The Pillars of My Faith

Here's the text of the talk I gave at "The Pillars of My Faith," at the Salt Lake Sunstone Symposium, Friday night, August 1, 2014.

I feel obligated in a forum such as this to say at least something about intellect and faith. I first became acquainted with Sunstone as a young student at BYU, when a couple of my professors, namely Mike Quinn and Bill Bradshaw, assigned Sunstone articles as readings in history and religion courses, respectively. My time at BYU, between 1981 and 1986 (including a brief 2-year interlude for a mission), began shortly after Elder Boyd K. Packer’s statement to C.E.S. teachers that “There is a temptation for the writer or the teacher of Church history to want to tell everything, whether it is worthy or faith promoting or not. Some things that are true are not very useful.”[1] This was also when Leonard Arrington was released as Church historian and the Church archives were closed, and the time of the Mark Hoffman forgeries, murders and scandal. It was, putting it euphemistically, an exciting time to be an aspiring Church historian.

Questions related to the historicity of the Book of Mormon, and related to challenging aspects of early Mormon history, and related to the role of intellect and free inquiry in the life of the Church weighed heavily on me during my last year at BYU. They played a role in a downward spiral into depression that nearly led me to commit suicide during the summer of 1986.

Resigning from the Church in 1986 freed me to explore and to read books I had previously avoided as heretical or suspect, like Sonya Johnson’s From Housewife to Heretic and Fawn Brodie’s No Man Knows My History.[2] Resigning from the Church freed me to read literature about Church history and about the Book of Mormon with an open mind, and from any perspective I wanted, skeptical or faithful or in between. It freed me to dig into books like Brent Lee Metcalfe’s New Approaches to the Book of Mormon: Explorations in Critical Methodology (1993), or newsletters of the Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies  (to which I subscribed for a time), or D. Michael Quinn’s 2-volume study of The Mormon Hierarchy (1994), or Greg Prince’s David O. McKay and the Rise of Modern Mormonism (2005), or Richard Bushman’s Rough Stone Rolling (2007), or Armand Mauss’s All Abraham’s Children (2003), or Darron Smith and Newell Bringhurst’s Black and Mormon (2004), or Juanita Brooks’ Mountain Meadows Massacre (1950).

At this point, there are a few affirmations I am willing to make about the relationship between faith and intellect.

First, faith without knowledge is meaningless. If I do not know, for example, the facts of Joseph Smith’s career as a prophet, belief that he was a prophet would be meaningless.

Second, faith cannot be counterfactual. If Jesus Christ did not in some literal way descend to and minister to a remnant of the House of Israel living in the Americas near the meridian of time, there is no meaningful sense in which the Book of Mormon can be “another testament of Jesus Christ.” I continue to feel driven to evaluate historical and scientific data that are relevant to theological truth claims, which is why, for instance, I’m currently reading Brian Hales’ three-volume history of Joseph Smith’s Polygamy,[3] and plan to read Earl Wunderli’s Imperfect Book: What the Book of Mormon Tells Us About Itself.

Third, everything is not always what it superficially appears to be. The problem of what a “fact” is and how we decide we “know” it is not trivial. And the older I get, the more I learn that much of what I once thought I knew is really nothing more than prejudice, and that what I actually do “know” with  anything approaching fullness is relatively little. The life of faith and the life of intellect seem more alike to me than different. Both require patience, perseverance, and at times irrational leaps.

Fourth, that being the case, I regard with skepticism intellectual critiques of faith having as an a priori that there are no such things as angels, spirits, gods or miracles; that all there is to know is what is seen and tangible. I accept my own spiritual experiences as data that are at least as reliable as other sensory data and logic, all subject to validation through a continuous process of observation and discernment.

In other words, I tend to look at my life as an experiment, the results of which can only be known when it is completely finished, in which each experience, either good or bad, is an opportunity to validate or disprove my various working hypotheses about what is true and what is not.

*****

There was never a time growing up in my home, when I did not feel the power of the Spirit. There was never a time when I did not have absolute trust in the power of the priesthood that my father exercised righteously and lovingly. I was extraordinarily lucky.

I still remember, as if it were yesterday, the first time my father sat down with me on the couch, opened the Book of Mormon in front of me, and we read it together, and I felt the Spirit. I grew up in a home where prayer was the fabric of our home life and where answers to prayers were received frequently. I remember one day when I was in the fourth grade staying late after school to work on an art project. My mother came to pick me up and drove us home. We were in a terrible car accident. I remembered as soon as the car had stopped spinning saying to my mother, “I think we need to pray.” So we took turns praying for the well-being of the family in the other car. In our home, whenever there was illness, whenever there were surgeries or other medical procedures, we received priesthood blessings, and we were never surprised by full and speedy recoveries.

I remember one Sunday after Sacrament Meeting, my dad said something to me along the lines of, “You have to make your own decision about which religion is true.” At the time – and even now – to me this was an astounding statement. Could my dad really countenance the possibility of my leaving the faith that he had devoted his life to? Was I truly free to make my own decision?

How could I, growing up in such a home, fully appreciate what I had? I never knew anything else. I didn't know what it would have been like to grow up without such blessings. Maybe that's why I had to leave. Maybe the intellectual doubts that drove me away in search of answers where the greatest gift of my life. They were a pathway to understand what I had always had and what I needed most.

*****

It was not inevitable that I leave the Church, simply by virtue of the fact that I am gay and came of age in the early 80’s. Other gay men and lesbians of my generation found other paths within the Church. Perhaps the chain of events that led me to resign my membership after nearly committing suicide in 1986 had as much to do with the fact that at the end of my sophomore year I moved from on-campus university housing to off-campus housing, and as a result went from a ward with a gentle, compassionate bishop who possessed a sense of humor and sensible attitudes toward sexuality, to a ward with a bishop who was legalistic, authoritarian, and seemed unhealthily obsessed with sex. If I had stayed in the former ward, perhaps that bishop could have helped me reason through some of the intellectual doubts that were tormenting me, and I wouldn’t have been denied a calling and a temple recommend and the right to take the sacrament, for admitting that I occasionally masturbated. Perhaps with a calling, and regular opportunities to partake of the sacrament and to pray and meditate in the temple, and an understanding bishop, I would have found a way to stay and make it work, even with the tremendous burdens and limitations of being gay under such circumstances.

There have been lots of twists and turns of that nature in my life, like that fact that I chose to leave the Church during a BYU-sponsored internship in Helsinki, Finland, which helped me establish connections with the Finnish-American community in Northern Michigan, which is where I fled after deciding not to go back to BYU. It was my work with the Finnish-American collection at Northern Michigan University that led me to enter a PhD program in immigration studies at the University of Minnesota, where I received a full, four-year fellowship. I moved to Minneapolis in 1987, the same year the man I ultimately married moved there after a falling out with his parents in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

Seemingly inconsequential decisions resulted in chains of events with momentous impact. But while my life has been shaped in unanticipated ways by random events, my life has also been guided at key crossroads by powerful – sometimes visionary – spiritual experiences.

In August 1986, after nearly committing suicide, after a long period of depression and inability to speak to God, those communications channels were reopened when I felt the Spirit inviting me to pray. As I got on my knees and began by confessing to God that I was gay, the Spirit poured out on me the peace that passes understanding, and God reassured me that he knew that I was gay because he knew how I was woven “from my inmost parts.” It was shortly thereafter that the Spirit also made clear to me that it was time to leave the Church “for a time.” I wrestled with and resisted the notion that it could be possible or right for me to leave the Church. As I prayed for guidance to write letters announcing my intention to my parents and my bishop, I was carried away, up and out of my body, beyond the confines of the earth, and I saw the throne of God. I saw multitudes of people dressed in white, worshiping God, and among them I recognized deceased members of my family. I heard a voice reassuring me that all would be well.

