Just when things seemed to be dying down, the LDS Church made another embarrassing lunge at our nation’s gay community by reemphasizing the Church’s November 2015 ruling and backing it up with increasingly absurd, manipulative and belittling ideas and language. Early last week The Salt Lake Tribune published an above-the-fold article by Peggy Fletcher Stack titled, “Senior apostle: LDS gay policy is the ‘will of the Lord’ through his prophet.” It will likely be the source of increased confusion and animosity for the outdated, stubborn and irrational ideas that influence LDS policy.
Russell M. Nelson, the president of the church’s Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, was the lead spokesman on the issue, taking the time to explain the new policy and how LDS leaders came to their conclusions. He explained that, after extensive debate between LDS council members, it was revealed to President Thomas S. Monson by God that the new policy will prevent children of same-sex couples, considered “apostates” by LDS followers, from receiving LDS baptism and other privileges until age 18. Not only is it unusual that Nelson would be so open in describing the nature of the process by which the policy was made, but the method itself also seems atypical (there is nothing in the Bible about a “process” or debate over the Ten Commandments). This leads to some questions: Why is it that council members had to undergo frantic policy debate after same-sex marriage became legal in the U.S.? Couldn’t God have just saved them the time and revealed His oh-so-specific and relevant will sooner and without the trouble? Why is it that the Church felt it necessary to blame God’s will at all? Maybe it worried that the word of its head councilmen alone wouldn’t be strong enough to persuade its members to continue condemning gays.
Nelson proceeded to call upon millennials to focus hard on their faith and trust in those LDS ideas and policies they may not fully understand or agree with. People born during this time frame range from those just peaking in their teens to those likely settling down with young families. These people are still young and may be considered a potential threat, as the Church worries that society’s more tolerant stances on things like abortion and same-sex marriage will influence the newly independent minds of younger members. So, to fight independent and reasonable questioning and gain control, the LDS Church has fallen back on traditional methods of instilling fear and binding members together as some sort of desperate army against a rational and evolving society.
Keeping this in mind, Nelson, after explaining that the essential life purpose of those in this age bracket is to “prepare the people of this world for the Second Coming of Jesus Christ and his millennial reign,” made it clear that these younger members would have to develop extreme, sacrificial, Abraham-like mindsets in order to stay true to their beliefs during this time. He went on to claim that, while it is okay to ask questions, “the safest course is to heed the words of Mormon leaders, particularly Monson,” because they, apparently, have the ability to foresee detrimental horrors and punishments for those who seriously question the Church and “grand possibilities and privileges awaiting those who listen with the intent to obey.”
Nelson then iced the cake when he explained to young members that the “reality is that there are ‘servants of Satan’ embedded throughout society. So be very careful whose counsel you follow.” Is that a threat? Maybe. Either way, I guess that means that those of us who don’t blindly follow Mormon doctrine, myself included, are in league with Satan. I didn’t realize I was serving and advocating for Satan by thinking independently of religion and developing personal morals intended to create a better world of love and acceptance, and good work and service for those around us — not for God, and not for reward, but for the sake of being a good human being and leaving the world better than it was when I arrived. Seems Satanic enough.
On this matter, the LDS faith is on the wrong side of history. Its ideas and practices are becoming not just outdated, but silly. Its actions are increasingly desperate. If it continues on the path it’s been traveling recently, in a world of growing rationality and acceptance the Church will risk falling into irrelevance.