Fourteen Questions and Some Answers

1.  When did you decide you were gay?

Actually, I decided I was not gay, but that made no difference.

When I was in the early elementary school years, I recognized that I interacted with girls the way other girls interacted with girls, rather than the way boys usually interacted with girls.  I strongly identified as male and I didn't want to give anyone any indication that I was otherwise, so I recall making an effort to not present any effeminate behaviors.  But I wasn't particularly masculine, either.  That being said, I didn't really understand much about my orientation until I started to mature sexually around age 11 or 12.  I wasn't attracted to girls at all and was only attracted to boys.  My dreams at night only included intimacy with boys, not girls.  I decided I wasn't gay, because I didn't really identify with the gay pride movement, nor did I have any plans to act on my feelings.  But that didn't change them at all.  I kept my feelings a total secret from everyone, but that didn't change them at all.  Until I started to get serious about courtship, I never told anyone.  I did tell the girl I was dating, and eventually we got married, but it still didn't change my feelings at all.  So deciding that I wasn't gay, didn't make me not gay.  I always have been, whether I admitted it or not.

2.  But you don't act gay.

I don't fall into a lot of the stereotypes that are associated with being gay.  I don't particularly like the flamboyance of the gay pride movement.  I have no interest in drag.  I love watching sports, including football and basketball.  I'm a fiscal conservative.  I'm married to a woman and have five children.  I'm strongly religious.  But, you know, none of these things has anything to do with the definition of what it means to be gay.  I'm romantically and sexually attracted to men, and not to women.

3.  Are you attracted to all men?

Not any more than straight guys are attracted to all women.  That's not the way it works.  Being attracted to every male would be exhausting!  I'm glad I don't have to deal with something like that.

4.  If you're married to a girl, doesn't that make you straight, or at least bisexual?

No, I'm neither sexually nor romantically attracted to girls at all.  That doesn't mean that I don't love my wife, it just means that there are some emotions and some sense of connection that I just never experience in my marriage.

5.  How do you have kids if you are gay?

Sexual reproduction still works when you are gay; at least it does for me.  I just don't get the emotional and chemical signals that bind a couple together in the process.  Having and rearing children helps me feel closer to my wife, but not the act of making them.

6.  Are you faking your love for your wife?

Not at all.  I really do love my wife.  It's a close, intimate, familial love, closer than friendship and closer than a sibling relationship, but I don't feel romantic about it.  So it's probably not exactly the same as other married couples.

7.  Does this disturb your wife?

While our marriage is complicated, and sometimes difficult emotions have to be dealt with, my wife has expressed that she is very happy with our relationship for a lot of reasons.

8.  Do you wish you were married to a man?

I don't doubt that there are types of relationship satisfaction that I just can't achieve being married to a woman.  I'm attracted to other guys, and that doesn't go away.  However, I can't imagine a relationship with anyone of either gender to be a better fit than the one I have with my wife.  Other than my orientation, my wife and I seem to have been made for each other, with similar interests, hobbies, goals, etc.

9.  Isn't it hard being married to a woman when you're gay?

Extremely.  Not having that romantic and sexual satisfaction in my marriage is one of the more difficult aspects of my life.  But life wasn't meant to be free from difficulty.  And there are so many great aspects of our marriage.  But yes, the difficulty and pain don't go away.  It's like there is something about my life that doesn't quite fit and I have to constantly hold it in place, and I sometimes get tired.  I used to hope that it would grow to fit better, but I've come to realize that's not how it works.

10.  How can you be a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and be gay?

Well, I've had experiences that have convinced me of the reality of Deity and my relationship with them.  I am convinced of the veracity of the church.  I am also convinced that the church has a lot of change and development that needs to happen in order to become more in line with Christ's teachings, and I have hope that the changes will eventually come.

11.  Do you support gay marriage?

I find that the scriptures that have been revealed in the modern dispensation say basically nothing about homosexuality at all, and what little is said in the Bible comes from the Law of Moses and the epistles of the apostles.  Neither of these sections are great as a basis for church policy.  Nowhere in the teachings of Christ is the subject breached.  And never is homosexual marriage addressed at all.  Basically I don't find any evidence in the scriptures that gay marriage is wrong.  

I think that the law of chastity is very important, but since the church is so strongly against gay marriage, the message that young LGBTQ+ members of the church tend to hear is that there is no chaste way to express themselves in marriage, so either they are inherently evil or the law of chastity doesn't apply to them.  I really think something needs to change in how the church interacts with its LGBTQ+ members, but I'm not sure exactly how.

12.  What about your marriage to a woman.  The church approves of that, right?

Well, yes, but I think my situation is rather a special case and not a model for others.  Please, please don't try to pressure gay members to marry heterosexually.  There are so many challenges in such a marriage that can make life emotionally painful.  

And to any LGBTQ+ member of the church looking to marry against their orientation, please make sure you are honest with your significant other about your feelings, and you enter the marriage with your eyes open to the difficulties you are likely to face.  And realize that there will be more difficulties that you haven't yet imagined that may crop up and make life even more challenging.  I guess that's true of any marriage, but in this case you are starting with some serious preexisting difficulties.

13.  Why do you stay in a church that doesn't allow you to express your true self in marriage?

My membership in the church is based on my experience interacting with Deity, and not necessarily on the policies of the church.  That being said, I think there is an awful lot of church culture and policy that is praiseworthy and powerfully good.

14.  What is something that you think the church could change in order to better support its LGBTQ+ members?

The ministering program doesn't do a lot of good in providing love and support when members don't feel that they can admit some of their basic attributes, like their orientation or gender identity.  How can we lift up the hands that hang down and strengthen the feeble knees when people are too scared to let others see their needs?  Somehow we need to change the narrative within the church to be less confrontational and more compassionate, so people will feel safe enough to be honest.  And it needs to happen at all hierarchical levels, from the apostles to the assistant nursery leaders.