In 1988 I decided I needed clarity about how to deal with my sexuality. I told God I would begin a fast and not end it until I received an answer to an urgent question: should I commit myself to a life of celibacy, or should I pursue the possibility of marriage to a woman? It was the morning of the third day of my fast, while I was walking across the University of Minnesota footbridge between the east and the west banks of the Mississippi that the Spirit gave me a clear answer to my query: “Consider all the options.”

All my efforts at dating women over the previous decade had demonstrated to me that that was a dead end, for me and for them. After spending the summer of 1989 in a Roman Catholic monastery to learn more about celibacy from people who had experience with it; after spending many hours in prayer and meditation every day during matins and vespers and while working on the monastery farm, I received clarity that God’s calling for me did not involve celibacy. It was then I opened myself to the possibility of a relationship with a man. After dating men for a few years, I met my husband Göran in 1991.

I met my husband Göran at a gay bar in Minneapolis called “The Gay 90s.” Göran invited me to dance. We dated briefly. He knew I was the right one for him. I didn’t know that yet, and broke it off with him. We met again nine months later quite by chance in a meeting of the Association of LGBT Student Organizations, I as a co-chair of the LGBT grad students’ organization and he subbing for the president of the gay fraternity, Delta Lambda Phi. It was finally then that the emotions the sight of him stirred in me made me realize he was the one for me. He’s always said he knew I was “the one” from the beginning. It took me a year longer to figure that out, a fact he’s never let me live down. 

In August 2005, at the Sunstone Symposium here in Salt Lake, during a session by Lavina Fielding Anderson critiquing the “For the Strength of Youth” pamphlet, the Spirit spoke to me with a clarity and power I had never before experienced in my life, telling me that it was time for me to come back to the Church. I wept, I cursed, I tried to deny it. But in the end, I realized that I wanted the peace that came from following that prompting more than I wanted a life free from contradiction and conflict. I started attending my ward in Minneapolis in October 2005. I felt the Spirit at Church more powerfully than I had felt it in more than 15 years.

When I met with my bishop, he listened attentively to my story, asked questions intended to get to know both me and my husband better, prayed with me, blessed me, encouraged me to live as much of the Gospel as I could within the constraints of being excommunicated and in a committed same-sex relationship, and promised me that I belonged, and that he would personally deal with anyone in the ward who gave me any problems. We continued to meet regularly, as I have with all my bishops since then. There were times I met with my bishop when I saw a visible heavenly light filling the room. On occasion I have seen that same heavenly light in my ward meeting house, and in the lobby of the temple. I know that the priesthood these men hold is real.

As my testimony of different Gospel principles was reaffirmed – most often through practicing them – and as I became more and more convinced that this Church was true, I faced a stupendous conflict. How could I have received such clear and convincing directives from God – promptings that I myself had mentally resisted because I had found them so difficult to believe – that my gayness was an inherent part of who I am “from my inmost parts,” that my relationship with my husband was commended to me and blessed by God, but also have such a clear, compelling, undeniable sense that the Church was true and the men who led it held true priesthood authority from God, when what they taught about homosexuality seemed so utterly to contradict my personal experience?

Periodically I would attempt to pray about it, but always the Spirit put me off and told me not to worry about that right now. Still, I wrestled. I had never in all my life been filled with such an abundance of peace and happiness and a sense of perpetual companionship of the Spirit. I thought, I want my life to be in harmony with the Gospel in every particular. And finally, in April 2006, I put it before the Lord very bluntly, and I said I need to know. If you need me to leave my husband I need to know now. And then the answer came to me unequivocally. Under no circumstance was I to leave my husband. Under no circumstance was I to, through inattentiveness to his needs, cause him to leave me. To do so would be a sin.

In May 2008, as soon as I heard of the California Supreme Court ruling that legalized marriage for gay couples, the Spirit said to me very clearly, Go now and get married. Göran and I were prepared to fly out to California with our foster son Glen as soon as the ruling went into effect in mid-June of that year, but ended up delaying one month at the insistence of my parents, who wanted to be able to meet us in California and attend. After our return to Minnesota, I felt different. I felt blessed for having done what the Spirit told us to do, and I experienced access to spiritual gifts intended to bless my family, my husband and our son.

The morning of March 29, 2009, as I was preparing to go to Church, I felt prompted to bear my testimony during Fast and Testimony Meeting, something I knew I was not permitted to do as an excommunicated member. My bishop at the time was a stickler for rules, but the Spirit told me to ask my bishop for permission to bear my testimony. The Spirit warned me against couching the request in a fancy speech, or thinking ahead what I would say in my testimony. I arrived at my bishop’s office just as a ward executive committee meeting was ending. Without fanfare I asked him simply, “May I bear my testimony today?” He looked me in the eyes and said nine words: “You have the gift of faith. Yes you may.” My bishop later confirmed that he would not likely allow me to repeat the experience, but the Spirit had prompted him to make an exception that particular morning. He called it “a tender mercy of the Lord.” So with no plan aforethought as to what I would say, I stood at the podium as soon as it was opened to the congregation and simply told my story – of learning I was gay, of nearly leaving the Church by way of suicide, of my relationship with my husband, of the spiritual experiences that had brought me back to Church and taught me it was true. And I bore testimony of Jesus Christ, of what I knew from an experience I had had in October 2007, that he was real, that he lived, that all power given to him by the Father, and that he was coming again, and that it was easier for me to disbelieve my own existence than to disbelieve his. After my testimony, individuals stood up and bore their testimonies of what they knew of me. A throng surrounded me afterwards to encircle me with hugs and tears. I’ve never been permitted to bear my testimony in my ward since, but for me that was an eternal mercy.

In the past year, as the tide has turned nationally in relation to the issue of marriage for gay and lesbian couples, Church leaders have responded by, first, preaching a message of tolerance and love toward those who disagree with the Church accompanied by, second, an unequivocal rejection of same-sex marriage.

I have frequently heard the notion expressed that the Church must inexorably evolve toward acceptance of same-sex relationships; that Church leaders would quietly phase out high profile statements expressing opposition to the legalization of same-sex marriage; that the shifting tide of public opinion on this  issue would force Church leaders to reevaluate their position or risk losing a critical mass of Church members (particularly in the upcoming generation). Obviously, folks who were expecting that path forward have been disillusioned, at least for now.

Recent Church statements have not surprised, disillusioned or upset me. Unless our leaders receive a revelation revising our current understanding of the doctrine of Eternal Marriage, I’m not sure our leaders have any other choice than to do this. Since I personally have little interest in belonging to a Church not governed by revelation, ironically perhaps, recent statements reassure me that the Church operates in the way my testimony has taught me it should operate.

Still, the recent high profile statements in General Conference have had the overall effect of making it more awkward and uncomfortable than ever to be a gay married believing Latter-day Saint.

*****

There’s a temptation in my situation to resolve the conflict through the assumption that the Church will eventually receive light on the subject of homosexuality that will make better sense of my experiences and the experiences of so many others in the framework of eternal family.[4] I have found that I lose the Spirit when I succumb to the temptation to believe that I know more on this subject than those who have the keys to receive and reveal doctrine. I know that the Spirit is at work in my life, and I have a relationship with God, and I know what I am supposed to do, within the constraints of my particular circumstances. I accept the possibility that mine may be a lesser path than that of others who are strictly obedient to the current teachings of the Church in relation to marriage.[5] But I accept the assurances I’ve received from God that my present offering is accepted by Him, despite my faults and weaknesses.

