Affirmation Spring Spiritual Gathering: “Healing Our Wounds,” Salt Lake City, March 31, 2017
Affirmation sponsors spiritual gatherings to provide places of spiritual refuge and healing and promote greater spiritual self-reliance in the LGBT Mormon community.
Affirmation spiritual gatherings explore the spirituality of LGBT Mormons from different perspectives. We recognize that each individual’s journey is unique, and we seek to be inclusive of many different ideas, perspectives, and spiritual paths.
This spiritual gathering will have the theme, “Healing Our Wounds,” and will take place Friday, March 31, 2017, starting at 7:00 p.m. at the Fort Douglas Post Theater, 245 Fort Douglas Blvd, Bldg 636, Salt Lake City, Utah 84113. There will be a Dessert Social starting at 8:15 until 10:00 p.m.
Speakers/Performers will include:
Wendall T. Hair identifies as gay and is a convert to the LDS Church. The first in his family to be baptized, he was raised by a strong and loving single mom, has an older sister and is the uncle to four nieces and nephews. He served an LDS mission in the St. George, Utah mission. After the promulgation of the November 2015 LDS handbook policy, he says, “My world and faith came crashing down.” Since then he has struggled to find a place in the Church, and has made major changes in his faith that have helped him find solace.
Ann Ryan Pack is a transgender woman who has been a member of the church since she was 8 years old. She came from a strong LDS family and has lived in Utah her whole life. After serving a mission in London, England, she met her wife Brigit and they were married in the Bountiful temple. They have been married for 17 years and have a 12 year old daughter. Ann attends church each week with her family. Together Ann and her wife seek to help make church more welcoming for LGBTQI+ individuals.
John Bonner is a Licenced Clinical Social Worker who has been in practice in Salt Lake City for the past decade, specializing in grief and loss, addiction recovery, faith transitions, and working with the LGBTQ community. John grew up in Rexburg, Idaho with two older sisters and two loving parents. He is currently singing his eighth season with the Utah Chamber Artists and is a former member of The Mormon Tabernacle Choir, University of Utah Singers, BYU Singers, and Deseret Chamber Singers.
There will be a Special Musical Performance by Chad Millar, who has performed opera professionally with the San Francisco Opera and won a national singing competition sponsored by the Met Opera. Chad still sings at special performances of the San Francisco Opera, and will grace us with his rendition of the tenor arias from Mendelssohn’s “Elijah.”
The event will be MC’d by Blaire Ostler.
After the spiritual gathering, there will be a dessert social!
ALL are welcome!