” upon which parents have to worry about their children, children have to worry about their parents, and it goes all the way out into every member of the extended family.

So, let’s roll the clock back to 1974 and presume that we discovered in my family that our mother was an illegitimate child. Let’s presume that Grandma Lb------’s conscience finally drove her to disclose that she had once had an affair with a black man and gotten pregnant. She decided to wait and see how light the baby’s skin was before she would tell Grandpa. She knew for sure that Grandpa was not the father. Mom was born with very fair skin and Grandma’s lie was buried. In 1974 she clears her conscience by telling the entire family, not just mom.

The truth sinks in quickly. Mom has a black father! She obtained her endowments in 1949. G----- (my oldest brother) has already been ordained an Elder, served a mission, and is married. So are D----- and Fs---- (my sisters). Fd---- is just a few years away from being an Elder and going on a mission. You wonder why President Kimball wrestled with this so deeply? This was happening several times a week in Brazil, where the church was growing very rapidly and nobody knew their genealogy, and I think I read somewhere that over 70% of the population is mixed-race.

But it wasn’t happening in Cardston that often. In Brazil the church leaders had become very liberal in allowing people like my imaginary mom to keep her temple blessings and her recommend, and G----- likewise to keep his priesthood. In Brazil they would just say, “God will sort it out in Heaven”. Still, in either Brazil or Cardston, Fd----(my brother just a year older) and I would not be ordained Elders when we turn 19 in this scenario. In the south, of course, things were dealt with very differently from Brazil. Dad & mom’s temple marriage would be cancelled, her recommend revoked, and G----- would be stripped of his priesthood and his endowment and temple marriage annulled. Just like my excommunication, it is all up to the Stake President you have. The south just seems to have more assholes on a per-capita basis who like to enforce the “letter of the law” when it comes to issues like these.

Because of how pervasive our family is in the Cardston community, there was no containing the secret. This is where I get to illustrate how meaningless “unconditional love” is in the Mormon Church. Now, at the post office, mom would be treated differently and she would come to understand very clearly what the word “placating” means. To all but her dearest friends, conversations would best be described as polite. Only her closest friend (our back-door neighbor) would have the nerve to really find out how mom feels, and in those first weeks mom would hear “unconditional love” uttered about 15 times a day (1,500 on Sunday). The tension builds every day because nobody can anticipate what the stake president is going to do about this, but to keep this allegory as parallel as possible to my experience, let’s presume that we have a stake president with southern blood. Our parents’ temple marriage is dissolved and G----- is stripped of his priesthood, and both G----- and Fs---- have their temple marriages annulled. D----- is coming up later. This is where it gets good.

Everybody, and I mean everybody, come up to us and tell us about their “unconditional love” for our family. The phrase that is second only to “unconditional love” is “we’ll have all the answers to this in the next life” (or some version of that).

As a family, everything changed, but in actual fact nothing had changed! Do you see my point? We weren’t different people after the disclosure, but we were treated like different people. At this point Fd---- and I would have to pay girls to date us (pretending that Lester really liked dating girls, which I didn’t). We weren’t going to be taking any girls to the temple. We would never be returned missionaries. When Fd---- went to BYU he would have to put adhesive tape on his legs and wear an undershirt to fool girls into thinking he was wearing garments before he could get a date, and the relationship would only last until he was forced to tell them he was ¼ black and would never have a temple recommend.

But they would still love him “unconditionally”, right? Do you see why the word is so empty in the Mormon Church. Nobody will back it up with any meaningful action.

Rolling back to 1974, everybody would tell us in private conversations about how unfair it was that the doctrine is what it is, but not a sole would go on record to protest the action taken by the stake president. Like I said, in Brazil, nothing would have been done to mom’s status, so we would still remain sealed to her. Nothing would happen to G----- or Fs----’s status, but G----- would most certainly never be advanced to High Priest. For Fd---- and I, our lives would have been very different, but for this point, let’s focus on mom. Like I said, in Brazil we would have been allowed to remain as an Eternal Family.

So why wouldn’t everybody in our family and the Cardston community lobby for an appeal to the action taken by the stake president? They had all professed to have “unconditional love” for us, but let’s presume in my example that not a sole wrote a letter to the First Presidency. Mom and dad both wrote letters and appealed the decision, but there was no tangible evidence of support produced from within the community. P----- (remember, my son in San Diego), can you now begin to see why I’m asking you to demonstrate your unconditional love (by walking out of church if they read the letter from the prophet over the pulpit)?

Returning to the 1974 allegory, couldn’t somebody at least have written, “We think it is unfair that mixed-race people in Brazil are allowed to keep their temple blessings and people here are not!”?

No, they can’t write that. They would be labeled apostate for even having had the thought, and in Cardston, that would be social suicide. There are no secrets in the Mormon Church. Fifteen men are privy to every church disciplinary council. Trickle that down to the Ward Council of the member, and it goes up by another dozen, and then each of those auxiliary leaders have two counselors and a secretary, so for any church action, about 60 people know all the gory details. No dissenters come forward in a climate like that, trust me.

Every single active Mormon who found out about my excommunication (in 2006) cried foul, but not a single letter of support came in when I announced my appeal, and I made a point of asking for these letters.

Is that “unconditional love”? The words are still the same, but the feeling on the part of the “loved” person quickly changes. They soon come to realize that there are conditions all over the place.

Let’s say G-----‘s wife feels betrayed by this. I think their oldest son was born in June 1974, so let’s say this all came down in May. G-----‘s wife has to ask her dad to bless their son in church. She’s not too far into this marriage and she starts to think about a divorce because G----- obviously will not be the head of her household in the Celestial Kingdom, but even with those thoughts that are never spoken aloud to anyone she still repeats the tired words “unconditional love”, hoping against hope that she can convince herself to believe them. G----- knows that the words are empty. He gets all of his signals from how she behaves around him now, so it wouldn’t matter what she says. He knows what he feels.

The year 1974 was J-----’s grad year, I think. If her boyfriend didn’t ask her to grad, but went with another girl, would the 5 weeks of “unconditional love” pronouncements prior to graduation now be seen as “conditional”? Do you think she would have eventually married R-----?

