Search Results: suicide
My son Jonathan told us he was gay about ten years ago. I didn’t react well. I tried to convince him he could be straight. I tried to convince him that even if he was “a little gay” that he could marry a woman. I couldn’t believe that “this” happened in my family. The first time my son brought home another young man and introduced him as his boyfriend, I nearly became sick to my stomach and I treated them both like lepers and didn’t want them to come into the house. Affirmation healed my relationship with my son. He knows now that my former homophobia is totally gone and that I love him unconditionally.
It is only then when we touch the pain that we are in a position to be able to mourn. To be able to enter that second covenant. To mourn with that person. It is only then that we can truly comfort. That we can be good friends… Only then, when we understand the pain, can we offer words of comfort that reach deeply. And only then can we take upon ourselves the name of Christ.
For decades, the book has been handed out “by well-meaning bishops,” Munson says, “but has caused a lot of pain on the part of LGBT Mormons, their families and allies.”
Kimball’s instruction that “if you pray hard enough, fast hard enough, and are a good enough Mormon, your sexual orientation will change or go away,” she says, “has caused incredible pain and has even cost lives.”
The Bishop finished reading the letter. Placing it to the side…he wept. Humbly he began to bear his testimony. He spoke of his lack of understanding. He didn’t understand why things happened the way they did. He didn’t know what God eventually had planned for all of us. But what he did know…was that God asked us to love each other. Unconditionally. He bore his testimony of his children…two of which are gay. He said he looked forward to the day when his family could be together at Church. When his gay children could feel welcome to bring their partners with them and feel the love surround them. He spoke of how unfair it is to expect someone who is attracted to someone of the same sex to spend their lives alone. After his sweet testimony he opened up to everyone else to discuss.
“I was relieved to see that the lesson did not directly attack gay relationships as a source for “the attacks on the family” but that it focused primarily on HOW to create a successful marriage. I think the teachings in this lesson are very applicable to my same-sex marriage and look forward to sharing my perspectives in Church this Sunday.” (This is part of a series of perspectives and resources for LDS Church teachers and participants who are looking for ways to teach and learn that invite LGBT individuals, their families and friends to liken the scriptures unto themselves and apply the gospel in their lives.)
Participants came with open hearts, right from the beginning sharing the most vulnerable elements of their journeys and their lives: their hopes, their pain and their questions, their skepticism and their faith. Read more here about the conferences held in South America this past month.
Listening to Megan’s parents speak was very touching to me. Again, I felt the challenge that parents face in navigating their faith and the love they have for their children. Hearing how much they cared about their daughter, even through the challenges, was very encouraging to me. I could truly feel the love that they have, not only for their daughter, but also for the LGBT community.
Overall, I left this fireside with my heart filled with hope, and with an overwhelming sense of love for who I am, and for those around me. I truly enjoyed this evening, and I am so glad that we have opportunities to come together to support each other, to love each other, and to help each other.
One Sunday, in October 2013, Jensen announced her transgender identity to a Springville LDS singles ward bishop and asked if she could attend church.
” ‘I don’t know anything about being a transgender Mormon,’ ” she recalls him saying, ” ‘but it’s my job to welcome you..’ ”
The Springville experience was richer than the worship she knew during her youth, she says, because she could “be in tune with the Holy Spirit.”
My role was to strategize an approach, to implement activities that operationalized LGBT outreach in the stake. Our efforts were not without precedent – I spoke with one former Bishop who had fellowshipped gay members locally two decades earlier, and I knew a stake leadership training on the topic of homosexuality had occurred here in more recent years. I got wind of the recent Beaverton, Oregon firesides and I was an online acquaintance of Mitch Mayne, who I figured would be a source of good ideas (given his highly-publicized role in LGBT outreach as the executive secretary in his ward in San Francisco). So I solicited advice from various sources.