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long boring religious thread:
back when i was coming out to the people closest to me, i dug my heels in with church and was uber active in my calling, also going to the temple like twice a week. during that time i felt close to god and was getting lots of spiritual validation.
back when i was coming out to the people closest to me, i dug my heels in with church and was uber active in my calling, also going to the temple like twice a week. during that time i felt close to god and was getting lots of spiritual validation.
i felt my pain and frustration with church leaders validated. i felt my sexual orientation validated. i felt my agency and choice to do what makes me happy validated. there was neither condemnation nor a push to do anything a certain way.
luckily i had a supportive bishop and people around me i could be honest with. not everyone is so lucky. it was so hard having all of these feelings that just didn’t quite line up with what the church as an institution was telling me.
one day i found alma 32:5 “they have cast us out of our synagogues which we have labored abundantly to build with our own hands; and they have cast us out because of our exceeding poverty; and we have no place to worship our God; and behold, what shall we do?”
it’s weird coming back to this almost a year later. i’ve distanced myself from church and am still figuring out a lot, but this made me realize that many of us in the gay/mormon-adjacent community spent so much time helping to “build synagogues”
we were told we were literally helping to build up the kingdom of god on earth. many of us served missions, wanted to go to byu our whole lives, even strived for temple marriages, all while expending so much energy on having our “brokenness” fixed. but we’re not broken.
but many of us feel cast out because of one facet of our existence. it feels unfair because of all the literal blood, sweat, and tears that go invalidated institutionally. i share all of this in the hopes that no matter where we’re at, we can allow ourselves to validate pain.
regardless of whatever our individual beliefs/convictions are now, we can be happy doing what feels right and authentic to us. in or out of the church, believing in god or not. there’s not a single “right” way to do things, and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise! /end