D-----, you were already married in 1974 and pregnant. You were living in Utah and watching all of this come down and your husband and you decide to just sweep it all under the rug, hoping against hope that our Cardston bishop and stake president don’t say anything to your bishop or stake president. Welcome to my closet! The people in your ward in Richmond still treat you the same but you in your heart know you are different now. You also know without a doubt that if they knew your secret, things would be very different. This was my world for over 35 years! I went through my life trying to evaluate how different each and every one of my friends and loved ones would treat me if they knew my secret. The moment that you and your husband decided to stay in the closet would mark the beginning of your questioning the word “love” in general. Your friends weren’t adding the word “conditional” to the phrase, but your subconscious adds it for them.

Fs----, I’m not going to go into a scenario for you, so please don’t be offended. I’ve illustrated all the points that I want you all to understand.

So, directing this letter back to P----- (my son); you pointed out one line in my letter that made my love ‘conditional’: "My logic was that this would be a simple way for them to demonstrate the love that they profess to have for me."

Do you wonder now why I am groping for some tangible piece of evidence that all of these pronouncements of “unconditional love” actually have some substance?

With my illustration above, we have the benefit of history to know that this struggle would have only been endured for 4 short years before the prophet would have received the revelation on blacks and the priesthood. We won’t get into the debate about whether President Kimball was “inspired” by God or by the rapid advance through the courts of the removal of the church’s tax exempt status in the State of Wisconson on the basis of racial discrimination (or Minnesota…can’t remember right now). Suffice it to say that the prophet saw the light, finally.

Let’s presume that in 1974 we were a very “illuminated” family and we prayed about this whole mess and received our own personal revelation that the prophet was wrong, but that the church was still true. As a family, we weren’t so intent on keeping this a secret, but nobody we shared it with would utter a word of acknowledgement. In my case in 2006 I shouted it from the roof tops and didn’t give anybody the luxury of ignoring me or sweeping my comments under the rug. I had received my revelation that a man is born gay, and that it wasn’t just a “lifestyle” that I decided to adopt as my own personal “mid-life crisis”. I wrote this in my memoirs and actively campaigned to have my loved ones see things my way. In the heat of a “letter from the pulpit” moment (May 29th, 2006 when the Mormon prophet commanded all members to lobby for the passage of the Federal Marriage Amendment), my stake president had to shut me up. I was excommunicated for apostasy because my “personal revelation” was too far ahead of the curve.

But, back to 1974; as a family we received this kind of personal revelation that our family would remain an eternal family even in the face of all the church court proceedings that were dismantling our lives and telling us otherwise. As a 1974 family, we are at odds with the majority of the church community, but we find support in the “Mormon underground” community and forge ahead in our belief that we will have all the same blessings that we used to enjoy before Grandma ruined everything by purging her conscience. We find some solace in our personal revelation, but it doesn’t change anything where the rubber hits the road in Cardston. After a year, the phrase “unconditional love” has grown very old because it has not translated into any kind of visible support. D----- and her husband in Richmond, UT are still in the closet but have to live with the question hanging over them that they only enjoy acceptance there because nobody knows their secret. They too have prayed and received the personal revelation that all will be sorted out in the end, so they are as comfortable as they can be living their lie.

The Conclusion (finally):
P-----, you have waffled for three years on your position. Your conversations with me have been vague, and the most common phrase is, “I don’t know,” and then that is always followed by some kind of pronouncement of your “unconditional love” for me. I still have no clue where you stand? I hope you can see now that “having unconditional love for me” tells me nothing. What do you mean when you say it?

Fl----’s stand (my 20-year-old daughter in Washington State) is very clear. She knows I was born gay and she doesn’t care what the prophet says about it. When she says she has unconditional love for me I know that it means that she will go as far as she possibly can to defend me without having to announce to her Mormon universe that her father is gay (because, as we all must admit in our heart, Mormon love is very conditional when it comes to homosexuals). I can live with that. Fl---- will not date TBM’s (true blue Mormons) because she can see that that road ends where J-----’s world is…married to a husband who has to be coerced into being quiet when he attends family reunions that include a gay relative. Fl---- won’t go there.

Fl---- is a “cultural Mormon” and she backs up her proclamation of unconditional love by letting me know that she is not afraid to let the world know that she has beliefs that are at odds with the Prophet. She does want her life to be easier than mine is though, so she stops short of a public pronouncement in her congregation that her father is gay, but she takes me to institute class, invites me to the parties that she goes to while I’m visiting, and even tells her institute teacher to have me play the piano for the opening hymn. I’m Fl----’s dad, no doubt about it in anybody’s mind! If somebody asks if I'm gay, she will happily acknowledge the fact. That is unconditional love in action. Anything less is just pretending.

Contrast that to you, P-----. You’re playing both sides of the fence to the middle. At church you’re TBM, and on the phone with me you’re….? I don’t know. What are you? It's just words to me. After 3 years I have no clue except for these oft repeated words “unconditional love” that have no tangible connection to them. You often quote Gandhi, so I’ll quote him back to you: “Be the change you want to see in the world!”

With the exception of Fl---- and K---- (my niece in British Columbia), you are all at a crossroads, and most of you are just standing there waiting for your prophet to tell you that it is okay to go where your heart wants you to go, but he hasn’t, and it is very possible that in this lifetime, he won’t. The biggest problem is that you would like a third choice, and up until last Friday there was a chance that a third choice was opening up, but the letter from the prophet that is to be read in every Mormon congregation in California on Sunday (June 29th, 2008) slammed that door shut. That is why yesterday I resigned my membership in the Mormon Church by a letter mailed Priority Mail to Salt Lake City.

You are now the 21st century equivalents of a Mormon family who discovered “after the fact” that you have Negro blood. Take yourselves back to 1974 and place yourselves in Uncle M-----‘s position (my mother’s brother, but remember, this is all an imagined scenario, he really was not this open-minded). Let's suppose that Uncle M----- reflects on his sister (my imaginary mom). Because at the time nobody knew she was illegitimate, she was born in the covenant and was therefore automatically sealed to her parents and siblings for eterminty, but at the age of 43 she has been yanked away. She is no longer sealed as a sister to Uncle M-----. He realizes that his nieces and nephews (the 6 of us) are all going to be spending eternity in a terrestrial glory. He pray’s about it, and receives a confirmation that there is a problem…that the doctrine is flawed somehow. He doesn’t know how, but in his heart he just knows that the doctrine is flawed. But he lives in Salt Lake City and is a stake president. Nobody can know that his heart has taken him on a path at odds with the prophet. He pleads with God for guidance, but most importantly, assurance that his sister will be with him for eternity. His prayer is answered, but his answer is at odds with the prophet. He knows he is not an apostate, but he is also not so naïve to think that he wouldn’t be excommunicated for apostasy if he came forward with this personal certainty that he will not deny in his heart.