I’ve looked for outward signs of God’s grace in my life. Shortly after returning to activity in the Church, I felt prompted to pray for the resolution of a problem that put my husband and our relationship in serious jeopardy. When he was four years old, his mother kidnapped him and went into hiding from the rest of his family, going under an assumed name. After she passed away in 1996, we discovered that he had never had a birth certificate, and were informed by an attorney that if he could not prove his citizenship, he was at risk to be incarcerated indefinitely. We worked for eight years trying to resolve this situation without success. I received a prompting from the Spirit early in 2006 that if I would pray for help with this situation, the Lord would help us resolve it. In 2007, even though repeated previous efforts to seek help from elected officials had been rebuffed, we felt prompted to approach our newly elected congressman, Keith Ellison. His office agreed to help, and asked us to provide copies of all the documents we had collected over the years attempting to establish Göran’s citizenship, with a summary of what we knew about his situation. Shortly after we did so, Congressman Ellison’s office located Göran’s birth certificate in Tennessee, and secured the state’s agreement to release the document to us.

I still remember the day we learned the news, ending a long nightmare of fear and uncertainty we had experienced in relation to his citizenship status and our ability to remain together as a couple. I felt an outpouring of the Spirit confirming that this was the answer to the prayers I had been offering for over a year on his behalf. I also felt a strong impression that this breakthrough was symbolic of a breakthrough we would someday receive in the eternal world in relation to our marital covenants with each other. The Spirit said to me: “Have faith.”

A series of blessings came into our lives in rapid succession after that. We became foster parents of a wonderful gay son later that year. (Our son Glen will soon be graduating from the University of Minnesota with a degree in urban studies and urban planning, and next month will be legally marrying his fiancé in our home state.) In early 2008, using information that had become available to us through the release of Göran’s birth certificate, we made contact with his birth family in Memphis, Tennessee, and he was reunited with his father, three half-siblings, his grandmother, his aunt, and a plethora of cousins, great aunts and uncles and other extended family, all of whom had been praying and searching for him some forty years. We met them in Memphis in a dramatic, tear-filled, laughter-filled reunion, one month after Göran and I were legally married in Riverside, California. All of these events made a deep impression in my mind and my heart as symbolic of blessings of family available in the eternal world, if we continued faithful.

Since then, we have also suffered challenges and setbacks that have humbled us and reminded us of our utter dependence on God. In August 2012, toward the end of our second foster care placement, I was involved in a bike accident that resulted in a severe head injury. I had a subdural hematoma that went undetected by my doctors for over six weeks, and that, according to my doctors, would have resulted in my death had it not been for the intervention of a member of my ward. I requested and received a priesthood blessing prior to my brain surgery, and have since made a full recovery, with no discernible mental impairment from the injury or the surgery.

Last year, a few months after I returned to work following post-surgery disability leave, my husband experienced a disturbing decline in health. He was diagnosed with kidney failure. Since July 2013, my husband has been on dialysis and is on the waiting list for a kidney transplant. In the past year my family has experienced a number of additional emotionally and physically difficult challenges which I won’t detail here.
 

In the midst of the trials and challenges of the past two years, I have on bad days wondered if I was somehow being punished. On good days, I view the challenges, like the blessings, through eyes of faith, and like Nephi I can say, “having seen many afflictions in the course of my days, nevertheless, having been highly favored of the Lord in all my days; yea, having had a great knowledge of the goodness and the mysteries of God,”[6] I bear testimony of my proceedings.

At the heart of my predicament is the question I think all people of faith must answer, though for me the question is particularly poignant. To what extent should I rely on internal versus external guides in order to answer the great questions about my life’s meaning and trajectory? Should I reject my own perceptions and spiritual experiences as too subjective, in favor of definitive statements of modern-day prophets and apostles about same-sex marriage? Should I dismiss teachings, no matter how ecclesiastically authoritative, that don’t make sense in my world? Is it possible to find in my life good fruit born of a good tree objectively manifesting God’s hand in my life and his blessings on my marriage? Or is my perception of good or bad fruit hopelessly indistinguishable from my presuppositions and subjectively constructed narratives?

The great temptation in my life has been to prematurely call the question, to resolve the problem quickly and easily in one direction or another. But I find that kind of resolution ultimately unsatisfying. There have been profound moments in my life when I have been forced to acknowledge, like Moses, “Now, for this cause I know that man is nothing, which thing I never had supposed.”[7]

It is better to be annihilated by the truth than to be saved by a lie. But if that rings true it is only because deep down inside we know that it is not us, not our true selves that the truth can annihilate, but only our ego, that false god in each of us. We know in the marrow of our bones that the truth will exalt and free the true us. Shouldn't we stake our salvation on that? But it takes patience to discern what is exalting, liberating truth, and what is masquerading as truth, what is our ego clamoring to be god.

My soul demands that the outward, external world align with and validate my inward, subjective world. Until the outward and the inward align, I am determined to dismiss neither, but to patiently work, listen, watch and wait.

*****

So what does that mean?

It first of all means abstaining from self-judgment, as I also abstain from judgment of others. It means acknowledging that God is the sole judge, of me as well as of all others. When I stand in judgment of others, I find myself less sure of my own standing before God.

I will not criticize or speak evil or put myself in the place of Church leaders, first of all because I find that I lose the Spirit when I do. But also because, I realize, it is from their lips that I look for my salvation to be declared, if there is salvation to be declared to me. At key moments in my voyage, when I have felt almost overwhelmed by the contradictions of my life, it has occurred to me that Christ, whose will is the Father's, had rather we sink or sail together than that we do either separately. So I abide with the Church, and find comfort in the abiding.

I dislike the idea that we should stay in the Church in order to change it. It assumes we know how the Church ought to change. In the past few months, there have been enough Mormons foundering on the shoals of that idea. I think it’s a terrible idea. We should stay in the Church because we find growth and joy and truth in it; and if we don’t, we should go somewhere else where we can find those things. That is healthy.

But I can say that if we find that growth and joy and truth, and if we do stay, the church will be different and better for our staying than if we left. And we will be different and better too. And I believe there is a place for every single one of us in the kingdom of God, if we have the love and humility to find the place Christ has prepared for us in it.

I love my husband Göran. I have loved him for twenty-two years as of our upcoming anniversary at the end of next week. In that time my love for him has only grown stronger, through every fight we have resolved and every challenge we have faced. It was a long, long time ago I realized I would give my life for him. What diminishes him diminishes me. My soul, body and spirit, cleaves to him. And I can honestly say that today, on this day, I love him more than I have on any other day that has preceded this. And I can honestly say that that love has always elevated me. It has always made me want to be, and has helped me to be, a better man.

I love God. I love his Church because I love Him. And I have found that this love elevates and exalts my soul, and makes me want to be more, to be better, to be like God. This love has made me see more clearly than any other the connections between me, my husband, our son, my parents, my siblings, all my brothers and sisters of every nation, all my brothers and sisters, human, animal and element; all creation.

I yearn for all those loves and connections to be eternal. I yearn to love in a way that is worthy of eternity.

Those are the pillars of my faith.

---

[1] Boyd K. Packer, "The Mantle is Far, Far Greater Than the Intellect," Address to the Fifth Annual CES Religious Educators' Symposium, 1981; see also Let Not Your Heart Be Troubled (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1991), 101-122; see also Boyd K. Packer, "'The Mantle is Far, Far Greater than the Intellect.'," Brigham Young University Studies 21 no. 3 (Summer 1981), 259–278.

[2] I credit Fawn Brodie at least in part with the renewal of my testimony of the prophet Joseph Smith. Though I found her narrative of Joseph Smith as a conscious, pious fraud who came to believe his own lies fascinating, data she presented in her own book convinced me that whatever the prophet’s failings might be, he was not a fraud.

