About Reality Distortion

Sometimes I can't live with the reality distortion field Mormonism produces. In particular, I'm tired of being told that gay people aren't gay.

Nomenclature

Mitch Hedberg, a master of awkwardly delivered one-liner comedy, once said "I don't have a girlfriend, I just know a girl who would get really mad if she heard me say that." David Bednar, an LDS apostle, now says "There are no homosexual members of the [LDS] Church," -- and I have to add "I just know some gay and lesbian Mormons who would get really mad if they heard me say that."

Seriously, "you're saying I'm not your girlfriend?!" has to be less of a rude awakening than "you're saying I'm not gay?!" I didn't miss the point: we're all children of God, and that fundamental truth is not affected by the variety of challenges we face. But is using an adjective to describe a person therefore anathema?

In this particular case, the question was "How can homosexual members of the church live and remain steadfast in the gospel." It's a useful question. The LDS church insists that only heterosexual marriage or celibacy are acceptable, and celibacy is definitely a lesser state -- even heaven isn't as good if you're not married. It's bad enough if you have no marriage prospects for whatever reason, but it can only be exponentially worse if what you really want, and might have prospects of, is a loving, satisfying relationship with a partner of the same sex.

So, a question about meeting the needs of gay and lesbian Mormons is particularly relevant. On the other hand, picking on the language to insist that there are no homosexual Mormons, that we need to avoid being misled by the World, and that a better understanding of God's plan would clarify why heterosexual marriage is so dang important, is remarkably unresponsive to the question.

In fact, it's an incredibly bad answer. I know nothing more about how to help gay and lesbian Mormons with an incredibly difficult situation than I did before. (Incidentally, I don't mean to be exclusive by saying "gay and lesbian"; I just don't think the question, let alone the answer, even begins to address the needs of bisexual, trans, or other marginalized people.) At any rate, I don't think many gay or lesbian people who struggle to "live and remain steadfast in the gospel" taught by the LDS Church have failed to understand what the LDS Church teaches about the importance of opposite-sex marriage in God's plan. It's more likely that they do understand it, and that that's part of why the whole situation is so difficult in the first place.

Now, if you want to personally describe yourself as a "person with same-sex attraction," you have my full support. You're choosing what I think (not that my opinion matters) is an incredibly difficult way to see the world and your place in it, and I don't want my attitude to make it any worse. But don't try to tell me that a gay person, who identifies as gay, isn't. Especially if you're not the person dealing with those challenges, don't tell me that the people who are have got it wrong. "In Christ there is no gay or straight" has the potential to be a beautiful answer, but only if we build Zion, or the body of Christ (or whatever metaphor you prefer), so that those differences truly don't divide us. That's not accomplished by insisting that God's plan is for straightness, and you just need to understand it better.

Dealing with Challenges

Bednar also had some things to say about how the Gospel and the Church exist to give us strength to deal with our challenges. That's true, and in general, I believe in the power of Christ to help us in our difficulties -- and sometimes, out of them. When it comes to the particular challenges gay people face, though, I think "God can help you deal with challenges" is dangerously ambiguous.

"God can help you deal with challenges" is just too easily interpreted to mean "you can pray the gay away," and leads to despair, depression, and sometimes suicide, when God doesn't grant that prayer. Now, I'm not saying that God lacks the power to do it -- but it would be a miracle on par with the miracles in the Bible, and those are rare by definition. Jesus made a lot of people walk, and maybe he still does, but it's only charlatans who promise that that'll happen to you. We don't lead Christians in wheelchairs to expect a miraculous change, and we shouldn't be leading LGBT Christians to expect a miraculous change, either.

On the other hand, clearly saying "we all live with challenges, and gay people can live with the challenges of being gay" avoids one form of ambiguity, but there are still some crucial details missing. Also, maybe some of the challenges are really things that a person can live without. Maybe, for example, the challenge of dealing with people who insist that there are no homosexual Mormons isn't something you're meant to live with, but something we're meant to change.

Discrimination

Lastly, even without the initial insistence that there are no homosexual Mormons, there'd still be a remarkable reality distortion in Bednar's recent remarks. The assertion is that, because the Church exists to help people deal with their challenges, "we do not discriminate, and we are not bigots."

We do not discriminate? I'm sorry, but we do -- it's not up for debate. We say that we discriminate on the basis of behavior, not orientation, but behavior generally follows orientation. I suspect there aren't a lot of completely straight students getting kicked out of BYU for "homosexual behavior." Also, remember when the church supported the policy of the Boy Scouts to kick out gay scoutmasters on the basis of their stated orientation (even if their behavior met with all LDS or BSA standards)? Yeah, we discriminate.

We aren't bigots? If the shoe fits.... I mean, I don't think it's all that useful to go around saying who is a bigot and who isn't. We all have a little intolerance in us, and room to improve. Insisting that our particular lack of tolerance is divinely mandated, though, is particularly the sort of thing that should not precede "and we are not bigots." Hey, maybe we just have "challenges" that are frequently associated with bigotry.