Now let me take you back to today; to the fork in the road. With the “third option” shut tight, you are now back to only two choices. Either I was born gay, or I chose to be gay. The third option would have been: “I don’t have an answer to this,” but that is no longer on the table now.

Every time you use the word “lifestyle” you tell me that I have chosen to be gay. Every one of you TBM’s use that word. Quoting from your letter, P-----: “Give me and all of us the credit we deserve for doing our best to accept you and your lifestyle”.

It’s not a “lifestyle”. It is my life; a valid life; an authentic life!

When you use the word “lifestyle”, you are standing in judgment of me, and any reference to “unconditional love” that shares a page with the word “lifestyle” is negated and meaningless. What it means is that your “love” does not come with the same kind of support that I would have from you if I “hadn’t chosen this lifestyle”.

I don’t want people around me and in my life who stand in judgment of me, and that includes my own children.

If you cannot find some way to be “ahead of the curve” on this issue, so far as it relates to the Mormon Church, then please come back into my life when the church allows you that privilege.

There were literally millions of Mormons ahead of the curve on the ordination of blacks to the priesthood. It was an enormous burden off of us when we could actually verbalize those feelings.

P-----, (and the rest of you), don’t be so afraid to be ahead of the curve on the issue of a man being born gay. If you feel it in your heart, go with that feeling. Don’t back down when you know that your personal revelation on this goes against current dogma. In my example, back in 1974, Uncle M---- and our entire family received that personal revelation. Millions of Mormons did just that. They shared it among themselves and knew of the support that they put forward in solidarity with each other. Even though Uncle M----- (in my example) would not have been able to write a letter to the prophet in support of our imaginary “appeal”, it wouldn’t have stopped him from telling everybody that he shared a confidence with that he saw an injustice in the "double standard" between Brazil and Utah blacks.

Nobody has done that for me except Fl---- and K----, the two “cultural Mormons” that I can name openly.

I hope you see that nothing I am asking here requires the church to change any doctrine before you can implement any of these actions within our family. To paraphrase Gandhi, “You can be the change you want to see in the church,” right now, starting this very minute. You just need to decide.

Until yesterday, I was going to remain in the church fold as a “cultural Mormon”, but from your reaction, and from the action of the prophet, I can see that the church is proceeding with a plan that will begin a slow and methodical purge of “cultural Mormons”. Until yesterday, the church was gradually distancing itself from the following divisive quote from Elder Dallin H. Oaks (when speaking of parents and a gay son/daughter) on http://www.lds.org/: “An even bigger error is now to become defensive of the child, because that neither helps the child nor helps the parent. That course of action, which experience teaches, is almost certainly to lead both away from the Lord’s way.”, and “We feel great compassion for parents whose love and protective instincts for their challenged children have moved them to some positions that are adversarial to the Church. I hope the Lord will be merciful to parents whose love for their children has caused them to get into such traps.” Last Friday, they moved firmly back to this position and placed the prophet himself in between parents and their gay children, forcing the parents (and thereby all of you, including P-----) to pick one side or the other. In a flash, the third option evaporated. You talk of a growing distance between us. There is greater distance between because Dallin H. Oaks is standing in between us now and pushing you away from me. I’m not moving anywhere. I’m where I’ve always been and I'm staying here, with Mickey at my side. By his own mouth an apostle of God has dictated that if your world includes him (and by extension President Monson now), it cannot include Mickey and I.

Another way of explaining the “third option” would be to imagine that the church will leave the cultural Mormons alone and give them enough room to exist. This is what it looked like they were going to do until this letter came out. Cultural Mormons vote Democrat because they respect a woman’s rights (Democrats are a persecuted class in Utah and Idaho). Cultural Mormons do not oppose gay marriages because they see no threat to themselves by homosexuality. Cultural Mormons will invite their gay son and his partner home for the holidays and let them sleep in the queen size bed in the guest room. Cultural Mormons will attend the wedding of their gay son in California. Cultural Mormons are just regular Mormons who are ahead of the curve a bit. They break trail for the rest of you to follow on. It is very much a generational thing.

Dozens of people have asked me why I would "push P----- away"? Call it what you want, but whether he looks down on me himself or not, I will not allow him the luxury of allowing his peers to pass judgment on me and publicly treat me as a second-class citizen while he stands by and does nothing! Fl--- is active in the church and doesn't allow people to do that. Peter should find a way to do it that works for him too.

P-----, if you are a “cultural Mormon”, we are going to get along just fine, but with the exception of one notable conversation a long time ago (which I bring up later), you haven’t had the spine to verbalize this to me yet. If you are, you will have to stake your claim as a “cultural Mormon” before I believe you. Fl---- has done this. She gets up and walks out of Sunday School classes when they talk about any number of issues where she disagrees with the church, not just on homosexuality. Lately, the bad classes have outnumbered the good classes to the point that she just sits in the foyer rather than even attend Sunday School or Relief Society. She sees the church as backwards in a number of ways. She’s a raging liberal, and she has found herself a safe group of raging liberal Mormon friends. She only dates liberal Mormons, and things are going to be just fine between us and whoever she marries. She will likely even thumb her nose at the fear-mongering and have a civil wedding so that your mother and I can attend, knowing in her heart that if she or her husband died within the “penalty year” that the Lord would take care of it and seal them anyway in the next life (because they were “worthy” to have been married in the temple anyway, but gave family the priority it deserves in this life).