[3]I thank Brian C. Hales for, in his three-volume study of Joseph Smith’s Polygamy (Greg Kofford Books, 2013), presenting a wealth of primary source materials and historiographical analysis. His perspectives on the Prophet’s character and on the place of polygamy in Mormon theology are much needed counterpoints in the literature.

[4] It’s tempting to assume that the Church has taken the position it has because our leaders haven’t yet asked God the question about homosexuality, that our Church leaders’ views on this subject are so colored by a thousand years of cultural homophobia that they can’t figure out how or why it would be necessary to ask such a question. Maybe. In Acts 10, Peter was shocked by the vision of the canopy of unclean animals that God commanded him to eat. He was shocked in Acts 11 to see the Spirit being poured out on uncircumcised Gentiles. The Church as a body was convulsed and divided by the implications of Cornelius’ baptism, resulting in the contentious Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15). Jewish Christians like Peter had  been raised from childhood to view the Levitical law as “a statute forever.” (See Exodus 28, 29, 30; Leviticus 6, 7, 10, 16, 17,  23, 24; Numbers 18, 19; and Deuteronomy 4, where the Lord repeatedly refers to Levitical statutes as “a statute for ever.”) Gentiles already had a mechanism  for joining the Church that required no new revelation. They could be circumcised and submit themselves to the law. Through Cornelius and through the vision of the unclean beasts, the Lord made it known that the Church was no longer bound by laws they had taken for granted to be eternal. Maybe the issue of homosexuality is similar, and it will take some dramatic act on the part of the Lord to open the Church’s eyes to a new paradigm. But maybe not.

[5] In 1995 I made a public, marital commitment to my husband Göran before family, friends and God. Maybe in so doing I was binding myself in the manner described in Numbers 30: “If a man vow a vow unto the Lord, or swear an oath to bind his soul with a bond; he shall not break his word, he shall do according to all that proceedeth out of his mouth….  Every vow… wherewith they have bound their souls, shall stand against [them]” (verses 2, 9). Perhaps that is the reason the Lord has made it clear to me that to leave my husband would be a sin, even if the end result is to restrict my eternal potential. I feel I have no objective basis to deny that possibility.

[6] 1 Nephi 1:1.

[7] Moses 1:10.

I Am Not Offended

I am not offended by the words people speak.

If their words are true, then I would be a wise man to listen to them and take them to heart, even if to do so causes inconvenience to me. In fact, the more inconvenient the truths, the wiser I would be to listen.

Inconvenience creates emotions like stress or anger or hurt. And those kinds of emotions cloud my ability to see truth. So if I hunger for truth I need to find a way to calm those emotions. I must try not to be offended.

If the words someone speaks are false, there is no power in them. I have no need to be offended. I would be wise to ignore them.

Spoken untruths may inconvenience me for a time, especially if they inspire others to act in a way that is harmful to me. But I cannot stop that from happening by being offended. I am better served by trusting that the truth is larger than words.

I'm not super human. I'm just me, a man, with all the mixture of weakness and nobility that implies. I do not know all things. I do not regard myself as better than any one else. I feel good will toward all, and would prefer that we wrestle together to come to an understanding of the truth, than that we make each other enemies because one or both of us takes offense.

So I am not offended, because my hunger for your fellowship and for the truth is greater than my fears.

*****

This morning, I woke up in my husband's arms just as the grey sunlight was starting to filter through our window shades. It was still very early, and he was sound asleep. He was clutching me tighter than usual, breathing heavily. In the background I could hear the hum of the dialysis machine he is connected to each night as we sleep. Life is fragile and precious.

My mind was filled with beautiful memories from the weekend. Beautiful sessions of conference that left me feeling inspired and deeply, deeply happy. Special promptings from the Spirit that filled me with hope and confidence, that I jotted into the little notebook I keep with my scriptures. A ward potluck in between Saturday sessions where I stuffed myself on Relief Society-produced delicacies, including the best collared greens I've ever had. A rare opportunity to bear my testimony. I love the Church. I know too deeply in my soul to ever deny it that the Church is true.

Sunday afternoon, a lot of people were upset by a couple of conference talks. I spent a lot of time on Facebook and on the phone. I was not -- I am not -- offended, either by what had upset people, nor by the fact that they were upset. But when I finally fell asleep after midnight, I was exhausted.

I woke up in my husband's arms filled with warmth. The Spirit was there in our room, luminescent almost, brighter than the filtered grey sunlight coming in through the shades. I felt deeply happy. As my husband clutched me, I realized how precious he is to me, what a gift our love is to us, what a gift is our mutual life, even with the disappointments, even with the difficulty, even with the dialysis machine humming in the background. It is our commitment to each other -- expressed in rituals and in legal documents hard fought for, but also expressed in the way his whole life intertwines with mine -- that gives everything in my life meaning and direction.

"I love you," I told him as I kissed him on the forehead while he slept on blissfully.

That truth is larger than words.

A Personal Note

Many of you may not know that I have not been on-line much in over a month, because of a very frightening personal health crisis. Unbeknownst to me or any of my doctors, my bike accident and concussion on August 21 resulted in a small subdural hematoma (bleeding in my brain).  The hematoma did not show up in the CT scan performed on me in the immediate aftermath of my bike accident.  So even though I appeared to be recovering well in the three weeks or so immediately after the accident, by early September I was beginning to experience increasingly frequent and severe headaches, and brief episodes of numbness in my left arm, my left leg, and in the left side of my face.  My doctor was baffled by the intermittancy of these symptoms, and did not recommend a course of action other than to just monitor it and let him know if it got worse.  Then, Sunday, September 30, while I was attending Fast and Testimony Meeting in my ward, the entire left side of my body went numb for about 20 minutes.  I was planning to call my doctor the next day.  But a brother in my ward who is a former EMT insisted I go immediately to the E.R.  As it turns out, this brother's advice literally saved my life.  I will always be grateful to my brother Matthew.

A new CT scan revealed a hematoma that had progressed to the point where only immediate brain surgery could relieve building pressure that would likely have killed me within the next twenty-four hours. After signing a waiver acknowledging the risks of 1) infection in the brain, 2) permanent neurological damage caused by drilling two nickel-sized holes into my skull, or 3) the possible need to remove as much as one third of my cranium, I submitted to this emergency procedure the following day, exactly one week short of my 49th birthday.  Göran took the day off work to be with me in the hospital.  I have been so grateful for my loving husband's presence and support through all of this.

After my doctors had revealed to me the nature of my condition, I called the brother who -- I now realized -- had saved my life.  I asked him to minister to me again, this time by coming to the hospital and giving me a priesthood blessing.  He arrived with a friend and former home teacher.  They laid their hands on my head and promised me, in the name of Jesus Christ, successful surgery and a speedy recovery.  I felt the Holy Spirit present, confirming that the blessing was true.

Throughout this frightening time, I experienced the presence of God in a way that I know he is real, and that he loves me deeply.  He was present with me as I was being rolled into the operating room.  As I slipped away into the darkness of anesthetic sleep, I felt his loving embrace, and his assurance that he would keep me safe.  Not safe in a merely proximal sense, but safe in the ultimate sense.  Safe in the sense that even if I died, I would be eternally cared for.  I was not afraid to die.  It was a remarkable experience.

I learned that I may not take my life or my intellectual capacities for granted.  God could take both these things away from me in an instant.  I belong to God, and if my life or my intellect are worth anything, it is because I have dedicated them to his service.

I learned that the Lord has yet a work for me to do, but that I can only accomplish it if I acknowledge his hand in everything.

