Elder
Bruce C. Hafen Speaks on Same-Sex Attraction
Of
the Quorum of the Seventy – Given Sept 19, 2009
During a recent stake conference in
He said he’d heard of an organization called Evergreen and he
wondered if I thought they could assist him. I encouraged him to find their Web
site, contact them, and follow their counsel. He then asked for a
blessing, which I gladly gave him.
As I felt about him, I admire your righteous desires and your
courage. You may not have consciously chosen to have same-gender attraction,
but you are faithfully choosing to deal with it. Sometimes that
attraction may make you feel sinful, even though the attraction alone is not a
sin if you do not act on it. Sometimes you may feel frustration or anger or
simply a deep sadness about yourself. But as hard as same-gender
attraction is, your feeling that attraction does not mean that your nature is
flawed. Whenever the adversary tries to convince you that you are hopelessly
“that way,” so that acting out your feelings is inevitable, he is lying. He is
the father of lies.
Remember President
Hinckley’s confidence in you: “Our hearts reach out to [you]. We remember
you before the Lord, we sympathize with you, we regard you as our brothers and
sisters.” [i] And
President Packer has echoed, “We do not reject you… We cannot reject you… We
will not reject you, because we love you.” [ii] With that kind of leadership, I
pray that all Church members are learning to be more compassionate and
understanding.
Some may wonder how
the Church’s leaders can empathize with you when they haven’t been in your
shoes themselves. Some may even wonder how the Savior Himself can really
understand you when He hasn’t been where you are. But remember: Christ
not only descended TO our conditions, he has descended BELOW our conditions,
whatever they are, because “The Son of Man hath descended below [all things].” [iii] The
Atonement was possible only because of that descent, which Elder Neal A.
Maxwell called Christ’s “earned empathy.” He knows that every day may
feel like a major battle for you.
Many other people also live heroically with uninvited daily
struggles. The victims of childhood sexual abuse also live with agonizing daily
battles that may echo the experiences of some who cope with same-gender
attraction. A young woman I know has spent years trying to put her
spiritual and emotional life back together, trying to regain her trust in
men—and in God. She was devastated when a Church leader to whom she went for
counsel told her, “Oh, get over it and get on with your life.” He simply didn’t
grasp her condition. Another more seasoned priesthood leader said that many
abuse victims are like emotional quadriplegics—yet they look so normal that
other people have no idea what they are really dealing with. She went
through an arduous recovery process, stretching her soul in faith almost to the
breaking point; but she has developed a remarkable spiritual maturity.
Elder Maxwell once taught a group of people who lived with
really hard daily challenges. He had been watching the Olympic diving
competition, where he had learned that the judges grade a dive not just by how
graceful it looks to the public, but by how difficult the dive is—which only
the judges can understand enough to measure. Elder Maxwell told this group that
the Lord will judge their lives by the difficulty of their dive, which He
understands in every detail. And your own difficult dives are being made
much harder these days by the increasing cultural confusion that now swirls
around the topic of homosexuality.
Before discussing that confusion, I first want to draw on a few
doctrines that apply to your concerns. The doctrinal foundation is in the
nature of God and how he feels about you. He is the greatest being in the
universe, and He knows and loves you. He wants you to find joy. His power
is greater than all the powers of darkness combined.
You are literally
God’s spirit child. Having same-gender attraction is NOT in your DNA, but
being a child of God clearly IS in your spiritual DNA—only one generation
removed from Him whom we call Father in Heaven. As the family proclamation
states, “Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal,
and eternal identity and purpose.” As part of an eternal plan, our Father
placed us in this world subject to death, sin, sorrow, and misery—ALL of which
serve the eternal purpose of letting us taste the bitter that we may learn to
prize the sweet.
