Two issues many members of the church—myself included—are struggling with are gender and sexuality. Both are highly charged. Here I am sharing some ideas that I've had to help me reconcile church positions with my own logic. I'm attempting to do so with respect and ask that any response be returned in the same way.
Systemic Disparity
Since I was four years old I have been confused, sad, disappointed, discouraged, angry, baffled by the gender disparity in the church. Just as I did not ever believe that God created a racial hierarchy in his kingdom, I have never believed in a gender one.Â
This is an issue I have grappled with for 50 years, with little in the way of satisfying response. Our church culture is still, sadly, such that even asking about these issues is usually deemed inappropriate. 11 years ago I finally got up the nerve to write about an incident that occurred eight years earlier. I knew doing so would cause me to be categorized as a trouble maker, a boat rocker. (And it did.) But I was at the point where I could no longer remain silent about systemic issues that harm our church and, particularly, women.
In this vein, I have studied and thought about Mother in Heaven a great deal. (If you want to get started with a wonderful (though not exhaustive) study on Mother in Heaven in the context of authoritative LDS statements (and—to be safe!—written by two men and published by BYU Studies), I highly recommend starting with this free article: “A Mother There”: A Survey of Historical Teachings about Mother in Heaven.)
I long for more information about the person who is my true divine role model, the only one whom I can actually become like.
Homosexuality in a Church Context
This gender-doctrine study collided unexpectedly with another issue I've tried to reconcile. I have grappled with the issue of homosexuality in culture and the church. A number of my friends from childhood and adulthood and more of the friends of my children define themselves as homosexual. Others have changed their sexual identity over the years, having spent at least some time claiming non-heterosexual identity. Some are close friends and some are like my own kids. I love them and sympathize with their struggles.
In this vein I want to be clear about something that seems foundational to the discussion: I accept as fact that God can proscribe behavior. Half of the gospel is proscription and the other half prescription (not an actual statistical analysis). If he can tell me not to steal or covet, I think he can tell me not to have sex with: children, animals, myself, people I'm not married to, and even to those of my same gender.
Let's also understand that there are a lot of people who feel like doing almost everything that is legally or morally unacceptable—or there would be no need for laws or commandments to cover them. The fact that people feel like having sex outside the bounds of church guidelines isn't particular persuasive to me. Just because you want to do something—even really, really badly—isn't much of an argument for whether or not the behavior is right or good.
In principle, I don't object to counsel to abstain from sexual activity with those of my gender. What I didn't understand was why this would be proscribed.
Of course, there are lots of things that I don't understand. But given the political/cultural shift around the issue of homosexuality, this causes more problems for the church and members than many others. Once I said to Sam, “It would just be so much easier if the church just accepted homosexual relationships.” And given that they haven't done so, the issue of possible reasoning is of interest to me.
Sexuality Outside the Context of Morality
With all the currently used sexual labels—and the many more sure to come—I admit I'm always baffled. Here are just a few so we are on the same page:
Asexual:Â experiencing little or no sexual attraction to others and/or a lack of interest in sexual relationships/behavior
Bisexual:Â a person who is emotionally, physically, and/or sexually attracted to males/men and females/women
Gay:Â individuals who are primarily emotionally, physically, and/or sexually attracted to members of the same sex and/or gender; more commonly used when referring to men who are attracted to other men, but can be applied to women as well
Heterosexual:Â a person primarily emotionally, physically, and/or sexually attracted to members of the opposite sex
Homosexual:Â a person primarily emotionally, physically, and/or sexually attracted to members of the same sex/gender
Lesbian:Â women who have the capacity to be attracted romantically, erotically, and/or emotionally to some other women
Pansexual:Â a person who experiences sexual, romantic, physical, and/or spiritual attraction for members of all gender identities/expressions (distinct from bisexuality in that it accepts the notion of gender fluidity)
Queer: individuals who don’t identify as straight
My state of bewilderment is the idea that these labels make sense in some general way. I suppose everyone would call me a heterosexual, but I'm certainly not attracted to every male on earth. I am attracted to a small subset of them. And I think a lot of women are really beautiful and sexy. I'm not sexually attracted to them, but how much of that is highly correlated with the fact that I was raised:
- In a culture that never really discussed homosexuality, so it was never something I considered?
- In a church that, had I even known what it was during early adolescence, specifically denounced the practice?