Thank you to all you who have comforted and helped care for me through this ordeal.  The blessing I received through Brother Matthew has all come true.  It was a model surgery, and my doctors were surprised to observe that within four days of the surgery I had recovered sufficiently to be released from the hospital, with tests showing I had sustained zero to minimal neurological damage.  For a long time now, I have felt like the luckiest, most blessed person on the planet.

Far Between and Many Miles to Go

Kendall Wilcox is a gay Mormon who has been producing a documentary that asks the question: What does it mean to be homosexual and Mormon?  One of the most remarkable aspects of this documentary is its very open-ended approach to this question.  On the Far Between website, Kendall has posted dozens of interviews with gay and bisexual Mormons, each of whom is invited to answer the question, "What does it mean to be homosexual and Mormon?"  Kendall has gone out of his way to include folks with dramatically different perspectives, from individuals who have remained active in the LDS Church and have chosen to marry a member of the opposite sex, to those who have embraced their homosexuality and have definitively cut their ties to the Church, and many others in between.  And the results, as they are unfolding on the web site are incredibly moving and quite amazing.

Kendall's achievement so far is that much more remarkable, when you consider the difficulty of even finding the right language to ask the central question of the film.  Every element of that question is disputed.  Am I "homosexual" or "same-sex-attracted (SSA)" or "gay"?  Can I even be considered "Mormon" if I am excommunicated or have resigned from the Church?  Is a "Mormon" defined culturally, or in terms of the beliefs a person holds, or ecclesiastically in terms of membership status?  If you ask the question, "What does it mean to be gay and Mormon?" you will alienate a major segment of the community that Kendall was trying to reach, because they reject the term "gay."  If you ask the question, "What does it mean to be SSA and Mormon?" you alienate a different major segment.  So in the actual interviews, Kendall has opted for the question: "What does it mean to be homosexual and Mormon?" (using a term that almost no one relates to), with a follow-up clarification of "however you choose to define any part of that question."

One of the themes that emerges in almost all of the interviews is that that intersection of Mormon-ness (however defined) and homosexuality (however defined!) creates a profound emotional/social/spiritual crisis for those who find themselves there.  (I love that the Far Between logo consists of two barely intersecting circles!)  The stories are painful, precisely because -- at least at first -- it seems literally almost impossible to bring those things together.  The stories are moving because they demonstrate human resiliency in the ways individuals navigate this intersection.  Collectively, a very interesting picture begins to emerge as you see the myriad of different solutions to the problem of being homosexual/gay/SSA and Mormon that people find.

And for me, this speaks volumes to Kendall's achievement as the film's producer.  Kendall is both "homosexual" and "Mormon," so he has (one presumes) experienced something of the anguish that is so evident in the stories of the many folks he's interviewed.  Kendall himself is fairly open about the fact that the urgency of finding a very personal resolution to the contradictions is what drives this project.  This film is his way of going forward, his way of trying to figure out what to make of all this.  But I think Kendall's project will succeed where other similar projects have failed, because of the extraordinary patience with which Kendall pursues this.  He hasn't, as far as I can tell, leaped to any conclusions.  He's not pushing any sort of agenda, apart from bringing as many different voices as possible into the discussion.  His openness is his agenda.

I hope Ty Mansfield doesn't mind my sharing the fact that the evening before Kendall was scheduled to arrive at his home for an interview with him and his wife, I got an urgent call from him, asking me to tell him everything I knew about Kendall Wilcox.  He was understandably nervous about how his marriage might be portrayed in this kind of documentary.  There are risks involved in sharing, especially when you're not sure of the agenda of the person you're sharing with.  As far as I can tell from the interviews that have been posted, Kendall has done a good job of nurturing the kind of trust that is necessary for something like this to unfold.  Part I of his interview with Ty was posted here.

A film of this nature has the virtue of attracting anyone who wishes to be heard -- or the vice of attracting anyone who wants a soapbox or a bully pulpit.  Kendall has done a remarkable job of framing each story as "a" story, one angle, one perspective, on a multifaceted and complex problem.  So one senses that the film will not, in the end, validate any one path over another.  And therefore the final product has the potential of alienating many and pleasing none.  Though it also has the potential of illuminating the issues more profoundly than any other treatment of this subject before ever possibly could.  And that latter potential is worth all the risks of engaging in this kind of project.

I had a fuller appreciation of the risks and the potential of this project when yesterday I finally watched part II of Kendall's interview with Wilum.  I am now embarrassed to admit that it took me a long time to get around to actually listening to the interviews with Wilum, because one look at the images and I thought I knew everything I needed to know about him: "Angry gay ex-Mormon."  My prejudice couldn't have been more misleading.  Every assumption I made about him was completely wrong.  (Except the one about him being gay!)

Will folks look at this film project in its entirety, and do the same thing I did in relation to Wilum's interview?  Will people just assume they know everything they need to know about a film that asks a hotly contested question like "What does it mean to be both homosexual and Mormon?"  Many people most assuredly will...  But I think, assuming the project is successfully brought to completion, the end product will stand the test of time.

Part I of my own interview with Kendall was recently posted here.  The interview was conducted just after the closing devotional held at the Kirtland, OH Affirmation convention last September.  I was still feeling a bit buzzed from the spiritual high I had experienced that morning, first in the testimony meeting and then in the devotional that came right after.  I remember feeling a bit scattered during the interview itself, though actually seeing it, I look and sound less incoherent than I remember! 

Watching it now, seeing my story intersected with the very different stories of so many others, I am left both with a sense of gratitude and of vulnerability.  I have a greater appreciation of, and hopefulness about how all of our stories seem to be unfolding toward some wonderful ending.  And I'm not just talking about the ending of this film project!

The Temple, Revisited

Yesterday, a non-Mormon friend of mine asked me: "I wonder if you could explain to me why Mormons don't allow non-Mormons into their temples? There must be some kind of theology behind it... I just find it kind of unusual, since where I go to church (the Episcopal Church) everyone is allowed to come into the church."

I explained to her that actually Mormons also have meeting houses where we gather for worship every Sunday, and that everyone is allowed to come into those meeting houses and join us for worship if they wish. But the temples were special.

"Well," she continued, "I'm still curious what the theology is behind not allowing everybody into the temple, because you were saying to me that you were not allowed to go into the temple."

I really liked the way she posed this question. I thought it was one of the most respectful ways I've ever heard this question asked. Because in acknowledging that "there must be some kind of theology" behind it, she was in essence saying, "Clearly Mormons have a good reason behind this rule, and I would really appreciate if you could explain it to me."

But I also found that the way she posed this question required me to think more deeply about this question. It wasn't enough to explain simply that this was a rule set by the Church. She wanted to understand the "theology" behind it.

My stab at explaining this to her was to say, "Well, Mormons regard the temple as one of the most sacred places on earth. One of the reasons we build temples is because we expect that these are places where the Lord can literally come to visit us."

Reflecting on my experience at the temple this past Friday night, I added, "When I was just recently at the temple, I can say that I literally felt Christ's presence there, even just in the waiting area outside the temple proper. I could feel his presence and his love and his embrace there."

"Because temples are so sacred, Mormons feel that only those who are making sincere efforts to follow Jesus Christ should enter. We don't have to be perfect, but we need to be obeying at least all the major commandments as a sign that we are loyal to him and want to follow him." She asked a few more questions about the mechanics of how that worked, so I explained the system of obtaining and regularly renewing temple recommends.

I guess I was unprepared for how powerful an experience it actually would be to visit the temple last Friday as part of my ward's temple night. The experience has continued to dwell with me throughout the entire weekend and into this morning. I've found myself revisiting the temple in my mind, and longing to go back. As we did some centering and meditation exercises this morning as part of my daily yoga, I found myself there again in my mind/heart/soul.