If you are faithful,
on resurrection morning—and maybe even before then—you will rise with normal
attractions for the opposite sex. Some of you may wonder if that doctrine
is too good to be true. But Elder Dallin H. Oaks has said it MUST be true,
because “there is no fullness of joy in the next life without a family unit,
including a husband and wife, and posterity.” And “men (and women) are that
they might have joy.” [v]
It’s true that the law of chastity forbids all sexual relations
outside the bonds of a married heterosexual relationship. And while same-gender
attraction is not a sin, you need to resist cultivating immoral, lustful
thoughts toward those of either gender. It’s no sin if a bird lands in
your tree, just don’t let him build a nest there. The adversary will
tempt you by constantly “enticing” you to “do that which is evil,” because
“there is an opposition in all things.” (2 Nephi 2:11) But God will also
constantly “entice” you “to do good continually.” (see
There’s an old Native
American parable, about a young brave is brought before the tribal elders, who
are concerned about his aggressive tendencies. One of the tribal elders
is assigned to teach this young man that his anger is understandable, but he
needs help. So he tells the young brave all humans have within them two
dogs. One dog is good and peaceable. The other dog is angry and evil.
The two dogs are in a constant battle with one another, since neither is
powerful enough to destroy the other. The young brave asks, ”If they are
of equal power, which dog will win?” The elder replies, “The dog you feed the most.”
You feed the angry dog when you cultivate lustful feelings, view
pornography, label yourself as gay, or associate with activists who
aggressively promote gay lifestyles. Those activists have an agenda, and
it includes constantly feeding your angry dog.
You feed the peaceful
dog when you seek the Lord’s Spirit. You feed the peaceful dog when you
simply stop fighting the angry dog. Don’t let your challenge define your entire
identity. As Dr. Jeff Robinson said, [vii] you
can’t hate your way out of your attraction. Just walk away from fighting
the angry dog and focus on all the good things you may have put on hold—your
education, career plans, social experience, and Church service. Stop focusing
so much on yourself, including hating yourself, and spend more energy caring
about other people. Build good associations with people of your own
gender. Find a therapist who can help you identify the unmet emotional
needs that you are tempted to satisfy in false sexual ways. As you do such
things, the peaceful dog will grow stronger than the miserable, angry dog.
Now how does our most central doctrine, the Atonement, apply to
same-gender attraction? If you have engaged in immoral behavior, you need
to repent fully by confessing your sins and forsaking them. These actions
unlock the door to the Savior’s mercy, which allows your complete
forgiveness. But if you feel an attraction you didn’t seek and haven’t
acted on, you have nothing to repent of. So how can you qualify for the
Atonement’s power?
The Atonement means just what the word says: at-one-ment.
Its purpose is to make us “at one” with God, or bring us into harmony with Him,
after being separated from him by death, by sin, or any other
force. In that sense, the Atonement can heal us not only from sin,
but also from carelessness, imperfection, and all mortal bitterness — intended
and unintended. Even though same-gender attraction is by itself not a
sin, its presence can make us feel estranged from God. That sense of
separation arises from our knowing that this attraction runs counter to our
eternal nature as a son or daughter of god. These feelings can terribly
damage a conscientious person’s sense of both worth and worthiness in God’s
sight.
The blessings of the Atonement include its healing and
compensating power when one has been separated from God by sin, by
unintentional mistakes, or simply by adversity. I classify same-gender
attraction within the category of “adversity,” because typically you haven’t
brought it upon yourselves. It has consequences similar to being harmed
by the sins of others, such as the separation from God felt so commonly by the
victims of childhood sexual abuse.
The Savior described
this part of His healing power to the Nephites: “Will ye not return unto me,
and repent of your sins, and be
converted that I may heal you?” Consider also Alma’s description of
Christ’s broad healing power, which includes “afflictions,” “infirmities,” and
“sicknesses,” in addition to death and sin: “And he shall go forth suffering
pains and afflictions and temptations of every kind; and this that the word
might be fulfilled which saith he will take upon him the pains and the sicknesses
of his people. And he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may
be filled with mercy.” [viii]
The Atonement’s healing blessings are conditional, just as
receiving the mercy that allows forgiveness is conditioned on our
repentance. The conditions we must satisfy include repenting fully of any
actual sins in our lives. Beyond that, Nephi teaches us this about the
other conditions we must satisfy: “It is by grace that we are saved, after all
we can do.” (2 Nephi 25:23) In other words, we must do “all we can do”
within our own power, then his grace overcomes our separation from God as it
heals us.