Strangely enough, Fl---- learned how to be a cultural Mormon during an extended stay with Kr---- and her husband (my brother’s daughter here in Florida). Kr---- taught her that if you don’t sleep in your garments or wear them all day in the hot Florida sun, God will not burn the house down and consume your flesh because you left it exposed for too long. They taught her that Sunday School teachers who are “over the top” can be ridiculed and dismissed. I doubt if Fl---- could have gone back to the church without learning all of this from Kr----. I hope that in moving back behind Canada’s “Zion Curtain” Kr---- doesn’t lose that “liberal flair” and I wish her all the best in her efforts to raising a liberal child to continue her work in freeing the Mormons from their “wanderings in the wilderness”.

P-----, get rid of the notion that just because you believe it doesn’t mean that the entire world has to buy into the program that there is only “one path to Heaven”. Cultural Mormons fight to protect everybody’s right to a full and authentic life, even while still firmly believing in all three of the Kingdoms of Heaven and the New and Everlasting Covenant. They aren’t threatened by diversity, and they have a very broad interpretation of how much of this stuff that we don’t understand will all be sorted out in the next life. You’re all wound too tight.

You must all disagree with this idea of reading a letter from the pulpit and telling everybody to get in lock-step politically. It flies in the face of free agency and screams “cult mentality” from every chapel doorway. I challenge you to show me a single country that has improved the quality of life for their citizens by entrenching any literal interpretation of religious scripture into their constitution (especially after using “inspiration” to selectively interpret parts of it more favorably than others so that it favors one religion viewpoint over another)!

If I haven’t made my point by now, there is no hope.

One final important note: If you all haven’t seen enough evidence of it already, I don’t know what it would take, but narrow-minded Mormon doctrine is very toxic to me. It disrupts the balance that I otherwise enjoy. My heart sings when it is around Fl---- and K----- because they give me hope for a better tomorrow for all the gay boys that are yet to come out in the Mormon Church. It will be a never-ending stream because God designed gay boys and girls as part of the diversity intended for this world. We’ve been a part of the fabric of humanity from the dawn of time. Don’t be so afraid to be ahead of the curve on this issue. Become a “cultural Mormon” and admit openly that people are born gay, that they don’t have a choice in the matter, and most importantly, that they are entitled to full and authentic lives. And please, don’t ever use the word “lifestyle” to diminish my existence on this Earth.

My love for you is unbreakable. Having you actively involved in my life is optional. I’m sorry, but that is the way it has to be. If you don’t validate my life by your words and actions, why would I choose to have you around me and my future husband?

These actions will tell me that the words “unconditional love” have real meaning to you:

1) Have a civil marriage and respectfully ask for the right to be sealed right after in the temple if you’re worthy. We’ve had this conversation and you told me that you already see that as a “Mormon culture” penalty, not an inspired piece of doctrine. If you capitulate to perpetuating this practice you will be going against your own stated personal revelation in this regard. In doing so, you will demonstrate to the world that you are still held captive by a cult mentality. I know that this will narrow the field a bit for a TBM to find a good Mormon girl, but Fl----’s not alone out there. They exist. Rest assured that I will not be flying to San Diego to stand outside in the rain like a second-class citizen. The constitution banned segregation in the ‘60’s. It’s not a “church thing” for me. It’s a “civil rights” thing.
2) I don’t care if you walk out of church on Sunday, but at least do something like write a letter to the editor and copy me in on it. There are literally hundreds of letters to the editor showing up in newspapers across the country over this, and in the Salt Lake Tribune one letter had over 90 comments after it within a couple of hours. Read those letters and contribute your comments. I had two interviews with reporters yesterday. There are a group of Mormons who are making rainbow ribbons that they will wear to church on Sunday. Just get off the bloody fence and do something!
3) Reassure me that the person that you marry will have to be someone who will allow Mickey and I to come and visit as a couple and have the dignity of sharing a bed in the guest bedroom. Mickey’s mother never allowed him this privilege. What does that say to a son?
4) Reassure me that the only reason you would not attend my marriage to Mickey will be for financial reasons, not moral reasons, and don’t fudge on this. You’re my son. I know when you are insincere, and that is why we are at this conjuncture right now. You have not conveyed any degree of sincerity in your support, even though the words “unconditional love” have appeared in every letter and every conversation has ended with “I love you”.

I’m sorry P-----, but those are minimums. These are things that never would have even been discussed if your mother and I divorced and I married another woman. I would have been able to keep my temple recommend and see you married in the temple. I would have been able to re-marry in the temple and have you attend that 2nd marriage willingly (assuming that it was an amicable divorce from your mother). I would have been invited to come with my new wife to visit you and stay in the guest bedroom.

So, can you see how “unconditional love” is meaningless on your part if you won’t concede those four points above? You have judged me and find me wanting now. You have diminished me. This really is your burden to bear now, not mine. I’m the same person I was four years ago, but you now see me differently.

Put yourself in the position of Robert Frost:

TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

One fork in the road will leave you intact as a TBM. To follow this path means that you will continue in lockstep with the prophet and you will be a good candidate for marriage to some wonderful Mormon girl. Also down this road is a strained relationship with your father. Unless you divorce yourself from him, you will live a double life because you will never be allowed to defend his “lifestyle” because this would preclude you from any leadership capacity. You will be obligated to continue using the empty words “unconditional love” in all of your correspondence with your father because of this double life you are living. I will be an embarrassment to you because you will have bought into Elder Dallin H. Oaks published statement where he has stated unequivocally that to validate my life in any way will see you labeled as an apostate, and then the church will have pity on you! You will always fall into the trap of referring to my life as a “lifestyle” because that is what you have to refer to it as if you are a bishop or stake president.

Let me save you all that trouble by just bowing out of your life now if you are going to choose that path. It will be easier for both of us. Invite me back into your life at some point in the future when it is not so embarrassing in the Mormon Church to have gay friends and family members. This is where I am already at with several of my brothers and sisters. You know who you are, and you now know the conditions that will have to exist before any amount of persuading on your part will bring me back into your lives. I can love you from a distance, and I will not be placated. Will you come to our wedding? Are we welcome to share a bed in your guest bedroom? Will you let your friends at church know that you did that?