By the time I really understood anything about homosexuality, in late junior high, I'd already spent a number of years (hey, I developed early!) only considering boys as possible “objects” of my affection. Would I feel differently if I had considered women as possible romantic liaisons? Would I feel differently if I had experimented sexually with both men and women to compare?
I submit to you that outside the bounds of a learned and accepted value set, most of us would likely be bisexual. By that I mean that left only to our feelings, urges, drives, each of us would simply look for the specific human (or other) that satisfied our desires, without regard for gender (or even species). We would look to have our needs met without worrying about finding an acceptable subset of those to pursue or consider.
I have three friends who are now gay adult men who were molested in junior high by gay adult men. In all three cases they were told by the perpetrators that it was obvious they were gay because they were aroused by a man (the perpetrator) during the act.
Even as a high school kid with almost no understanding of sexuality, this didn't make sense to me. I'm not a guy, but guys I knew could get aroused by almost anything. Thinking about sex, very mild genital stimulation (or close to stimulation or thinking about stimulation or…), pictures, cute girls, dreams, sheets. Honestly, do you know any teenager who, if blindfolded, wouldn't get aroused by genital stimulation no matter who administered it? Yet this physical response was deemed the “proof” of sexual orientation.
If arousal doesn't prove orientation, what does? How much does what we learn in culture/religion impact how we view others sexually? How much does it impact what we are attracted to versus what we are repulsed by?
I don't have a lot of experience in trying to change what I think is sexy, but I see this lack of acculturation in almost everything. I like foods that are familiar and foods eaten in some cultures sound disgusting, even though it's not a rational response. (Is eating dead bugs really more nauseating than eating a dead cow?) With regard to how we are aroused or sexually stimulated, I tend to think instinctively there are all sorts of things that “work” if we have no moral compunctions surrounding it.
[In the typical acronym LGBTQ+ T is included to represent transgender. But since that has nothing to do with sexual orientation—and actually undermines most of the definitions as well as feminism—I've left it out.]
The Definition of God
Back to Heavenly Mother. It has seemed the most dissonant message to me that, on one hand, women are assigned an explicit role (in The Family: A Proclamation to the World, for one example) to create life and nurture it while, on the other, women are utterly absent from the entire creation story. Where was Heavenly Mother during all this? Napping? Knitting? Fixing a snack for the men after their hard day's labor? She was somewhere, doing something, right? Can we talk about that for a minute?
Elohim is the plural form of the singular noun ‘eloah. It is used 2,570 times in the Hebrew Bible (as opposed to 57 for the singular). One commentary on this (Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament – Botterweck, Ringgren) says that why the “plural ‘God' is used has not yet been explained satisfactorily.” To which I reply that there is a simple answer (Occam's Razor and all that) and one that I believe is true. This is my definition of God:
God consists of Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother, together, acting as one. God is the union of one man and one woman, bringing both parts in a symbiotic relationship to create a whole, complete God.
For years this has made sense to me in the context of marriage, creation, godhood. It was, as far as I knew, an explanation that I had invented to remove the cognitive dissonance I felt. But it helped me to view many things in a way that made sense. I didn't address it publicly because, as with other possibly controversial issues, there can be a high cost for seeming radical in the church. Before I was ready to further radicalize myself, I needed time to form a cogent position.
A couple of months ago Sam was preparing his Gospel Doctrine lesson and came upon these validating sections:
If we study physiology or anatomy, we are led to exclaim with the Psalmist of old, “I am fearfully and wonderfully made,” and see a a beautiful harmony in all the parts, and a most exquisite design. This is proven by an examination of various parts of the human form. And every organ adapted to its special use, and for its special purpose, and combining a whole, a grand union—a little kingdom composed of many kingdoms, united and constituting the grand whole, the being we call man, but which in the language of these Scriptures was called Adam—male and female created he them, and called their name Adam, which in the original, in which these Scriptures were written by Moses, signifies “the first man.†There was no effort at distinguishing between the one half and the other, and calling one man and the other woman. This was an after distinction, but the explanation of it is—one man, one being, and he called their name Adam. But he created them male and female, for they were one, and he says not unto the woman multiply, and to the man multiply, but he says unto them, multiply and reproduce your species, and replenish the earth. He speaks unto them as belonging together, as constituting one being, and as organized in his image and after his likeness.
Journal of Discourses 11:268-269
“What,†says one, “do you mean we should understand that Deity consists of man and woman?†Most certainly I do. If I believe anything that God has ever said about himself, and anything pertaining to the creation and organization of man upon the earth, I must believe that Deity consists of man and woman.
