This week, the Supreme Court decided not to hear any appeals on the issue of same-sex marriage, making those marriages legal in 5 states, including Utah. I"m sure no one is surprised that this has caused an outcry from many Utahans as well as a great deal of excitement for those whose marriages were previously voided after the appeal was originally made. These events have placed the issue of gay marriage at the forefront of people's minds. Normally, I wouldn't comment on such a controversial topic, but I feel like I can shed some light on how difficult it can be as a member of the LDS church to come to a conclusion about this subject. It's true that a lot of Mormons take an extremely inflexible stand against same-sex unions, but there are also many members of the Church who support it just as rigidly. You can do a quick Google search and you'll find several websites (mormonsformarriage.com, mormonsformarriageequality.org, mormonsandgays.org, and likely others) dedicated to proving that homosexuality and Mormonism are not mutually exclusive. But my guess is that most members of the Church fall somewhere in between these two extremes.
I can't speak for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, nor would I ever wish to. But I can explain where my own concepts of gay marriage stem from. When I was 13, I attended a Mormon Girls Camp (thousands of LDS girls between the ages of 12 and 16 in the US attend a week-long Girls Camp every summer, similar to Scout Camp, but more focused on spirituality). I still remember having a conversation one night about homosexuality where one of the girls quite effectively convinced us that being gay is a choice, that being attracted to someone of the same sex is unnatural and only happens when someone decides that they'd rather be gay than straight. I knew what homosexuality was, but I'd never thought to ask my parents why people were homosexual, and this answer satisfied my 13-year-old mind. But the reality is, being gay is not a choice someone makes in adulthood. It happens as naturally as being straight does - you're born that way. That's not to say that some people don't try things simply out of curiosity, because some people do explore their sexuality that way. But for most people, being gay is a life-long reality, the same as being heterosexual is. Admittedly, I was extremely naive and prejudiced when I accepted the idea that sexual orientation fell into one of two categories: straight or purposefully deviant. It took a lot of humility to accept that I had been wrong, and I'm still ashamed that I ever held that belief. That being said, while my understanding of homosexuality has shifted, my stance on marriage has not.
I support traditional marriage. As a life-long member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I firmly believe that marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God, and that all other unions are not in harmony with God's plan for His children. But there is something about forcing my beliefs on other people that grates against my perception of self in an extremely uncomfortable way. I don't think I have the right to tell other people how to live their life, and I think that actually comes from my upbringing in the Church. When Joseph Smith was asked by a reporter what Mormons believed, he wrote a response that included 13 statements now known as "The Articles of Faith". In the 11th and 12th articles, Joseph Smith said the following:
11. We claim the privilege of worshiping Almighty God according to the dictates of our own conscience, and allow all men the same privilege, let them worship how, where, or what they may.
12. We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, and magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law."
I interpret those two statements to mean that I cannot, in good conscience, insist that someone who believes differently than I believe is lesser than I am or that I should force other people to obey my concepts of right and wrong. I can only be concerned with me, and with whether or not I am living my life in accordance with what I believe. If you add to that my American heritage, which teaches me that "all men are created equal" and that everyone has the right to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," there is an ingrained conviction within me that I must allow people to be agents unto themselves, and ask only that they allow me the same privilege. The problem lies in the fact that my belief in traditional marriage is directly opposed to non-traditional marriage, and in recent years the issue of non-traditional marriage has left the theoretical arena and entered the political arena. Now I can no longer remain silent - my church and my country both expect me to pick a side.
When I got married, I went through a lot of painful reflection on the issue of gay marriage. I love my husband, and after making covenants with him as his wife, I was more firm in my belief in the sanctity of marriage than ever. But I also knew what it was like to love someone, and I realized how awful it would be if I were denied the right to marry the person that I loved. Up to that point, I had stuck with the Church on all aspects of the gay marriage debate, but last year I began questioning that stance for the first time. What gives me the right to deny someone the privilege of marrying their beloved companion? Who am I to tell people who to love? Suddenly I was no longer looking at gay marriage as a purely black and white issue. I was standing in murky waters.
The problem was not that I had changed my mind on what I thought God wanted for His children, but that I could not reconcile that with the fact that I could vote to deny someone else the right to marry whomever they wanted. I didn't want to wield that kind of power. I would rather be in favor of traditional marriage without having to ever publicly defend that belief. The unfortunate reality is, I am a coward. I want to be comfortable, to exist only where I feel safe and unchallenged. When I realized this, I knew I had to make a decision. Would I chose to be unopposed by popular opinion and quietly maintain my own beliefs while voting to allow others to express their own? Or would I chose to stand with the Church, placing myself on an unpopular side of an issue that I could not fully defend because I didn't fully understand it?
I chose to oppose gay marriage. Not because I believe that I have the right to tell anyone who they can and cannot love or marry, but because I know that whatever side of an issue God is on, I want to be on as well. And I believe that God is on the side of traditional marriage. Many people would consider this weakness on my part, or would say I succumbed to the cult-like obedience of my church. I don't think that's true. I think I chose the harder option. Support for traditional marriages and families is extremely unpopular right now, and many people who read this may be turned off permanently to anything else I have to say. But I knew that I believed in the sanctity of marriage between a man and a woman, so I chose that option. I still don't fully know how to reconcile that belief with my discomfort with denying people who love each other the right to marry. That being said, I have decided that I don't need to know all the answers. I just have to trust in the answers I already have.
