“Religious and Gay, A Catholic-Mormon Dialogue: Part One”

I’m in this!

Sometime at church in the past two weeks, local Mormons leaders across the country read aloud a letter addressing the Church’s response to the Supreme Court’s recent decision on same-sex marriage. [fn1] In my own ward, one person asked a question that has become more and more salient: what about gay Mormons who wish to remain Mormon?

Unfortunately, at present there are few good answers to this question. Today in my congregation, the answer given was that gay Mormons are no different than their heterosexual single compatriots, and that the advice given to the latter applies equally to the former. Other times, gay Mormons have been told to stay active and involved in church, fulfilling assignments and keeping up personal devotions. And in one painful moment several months ago, a member of the stake presidency hesitantly explained that LGB Mormons would simply be alone. (On “LGB,” see [fn2].)

LGB Mormons facing these alternately nondescript and bleak prospects have few resources to help them along. As I have found interfaith discussions to be relatively fertile ground for cultivation of new ideas, back in January I reached out to Alex Griffin and Eve Tushnet, lesbian friends of mine concerned about the place of non-heterosexuals in their respective religious traditions, Mormonism and Catholicism. Over the succeeding months, we had the following conversation via email, which I hope can be of use in fostering and ecumenical understanding of the issues of LGB members of sexually conservative faiths. I am sincerely grateful for their work and their patience.

I will present our conversation in three parts this week. The first post deals with general religious discourse about homosexuality; the second about resources our interlocutors have found enlightening, whether from within or without their faiths; and in the third, Alex and Eve will ask each other questions.

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