How much is “all we can do” for one who suffers same-gender
attraction? I don’t know. But I do know that “all we can do” is less than many
of you think it is, because some of you are so conscientious that you think you
have to do it all. Don’t beat yourselves up needlessly. You don’t
have to do it all. Grace shall be “as your day” — whatever your
particular dive requires.
To those challenged by same-gender attraction, the Atonement
offers two healing blessings. First, Christ helps us draw on His strength to become
more “at-one” with God even while still overcoming the attraction. He
helps us bear the burden of our afflictions. In Alma’s words, when our
testimony of the Atonement grows within us like the tree of life, “then may God
grant unto you that your burdens may be light, through the joy of his
Son” (Alma 33:23) For example, when the king cast Shadrach, Meshach, and
Abednego into that fiery furnace, their faith in the Lord’s power saved them
from being burned. Remember the story. As the astonished king looked into
the furnace, he saw not just the three men but “four men walking in the midst
of the fire, and they have no hurt; and the form of the fourth is like the Son
of God.” (Daniel 3:25) The Savior’s presence in that fire symbolizes the
way He is truly “with us” in our afflictions, not just passively observing us
or waiting until our trial is completed. Think of that next time you partake of
the sacrament. He will be with you.
As a second healing
blessing, the Atonement enables the grace that assures us of this grand
promise: No eternal blessing—including marriage and family life—will be
withheld from those who suffer same-gender attraction, if they do “all they can
do” to remain faithful always. That story from the book of Daniel
applies to this blessing as well. You will remember that when the three
men refused to worship the Babylonian idol, they weren’t afraid of being thrown
into the fiery furnace. They said, “Our God is able to deliver us from
the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us. But if not, we [still] will not worship the golden
image” (Daniel 3:17-18).
Applied to you, what does “but if not” mean? It means that
your faith in God must run so deep that, first, you know, first of all that He
has the power to remove your unwanted same-gender attraction—“he is able to
deliver us from the furnace.” But, second, if He doesn’t deliver you
right now (“but if not”), for whatever reason, you will not give up on Him or
on yourself. There truly is light at the end of your tunnel, no matter
how long it is. That light is the Light and the Life of the World.
Now let’s discuss how today’s cultural and legal climate is
making your challenge much harder than it would otherwise be. First a
little historical background. I began teaching family law in the early
1970s, during the
Even though criminal
laws against homosexual acts were seldom enforced, the Supreme Court considered
those laws constitutional as recently as 2003. In the early 1970s, the
public and most lawyers, doctors, and therapists saw homosexuality not as
normal adult behavior but as a psychological disorder. As recently as
1982, the mayor of
So what's been going
on during the last few years to cause the cultural earthquake we’re now
feeling on this subject? We have witnessed primarily an aggressive
political movement more than we’ve witnessed substantive change in the medical
or legal evidence. In 1973, in response to increasing disruptions
and protests by gay activists, the American Psychiatric and Psychological
Associations removed homosexuality from their official lists of disorders.
