I put this question on the internet and got nothing. Does anyone on this board know?

I bring this up because I just listened to an interview John Dehlin had with Meg and Jake Abhau (Mormon Stories episode 731). This couple met with Apostle Todd Christofferson earlier this year concerning what the church has to offer their gay teenage son. Christofferson advised them that raising their son in the church would not be the safest place for him.

Also note that Todd Christofferson has a brother named Tom who lives with his gay partner.

the Unitarian Church is not a gay LDS ward. ;)

numbersRus Wrote:
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> the Unitarian Church is not a gay LDS ward. ;)


I don't understand this response. How does the Unitarian Church relate to my post?

The Unitarians are very welcoming to the LGBT community. This is humor. I actually got quite a chuckle.

Ah. I didn't know that. I've actually investigated that church because it seems so inclusive rather than exclusive.

They, among others, seem to be accepting of LGBT members.

Try looking up affirmation.org. It is an organization for LDS member of the LGBT community and I have heard that they hold their own church meetings

But Affirmation is not, and has never been, institutionally affiliated with the church. There have been some times when there was dialogue, but the church engages and disengages as it likes. You see the same pattern in the church's "efforts" to engage with women.

If Affirmation has its own meetings, it does so without the permission of the church.

Mormons are saying this after Bednar's famous "There are no homosexuals in the Mormon church" speech?

There are no gay wards. With all due respect to your wife, she is really reaching to let the Mormon church off the hook here I would guess. If they did have those wards then they couldn't be bigoted against gay people right? But they don't. And they are.

The Mormons officially don't let the children of gay people be baptized. These kids cannot join until they are 18 and disavow their parents. This was an official decree from on high. So what on earth would make her think that the Gerontocracy created special gay wards? I think she's hanging out with the wrong crowd. :)

The gay Mormon kids aren't contemplating suicide and getting kicked out of their houses because they have a special welcoming gay ward to go to.

Done & Done Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Mormons are saying this after Bednar's famous
> "There are no homosexuals in the Mormon church"
> speech?
>
> There are no gay wards. With all due respect to
> your wife, she is really reaching to let the
> Mormon church off the hook here I would guess. If
> they did have those wards then they couldn't be
> bigoted against gay people right? But they don't.
> And they are.
>
> The Mormons officially don't let the children of
> gay people be baptized. These kids cannot join
> until they are 18 and disavow their parents. This
> was an official decree from on high. So what on
> earth would make her think that the Gerontocracy
> created special gay wards? I think she's hanging
> out with the wrong crowd. :)
>
> The gay Mormon kids aren't contemplating suicide
> and getting kicked out of their houses because
> they have a special welcoming gay ward to go to.


My TBM wife sometimes - and even more so as she ages - tends to grab on to an idea in passing and hangs her hat on it. It is very frustrating for me so I have to verify things she says. I chalk a lot of this up to pre-dementia I'm sorry to say. She just barely read the November 2015 policy on children of gay couples today. I mentioned the policy and she reacted like I was lying so I found Christofferson's statement for her to read. My wife didn't know about the essays so I'm having her read them as well. I have to be very patient with her.

That has to be very hard for you. Hang in there. Maybe she's a little like my mother--very "Little Mary Sunshine." Only allows herself to see the robins, not the crows, with her rose colored glasses on her nose or however it goes. She can't fathom her church being about anything but love and goodness.

I'm not one of those ignorance is bliss types myself thought. Good luck with everything.

Thanks!

Ditto to what has been said above, Tom. Even if there were gay wards (almost impossible to conceive of in the world’s worst homophobic church), it would still be rank segregationism. Our gay sisters and brothers should be able to sit with us, as equals, in church. Hugs, man! Da Bone!

Permission from the church??? Most of them but not all have already been humiliated and disenfranchised from the church thru
Excommunication. I believe they are free to conduct their church services any way they choose

A separate but equal fantasy.

donbagley Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> A separate but equal fantasy.


Yeah, gotta segregate 'em -- for their own good, of course.

There are absolutely no LGBT wards. It is another lie that makes Mormons feel like the church is not as evil as it is.

Yes, and the Bishop is a Muslim!

They are called Single's Wards ;)

Serious though, I sure have never heard even the mention of one. Good luck with your wife Tom. I think the essays are the best teaching tool out there. This one seems to make the biggest impact on women. The second link really brings home just what he really thought of Emma. Slipped in her sealing between the teens.

Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo
https://www.lds.org/topics/plural-marriage-in-kirtland-and-nauvoo?lang=eng

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Joseph_Smith%27s_wives
Sealed to wife, Emma, 28 May 1843

That essay is so disturbing on every level; not just Joseph Smith's actions, but the church trying to spin it as something positive. I am so glad I realized the church was a fraud.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/12/2017 11:56AM by Atari.

Where do you think I met my "ex?" He knew who all the gays were in the ward and they knew about him.

As for what your wife said, I think this is the most absurd thing I've ever heard a mormon state.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/12/2017 06:33AM by cl2.

Highly doubtful there is anything "official". I do recall support groups in Utah for "same sex addiction" issues, but nothing that is Church Inc officially sanctioned.

Besides, what would be the point? Would you take a vegetarian to a BBQ? Would you take an alcoholic to a bar?

Grouping people who are LGBT with others LGBT would just give them a dating pool. Church Inc wouldn't be able to deal with the singles dances.

RMM

Laughing so hard. The thought of Oaks or Bednar walking in on the gay ward singles dance. hahahaha. You'd have to call the paramedics after that.

Laughing my socks off!!!!!!! I can just imagine a whole gay ward and nobody knows it. Mormons are a mighty secretive bunch and truth telling is not what they are known for.

If false, ask her why someone in the church would lie to her like that.

If true (and I honestly don't know), ask her why they feel the need to segregate people into their own wards. Just like they used to do with "black" wards.

Shouldn't everybody be welcome in every ward?

She's in a lose-lose position :)

Yes. They are called Legitimate Gold Book Theory wards and include all Mormonite roots and branches. All are welcomed, then shunned, for learning too much, too fast.

No. LDS is set up to segregate. That's what it does. Separate. Classify. Break down. Break up. Divide. Subtract. Multiply. Add. But IN ALL THE WRONG WAYS.

Church head-sorry(ass)-quarters tell themselves so many stories it's wonder many are believed. It sound like you may be educating her though. Good luck and best wishes.

M@t

"Todd Christofferson has a brother named Tom who lives with his gay partner."

Make that "lived," as in past tense.

Tom recently left his partner to return to the church and a loveless, celibate life. But he did get a book deal out of it, so there's that!

https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/comments/6zvqg1/lds_living_has_an_article_about_tom/

https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/comments/73mj8n/tom_christoffersons_book_was_published_by_deseret/