My sense of the presence of Christ there was so powerful. And it wasn't until this morning that I was able to put my finger on an adequate analogy to describe exactly how I experienced that presence. When I go to the doctor for my routine annual physical, I enter a kind of passive state. The doctor listens to my heart, he tests my reflexes, he asks me to cough. I do what the doctor asks, but in a passive state, allowing him to examine and determine the level of my physical health. I don't try to diagnose myself; I'm not in a position to do that. The doctor does it for me. I trust the doctor implicitly, and I do what he asks me to do for my own well being.

That feeling of trust is the best analogy I can imagine of how it felt to me to be there at the temple. I felt Christ's superabundant love for me, and I felt his power and his care for me. And I had no desire to do anything but to rest in it, and let it work in me. It was slightly unsettling to let go of any desire to evaluate myself, or make my own determinations as to what I need in order to be spiritually healthy. But I felt OK with that, because the tremendous peace and love of Christ that I felt there persuaded me that he knows my best interests, and how best to heal me and care for me, and if I trust him and let him, all will be well. Christ is my true physician, not just the caretaker of my body, but of my whole soul: body, mind and spirit.

I am so grateful for this. I never imagined it possible to feel the things I felt there and to experience the things I experienced. This was an unexpected gift, and I've found in my prayers since, I could only express tearful gratitude for the great love my Heavenly Father and my older brother Jesus Christ have for me.

I can't believe that this gift was given to me.

Temple Attendance

This past Sunday was our Stake Conference.  As always, I was grateful to be able to attend; grateful for friends who gave me a ride, and friends who were there to be my surrogate Church family.  As is often the case, there was at least some discomfort.  Though I guess I've come to see the discomfort as a friend.  It is there to help me to avoid slipping into complacency or taking things for granted.

Our temple president spoke about covenants, which he defined (he said, according to the "Greek definition") as a strong commitment through which we come to resemble the one with whom we have made the commitment.  I reflected on the attributes of Christ: patience, compassion, sacrifice.  I reflected on how I might cultivate those attributes in myself; and on what doing so would reflect about the nature of my relationship with God.

Our mission president spoke, and invited every member of the Stake to "call yourself on a mission."  I reflected on my testimony; how it is the greatest gift that I have, and how it is the greatest gift I can share.

Those reflections filled me -- and fill me -- with peace and gratitude.

I found our Stake President's remarks, however, of greatest direct relevance to my own personal situation.  He began with an analogy between physical health and spiritual health (he used his efforts to monitor his cholesterol as an example).  He then asked us a series of questions, inviting us to ask these questions of ourselves as a way of monitoring our spiritual health.  "Do you know God and Christ and do you listen to the Spirit?" was the first question.  "Do you sustain the prophets and apostles?" which, he clarified, meant to listen to and apply their teachings in our lives.  "Do you keep yourself pure and clean of the world?"  "Do you strive to keep the covenants you've made?"  He broke it out for us: being open and honest; practicing contrition and repentance; obeying the Word of Wisdom; and so on.  This was all basically a reiteration of the temple president's message.

He reminded us that these were all basically temple worthiness questions, and he followed this series of questions with an admonition: Go to the temple frequently, because the temple is a place where you can find healing and revelation.

I determined to go to the temple.  I know I can't go inside the temple.  As long as I remain committed to my spouse, I won't be able to be baptized or receive a recommend.  But I can at least go to the temple.  I can pray and seek healing and revelation outside its walls if I can't inside.

He ended his talk with two more questions: "Are you willing to stand as a witness of Christ?"  (He quoted Mosiah 18: 8-9.)  And, "Are you willing to be an example?"  And he followed those two questions by reiterating our mission president's message with the admonition: "Share the Gospel."

*****

The next morning, I knew I wanted to go to the temple that day.  I texted a friend of mine, a member of my family home evening group.  I told him what I wanted to do, and asked him if he would join me.  Synchronicity!  S. too had gone to his Stake Conference the previous day -- in the nearby St. Paul Stake.  And he had had a similar revelation.  Like me, he currently does not have a temple recommend.  Unlike me, he is currently a member of the Church, and has been working with his bishop and is confident of his ability to get a recommend soon.  But as of yesterday, neither of us could enter the temple.  But we both wanted to go to the temple.

So I rented an "hour car" around lunch time, and picked S. up from work.  We brought sack lunches with us.  When we arrived at the temple, there was no one there.  No cars in the parking lot.  There was a person outside the temple, cleaning the windows.  I parked the car so we could look at the temple while we ate.  My eyes were drawn to the gleaming statue of the Angel Moroni on the steeple.  We prayed together and we talked.  After we had finished eating, we got out of the car and walked around the temple.  The air was cool -- the forecast had predicted snow flurries, though we never got them.  But it wasn't too cool for us to sit down on a stone bench outside the temple and share our testimonies of Jesus Christ and of his Church with one another.

*****

I have a little pocket charm.  Göran bought it for me years ago as a souvenir from a trip he made to northern Minnesota.  It's a little clear glass sun symbol that shimmers and reflects rainbow colors in the sunlight.  I like to carry it around with me as a reminder of Göran's love for me, but also as a reminder of the Kingdom of glory that is likened to the glory of the sun.  Its translucence reminds me of how I want to be a channel of light myself; how I want my soul to be pure and clean so that the light of Christ can shine through it.

The temple is like that to me as well.  It is a place where I can go and be reminded of what I yearn for, and what I want to be.  It is a kind of touchstone to me.  I want to go there often.

It was such a blessing to be able to worship last September inside the Kirtland Temple.  I look forward to the time when I can worship inside other temples of the Restoration as well.  But for now, I was grateful for the presence of the temple -- a place that has been consecrated by the power of God, and dedicated to the building of God's kingdom -- where I could go to be inspired and be reminded and feel the Spirit and have my testimony strengthened.

*****

Yesterday morning, before deciding I was going to go to the temple, I began reading the Gospel of Matthew.  I was fascinated by the genealogy presented in verses 1-17.  There are a lot of very interesting things about that genealogy (the fact that it is a catalog of sinners as well as saints, not the least interesting of them).  But what interested me most that particular morning was the fact that Matthew presented the genealogy not of Mary but of Joseph.  Matthew goes on to emphasize in the ensuing narrative that Joseph is not Jesus' father by blood lineage.  But Joseph's genealogy is presented as "the book of the generation of Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham".
In the Annotated Scholar's Version of Matthew, there's a note appended to verse 25, emphasizing that when Joseph gave the name "Jesus" to the child (in accordance with angelic instructions), the "act of naming the child is tantamount to adoption, claiming the child as his own.  Thus, Jesus is the legal son of Joseph."

This somehow gave me hope.  It reminded me that in the Kingdom of God, blood does not make a family.  Faith and action do.

So I prayed for my family at the temple, as I did the first time I visited the temple a few years ago, with Göran and Glen.

*****


My testimony doesn't depend on things in my life being perfect.  It doesn't depend on the world being a perfect place to live.  It doesn't depend on the Church or its members or leaders being perfect.  It certainly doesn't depend on me being perfect.

When our family home evening group met last month, I think I felt inspired to say something along the lines of, "The Church can only be as perfect as its most imperfect member."  And my brothers both giggled a bit at that saying, and J. said, "Well, knowing myself, that's not very perfect."  And S. and I both echoed his sentiment with hearty Amens in relation to ourselves.  If we desire to be forgiven, we must forgive.  Or, in order to receive forgiveness, we must cultivate an awareness of our need to be forgiven.  As soon as we are aware of our own sins, the need to judge dissipates, and the hunger for communion increases.