Alternatively, P-----, you can choose the other path as a “liberal Mormon”. Unfortunately, if you have always dreamed of the life of a TBM, this comes with a very high price. You may only ever sing in the choir or hand out hymnbooks. You may never be the young men’s president, elder’s quorum president, ward mission leader or bishop because you will not be afraid to admit that you have a gay father and attended his wedding. Your wife (who will have to be a liberal Mormon too), will be shunned in Relief Society because she will not be embarrassed to say how much your children love their grandfathers on their father’s side. Your children will not be embarrassed to talk in primary about their two grandfathers either. I laugh out loud at the thought that the day will come when a child in primary stands up and blurts that out while rehearsing “The Grandpa Song” for Father’s Day. You and your wife, as liberal Mormons, will be fine with this because you willingly took on the role of teaching your children the value of diversity and bringing that value into a church that desperately needs to change if it really does profess that “family is the most important thing”.

As a liberal Mormon, you will forge ahead in the Mormon Church, firm in the knowledge that your personal revelation has affirmed without a shadow of doubt that you are just ahead of the curve on this. With the gradual succession of prophets, the church will some day catch up when the current generation of leadership dies off and someone from your generation is at the helm.

I challenge you to prepare in every way so that you can be that prophet!

I do love you P-----, unconditionally! I just won’t be marginalized. This means that for the good of both of us, if you choose “the road more traveled by”, we both have to admit that my “lifestyle” will contaminate every part of your future. I’m fine with you choosing that, if that is truly what you want, and don’t think I’m bitter. I’m not, but I will be disappointed. Call me selfish if you want, but I’m doing this for myself so that I don’t keep crawling back to all of you to find a bone that you are gracious enough to throw me in order to keep stringing me along. I don’t have to be accepted by everybody in order to be authentic now. I closed that door three years ago for everybody else. It just took longer before I was prepared to give up on family, and a son. Keep me up-to-date on the important events in your life with an occasional phone call and email.

With love,
Your dad.

With This I Close a Chapter of My Life

Today I sent the following to my children, siblings, extended family, several news threads and over 50 media contacts.

* * *

Letter to the Editor:

In an email last Sunday morning, I asked my son in California (and indirectly my entire family) to walk out of church on Sunday (June 29th, 2008) when their bishop stands up to read a letter from the First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the Mormons). I disagree with the reading of this letter because in it the Mormon prophet has asked all California Mormons to “…do all [they] can to support the proposed constitutional amendment by donating of [their] means and time to assure that marriage in California is legally defined as being between a man and a woman.”

I thought that by asking my family to do this, I was simply asking them to send a strong message to Salt Lake City that they disagree with the idea that any church has a right to entrench clearly religious dogma into the constitution of a state or country. By asking my California family members (again, most importantly my son) to stand up and walk out of church, I was just asking them to defend my civil rights. My logic was that this would be a simple way for them to demonstrate the love that they profess to have for me. Over the past three years (I came out at age 45 after 25 years of marriage), my four children, two brothers, three sisters, and several of my 30+ nieces and nephews have all in some way tried to communicate their unconditional love for me in spite of my “chosen lifestyle”. Only a handful of them actually think I was born gay, but many, including my four children, have told me to my face that they support my right to live a full and authentic life as a gay man. They all have a different way of saying it, but the message is clear that they want me to know that they do not have to agree with me in order to love me.

My question to my family members in California is this. Before I can “live a full and authentic life as a gay man”, which is what my son specifically thinks I should have the right to do, the constitution must proclaim that I actually do have those kinds of rights. The courts in California have determined that this is in fact the kind of constitution that they have now. If I choose to abstain and be free from all religion, then that is my right in America. My personal beliefs do not restrict a free expression of love between two people, and as long as marriage exists as the contract that it is in our modern culture, then it must be made available to any two people who wish to enter into it (while still holding fast to the existing laws that are in place to protect the rights of both parties to the contract, such as prohibiting fundamentalist Mormons from marrying their close relatives, minor children, and having more than one spouse).

To walk out of church is not to disagree with the prophet, but to simply disagree with his efforts to force the religious dogma of the majority into the lives of a minority. In my mind, this act of protest would largely be symbolic and leave the prophet intact as a prophet. To my family, I say this: “If you can muster the courage to do this, your professed love for me would be validated for the very first time because it would have been demonstrated by your willingness to defend my rights as an American citizen in the face of bigotry.”

In response to my appeal, this is what was in my inbox from my older sister:

“…you are asking us to choose between our God (our Father in Heaven) and our brother (you). I cannot, nor will I, go against what I know to be true, which is this church, and that it is guided directly by God through the prophet. I will never go against that.”

The last sentence echoed in my mind. I had read a very similar line the night before in an email from one of my favorite nieces. After regurgitating the tired line about her love for me in spite of my sinful “lifestyle”, she finished the email with:

“...but I follow the doctrine and that includes the First Presidency and anything they sign in accordance with their callings as Prophets of God!”

I was stunned. Finally two people had found the courage to articulate the truth. I re-read both emails and finally identified my fear.

“What if they serve up the purple Kool-Aid?”

I really do not think there is a risk of the Mormon prophet taking millions of Mormons to their graves, but in the infinite shades of gray between having millions of followers who will unquestioningly cast a vote and almost a thousand followers who will willingly drink cyanide, at what point did the Mormon prophet cross the line and become a cult leader? I assert that it was at the moment that the prophet had the unmitigated gall to even suppose that he was within his rights to even ask such a thing.

If my son tells me on Friday that he supports me as a gay man, and then on Sunday listens quietly in his seat without speaking out or leaving in protest, what does it symbolize? In America we pride ourselves on being free to “vote our conscience”, so to me, unless they’ve all just been placating me with empty words, this means that I have already lost my son and my family to the cult because they have allowed their conscience to be subverted by the voice of a mortal man.

Today, after a lifetime of turmoil, I finally found the courage to resign my membership in the Mormon Church and admit publicly for the very first time that it exerts enough power over the minds of its congregants to be considered a cult. With this, I close that chapter of my life.

Lester Leavitt
Pompano Beach, FL

Where we were going, and now this!

Two posts from one of my news threads June 22, 2008.

The first illustrates the direction that we (gay Mormon's) were going before the "letter from the pulpit" was announced to be read on June 29th, 2008. The second illustrates what the "letter from the pulpit" will continue to perpetuate.

* * *
"Just wanted to share an experience running into a friend at pride in SLC two weeks ago. I think she was on this list at one time but I haven't seen her post in a long time. Her name is [Mary - name changed], she came out to her parents a few years ago and they were NOT HAPPY. Her father could hardly talk to her, said she had ruined their eternal family, etc. (My parents and her parents were best friends in grad school at Indiana University years ago).