Journal of Discourses 11:269
I sometimes illustrate this matter by taking up a pair of shears, if I have one, but then you all know they are composed of two halves, but they are necessarily parts, one of another, and to perform their work for each other, as designed, they belong together, and neither one of them is fitted for the accomplishment of their works alone. And for this reason says St. Paul, “the man is not without the woman, nor the woman without the man in the Lord.†In other words, there can be no God except he is composed of the man and woman united, and there is not in all the eternities that exist, nor ever will be, a God in any other way. I have another description: There never was a God, and there never will be in all eternities, except they are made of these two component parts; a man and a woman; the male and the female.
Journal of Discourses 11:270
As I said, man was created, male and female, and two principles are blended in one; and the man is not without the woman nor the woman without the man in the Lord; and there is no Lord, there is no God in which the two principles are not blended, nor can be; and we may never hope to attain unto the eternal power and the Godhead upon any other principle.
Journal of Discourses 11:272
I realize now that I'm not the first person to unearth these quotes, but I had not read this volume before and was thrilled to find them. It's one thing for me to form ideas that make sense of the world (and the otherworld), but another to have authoritative backup from my religious foundation. These have made it much easier to clarify and defend my ideas.
God and Sexuality in Collision
Pondering homosexuality one day in the context of homosexual behavior being declared sinful, I stopped to think about what sin is at the core. The church defines it as “willful disobedience to God's commands or failure to act righteously despite a knowledge of truth.” As a principle, then, it's countering whatever God says at a given time. But what makes something fundamentally sinful to God? My conclusion is that sin is something that separates us from God, something that stops our progress to becoming like them.
When I considered my own definition of God being one man and one woman united to create a whole, I saw the possibility that refusing to accept a female/male partnership would prevent someone from becoming a god in their own right. In other words, the “sin” of homosexuality could be that it stops people from achieving their godly potential—something they can only do within the context of a whole godly being, with the two necessary parts combined.
Conclusion
For those looking for the cliff notes version, my conclusion is that understanding God as the combined powers/attributes/character of one man and one woman reconciles two issues for me:
- Whenever God is present, it is both Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother, working as one. Heavenly Mother isn't nonexistent and she isn't unimportant. She is as central to the workings of the divine as is her male counterpart. I have a real role model, not just an imaginary one.
- God has proscribed homosexual relations because they fundamentally reject an essential element to reaching our full potential. They exclude one of the two necessary parts to make a whole, godly being.
Of course, this is mostly speculation. I can certainly be accused of confirmation bias. That this is an explicit attempt on my part to reconcile policy and doctrinal issues that have not completely made sense to me, should be clear.
For now, these ideas have helped give me a possible explanation for some of the things I see in the church as well as for a possible reason why God might proscribe particular behavior.
I'm interested to hear your thoughts on the matter.
You lost me a little at inter-species attraction, but I pressed on because I do think you’ve made some valid points here.
As for homosexual activity, I think you love you who love. That’s pretty much it. I think sex outside of marriage is wrong by church standards. I’m not sure how much I think God really cares about it, since it isn’t mentioned a whole lot in the Bible (mostly mentions adultery, which is a married person having sex outside of marriage) – and certainly homosexual activity is not heavily mentioned. So I think we do obsess about this a little much in the church. Having said that, since I’m a member of the church, I’ll go with no sex outside of marriage, period. I have no problem with any two people having sex with each other if they are married. That’s probably all I should say about my feelings on that.
So, the idea of the nature of God including the divine feminine. I’ve long thought that God encompassed all the masculine and feminine qualities. Whether this is one “male” God who has evolved to the point of encompassing it all, one male and one female God working together to be Elohim, one male God with his polygamous female Gods (the most likely under LDS theology), or a multitude of male and female Gods who collectively are Elohim – I don’t really know. Do I think it’s more like that there is at least a male and a female God comprising Elohim – yes, personally I do. Whether there is doctrinal support for what exactly that looks like, I don’t really know the answer. Considering our doctrine that we will become Gods some day, I think it’s very possible that “God” is really a lot of people, male and female. But, who knows. I think it’s an interesting thing to think about and consider, but it’s not really something I stew about.
Thanks for sticking with me, Angie, and for the thoughtful response. I realize it was a long, convoluted post.
I think this is equivocation. If not on your part, then on the part of the LGBTQ+/ally movement whose rhetoric this mirrors. No one on earth cares who anyone loves. Christianity commands that we love everyone. The contention is with whom should you engage in sexual activities. The distinction is an enormous one.
