Into the West

The question running through my mind these last few weeks has been whether or not to remove my name from the records of the church. Why do I keep my name on the church records? What does it mean to have my name listed on the rolls of an organization that actively speaks out against gay marriage and lgbt equality legislation. Is there any benefit to keeping my name on the church records? If the church ever receives a revelation giving gay people a place in God's plan, would I go back? So many questions... but I don't really want to focus on those questions as the topic of this post. I'm more concerned today about pointing out that the Mormon church is not a safe place for gay or transgendered people. Case in point, Mitch Mayne.

Many of you have probably heard this story a thousand times. If you haven't, you can get some good background over at Main Street Plaza. Long story short, Mitch was called to a relatively minor leadership position in his local congregation. He has no real leadership authority there, but basically serves as a secretary or clerk. The hooplah comes from the fact that he is "openly gay" - a term that doesn't adequately explain his situation. While Mr. Mayne is indeed open about his sexuality, he is not currently in a relationship, nor does it appear that he is dating anyone. Everyone admits that were he to be in a relationship with another man, that would be the end of this "ground breaking" calling. Mitch Mayne and his local church leaders are using his calling as a way to invite gay people back to church with "open arms." While I think it's important for church members to push and pray for change, I think it's more important to point out that the church is not a safe place for gay people. At the end of the day, the only thing that has changed is that they are trying to get people in one small congregation in San Francisco to not openly shun any gay couples that may come to church. Those gay couples still can't be baptized, receive the priesthood, or be married. In Mormon theology these individuals are doomed to be eternally separated from their families, children, and spouses - all torn apart by God. I don't care what kind of doctrine the church comes up with, as long as the highest level of their heaven is only open to straight couples, their gay youth are going to continue to kill themselves in an attempt to get there. And it's not only the lost lives that will continue to plague our community, but also the failed marriages, where the straight spouse and children are victims just as much as the gay man is. A few examples of this environment:

Example #1 - It's not even safe to put your name on a postcard.

A recent post by Mitch reveals what kind of environment you can really find at church. He asked his readers to send in a postcard talking about their own struggles and hopes for the church. Among the proposed topic ideas were the following points:

• What you felt when you learned about the cultural shift we're trying to make in our faith in San Francisco
• How you've struggled to find your 'fit' within our Mormon culture
• How people within our faith have responded to you about your status as an LGBT individual or ally, or as someone who is perceived as different
• How someone or something has helped you or given you hope—and how that has increased your faith

After this invitation he then insures readers that any kind of identifying information will be stripped from the post card, including your name, your location, and your ward. Heaven knows what would happen if someone's bishop found out they wrote a post-card supporting an lgbt issue. This way, no one has to worry about being excommunicated by a local leader, about being ostracized by their local congregation, by their friends, and their families. But these are all things that gay members of the church worry about every single day. And they do so needlessly.


Example #2 - "What causes two men to drive their pickup down the central street of a university campus yelling, Fag! Fag! Fag!"?

Jennifer Sinor recently wrote an article in The American Scholar about what Mormonism is like in Utah. I was particularly fascinated by the article because Jennifer is a professor at USU and talks about situations and life in the town that I grew up in, Logan, UT. One of the more horrifying experiences in the article comes from a young woman:

"Originally from the Washington, D.C., area, Amanda moved to Logan seven or eight years ago with her partner. At the time her hair was short and her skin without tattoos. One afternoon shortly after her arrival, she was walking home from work, not three blocks from where I live now, smack in the center of Logan. She wore jeans and a T-shirt. Two men in a pickup truck pulled to the side of the road. They leapt from the truck and started beating her, yelling “dyke,” yelling “bitch.” Cars drove past, and drivers did nothing. The mountains watched in silence. In broad daylight, near the neighborhood quick mart, only two blocks from the university, Amanda was beaten until she broke free and ran for home.

The next week when the men stopped Amanda, they had baseball bats.

Beaten nearly to death by repeated blows, Amanda stumbled home through the back yards of churchgoing folk. No one came out to help. No one so much as cracked a window. No one called the police. Nobody asked her, blood dripping from her nose, her cheeks, if she was okay. When later she told the police that her attackers had called “Dyke!” between blows, one officer responded, “Boys will be boys.”

One anecdotal incident does not make a trend, but if you've been paying attention to the news of the beehive state recently you will be aware of several more incidents. And of course, this ignores the countless looks, glares, and other forms of discrimination that gay people in Utah experience everyday. Where does all this hatred and discrimination come from? I think Jennifer explains it best.

"What causes two men to drive their pickup down the central street of a university campus yelling, “Fag! Fag! Fag!”—something my five-year-old son, Aidan, and I witnessed while walking through campus on the way to his swimming lesson? Who are they yelling at? Who do they hope will hear? I used to believe it was hatred that caused such actions, pure undiluted rage. But I have lived here long enough to understand the power of fear. Such behavior, I imagine, begins in the grocery store where images of bodies are concealed and sexuality is contained. It begins at the kitchen table where your father cracks gay jokes. It is furthered at school where the teachers allow kids to call each other fag. It grows into a hot flame in the church pew on Sunday where you are told that the door to eternity is narrow and policed, where the lines between lost and saved are engraved into your skin. All of that fear must go somewhere. It cannot be contained. And so it erupts in ignorance and baseball bats."

I think it's wrong to try and convince gay people to participate in this kind of environment, or in a religion that inevitably leads to these kind of prejudices. It's one thing to allow individuals to follow their own path in life - to allow space for those who feel like they still have some distance to go in the church. But to encourage people to return to an organization that not only doesn't understand them, but slams the door of the eternities in their face is not something I can condone or support.