What a change a few years has brought about. Three years ago when [Mary] met her partner, the parents had accepted [Mary] a little bit more but were a bit cold to the partner.

It didn't help things that [Mary's] younger sister decided post-mission she was lesbian, had several girlfriends, then suddenly decided she wasn't and married a guy. Of course the parents were thinking "if she can do it, surely [Mary] can." Anyway, a year ago most of [her] family came to SLC to see "Facing East" and spent the evening talking with her and her partner. She's only got one brother who is holding out a bit, the rest of the family is totally on her side (and all of them very church active). Recently her mom's sister was planning the huge family reunion for the year to be held in CA, but wanted it known that [Mary's] partner was not invited, and [Mary] only would be if she wouldn't talk about her life. The aunt basically received a huge WTF from the rest of the family...not just [Mary's] immediate family, but even the other aunts and uncles. It's caused a huge controversy in the family with almost everyone on [Mary's] side. I don't know what's going to happen, or who will go, but this one aunt is really isolated because of her behavior.

Anyway, all that just to say that watching [Mary's] family has been amazing, I know they're all still TBM's (True-blue Mormons) and active, but they fully support [Mary] and her partner ."

* * *
Contrast this to the following post on the thread.
* * *

"I sure envy [Mary] with her family's being able to come around to her side. I've been out to my family for close to 10 years now. I can't believe how time flies. Anyway, they are still as cold to me as they were from the start. I've been in a relationship for almost 8 years now and they have refused to meet my partner (soon to be husband). Only my brother has met him and even that is uncomfortable.

I was hospitalized twice in the last two years and was told by doctors that I nearly died both times, but my family refused to even visit because they didn't want to meet my partner. Last week I mentioned that my partner and I were going to take advantage of the court decision [allowing marriages in California] that was becoming final this last week. They didn't say much then, but I just got this e-mail from my father.

"We choose not to participate in your efforts to forfeit your salvation and break the sealing ordinance. Have you given much thought to what this does to your family? There have been several talks given by members of the church leadership inviting persons living that lifestyle to return and that it is not too late."

Of course I didn't expect them to come. But I did want to give them the opportunity of taking part in something that matters a great deal to me. I figure it is their loss not mine. If they are so concerned that we won't be together in the next life then why do they refuse to be part of my life in the here and now? I do feel hurt, but I'll survive.

[name withheld]

* * *

If you're new to this line of thinking, read on and you will find out where this man's family get their thinking from. This is a quote from http://www.lds.org/ (the official site of the Mormon Church). It was a staged interview with the general authorities of the church, Dallin H. Oaks and Lance B. Wickman.

PUBLIC AFFAIRS: At what point does showing that love cross the line into inadvertently endorsing behavior? If the son says, ‘Well, if you love me, can I bring my partner to our home to visit? Can we come for holidays?’ How do you balance that against, for example, concern for other children in the home?’

ELDER OAKS: That’s a decision that needs to be made individually by the person responsible, calling upon the Lord for inspiration. I can imagine that in most circumstances the parents would say, ‘Please don’t do that. Don’t put us into that position.’ Surely if there are children in the home who would be influenced by this example, the answer would likely be that. There would also be other factors that would make that the likely answer.
I can also imagine some circumstances in which it might be possible to say, ‘Yes, come, but don’t expect to stay overnight. Don’t expect to be a lengthy house guest. Don’t expect us to take you out and introduce you to our friends, or to deal with you in a public situation that would imply our approval of your “partnership.”
There are so many different circumstances, it’s impossible to give one answer that fits all.

ELDER WICKMAN: It’s hard to imagine a more difficult circumstance for a parent to face than that one. It is a case by case determination. The only thing that I would add to what Elder Oaks has just said is that I think it’s important as a parent to avoid a potential trap arising out of one’s anguish over this situation.
I refer to a shift from defending the Lord’s way to defending the errant child’s lifestyle, both with him and with others. It really is true the Lord’s way is to love the sinner while condemning the sin. That is to say we continue to open our homes and our hearts and our arms to our children, but that need not be with approval of their lifestyle. Neither does it mean we need to be constantly telling them that their lifestyle is inappropriate. An even bigger error is now to become defensive of the child, because that neither helps the child nor helps the parent. That course of action, which experience teaches, is almost certainly to lead both away from the Lord’s way.

ELDER OAKS: The First Presidency made a wonderful statement on this subject in a letter in 1991. Speaking of individuals and families that were struggling with this kind of problem, they said, “We encourage Church leaders and members to reach out with love and understanding to those struggling with these issues.” Surely if we are counseled as a body of Church membership to reach out with love and understanding to those ‘struggling with these issues,’ that obligation rests with particular intensity on parents who have children struggling with these issues… even children who are engaged in sinful behavior associated with these issues.

PUBLIC AFFAIRS: Is rejection of a child to some degree the natural reaction of some parents whenever their children fall short of expectations? Is it sometimes easier to ‘close the window’ on an issue than deal with it?

ELDER OAKS: We surely encourage parents not to blame themselves and we encourage Church members not to blame parents in this circumstance. We should remember that none of us is perfect and none of us has children whose behavior is entirely in accord with exactly what we would have them do in all circumstances.
We feel great compassion for parents whose love and protective instincts for their challenged children have moved them to some positions that are adversary to the Church. I hope the Lord will be merciful to parents whose love for their children has caused them to get into such traps.

* * *

Reading the lines highlighted by bold type. most notably the very last line, it is easy to see why this man's parents are refusing to have anything to do with him. Their "love" is conditional on him living the kind of life that they want him to live, not the life he was born to live.

Dallin H. Oaks is an apostle, one of twelve who are second in authority only to the prophet. To go against his counsel would be interpreted as apostacy by fellow congregants in the Mormon Church.

Thankfully, Mary's parents had the spine to do it anyway.

May 29th, 2006: The last time a letter was read from the pulpit

1)

This first link is about the fiasco that came down in Washington around the May 29th, 2006 letter from the pulpit, which lead to my excommunication (which was subsequently vacated):

http://www.affirmation.org/news/2006_47.shtml

Note that Harry Reid was very critical of the church involvement, as was an LDS Salt Lake City newspaper columnist.

