The mantra in the Mormon church now days with regard to LGBTQ people is “It’s OK to be Gay, just don’t act upon it” From a talk by Elder Ballard
Let us be clear: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints believes that ‘the experience of same-sex attraction is a complex reality for many people. The attraction itself is not a sin, but acting on it is. Even though individuals do not choose to have such attractions, they do choose how to respond to them. With love and understanding, the Church reaches out to all God’s children, including [those with same-sex attraction].’”
CES Devotional, 2014
There are gay members that buy into this 100%! See this from a few days ago on lds.org
But is this really what Jesus taught in the Bible? I found this interesting take on “forced celibacies” for gay people in a Christian context
In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says that we should avoid not only sinful acts, but also the desires for those acts—lust in addition to adultery, anger in addition to murder (Matthew 5:21-30). If all same-sex relationships are sinful, then same-sex attraction would be morally culpable as well.
Although many non-affirming Christians increasingly want to say there is nothing wrong with being gay as long as you aren’t in a gay relationship, this distinction is not supported by Scripture. It makes no more sense to say “it’s OK to be gay as long as you don’t act on it” than to say “it’s OK to feel greedy as long as you don’t steal.”
Brief Biblical Case for LGBTQ Inclusion
I had never thought of this before, but it raises an interesting point. Jesus taught that even the thought (desire) to do something wrong is a sin. But “non-affirming” Christian thought, and Mormon’s are part of this, are making a carve out on this principle. The fact is, you can’t have it both ways. If the act is sinful, the desire for that act is sinful. There is no “except for gays” clause in the Sermon on the Mount.
I could see an ultra TBM take the above thought and use to to condemn all LGBTQ people. But what I would hope for is that Christians would see the absurdity of forcing a gay person to be celibate. If having the feelings is OK, then acting on them in a legal and morally way should also be OK. If it is not OK, then the desire should also be not OK.
Have you heard of this argument before? Does it hold water, or am I missing something?
[Image by Julie Rose from Pixabay]
Wheat & Tares 
By the law of my country (in Europe) it is legal to be married as same sex couple for 20 years. In a few years these couples will be grandparents. It has been already legal for almost an entire generation. It is normal. I have a lot of same sex marriages among my group of friends. Honestly a phrase like “you can be gay just do but act upon it” sounds ridiculous and almost childlike in my european ears. The Q15 are walking so many years behind the parade. So Utah centered that has nothing to do with our lives realities elsewhere.
Bill I agree. The church has acknowledged that being LGBT is a personal trait that is not chosen and is simply how people can be wired although it was very late to do so, way behind the evidence that has accumulated over the last 70 years. It becomes obvious that being gay is not a sin but they are clinging to “acting on it is”, which is still pretty destructive to LDS LGBTQ people and their families. It’s sad.
I’m a gay man in a relationship with another man, so I’m clearly not particularly impressed by or interested in following the church’s position. I agree commanded celibacy for just gay people is wrong, because it is unhealthy. But I will say briefly that I think you’re parsing their stance a bit too closely. I’ve never understood “you can be gay but don’t act on it” to mean “gays, unlike the straights, are welcome to be lustful, just not have sex.”
In other words, all I think the church is saying is that being gay is not a sin in the same way that being straight is not a sin. But all of the related sexual desires remain sinful.
My mission president (talking to straight people) used to teach that the sin was in the ‘second look.’ Sometimes you’re walking down the street, and you see something inappropriate (soft pornography, like a sports illustrated or something). On a billboard, or on a magazine lying around, or just an attractive woman in suggestive clothing, etc. And you avert your eyes. You may have an instinctive sexual reaction to what you saw, but as of that moment, there’s still been no sin. But if you look *again*, if you do a double take, there’s the sin. (To be clear, my mission president wasn’t particularly hellfire and damnation-y. He wasn’t suggesting this was a grievous, loss-of-worthiness sin, just telling 19-year-old missionaries to be extra careful.)
Now, you can think everything my mission president taught is hogwash. I think it might be. But I think if you asked him to explain what the Church means when it says same-sex attraction is not a sin, just acting on it is, he would repeat the exact same above rule and stand by what counts as sin and what’s not sin. What images are involved would be different depending on your sexual orientation, but his sense of wrong and right does not. So I don’t really know that the Church’s position about feelings vs. actions is terribly inconsistent.
I wish that your interpretation caused people to think that these policies don’t make sense and our LGBTQ+ family members should be fully welcomed and celebrated in our spaces. My experience is that while the church has acknowledged that being gay is a trait that is not chosen, they haven’t acknowledged the same for many of the other letters in the LGBTQ+ community. Also, a large block of members are uninformed that the church has even acknowledged that being gay is OK even with the “not acting on it” part. The other problem is that the “not acting on it” part which includes marriage and family are the things that are believed to be required to fully participate in the gospel in this life and the next, so being able to be gay, but not act on it is just throwing crumbs. There is not an actual eternal plan developed for our single and celibate LGBTQ+ active members. The whole thing also doesn’t make any logical sense. We have these beautiful members who want to fully participate in our faith during a time when a large number of members have checked out. And the church’s response is “no, thanks.” When I listen to Affirmation events, I am struck by the talent and gifts our church has just walked away from. So very unwise. To me, it’s like being in the most important game of your life and benching your best players because they have green eyes.
I feel like this definition highlights the distinction between how non-affirming denominations (including the LDS church) treat heterosexual sexual sin vs homosexual sexual sin.
Like, on the one hand, people sometimes want to argue that the standards are the same for everyone. But no one will say heterosexual relationships themselves are sinful, and therefore no one will say heterosexual desire itself is sinful. There is a distinction made between lust and appropriate desire, between sex within marriage and sex as adultery or fornication or whatever else.