My testimony is an invisible touchstone, like my pocket sun charm, like the temple, pointing me in the right direction.  Pointing me in the direction of faith and repentance, hope and steadfastness, love and labor.

The temple is at its best a symbol of the perfection of the Kingdom, in advance of our actual perfection.  Patience and love are the virtues that will enable us to eventually realize that perfection.

Mormon Expressions Interview with Steven Fehr

Listen to this podcast.

Steven, this was a beautiful interview, with a beautiful testimony, and some fantastic insights. Thank you!

Practice Spirit, Do Justice

The NGLTF-sponsored National Conference on LGBT Equality -- "Creating Change" -- was in Minneapolis this past week. I'd heard a lot about Creating Change. I remember when this conference was held in Minneapolis the last time -- in 1990. A few weeks ago I received the Affirmation newsletter inviting individuals to take advantage of a group rate by joining the Affirmation delegation, and I realized it might never be easier or cheaper for me to attend this conference again. So I took two vacation days, and headed to the downtown Hilton bright and early this past Thursday morning.

I'm not entirely sure what I expected. I will admit I was a little apprehensive. Typical reactions from more secular folks in the GLBT community to my being both gay and a believing Mormon run the gamut from pitying me to seeing me as an oddity to condemning me as a traitor. The part of the conference I was most interested in was the "Practice Spirit, Do Justice" track, organized in part by a personal friend of mine, Rebecca Voelkel, who happens to be the Director of the "Institute for Welcoming Resources," an NGLTF-sponsored program that works with a variety of Churches on trying to improve the religious climate for GLBT folks. I know Rebecca well; I am very familiar with the work that she does. I could have known, based on what I know of her, that I had nothing to worry about. Still I was apprehensive.

That apprehension gradually melted away over the course of my first day at the conference. When I arrived, Rebecca was busy readying the ballroom space where the opening ceremony for the "Practice Spirit, Do Justice" portion of the conference was taking place. As soon as she saw me, she dropped what she was doing to come give me a warm welcome hug. She apologized for not responding to my last email to her. A local church had been considering airing and having a discussion about 8: The Mormon Proposition, and Rebecca had wanted to know if I would be willing to participate. I had told her that I didn't like 8, that I felt it was marred by reliance on stereotypically anti-Mormon tropes, that I (and other gay Mormons) had "wanted a film that might have the possibility of opening up dialog between gay and straight Mormons, and the general feeling [was that 8 would] shut it down." Rebecca told me she had been too busy organizing the conference to reply to my email, but she had passed my concerns on to the church in question.

I soon learned that most of the conference participants were people of faith like myself, of many different faith backgrounds. Gradually, I got the sense that other conference participants actually honored the fact that I wanted to be a Mormon. They did not judge me or look at me as strange; they did not pity me. They recognized that I find strength and joy in my testimony and in my faith. They understood that the best way for me to be centered and healthy as a gay man is for me to be a whole, complete human being, which includes nurturing my relationship with God and with the community of faith of my choice.

By the end of the first day I found that far from feeling alienated because of my religion, I was being invited to draw on the deep wellsprings of my religion to help me understand and come to terms with the profound injustices we live with in this world. A focus of much of the conference was racial and economic justice, with a particular focus on the demand to restore Native American communities and rights. My mind was naturally drawn to passages I've been reading recently in the Book of Mormon warning of the judgments that will come upon the Gentiles if they fail to repent of their oppression of the original inhabitants of this land, and if they fail to restore them to their rightful place (in 3 Nephi 21); and of the general Book of Mormon witness against the dangers of economic inequality and the pride that results from it; and about the judgments that will come upon the United States if they continue "to be lifted up in the pride of their hearts above all nations, and above all the people of the whole earth, and ... be filled with all manner of lyings, and of deceits, and of mischiefs, and all manner of hypocrisy..." (3 Nephi 16: 10).

Almost every session I attended was also attended by at least one or two members of Affirmation. Thursday evening, I met with members of the Affirmation executive committee just to chat and get acquainted. We had lunch together on Friday and Saturday. Over time, I got to hear bits and pieces of individuals' stories. Saturday George Cole was telling me about the Affirmation convention planned to take place in Cleveland, Ohio. Some of the conference events will be taking place in the Kirtland Temple. George mentioned off-handedly that a number of members would likely sit out the conference this year, because of this. When I asked him why, he said that for some members it was too painful to participate in a conference so explicitly connected to Mormon history and faith.

I could relate to this. Several months after my near suicide, I remember opening an American history text book and having a panic attack just from seeing a picture of Brigham Young. Through the course of my discussion with George, and through the course of other similar conversations I had over the course of the conference, I found myself grieving the deep alienation that so many gay and lesbian Latter-day Saints have experienced from their church, from the community that should have been a safe haven, that should have protected them.

At night I found myself earnestly praying for the Spirit to be poured out on us, to heal the wounds, to comfort us, to teach us, to reassure us of God's great love for us. The Spirit was poured out on me this morning. I wept all morning: as I prayed, as I read my scriptures, as I showered, as I dressed. Göran came with me to the closing worship service at the conference. David Melson, Director of Affirmation, was there. He gave me a hug, and asked me how the conference had been for me, and I just wept. Literally cried on his shoulder. Other Affirmation folks were there, Joshua, Mary, Robert. I sat down. We were all sitting together. I felt so happy being there with them, so grateful.

At the beginning of the service, we were invited to place a symbol of our faith on a table at the front of the meeting space. I placed the Book of Mormon on the table. There was a point in the worship service where we were invited to sit in silence, Quaker style, and then share words if we felt so inspired. David stood up and spoke of his hunger for a better world, of his desire for justice, for the poor, for those who have been marginalized and oppressed. I stood up and basically bore my testimony. I mentioned that today was fast and testimony Sunday in LDS churches. I explained that this is a day when we refrain from eating and give the money we would have spent to feed ourselves to those who are without. This is a time when Mormons also sit in silence, and wait for the Spirit to move them to stand up and bear witness of what they know.

I spoke of my love for the Church, and my testimony of the Church. I pointed to the Book of Mormon I had placed on the table, and spoke of the truths that that book had taught me, and how it had inspired me with a hunger for justice, with an understanding of how the Lord will hold us accountable for pride, how it calls us to repentance and faith and humility and love. And then I spoke of how I have been grieving this week: grieving for the pain of my fellow LDS gay men and lesbians, those with whom I was sitting there. I spoke of my grief over the pain that kept so many of us away from the Church. I spoke of my grief over the fact that I could bear my testimony here among strangers, but not in my own community. Not among those whom I love and claim as my own. And so I asked for the prayers of these strangers for me, for us, for those of us who are still grieving.

Many individuals came to me afterwards. I received hand clasps, hugs, kisses, blessings. An elderly man came to me and asked if he could bless me, and then reminded me that Christ blesses those who grieve, those who mourn. I was grateful and moved by the responses. I was most grateful to Robert, part of the Affirmation delegation, who like me had come to the worship service that morning fasting, who had wept during my testimony. I was grateful for more hugs and expressions of love from David and Joshua. I was grateful that Göran had been there to hear my testimony, and had lovingly held my hand and been quietly supportive through it.

I was grateful that none of the responses of those who came to me involved the least hint of pity. There was no suggestion breathed by anyone in that room that the appropriate response to my grief should have been simply to leave the Church, to stop believing in it, to pack up and move on. Not the slightest suggestion that someone else's faith must somehow be superior to mine because there was more place for them in theirs than there was for me in mine. One woman said she wished there were something she could do. I told her I had already received as much of a gift from this group of people as I needed: acknowledgment of my right to this journey, and a willingness to work with me in those aspects of our struggles for justice and mercy that we shared in common.