2)

The week after the letter was read over the pulpit, Jeffrey Nielsen, a BYU Professor, wrote a letter to the editor in Salt Lake City, with this consequence: He was fired!

http://www.affirmation.org/news/2006_49.shtml

3)

As the dominoes stack up, members of the Orchestra at Temple Square (Peter & Mary Danzig) wrote a letter to protest the treatment of Jeffrey Nielsen, and the church suspended his membership in the Orchestra. After a year of defending their rights and the lack of justification for the disciplinary action, Brother Danzig and his wife resigned their membership in the church and gave up hope that the Mormon Church would allow them political freedom of choice.

http://www.affirmation.org/media/2008_02_23.shtml

A Preventable Mess! How Families Become Divided.

Well, as I knew it would, an email that I sent out last night to my immediate family members has hit some raw nerves. That email was a personalized version of my post from earlier today that is entitled, "Religion - the root of MY Evil".

This is an email that I got back from one of my most favorite nieces. She is married and in her early 30's and has a brand new baby.

Quoting: "I have never before responded to any of Lester's letters. I likely never will again. I love him and respect his opinions and the decisions he has chosen for his life. However, in return I expect that same respect. My beliefs are mine, and they tend to follow the doctrine of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, not the culture and not what other people in my church believe, but I follow the doctrine and that includes the First Presidency and anything they sign in accordance with their callings as Prophets of God! I will never walk out of a church meeting because of something they ask to be read over the pulpit, and I am offended that anyone would ask of me to do so! I have never asked you [Lester] to go against your beliefs, I expect the same respect!! My religion has stated its beliefs. How individuals choose to portray those beliefs is something that they will have to discuss with God, whom I believe is a loving, just and merciful Being! I have never been cruel, mean or judgemental to any homosexual, however, I also do not condone that lifestyle. This is my belief. This is a personal opinion! YOU have yours and I have NEVER judged you for it! Do not judge me for mine! You can still love and care for someone and disagree with their beliefs and their lifestyle!! I enjoy receiving emails and news from you, I do not enjoy being lectured or being told I am wrong in my opinions or beliefs. And I definitely do not appreciate being grouped into a category of Mormons who are cruel! My judgement is reserved for a session between me and my Lord and Savior. Do not presume to tell me how He is going to judge me!!" (End)

This is my reply:

"Thanks for taking the time to respond. FYI, you and [your older sister] were the only ones to do so, but at least [she] sees the church leaders for who they really are. In your email you wrote: "I have never asked you to go against your beliefs, I expect the same respect!!" Well, one of us has to be wrong, because if your prophet gets his way, I lose my right to equality, not only as an American, but a human being. I am an atheist now (well, maybe a hopeful agnostic at best), so by demanding that I afford you the privilege of blindly following your prophet, you are asking me to forfeit my belief that I was born gay and am entitled to a full, happy, authentic life as a gay man. A life, which I might add, will have no impact on how happy your marriage to [your husband] is and how you will raise your child. Please try to break away from the mentality that, "When the Prophet speaks, the thinking has been done." You are more intelligent than that. Take a step back and take a serious look at what the prophet is really asking you to do. He is telling you that your fellow human beings, (your gay "brothers" that you claim your God created,) really are not "equal" and that their homosexuality is a weakness in the flesh (a mental illness?) that must be endured alone and in sorrow. The problem here is your Bible...there is really nothing in the Bible that states that women or slaves were ever equal. It took the founding of a New World and some creative writing by the American Founding Fathers (several of whom were atheists) before modern liberals determined that they could ignore the writings of the Bible and free the slaves and let women own property and vote. These photos to the right are taken from above the doorways in the Capitol. Don't give any church the credit for doing that. Christian fundamentalists fought those changes every step of the way because they claimed then (and your prophet still wants to claim now) that the Bible had to be interpreted literally. Only in the New World, with an effective separation of church state, could this degree of equality have been accomplished. Your prophet is now asking California to once again merge church and state and take us backward toward the a selective interpretation of the Bible, the Spanish Inquisition, and the Holy Wars.

Just so you know, if the government were to implement a policy tomorrow restricting the Mormons from "sealing" their own dead ancestors, I would protest in the streets on your behalf so that you have your freedom of religion.

What the Mormons are doing in California (and what they did in 2006 with me), is telling me that now that I am an out gay man I am worth less in this country than I was 4 years ago while a hypocrite and lying about my authentic self. By obeying your prophet you are trying to tell me that I am expected to take a demotion in my status as a human being after accepting my birth as a gay man.

All I'm asking is that you (as a family member) leave religion out of this. It is a question of civil rights. I didn't ask to be born a gay man just like Mickey did not ask to be born a negro and you did not ask to be born a woman. You enjoy freedoms that were earned on the backs of women before you. Your children will see your prophet and other Christian fundamentalists as people who saw others as undeserving of equality under the law; exactly the same way as you yourself now see those who kept slaves and treated women as chattel only a few generations ago. As the Republican chief judge in California wrote when he struck down the ban against gay marriage; "I did not want to be seen as on the wrong side of history with this issue." Take a closer look at the stand your prophet is taking and re-evaluate your thinking.
I hope you can now see where this letter from the prophet has led us in our own family. Because I cannot stand down and ignore this (because it affects everything that I am and my right to the same happiness that you take for granted), and because you cannot opt to disagree with your prophet (because you will be labelled "apostate"), we will now have a very deep divide in our family; a divide that will likely be insurmountable for the rest of our lives, but what choice did I have? To remain silent? I tried that for over 35 years, it didn't work, so I will not allow you all to fool yourselves into thinking that this isn't important to me. It is important enough to me that I will risk alienating myself from my family because to do anything less than defend myself on this issue would be to go back into the closet and deny my authenticity!

Don't blame me for having an opinion. Blame your prophet for putting you into a "no win" situation. Because of what your prophet did, there are only losers on all sides of this whole, preventable, mess.

Sincerely,
Uncle Lester (End)

I'm going to end this post with the quote I posted earlier today from Stuart Matis. It was written to a friend a few short days before he commited suicide after the letter from the Prophet was ordered read early in the year 2000 during the California Proposition 22 debate: "The Knight Initiative [Prop 22] will certainly save no family. It is codified hatred. It is anti-family, anti-love and it is wrong."