Although I can't cite a statistic, I think that many Mormons feel the same way that I do. They wonder why God would create people who love non-traditionally and yet deny them approval to marry. They wonder how they could possibly have the right to vote against allowing such marriages. They struggle to reconcile what they believe with what they see. So don't judge all Mormons as being in the same category. We're not all spouting threats of fire and brimstone whenever someone suggests that gay marriage is equal to traditional marriage. And we're not all choosing to support popular belief over religious belief. I would bet that most of us are just trying to do the best we can with the minimal knowledge we have.
I can't speak for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, nor would I ever wish to. But I can explain where my own concepts of gay marriage stem from. When I was 13, I attended a Mormon Girls Camp (thousands of LDS girls between the ages of 12 and 16 in the US attend a week-long Girls Camp every summer, similar to Scout Camp, but more focused on spirituality). I still remember having a conversation one night about homosexuality where one of the girls quite effectively convinced us that being gay is a choice, that being attracted to someone of the same sex is unnatural and only happens when someone decides that they'd rather be gay than straight. I knew what homosexuality was, but I'd never thought to ask my parents why people were homosexual, and this answer satisfied my 13-year-old mind. But the reality is, being gay is not a choice someone makes in adulthood. It happens as naturally as being straight does - you're born that way. That's not to say that some people don't try things simply out of curiosity, because some people do explore their sexuality that way. But for most people, being gay is a life-long reality, the same as being heterosexual is. Admittedly, I was extremely naive and prejudiced when I accepted the idea that sexual orientation fell into one of two categories: straight or purposefully deviant. It took a lot of humility to accept that I had been wrong, and I'm still ashamed that I ever held that belief. That being said, while my understanding of homosexuality has shifted, my stance on marriage has not.
I support traditional marriage. As a life-long member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I firmly believe that marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God, and that all other unions are not in harmony with God's plan for His children. But there is something about forcing my beliefs on other people that grates against my perception of self in an extremely uncomfortable way. I don't think I have the right to tell other people how to live their life, and I think that actually comes from my upbringing in the Church. When Joseph Smith was asked by a reporter what Mormons believed, he wrote a response that included 13 statements now known as "The Articles of Faith". In the 11th and 12th articles, Joseph Smith said the following:
11. We claim the privilege of worshiping Almighty God according to the dictates of our own conscience, and allow all men the same privilege, let them worship how, where, or what they may.
12. We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, and magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law."
I interpret those two statements to mean that I cannot, in good conscience, insist that someone who believes differently than I believe is lesser than I am or that I should force other people to obey my concepts of right and wrong. I can only be concerned with me, and with whether or not I am living my life in accordance with what I believe. If you add to that my American heritage, which teaches me that "all men are created equal" and that everyone has the right to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," there is an ingrained conviction within me that I must allow people to be agents unto themselves, and ask only that they allow me the same privilege. The problem lies in the fact that my belief in traditional marriage is directly opposed to non-traditional marriage, and in recent years the issue of non-traditional marriage has left the theoretical arena and entered the political arena. Now I can no longer remain silent - my church and my country both expect me to pick a side.
When I got married, I went through a lot of painful reflection on the issue of gay marriage. I love my husband, and after making covenants with him as his wife, I was more firm in my belief in the sanctity of marriage than ever. But I also knew what it was like to love someone, and I realized how awful it would be if I were denied the right to marry the person that I loved. Up to that point, I had stuck with the Church on all aspects of the gay marriage debate, but last year I began questioning that stance for the first time. What gives me the right to deny someone the privilege of marrying their beloved companion? Who am I to tell people who to love? Suddenly I was no longer looking at gay marriage as a purely black and white issue. I was standing in murky waters.
The problem was not that I had changed my mind on what I thought God wanted for His children, but that I could not reconcile that with the fact that I could vote to deny someone else the right to marry whomever they wanted. I didn't want to wield that kind of power. I would rather be in favor of traditional marriage without having to ever publicly defend that belief. The unfortunate reality is, I am a coward. I want to be comfortable, to exist only where I feel safe and unchallenged. When I realized this, I knew I had to make a decision. Would I chose to be unopposed by popular opinion and quietly maintain my own beliefs while voting to allow others to express their own? Or would I chose to stand with the Church, placing myself on an unpopular side of an issue that I could not fully defend because I didn't fully understand it?
I chose to oppose gay marriage. Not because I believe that I have the right to tell anyone who they can and cannot love or marry, but because I know that whatever side of an issue God is on, I want to be on as well. And I believe that God is on the side of traditional marriage. Many people would consider this weakness on my part, or would say I succumbed to the cult-like obedience of my church. I don't think that's true. I think I chose the harder option. Support for traditional marriages and families is extremely unpopular right now, and many people who read this may be turned off permanently to anything else I have to say. But I knew that I believed in the sanctity of marriage between a man and a woman, so I chose that option. I still don't fully know how to reconcile that belief with my discomfort with denying people who love each other the right to marry. That being said, I have decided that I don't need to know all the answers. I just have to trust in the answers I already have.
Although I can't cite a statistic, I think that many Mormons feel the same way that I do. They wonder why God would create people who love non-traditionally and yet deny them approval to marry. They wonder how they could possibly have the right to vote against allowing such marriages. They struggle to reconcile what they believe with what they see. So don't judge all Mormons as being in the same category. We're not all spouting threats of fire and brimstone whenever someone suggests that gay marriage is equal to traditional marriage. And we're not all choosing to support popular belief over religious belief. I would bet that most of us are just trying to do the best we can with the minimal knowledge we have.