A good friend emailed me this week:

I heard something on the news about Mormons marching in the gay pride parade this year?  What’s that about?

And I responded:

A few Mormons who actually “support” equality are trying to make a statement, but this is not an officially-sanctioned activity, by any stretch of the imagination.

They still think that “god loves the sinner, not the sin” so think it’s okay to be a practicing (e.g. active) Mormon — as long as you also practice celibacy the rest of your life.

No thanks.

Here is a LINK to the Salt Lake Tribune article.

ABC-4 reported this:

“What we’re trying to do is say we welcome you.  We want you to be part of our congregation.  We want you to feel safe in our pews,” Munson said.

She is also sending a clear message to other Latter-day Saints.  “We want people in wards all over the world to see us and say these folks are just like me,” said Munson.

The temple going, tithing paying, faithful who say they believe President Thomas S. Monson is a prophet of God; want to share a message.  “We have been getting messages from our church leaders about reaching out with love, about never supporting bulling [sic], about being loving and kind to LGBT people,” said Munson.

Latter-day Saints only support marriage between a man and woman, but they also say they love those who support same sex marriage.  Jay Vann who is an active Latter-day Saint from Murray is thrilled about Latter-day Saints joining the gay pride parade.

“By marching in the parade it doesn’t mean that we have to move from our stance whether it’s right or wrong, but these are our brothers and sisters these are our friends our cousin [sic]. I think by marching with them I think what were saying is they deserve to be treated like human beings,” Vann said. [emphasis mine]

And of course, The Onion has an “American Voices” take, which is probably more accurate than is being reported in the mainstream media.

My honey’s parents spent the night with us and just left to fly to LAX, where they will meet other family members for a cruise to Vancouver, BC. We were invited, but with my travel schedule (or lack of one) lately, it’s been kind of hard to make any plans.

I was in Minneapolis on Thursday and Friday and got to have dinner with my brother and his family. Always fun.

I’m heading back to Brazil this week, arriving Saturday. This will make six trips to/from Brazil since mid-January (in 14 weeks). In sheer distance traveled, I will have done the equivalent of circumnavigating the globe four times.

My boss on Friday suggested that if I wanted to move to Brazil, she suspected that the company would support it. My honey was not thrilled, but logistically, I could probably do it for a year or so. He said, “You need to at least be home for our 25th anniversary” (in March 2013).

I guess we’ll see how serious everyone really is. I suggested that perhaps a week-long trip once a month to Brazil might suffice….

Today is the first day of our 2012 spring and the weather has turned lovely, even though it snowed again overnight. Recently, we have had a slate of 70 degree days, followed by two or three of snow and blustery winds, followed by more warm days. Odd stuff this year.

I returned from my latest trip to Brazil (and third this year) on Friday and my honey and I celebrated our 24th anniversary on Saturday with a quiet day of just spending time together. We have now officially been a couple for half of his lifespan (and just less than half of mine). It is hard to imagine how time has gone by so fast and it seems to speed up even more year after year.

I look forward to many more years together and am very happy with the decisions in my life that have lead to this moment with this person.

The Salt Lake Tribune published an article over the weekend that detailed an LGBT event for LDS-oriented people. Apparently one self-invited speaker–Bishop Kevin Kloosterman–gave an inspiring talk that the Trib has titled “Mormon bishop says church responsible for gays’ emotional wounds“.

Some commentators are saying that the Trib is making too much of this and has missed the gist of his comments. To those, I submit a transcript of his remarks.

For me, these were the most confirming:

And as I read these stories and as I learned more about these issues, I began to see the emotional wounds and the scars that many of you still have today. And I seem to ask the question, “Where did you get these wounds?” and unfortunately the answer was, “In the house of my friends.”

A rather elegant defense of “gay marriage” (when did it stop just being “marriage”?) by a “Heterosexual, Married, North Carolinian Father Of Three”, whose state is marshaling voters to define marriage as between a man and a woman can be found at this LINK.

One erudite quote:

LGBT people are citizens. I have friends (some of whom were married in other states years ago) who love each other as dearly as I love my own wife (and who have been committed to each other for just as long). It pains me to know that there are people who reject the validity of these relationships, and who wish to deny these couples the same benefits that other married couples are afforded. These committed, same-sex couples are North Carolinians. They contribute to the economy, they pay taxes, and they certainly do not deserve to be treated as second-class citizens by anyone. Just as it is hard to believe that we once denied marriage rights to interracial couples, or voting rights to women and African-Americans, we will look back upon this time with the same disbelief and shame.

The Salt Lake Tribune published an interesting article by Peggy Fletcher Stack that compares LDS founder (and polygamist) Joseph Smith with FLDS leader (and polygamist) Warren Jeffs and questions why the LDS population generally reveres the one and is horrified by the other.

So what are the differences between the two that make one a religious “genius,” as literary critic Harold Bloom described Smith, and the other a sexual predator and felon?

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A married LDS couple with whom we work invited us to the wedding reception of their son the other night.

Now, I want to note here that I am not a big fan of being asked to celebrate (e.g. contribute financially or gift wise or in most cases, even attend) something in which I can not legally partake. Also note that we had never actually met the couple, but I acquiesced to attending because I like and respect the parents.

Like any social being, I can show up and smile and make witticisms and be my normal charming self, but I personally begin to bristle when asked to swallow my pride and ignore the fact that my 23-year relationship would not only be unacknowledged by this particular group, it is essentially considered immoral, if not illegal by many of them.

We arrived at the evening gathering to the sight of what appeared to be an entire LDS ward plopped into the backyard: Small children, babies, older people, young couples, singles. A multi-million-dollar building overhead and industrial carpeting underfoot and we could have been in any LDS chapel in the world (except for the exceedingly “white and delightsome”-ness of the prevalent skin tones).

My honey always makes me do the writing whenever faced with a joint task, so I signed the guestbook, “At least yours is legal. Best wishes….”

I felt much better.

Our brothers and sisters in New York were able to legally marry today.

LINK

In response to an online treatise on gay Mormons and how the church deals (or not) with them, a friend responded with the following (JNR — let me know if its okay to post this; I only steal from the best):

The part of Mormon cosmology that claims an exalted destiny involves at least one heterosexual marriage is pretty hard to get around

I agree. And you’re right that it would be a disservice to not address that fact, so I’ll just say this (again this is just my personal belief):

Mormon belief/doctrine/dogma/cosmology is pretty messy and has changed an awful lot since 1830. We’ve changed our position on things like polygamy, blacks and the priesthood, the doctrine of tithing and the organization of church leadership. We’ve changed our policies on what members can/can’t eat and drink (no coffee/tea/alcohol, but it used to be okay to drink beer though not anymore). We no longer observe the doctrine of gathering, and we’ve even changed the content of our most sacred ceremonies several times and so dramatically that people who had been alive 50 years ago wouldn’t recognize our current iterations. We barely even recognize the doctrine of common consent, even though it was pretty obvious that it was a big part of the early church.
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It’s getting tougher to justify the stance of the United States regarding basic human rights.

Brazil’s Supreme Court approves civil unions for gay couples

by Jessica Geen | Pink News

Brazil’s Supreme Court has voted overwhelmingly to give gay couples the right to civil unions.

The panel backed the measure 10-0, with one abstention.

The ruling does not grant gay couples the right to marry, but it will allow “stable” couples the right to benefits enjoyed by straight married people, relating to benefits, inheritance and tax.

They will be able to register their relationships with solicitors or public bodies. Religious and public ceremonies will not be allowed.
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