Significantly, they took this action by simply putting the issue to an open
vote in their professional meetings—not because of any change in actual medical
findings. As LDS psychologist Dean Byrd writes, “This was the first time
in the history of healthcare that a diagnosis was decided by popular vote rather
than scientific evidence.” [xii]
The activists have
used similar methods in the years since then, trying to prove that they are a
legitimate demographic category with fixed and unchangeable
characteristics. They must present themselves in this way in order to
justify their demand for the same legal protections now given to race and
gender. That is a crucial point in understanding both the agenda and the
tactics of intimidation used by today’s activists. As Elder Dallin
H. Oaks has said, in recent years “we have seen unrelenting pressure from
advocates of [the homosexual] lifestyle to accept as normal what is not normal,
and to characterize those who disagree with them as narrow-minded, bigoted and
unreasonable. Such advocates are quick to demand freedom of speech and
thought for themselves, but equally quick to criticize those with a different
view and, if possible, to silence them by applying labels like ‘homophobic.’…
This is more than a social issue — ultimately it may be a test of our most
basic religious freedoms to teach what we know our Father in Heaven wants us to
teach.” [xiii]
Consider now four
misconceptions the activists seek to establish as facts in the minds of
policymakers and the public. I share these here because these
misconceptions, if believed, will seriously undermine the efforts of Latter-day
Saints or others who desire to overcome their own same-gender
attraction. First is the misconception that same-gender
attraction is an inborn and unalterable orientation. This untrue
assumption tries to persuade you to label yourselves and build your entire
identity around a fixed sexual orientation or condition. How would that
affect you? As President James E. Faust wrote, “The false belief of inborn
homosexual orientation denies to repentant souls the opportunity to change and
will ultimately lead to discouragement, disappointment, and despair.” [xiv]
However, the activists
have almost convinced the American public about this point. A reliable 2009
poll asked
So much individual
variation exists with so many possible explanations that there is simply no
scientific consensus about what causes homosexual tendencies. As the
American Psychological Association has stated, “No findings have emerged
that permit scientists to conclude that sexual orientation is determined by any
factor or set of factors. … Nature and nurture both play complex roles.” [xvi] So, even though natural
personality traits do influence one’s inclinations, the idea that there is a
“gay gene” has little scientific support. As two
Now we do know that
inherited susceptibilities, childhood experiences, and agency all influence a
given person’s development. And even though no universal explanation
exists, some patterns do fit many same-gender attraction cases. For example, we
know from the research that among women, up to 80% who have same-gender
attraction were abused in some way as children. [xviii] Among men, especially during the
years just before and during puberty, as President Boyd K. Packer has
said, “What would have only been a more or less normal passing phase in
establishing [your] gender identity can become implanted and leave you confused,
even disturbed.” [xix]
In other words, before
puberty, boys are typically more interested in other boys than in girls. Then
their interest gradually shifts to girls, but a few boys don’t make this
transition. Often these boys are emotionally sensitive, introspective, and,
especially among Church members, perfectionistic. When puberty hits this group,
they can be sexually aroused by many factors. When these factors include
other boys, they can become fixated on the fear that they are “gay,” especially
if they have male sexual experiences, including male pornography. Then their
fixation can block their normal emotional-sexual development. Adult men
who have had such childhood experiences can often resume their normal
development by identifying and addressing the sources of their emotional
blockage, which usually includes restoring healthy, appropriate male relationships. [xx]
A second misconception the activists promote is that therapy
cannot treat, let alone change, same-gender attraction. This false
assumption is linked to the first one: if you’re born gay, there is no need to
change; and since you have a permanent condition, you can’t change
anyway. Evidence that people have indeed changed threatens the political
agenda of the activists, because actual change disproves their claim that
homosexuality is a fixed condition that deserves the same legal protections as
those fixed conditions like race and gender. So they don’t want you, or
anyone else, to change, or even to believe that change is possible.
But as President
Packer said, “The angels of the devil convince some that they are born to a
life from which they cannot change and are compelled to live in sin. The
most wicked of lies is that they cannot change and repent and that they will
not be forgiven.” [xxii] If you believe no change is
possible, you have only two options, neither of which is acceptable to a
believing Latter-day Saint — you must either give in or give up.
Thankfully, you have other options.
Nonetheless, the American Psychiatric Association has considered
making it unethical for a therapist to treat someone with same-gender attraction
who wants to change. But in the year 2000, when such a proposal was
pending before that organization, they were met with a very different form of
activism than what they had seen earlier. Busloads of formerly gay men
appeared at their national meeting, claiming their right to choose therapy for
their unwanted attraction. In an ironic twist of history, the APA
representative who met with them, Dr. Robert L. Spitzer, just happened to be
the same man who had met with the gay activists nearly 30 years earlier, when
the APA voted to remove homosexuality from its list of disorders.
Dr. Spitzer listened
again, and he decided to study two hundred people who had changed to a
heterosexual orientation that had lasted more than five years. Dr.