Your list of possible male/female gods is good. OK, it’s good with regard to thoughtfulness. On other grounds, I don’t much like the alternatives.
(1) A lone god who progresses to have sufficient male/female qualities seems a lonely eternity to me. (3) After years of complete pain and angst over polygamy, I decided a few years ago that I simply reject it. I cannot even imagine such in inequitable arrangement. (As if God couldn’t really create enough men/women to make pairing possible…) (4) I could imagine a collective group of buddy gods working together. I do want to be surrounded be people I love. But having a special bond with one is still very attractive to me.
Like you, I do not stew much about the nature of godhood. But I stew a lot about the missing female divine, the command to be like someone and then told I cannot, etc.
Thanks for responding.
I can fancy that the God we should (do?) worship is waiting patiently and lovingly until we kids figure out that the mechanics of love can deal with multiple configurations of eros and philia etc. At least, until we realize that Gods are beyond the limitations of reproduction in a fallen world. Even we fallen humans are figuring out how to work around “not able to have kids.” I know that just looking around me at creation diversity is acceptable and doesn’t exclude my charity and love.
My imagination, of course.
Thanks for stimulating it with your post.
Thanks for your response. The problem lies mostly—in the church, at least—in very particular policies surrounding behavior without much clarification. Also, with a lot of contradiction. The church currently utterly romanticizes eternal marriage while leaving out the current polygamous nature of our sealing ceremony (Presidents Nelson and Oaks, for just two examples). And when anyone in the LDS realm presents the massive “love story” of Emma and Joseph—without mentioning the gazillion other wives—it’s almost nauseating.
So good Alison!! Absolutely right on. It’s sad that some of us are so confused these days as to be unable to recognize just the reality that children can only be made by a man and a woman together regardless of what our sexual preferences are. And if we don’t follow through on that and work to strengthen that bond for the good of the children, then we don’t reproduce and we don’t continue– we stop without it. We need both- man and woman together. Thank you for writing that so well and so succinctly,
Amber, thank you for commenting. I’m behind, if you didn’t notice!
I find the church signals two pretty polar opposite positions.
(1) Men and women are eternally distinct
(2) Women don’t matter all that much
At the recent women’s session, for example, the prophet made a point to say women’s voices are needed—while only 1 out of 29 speaking slots included women. The disconnect is utterly jarring.
Great thoughts, Allison. These (homosexuality, priesthood, Heavenly Father AND Heavenly Mother) are issues that are frequently on my mind. I always enjoy reading about it when someone else can really articulate their thoughts on these matters. I also really appreciate the Cliff Notes version at the end–I did read the whole post BUT I got a little lost in the middle and the Notes at the end helped me to tie it all together.
My one additional thought/question – I saw the other day that Family Search will be adding an option in 2019 to record same sex marriages, couples and families with children where both parents are the same gender. I was surprised to see this, but pleasantly so. Even though our doctrine regarding practicing homosexuality will not (in my opinion) change, I do want to be able to record family history as it actually is. This would necessarily include being able to list my brother’s husband (to whom he is legally married in his state). Does this also mean then that I would reasonably be able to do the temple work for my brother-in-law? I think so, though I wonder if I would have to get permission from one of his siblings.
Anyway, I think this is a good change–a way to show more acceptance and love, even though the doctrine has not changed. My husband is very concerned and feels that it is pandering. He feels that it is giving false hope and that people who want the doctrine to change will see this as a step towards that change. Thoughts?
Hello,
Indeed fantastic information about definition of god church policy.
I appreciate the effort you have clearly put into being fair and thoughtful in your pursuit of understanding this issue, Allison. That’s why I believe it deserves a response. However, the simple answer is not one that our society – innocently trapped in the complex web of misunderstandings that is the very thing which keeps us from knowing God – is prepared to accept. (Much like as with Harry Potter’s Voldemort: every one of the created horcruxes anchoring the evil tyrant to life must be destroyed, before the entity can be eliminated. Of course, all of that cannot be done in a single reply… thus… ‘line upon line, precept upon precept.’)
What I would have you do is look a bit more carefully at your definition of God. I recognize it to be one of an uncountable many which all have some truth to them – and yet, because they each regard the whole from a divided perspective, inevitably fall short of truly presenting the term properly. The only exception to this I have ever seen, and which is mentioned or referred to multiple times in the scriptures, is that God is Love. Not man’s definition of love, but the real thing that can do no ill. Because it is selfless and pure, genuine and unconditional; the end and the beginning, the law and the prophets. Above and beyond any definition of god that promotes an individual, or many, the reality of Love is what makes one able to -be- regarded as such, in the first place. Because the divine Love that God -is-, is as whole as the term it is describing. It takes a whole to define a whole.