Religion - the root of MY evil!

I was motivated to start my blog while reading Richard Dawkins' controversial book, "The God Delusion". In the preface, he tells of working with Channel Four (British television) on their two-part documentary "Root of All Evil". While promoting the documentary in the local papers, they bought a full-page ad and published a photo of the New York skyline that showed the twin towers of the World Trade Center. The caption read, "Imagine a World Without Religion".

The book is a brilliant thesis in defense of atheism, and as you read this post, I would invite you to think in broad terms beyond Christianity. The most difficult challenges in my life were generated by my membership in the Mormon Church (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints), but in every reference to my own experience, you could substitute "Catholic", "Islam", or simply "fundamentalism" or "extremism" for the word "Mormon".

Any religion can claim to be the only path to God, rather than just another path to God, but when that religion strives to influence government to legislate their interpretation of scripture into the laws of a country, then they have crossed the line into bigotry. Let me remind you of the definition of bigotry: "the stubborn and complete intolerance of any creed, belief, or opinion that differs from one's own."

The catalyst to begin my blog today was inspired by an email from an on-line group that on June 20th the Mormon Church formalized their support of a very political campaign to entrench bigotry into the California constitution. They have ordered that a letter from the prophet be read from the pulpit in every California congregation on June 29th, and this letter is instructing members to take a single polarizing position in a political campaign. With words like "Local Church leaders will provide information about how you may become involved...", "...do all you can...", and "...donating of your means and time....", the church has made it very clear that there will be no middle ground for the faithful members of the church during the November election this year.

But what about my son and my daughter who have yet to abandon their faith in the Mormon Church? I'm the youngest child in a family of six, and all five of my siblings are still TBM's (True Blue Mormons). I have 37 nieces and nephews, the majority of whom are still attending weekly church meetings. Where does this type of action by church leadership leave them?

It is well documented in history what action like this by the church does to families. At best, it polarizes congregations and divides families. At its worst, it has caused suicides and initiated disruptive church-court action against open-minded individuals and vulnerable church members like myself.

In early 2000 there was a fierce battle on in California over the passage of Proposition 22. The battle was so fierce that when one family took a vocal position against the church and refused to place a supportive lawn sign on their property, the head of the family was disfellowshipped (released from his position in the ward and had the use of priesthood authority suspended). Their main opposition was against the church's involvement in politics. Most tragically, the tension became so severe that on February 25th Stuart Matis shot himself in the head on the sidewalk of a regional California meeting house in Los Altos. A short time before his suicide he wrote this to a friend: "On the night of March 7th, many California couples will retire to their beds thrilled that they helped pass the Knight Initiative (Proposition 22). What they don't realize is that in the next room, their son or daughter is lying in bed crying and could very well one day be the victim of society's homophobia. The Knight Initiative will certainly save no family. It is codified hatred. It is anti-family, anti-love and it is wrong."

Asked to comment on the suicide, a spokesman for the "Yes on 22" campaign declined comment other than to say, "It's a personal family matter." No kidding! So why did the church and other campaigners get involved in "personal family matters" in the first place?

I think it was Stuart's mother who recounted that in a Sunday School class that she attended, and with full knowledge that she had a gay son (who was living a celibate life and still worthy of his temple recommend), a man stood up and said, "They should take every homosexual and round them up, put them on a boat, and sink it in the Mindanao Trench!"

How can you fail to see that statement as anything but bigotry?

During the campaign for Proposition 22, letters from the prophet were ordered to be read from the pulpit. The significance of this is that there is a saying in the Mormon Church that is not at all an exaggeration. The saying is, "When the Prophet speaks, the thinking has been done!"

Fast forward to May 29th, 2006 when the church once again saw fit to have a letter like this read from the pulpit, virtually commanding every Mormon to write a letter to their political leaders in support of the Federal Marriage Amendment. At 7PM that night I was personally served a letter from my bishop and my Elders Quorum president. I had been summoned to a disciplinary council at 7AM the morning of June 4th. These types of meetings are traditionally referred to as a "Court of Love", because they like to convince themselves that they are acting in my best interest out of their love for me by working out my salvation with God for me. They feel qualified to do this by virtue of their "calling" to preside over me. I asked to have my friend (and a member of my bishopric) attend with me, and was denied. I asked the stake president (the Mormon equivalent of a Cardinal) to distribute a two page letter to each man on the council that clarified my position as a gay man who was going to remain married and faithful to my wife of 25 years, and was denied.

The "court of love" was over in 35 minutes. Only two questions were asked of me (one was, "Have you been actively trying to get other members of the church to adopt your views?", to which I replied, "I have only written my personal views in my memoirs.") They debated my fate for 5 minutes and then invited me back in to pronounce my excommunication.

That same Sunday, (June 4th), a letter to the editor by Jeffrey Nielsen was published in the Salt Lake Tribune. Mr. Nielsen was a philosophy professor at BYU and was happily married to a woman and had a family. All he stated was that by reading a letter from the pulpit, essentially ordering all members of the church to adopt the church's stand on the FMA issue, that church leaders had crossed a line. He was fired the next day.

So here we are again. In the two years since my excommunication the church has made amazing strides toward reconciliation with the gay Mormons. Carol Lynn Pearson's book, "No More Goodbyes" has paved the way for this to happen. Her play, "Facing East" provides a riveting backdrop to the consequences of adopting a "no middle ground" position when it comes to homosexuals and the Bible. Pressure from SoulForce has forced BYU to stop expelling gay students, and pressure from ex-gay groups (including a demonstration by my former wife and I on the steps of Evergreen Int'l in July 2007) has forced the church to admit that they do not know what causes homosexuality and that they will never counsel a gay man to marry a woman as a "cure". They seem to have repealed all of their former printed matter on homosexuality and its causes in favor of a single brochure entitled "God Loveth His Children". All of the recent writings advocate their love for their gay brothers and sisters. It seemed that we had emerged from the dark ages and entered an age of enlightenment.

And now this. The wording of the current letter is essentially identical to those that were read in 2000 and in 2006.

Unfortunately, the consequences will therefore be almost identical as well.