Aaron Sherinian and Things That Will Never, Ever, Ever Change

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Hello and welcome to another episode of Inside Out.
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My name is Jim Bennett and I'm here with the cold but undaunted Ian Wills.
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How are you, sir?
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I'm doing very well, Jim.
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Good morning to you.
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How are you?
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I'm doing all right, but I understand you've got, what, six, seven inches of snow?
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We do.
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We spent quite a bit of time clearing the drive this morning and getting quite old for that.
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So, yeah, we might move at some point in the future.
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It's a big job to clear the drive, big, long drive.
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Well, we've got a little bit here.
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It's not quite as bad, but every year this happens, I just...
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You know, I've lived in this area for 20 years now, and every winter I'm always thinking, this again?
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Really?
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I have to do this again?
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I love the snow.
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I don't like driving in it.
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I certainly don't like clearing it off the drive.
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It is where it is.
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But good exercise at the same time.
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Yeah.
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But a lot of calories, so that's good.
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Well, this is all good.
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Well, we are going to be talking about a subject that is very near and dear to my heart, and I appreciate you...
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indulging me here a little bit, but there's been a lot of news in the Mormon blogosphere, the Mormon Twitterverse, whatever you want to call it, that is focused on a new hire that the church has done.
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The church has hired a new managing director of communications.
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I mentioned this in the podcast about Donald Trump, but did not realize how much this would sort of blow up and how prominent it would become in the discussion.
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The new managing director of communications is a man by the name of Aaron Sherinian, and many people, MAGA Mormons, are losing their minds over the fact that he's a very clear LGBTQ ally.
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There are pictures of him.
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There was a...
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The day that the Obergefell decision came down from the Supreme Court, that's the decision that legalized gay marriage throughout the United States, he posted a rainbow picture of the White House along with a celebratory sort of tweet saying, way to go, SCOTUS, love is love, hashtag love is love, you know, all of these kinds of things.
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There's a picture of him with his children.
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At a pride parade, he is wearing a shirt that says love, has a heart that has a rainbow on it.
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And even as recently as...
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And a lot of people were saying, well, this is in the past.
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This is 2015, 2016.
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Well, he was working for Deseret Management Corporation as its vice president.
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This is the company that manages the business end of the church.
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And his LinkedIn profile had pronouns.
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Aaron Sherinian, he, him, which is an absolute no-no for the people who, for Desnat and the people who weaponized the family proclamation.
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Just being able to say these are my preferred pronouns is acknowledging the existence of trans people, which many, many of these fundamentalist Mormons are not willing to do.
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Anyway, so But the long and short of it is this has been a very controversial hire.
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It has been spoken of in, you know, we've had these podcasts, the quick show with this guy who just went on for hours about how this is the end of the world.
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But he's not trying to check the church.
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He's not trying to correct the church.
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But the church is in complete apostasy and is going to burn hell.
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But he's not really.
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It's just.
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As someone who's been attacked repeatedly for being too progressive, it is in an unchristian way, sort of, in terms of schadenfreude, somewhat delightful to watch these people lose their minds when the church does something that they don't like.
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And I probably shouldn't enjoy that as much as I should.
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I think I talked about that in the Trump episode as well, that That doesn't really speak well for me, but I am who I am and that's where I am.
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And watching these people blow up has been sort of delightful for me.
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But the other thing is that I know Aaron Sherinian.
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I know him quite well.
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I met Aaron Sherinian in 2016.
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It was right after my father had a stroke that took his life.
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He died three weeks after the stroke.
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And he was living in Roslyn, Virginia.
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which was part of the Arlington, Virginia ward where Aaron Sherinian was serving as bishop.
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And if you go through the timeline, 2016 is not long after the Obergefell decision.
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And it's around the same time that Aaron Sherinian was posting pictures of himself at a pride parade.
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So all of this was happening.
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A lot of the fundamentalists are trying to sort of deal with their cognitive dissonance by saying, well, he was an apostasy then.
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But he's repented now.
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He no longer believes all of that, which I think is absolute nonsense.
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And the reality is, when he was posting these pictures, he was serving as a bishop.
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And my father had the idea.
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After my father left the Senate, he started his own consulting firm.
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And he very much wanted to get a contract with the church to where my father's consulting firm would essentially function as the church spokesman, and the consulting firm would hire Aaron Sherinian as the person who would do it.
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My father was very impressed with Aaron Sherinian.
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He has a really remarkable background, a lot of experience, and back then, my father said he had been offered this position that he's now taken multiple times.
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The church has...
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pursued Aaron Sherinian and tried to get them to work for him for years.
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And Aaron Sherinian turned them down primarily because he didn't want to take the pay cut.
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He was getting compensated quite well.
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When I met him, he was the communications director for the United Nations Foundation.
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And I ended up actually getting a contract.
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He arranged a contract where I was Given that after Patrick Kieran's talk on refugees, the church was very interested in sort of doing everything they could to up the media profile of the church's efforts with refugees.