Spitzer published his research findings, despite the objections of activists
who thought his work threatened their political agenda. He concluded,
“Like most psychiatrists, I thought that … sexual orientation could not be
changed. I now believe that is untrue — some people can and do change.” [xxiii]
Just last month the
American Psychological Association adopted a resolution stating that there is
insufficient evidence to prove conclusively whether sexual orientation can be
changed. But in what the Wall
Street Journal called “a
striking departure” from that Association’s earlier hesitation about
encouraging such therapy, the same resolution also stated that “it is ethical —
and can be beneficial — for counselors to help some clients reject gay or
lesbian attractions,” especially clients with a strong religious identity. [xxiv]
Now, to be sure, not
everybody who seeks treatment succeeds. We have got to be realistic and honest
about that. Not every experience with therapy is completely positive. That is
why responsible therapists can’t promise particular outcomes. And, the
Church does not endorse specific methods of treatment. Success rates
vary, and “success” can be defined in various ways. The client’s level of
commitment to the treatment process is probably the most significant variable
in successful outcomes. [xxv] The skill and attitude of the
therapist also matters a great deal. But in general, well over half
of those seeking treatment can be significantly helped by it. That is
roughly the same success rate as treatments for clinical depression. One
non-LDS therapist who has treated both men and women for years reports that 40%
of his clients find full heterosexual resolution, another 40% achieve enough
resolution to control their attraction and behavior, and 20% are unsuccessful. [xxvi]
The third
misconception is that most Americans favor same-gender marriage, which means
the Church is outside the mainstream in opposing it. For example, last June Time magazine carried a story that
described the aftermath of
The Time writer went on to say that “Gay
marriage…belongs to a class of behaviors increasingly tolerated in the broader
society.” It is true that six American states now permit same-gender marriage.
But 40 states have already passed laws opposing such marriages. And the
most recent national polls reinforce that large majority opinion, despite some
modest recent gains by the activists.
For example, last June
a CBS News/New York Times poll asked whether
These poll numbers hardly put the Church on the public fringe
with its view that same-gender marriage is not a good idea. But let us
finally consider the more important question — what’s wrong with same-gender
marriage?
The fourth
misconception is that there are no rational, non-religious reasons for opposing
same-gender marriage. The Time magazine writer said the only
“rational side” to the Church’s efforts in
First, the American
public has always distinguished between what the law toleratesand what the law
should endorse — a clear line between “passive
toleration” and “active support” of homosexual conduct. [xxix] To tolerate behavior is to
move it, legally, from being prohibited to being permitted, which we did in
deciding not to prosecute homosexual behavior as criminal. However, we
can tolerate or permit that behavior without also endorsing it — that is, promoting and
encouraging that behavior, which we have historically done only when the
behavior serves a significant public purpose.
Our society and our laws have long endorsed man-woman marriage
with an honored priority, not just to support happy lovers, but because
marriage is our most significant social institution — not merely a private
project. This “public interest” or “social interest” separates the marriage contract
from every other contract in society. We don’t invite guests and have
receptions when people sign a business deal; but we do celebrate marriage as a
publicly significant event. Why? Because the children of that marriage
are the future society and they clearly thrive best when reared in a formal
family with their own father and mother.
The New York Times, a few years
ago, reported a “powerful consensus” in the social science research [xxx] that
children do best when they live with their own mom and dad. The research
clearly shows that, by every measure of child well-being — such as health,
emotional stability, education, and avoiding crime, drugs, and abuse — children
do far better in a two-parent, married heterosexual family. That ideal
child-rearing environment is not always possible because of deaths, unavoidable
divorces, and births outside wedlock. But giving policy priority to
the natural family establishes the social goal that, whenever possible, every
child has a right to grow up with his or her own mother and father in a legal
marriage. That goal binds the father and mother to each other and to their children
— and to society’s long-term interests. Civilization began when the
culture required men to care about their women and their children. And
society has the right to expect that kind of pattern from fathers and mothers —
for the sake of the future society’s well being.