Though there were more activities after the ecumenical service, that was the end of the conference for me. Göran and I left together. I felt some of the same wistfulness I felt last summer after leaving Utah. But with a greater sense of urgency.

In at the Gate

The baptism of my friend Mary on Saturday was incredible. I actually had the kind of mountaintop spiritual experience there that left me looking down at my day-to-day problems and feeling like they really aren't problems after all. It left me feeling like most of the things I worry about and wrestle with just don't even register much in the light of God's love.

I got to see my friend Mary transformed. I've watched her go through so much pain and doubt and anguish of soul, but Saturday there was just such a peace and assurance about her. I saw calm and light and confidence. After all the wrestling, she finally knew this was the right thing to do, and she was doing it. She stood there literally like an angel. I was astonished.

And the Spirit there was so powerful and so pure. I had envisioned this event for a long time (from the first time I met Mary), and had always imagined that I would weep to see my friend take this step. But the only way I can describe the baptism Saturday is to say that the Spirit was so clear and so strong and so resplendent, there was no room for weeping. I think I finally understand what it means in the Book of Revelation when it says that in the Celestial Kingdom, Christ shall wipe away all our tears. It was joy beyond tears. I just sat there and glowed. I tried to describe it in an email I sent Mary yesterday, and the best I could say was that it was like being filled with light, from the bottoms of my heels to the top of my head.

There were tears though, later... As soon as the service ended, Mary turned around to give me a hug. And then the tears were like a waterfall. I actually sobbed, great, big, billowy sobs. It was embarrassing, actually -- I almost wanted to leave. I so wanted what she now had. I wanted to go in at the gate, as she just had. I felt so alone, still outside.

Mary knew what I was feeling, without me saying a word. She whispered into my ear: "I won't leave you behind." I am so thankful for Mary.

I know what is most valuable in life. It is to be in the presence of God, to be filled with God's pure light and love. I understand that we can only see what we are. And to become, we must pass through this vale of tears. So let us continue on...

Does God Really Care Where I Lost My House Keys?

OK, everybody at some time or another has sat through a testimony meeting where someone shares the experience of having lost something small but important, like house keys or car keys or whatever. And then they prayed and asked God for help to find whatever it is they lost, and then sure enough, no sooner than they have finished their prayer, an idea pops into their head and they investigate, and, sure enough, they find the lost item. A miracle! God helped them find their keys!

Now, I've always regarded these stories with a bit of skepticism for a number of reasons. First of all, I've always imagined that in the range of things that the Almighty concerns himself about, finding a set of lost keys can't possibly rate very highly. I mean, my spouse gets peeved at me if, every time I lose something, I ask him, as if he's supposed to keep track of all my little junk. Wouldn't God similarly expect me to organize my personal affairs so that I can keep track of where my keys are?

Second, it presents the same theological problem that every "answered" prayer for some physical, material blessing does. Why would God help me find a pair of keys, but let some child die of an incurable disease?

OK, so I admit I'm a skeptic.

Yet, Saturday, Göran and I were out snowshoeing with a new foreign exchange student who arrived Thursday and will be staying with us until early June of next year. While goofing around and making a snow angel, our student lost his cell phone in the snow. He didn't become aware that he had lost it until about a half-hour or so later after we arrived back at the house.

I felt terrible for him, so I volunteered to run back to the spot where the snow-angel-making activity had occurred and search for the phone. I arrived at the spot, but there was no cell phone in sight. Snow was coming down thick and heavy. I searched everywhere. I even started brushing away snow and digging around in spots where the phone might likely have fallen, to no avail. And after wandering around and digging and searching for several minutes, I was on the verge of admitting defeat and heading back home to deliver the bad news.

But just before leaving, it occurred to me to pray and ask God for help with this.

I know, right?

I mean, even as I was uttering the prayer in my mind, I thought, this can't possibly work. But, wouldn't you know it, no sooner had I calmed my heart, taken a deep breath, and asked for help, than I noticed a little patch of snow that was slightly darker than the snow around it. Just an ever so slightly darker shade of blue. I went straight to the spot and dug. The cell phone was there, it had slid into the snow length-wise and was buried quite deep. Unlikely I ever would have found it just lightly brushing snow away. I had to dig for it. But it was right there, and in perfectly good working condition.

So now my dilemma. Was this just a coincidence? And was it wrong to be grateful for God's help, if this was just a coincidence? Would God just be annoyed by my prayers of thanksgiving for something so trivial? Is it possible that this "miracle" might actually even be a disservice to our young exchange student friend, on the grounds that my success won't teach him to be more careful with his stuff the next time?

I don't know. Truth is, though, I was very thankful. So I uttered a prayer of thanksgiving as I slipped it into the warmth and security of my pocket. And when I got back, Farzad was thankful too. Extremely thankful! He couldn't stop thanking me.

So I'm not sure what the lesson is of this. But if it is possible to make theological sense of something like this, I suppose it is that all things are in God's hands, and I am grateful for all things. And I know that the greatness or triviality of a blessing or a miracle is relative. To a kid who's five thousand miles from home, a cell phone and the capability to stay in touch with mom and dad can be a big deal. And I don't know why things work the way they do. It breaks my heart beyond words to think of children starving and dying, and prayers for them going unanswered. I can't say I understand those things. But I am grateful for the good!

Full of Light

The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. (Matt. 6: 22)

I knew I had to go to Church today. I've actually been hungering to go all week. I've known that Church was where I needed to be today.

The sister giving the opening prayer quite unexpectedly started to weep, as she prayed for those in the Church who are struggling or in pain. I wept through the prayer, and a good part of the Sacrament Meeting. But the Spirit was present there unlike any presence I've ever felt. It was like the chapel was just filled with the most pure, white light, and this incredible clarity and warmth. I half expected Christ to appear above the podium. Tears were streaming down my cheeks during the passing of the sacrament, but I felt so incredibly calm and happy. And the Spirit said to me very clearly and unequivocally, You are a part of my Church.

Never have I had such a powerful experience at Church of being totally enveloped in God's loving embrace. I kept looking around me, trying to see if other members were feeling what I was feeling, to see if they were aware that there was something very, very special happening. There were some incredible testimonies born, but they were nothing compared with the almost electric presence I felt.

The Spirit bore witness to me of so many incredible things this morning, but the most powerful witness was just that Christ has set us free from the sin, darkness, and despair that reign in this world. Another powerful witness came to me as I simply let myself be immersed in the sheer gratitude and joy I felt about that, and it was that this is Christ's Church. This is the only Church that acts with Christ's full authority and has a true and complete understanding of his doctrine. And so many of the things that I stress and worry about, I needed to just set aside so I can partake fully in the blessings that having his Church here on earth can offer us. I was so incredibly grateful to be there, so glad that I hadn't let anything hinder me from coming, so glad that I had paid attention to that urgent sense that I had deep down inside that Church was the place where I needed to be this morning.

It almost killed me not to be able to stand up and bear my testimony. I so wanted to just get up and bear witness of what I was feeling, what I was experiencing right then and right there, to ask the others if they realized how lucky they were, how blessed!

The entire morning, a portion of that presence lingered, in Sunday School and Priesthood. When the meetings ended, I didn't want to leave. But I had to hurry home because I had to get our Aunt Dottie (visiting this past week from Memphis) back to the airport.

I have been thinking about this experience all day since, wondering about its significance. And the scripture that comes closest to making sense of it to me is this one about our eye and our body. There was a lot I had to let go of to go to Church this morning, a lot I needed to let go to even begin to approach God there.

The pain we feel, the sadness, the craziness purifies us. It helps us to define ourselves by forcing us to choose what is most important to us. And if we can find it in ourselves to turn to the light, we can be filled with it.

We become what we see.