But this is not the standard for gay folks. There is no legitimate expression of same-sex sexuality in this system, so even the desire for a committed monogamous marriage is seen exactly the same as promiscuous lust.
At least in other traditions (e.g., Catholicism) they are just honest enough about the thought process to say that they do think homosexual inclination is “objectively disordered.”
One of the fundamental problems here is the use of the word “attraction”. Because the premise is that you can ignore your attractions. A middle-aged man may be “attracted” to 25-year-old women but it’s his job to ignore that attraction. Likewise for all same sex attraction.
The problem, of course, is that homosexuality goes way beyond simple attraction.
As a gay Mormon, I refuse to allow the “straight white men” of the church to define my experience with God. They already tried that with the Black people for 125 years, with devastating and embarrassing results. I do find the responses to this post interesting, though.
Our double-standard for LGBTQ folks goes beyond celibacy because – as we saw during the BYU honor code debacle – in our church, gay people aren’t allowed to date or show any kind of romantic affection the way that straight people can. So agree with the comments above that yeah, we might say “lust” is bad for everyone (gay or straight), but there’s a huge range of “appropriate” romantic and sexual behavior for straight people that isn’t available to gay people. And we also know that homosexuality is way more complicated than just which gender you have sex with, so we are also shutting the door to all those other avenues of connection for gay folks.
I do think that your argument could be made to point out the absurdity of the current position but I think it would just as likely be twisted to justify why gay folks can’t even date.
It’s all just crazy. Sometimes I hear disaffected Mormons describe our Church as a sex cult. I don’t think that’s fair but sometimes … sometimes … it really does feel like our obsession with the right kind of sex between the right people in the right way in the right time (and the right kind of underwear), and the way we connect marriage and sex, and the way we envision a heaven full of sex (with multiple wives, no less!) is complete insanity and pretty sex culty.
My gay daughter and I talked just last night about our memories of when she came out to us as a teen. I thought maybe we had handled it well. She disagreed because of this same point. At some point my wife or I said that she could be gay and not act on it. This meant to her that she was expected to hide being gay and keep it secret. She said that was when she knew that she couldn’t stay in the church – and waited till she left home to fully leave the church.
It is an interesting thought exercise, but I don’t really buy into the idea that desire is a sin.
Consider this hypothetical statement: “it’s okay to be straight and procreate as long as you don’t like it too much.”
There are some who seem to believe it, but I think it’s ludicrous. If it were true, the least sinful people would be gay folk in hetero relationships, as they have less sexist desire and satisfaction with their partner. It makes no sense at all.
All that aside, I wish ask my LGBTQ friends the best in their relationships, and I hope the church accepts them as they are soon.
LOL. “ Sexist desire” should have been “sexual desire”.
I don’t know what sexist desire is, but I’m sure it exists.
I apologize in advance for venting my spleen.
I fully understand and support LGBT+ folks that want to have a place in the church. I understand and support the yearning that family members and allies have for it too – it was my most desperate hope when my son came out 11 years ago.
If the lived experience has gotten better in the church, it’s thanks to local members making it so – not because of anything coming from Salt Lake.
But I’m perturbed when the church publishes articles like the one linked to in the OP. Deseret Book just published a book by Ben Schilaty, a gay man who is an administrator in BYU’s Honor Code Office. Before that, Tom Christopherson (brother of apostle Christopherson) was the gay Mormon rock star who returned to the fold. I’m not upset with these individuals and support their respective journeys.
What bothers me is that these stories are held up as the ideal, when it is only livable for a fairly small percentage of LGBT+ Mormons. It tells the rest of the community – as if they didn’t get this enough already – that they aren’t doing it right. Pile on the guilt and shame.
Some of the Momon-friendly American Indian chiefs in nineteenth-century Utah were considered “good Indians”. Jane Manning James and Elija Able were referred to as “good Blacks”. And now we have our “Good Gays”. At least as long as they continue to toe the line.
And when did *not* treating people like crap become a “progressive” ideal? Could the term “progressive Mormon” have been coined by the conservative element of the Church to scare the rank-and-file away from the socialist impulse to not treat people like crap?
History tells the tale of nations, religions, and lots of other groups seeking to protect their position and status by proclaiming expetionalism. Unfortunately, in order to be “exceptional”, somebody else must be diminished, marginalized, looked down on, restricted, punished . . . you get the picture.
None of that seems to be of God. “I really like you guys. I did an excellent job making you. I want you to feel really good about yourselves, so I’m going to create some other people for you to kick around. Then when you need a rest, meet together one day a week and pat each other on the back.”
So as to the argument in question: I honestly don’t think the brethren are inclined to look for a loophole or that homophobic members would be persuaded by it. Being on the wrong side of arguments has long been a Mormon badge of courage – standing up to the world and Satan. Until the day that the Church’s official stance no longer serves them, they will stick to it.
@BeenThere – yep. Easy on people, hard on institutions. I won’t judge a gay person’s desire to stay in the Church (but if I had a gay kid I’d encourage them not to). But the fact that the Church puts people in this position is unacceptable.
@BeenThere Please vent your spleen any time the impulse hits you. Your insights into your lived experiences have more value for many of us than you’ll ever know. Thank you.
This reminds me of a post I did several years ago in which several theologians tackle “gay” scriptures. See https://mormonheretic.org/2012/12/26/re-evaluating-gay-scriptures/
The older I get, the more my attitude toward this issue becomes: leave the business of relationships to the people in them. I don’t think it is really anyone’s (other people, church, government, organizations) to have a position on the matter.