Recent experience in
this country has threatened this pattern, not just because of same-gender
marriage. The problem dates further back, because we have shifted, in
The new culture of divorce began with no-fault divorce in
Gay rights do not
claim to satisfy society’s enormous interest in its children. On the
contrary, in a key early Supreme Court opinion in 1986, Justice Harry Blackmun
argued that the Constitution should protect gay sexual rights “not because they
contribute to the general public welfare but because they form so central a
part of an individual’s life,” including one’s “right to differ as to things
that touch the heart of the existing order.” [xxxiv] The Court’s 2003 majority opinion
striking down state criminal laws against same-gender sexual conduct accepted
Justice Blackmun’s view, basing its rationale on the personal “autonomy” or
freedom rights of consenting adults, not on any benefit of that conduct to
society. [xxxv]
Now this contrast between adult rights and the rights of society
and children introduces the most persuasive example I have seen of the secular
case against same-gender marriage.
The French
parliament’s study of same-gender marriage centered on marriage as a social
institution. Its report said marriage is inevitably built around children, and
every country that has adopted same-gender marriage has soon afterward
authorized adoption and surrogate gestation by same-gender couples. But,
they concluded,
Specifically, the French report focused on children’s need for
identity and stability. Insofar as possible, it said, each child has the right
to know and be cared for by — and be bonded to — his or her biological
parents. Biological bonding combined with legal bonding inherently
creates the most lasting and stable adult-child relationships, which provides
the emotional and legal security required for optimal child development.
Occasional adoptions may be necessary in exceptional cases, but there are
plenty of stable heterosexual married couples who wish to adopt all available
adoptive children. The French report said that to accept a public
policy that consciously places children with homosexual adults increases the
risks to children who are already at risk because they feel identity confusion
and abandonment by their biological parents. To ignore this need is to
discriminate against these children. Adoption is about a child’s right to
a regular family, not merely about an adult’s right to a child.
So
I return now to where I started, to the admiration and empathy I
feel for you. I feel especially tender toward you who honor your covenants and
wholeheartedly desire the blessings of temple marriage and family life; and who
have tried repeatedly — but not successfully yet — to diminish your same-gender
feelings. I know people who feel that way. My heart goes out to them.
They are waiting upon the Lord.
I was once living through
a pretty difficult dive myself, though of a much different variety. One
day in the
I wondered what
“waiting upon the Lord” meant. Then I read in Joseph Smith’s Translation of
Matthew 3:24 that when young Jesus grew up, he “waxed strong, andwaited upon
the Lord for the time of his
ministry to come.” I couldn’t imagine the boy Christ just standing around
the carpenter shop “waiting” for something to happen. I came to
understand that “waiting upon the Lord” is a special invitation to become an
active, consecrated disciple of Christ. It isn’t to sit back passively and just
wait on your hands. I was moved to make changes in my daily pattern so I
could “wait” with much more intense spiritual initiative. As a result, I
discovered for myself that, as Isaiah said, men have not heard, “neither hath
any eye seen, O God, how great things thou hast prepared for him that waiteth
for thee” (D&C 133:45). As the angel sang to Elijah, “O rest in the
Lord; wait patiently for Him, and he will give thee thy heart’s desire.”
An LDS medical doctor who has worked closely with many people
who deal with same-gender attraction recently said to me, “This is a truly
difficult problem, but in its very difficulty is something that allows those
who meet the challenge to become amazingly purified and sanctified and thus
qualified for special comfort and revelation from the Savior, who knows how to
succor ‘all’ men and women in their infirmities.” His words prompted a memory
of Elder Maxwell’s insight: “If we are serious about our discipleship, Jesus
will eventually request each of us to do those very things which are [the] most
difficult to do.” The apostle Paul wrote, “All things work together for
good to them that love God” (Romans 8:28). Even same-gender attraction
can work for your good IF you love God.
You are not simply a
child of God. You are a son or a daughter of God, with all the masculine or
feminine connotations of those words. That is your true, eternal identity.
I urge you to seek a testimony, even a personal vision, of that identity.
I ask you to take every possible step, every day, to align your physical and
emotional life with the spiritual reality of who you really are. Even if
you can open only a tiny space for God’s influence in your life now, open it
up, all you can. Say “yes” to Him, over and over, and He will help you
make ever more room for Him in your heart. Then your confidence will grow
— not only in Him, but in yourself. I am describing a process, not an
event, and it can sometimes seem hopelessly long and difficult. But I promise
you that as you learn to connect your righteous desires with His love, His
power will pull you home — eventually, all the way home.