Thus, when you say things like:
> …I stopped to think about what sin is at the core. The church defines it as “willful disobedience to God’s commands or failure to act righteously despite a knowledge of truth.†As a principle, then, it’s countering whatever God says at a given time. But what makes something fundamentally sinful to God? <
I would reply: 'As a principle, then, it’s countering whatever Love says at a given time.' What would Love truly have me do? 'But what makes something fundamentally sinful to Love?' I would say: Lust, aka – that which distracts us from living it. (Because 'no man can serve two masters…')
Is it telling that 'sin' means 'without' in Spanish? Thus a sin can be properly identified as any activity entered into -without- love, operating according to a -lack- of love, or otherwise not -of- love. Always in reference to the whole, divine picture of the term.
The very fact that a mortal illusion of the term exists, is sad testament to the fact that man has tried to pass his lusts off as love for a long time. Actively, even if ignorantly, taking us away from God.
Ah, but that's a whole 'nother part of the issue. (The truth is, sexual sins of every kind have been equivalently proscribed from time immemorial… and it's ridiculous to focus on hetero versus homo when the lustfulness of the pursuit is the real problem.)
Suffice it to say that the reason for any -pre-scription from God is the hopeful nurturing of Love in our relationships, just as every -pro-scription is an attempt to guard against promoting the lack of it.
Respectfully,
LovingTruth
The lack of clarification, along with prevalent contradiction, are symptomatic of people seeing and promoting the parts of gospel they want to see (and have hope to understand), rather than developing a proper testimony of the whole. It’s an unfortunate trend. (And sadly typical, past the 3rd or 4th generation.)
The thing is, the whole -is- beautiful! One need not be afraid to learn of it, because it’s nature – like God – is -holy-. It’s just that… the principle of plural marriage (for instance) has never been able to be successfully presented in a way that truly illustrated its divine nature. No matter how hard Joseph Smith tried (very honestly, I believe), the fact is his first job was to get the doctrine to us (which he did)… while he was never in a position to be that example. (Emma would have had to have been thoroughly ready to embrace it, for that to be possible… and the conditions [of society] and timelines [of his life] were simply not conducive to that end. [Which was not her fault!])
Thus, it remains a principle that can only be truly comprehended through the genuine nurturing of -Love-, and by personal revelation. Which, honestly, no aspect of the gospel can be properly understood without.
Respectfully,
LovingTruth
Well, being as it appears that my comments are not really wanted here… I’m going to bow out of this conversation (and possibly this site, for good), so that you all can wander about through your hot topics in peace. Sooner or later you’ll discover (hopefully not the hard way) that the real answers to these questions aren’t particularly compatible with the prevalent attitudes of church culture… which is why it actually helps to have a friendly outside perspective. Believe it or not, I was trying to help.
Just remember that prejudice in any form (including that of gender distinction), is not of God… (the same being no respecter of persons!)… and as Jesus illustrated to us quite clearly by his own actions: any person who has honestly reached the point where he understands well enough to judge another… -won’t throw stones-. Please be careful about the attitudes you promote.
Respectfully,
LovingTruth
Don’t know how I missed this, Alison. You took the words right out of my soul. I believe the best thing the church can do to clear up the confusion around homosexual issues is to unveil Heavenly Mother.
Karl, thank you so much for the kind words! This post was a LONG time coming because I really had to try to parse out my thoughts. Thanks again.
I read your recent MTA conference post and saw this link. I have previously pondered many of the ideas you have expressed. I imagine with 100 billion spirit children Heavenly Mother must be pretty busy. An interesting cultural study on homosexuality was conducted in Africa. Barry and Bonnie Hewlett had been studying the Aka and Ngandu people of central Africa for many years before they began to specifically study the groups’ sexuality. Married Aka and Ngandu men and women consistently reported having sex multiple times in a single night and found that homosexuality and masturbation appeared to be foreign to both groups. The behavioral differences between Bonobos and Chimpanzees provide another possible case study to explain human behavior.
I am totally late to this party. But I am grateful to have found it, as it’s given me so much to think about. So much makes sense to me. Thanks for the time and thought you put into this.