Brigham Young’s words
describe the promise and the fulfillment of that homeward journey: “Your
spirits when they came to take [earthly] tabernacles were pure and holy. There
is no spirit among the human family that was begotten in hell; none that were
begotten by angels, or by any inferior being. They [are all the children
of] our Father in heaven. He is the Father of our spirits; and if we
could know, understand, and do His will, every soul would be prepared to return
back into His presence. And when they get there, they would see that they
had formerly lived there for ages, that they had previously been acquainted
with every nook and corner, with the palaces, walks, and gardens; and they
would embrace their Father, and He would embrace them and say, ‘My son, my daughter, I have you again;’
and the child would say, ‘O my Father, my Father, I am here again.’” [xxxviii]
[i] Ensign, Nov. 1995. 99.
[ii] Ensign, Nov. 2000.
[iii]D&C 122:8; D&C
88:6.
[iv]D&C 88:114.
[v]LDS.org Newsroom, interview
transcript.
[vi]Alma 37:36.
[vii] Theguardrail.com/transcript.htm.
[viii]
[ix]Carri P. Jenkins, “Toward
the Light of Hope: Victims of Abuse,” Brigham
Young Magazine, May 1993,
35.
[x]See note 7.
[xi] San Francisco Examiner, Nov.
21, 1982, at B10, col. 1.
[xii] Dean Byrd, Mormons & Homosexuality (2008), 22
[xiii] Dallin H. Oaks and Lance B. Wickman,
LDS.org Newsroom interview.
[xiv] James
E. Faust, Ensign, Sept.
1995.
[xv]
[xvi] In Dean Byrd, Mormons & Homosexuality,
36.
[xvii] Friedman and
[xviii] David C. Pruden, Lead My People, audio CD
[xix] Boyd K. Packer, Ensign, November 2000.
[xx] See generally
Jeffrey Robinson, Theguardrail.com; see also Jason Park,Understanding Male
Homosexual Problems.
[xxi] Ensign, Aug. 1979, 51.
[xxii] Boyd K. Packer, Ensign, May 2006.
[xxiii] Spitzer. R.L. (2003). “Can some gay
men and lesbians change their sexual orientation?” Archives of Sexual Behavior,
32, 5 October, 403-417.
[xxiv]Stephanie Simon, “A New
Therapy on Faith and Sexual Identity,” Wall
Street Journal, Aug. 6, 2009 online.wsj.com/article/SB124950491516608883.html.
[xxv] Jason Park, Understanding Male Homosexual
Problems, 30.
[xxvi] Park, 31.
[xxvii]PollingReport.com/civil.htm
(CBS/N.Y.Times poll June 12-16, 2009)
[xxviii]PollingReport.com/civil.htm
(USA Today/Gallup poll, May 7-10, 2009)
[xxix] Bernstein, “When
One Person’s Civil Rights Are Another’s Moral Outrage,”New York Times,
Oct. 16, section 4, p. 6; Barney, “Shaky Ground: Gay Rights Confront Determined
Resistance from Some Moderates,” Wall
Street Journal. Oct. 7, 1994, p. A1.
[xxx]Hardin, 2-Parent Families
Rise After Change in Welfare Laws, quoted in What Next for the Marriage
Movement? (
[xxxi] “The Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention reported in May that births to unmarried women
have reached an astonishing 39.7%” of all
[xxxii]”No Nation Can Rise
Higher Than the Strength of Its Families,” Church
News, 3 Oct. 1998, 6.
[xxxiii] “President Hinckley Notes His 85th Birthday.” Church News, 24
June 1995, 6.
[xxxiv] Bowers v.
Hardwick, ___
[xxxv]
[xxxvi] Report of the Mission of Inquiry on
the Family and the Rights of Children, a study commission appointed by the
National Assembly of France, January 25, 2006, p. 32 (English translation of
commission report).
[xxxvii] Isaiah 40:28-31
[xxxviii]Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, 4:268
(italics added).