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And Aaron Sherinian helped helped arrange a contract.
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whereby I was tasked with placing articles and opinion pieces about refugees in red state newspapers.
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In other words, in states that were predominantly Republican.
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A lot of that was in Utah.
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I was a columnist for the Deseret News at the time, and I placed a number of articles in the Deseret News as a result of that, and also in a bunch of other different newspapers.
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So I actually worked with Aaron Cherinian as a result of this.
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At one point, I went to a conference that he put on in New York City where Joe Biden, who was the vice president at the time, came and spoke about what he called the cancer moonshot.
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This was the effort to put all the kind of effort that we put into landing on the moon to curing cancer.
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It wasn't a political speech.
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But Joe Biden was the sitting vice president, so we all had to go through metal detectors as we went and did this.
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But anyway, so I know Aaron Sherinian.
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Where I got a real sense of who Aaron Sherinian is and where I realized just what a magnificent human being he is was the night my father died, May 4th, 2016.
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For three weeks, all of my siblings and I were sort of standing vigil around my father's bedside, because we knew the end was coming.
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And Aaron Sherinian and Emily Sherinian were constantly at my parents' house, just sort of to keep us company, just sort of to talk to us.
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I mean, they were doing everything they could to be true disciples of Christ, to really just show that sort of human element in a family that was in grief.
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And the night my father died, after he passed away, it was minutes before Aaron Sherinian came to our home.
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And he just sat with us and just talked with us and wept with us.
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It was just the most gracious, kind thing that anybody could do.
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And so I just adore this man.
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And when I saw that he'd been hired, I was absolutely thrilled.
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And I didn't even think about the political implications of this.
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I knew that he was not a Trumper.
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I did not know the extent of his LGBTQ alliances, but I knew that this was not a man that fit the sort of traditional MAGA Republican mold.
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Anyway, so I know Aaron Sherinian.
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I've actually been in communication with him while this has been happening.
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I don't really want to get into that because he hasn't given me permission to share any of that information.
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But I know that this has been difficult for him.
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I think it's been particularly difficult for his children.
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There have been people who come after his kids online.
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And these are active members of the church that think they're doing the church a service by trashing...
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a good man because they don't agree with his politics.
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But it's even more than that.
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I mean, the meltdown of the Desnats over Aaron Sherinian is on the idea that Aaron Sherinian was doing all of these things and the church should realize that he's in direct opposition to church doctrine.
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That's a direct quote from one of these tweets.
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I mean, I can share with you a few more of them.
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I mean, most of them are really quite ugly.
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I mean, one guy asks, what can we as members of the church do about openly apostate shit libs gaining lofty positions in church proceedings?
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Or excommunicate immediately.
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Or the church office's"...is polluted with so many apostate, woke, garbage humans, and it is hurting everyone who blindly follows the church and not the Savior.
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This will only make things worse.
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I'm still waiting for them to correct the false statement about the safe and effective jab." So there you have somebody who's mad at the church for promoting vaccination.
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They committed legitimacy suicide years ago.
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It just takes time for the reverberations to take effect.
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And this is one of the stages of dying.
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These are people who claim to be active members of the church.
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Infiltration.
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Look around.
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It's everywhere.
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Or death.
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The fact someone this educated and theoretically skilled in understanding public dynamics such as PR and communications couldn't foresee down the road a few years to recognize how badly the woke agenda's tactics were going to blow up and therefore have the courage to say no.
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And that's just where that stops.
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Another guy says, where's my pitchfork?
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I mean, these are people who consider themselves to be the most righteous members of the church.
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the most active members of the church.
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And they're the ones deriding the church for doing this and ripping Aaron Sherinian, ripping the brethren.
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And every time I push back and I've said, so it sounds like you don't sustain the leaders who appointed them.
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Oh, no, no, you're not.
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What are you talking about?
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I absolutely sustain the leaders.
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They didn't know about this.
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This was, I mean, as if Aaron Sherinian sort of snuck into the church office building and took this job.
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without any of the brethren knowing.
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And, you know, John Dillon and RFM and Bill Reel and our friend Rebecca Biblioteca did a podcast where they talked about this, and they framed it as, well, either the church is grossly negligent and incompetent and didn't know this, or they did know this.
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And I want to go on record as saying there is absolutely no way that the church did not know this, that they did not know about Aaron Sherinian's background.
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RFM is saying that Aaron Sherinian is scrubbing his social media or that the church is scrubbing his social media.
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I don't think so.
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I don't know if that's true.
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I think it may be likely that Aaron Sherinian is embarrassed by all the attention that this has created and scrubbed it himself.
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You know, I don't think there's a massive conspiracy here because I don't think Aaron Cherinian believes he's been hired to launch a new direction for the church.
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The communications director does...
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The tail doesn't wag the dog.
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The communications director does not set church doctrine, does not set church policy, and Aaron Sherinian is not going to do any of that.
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He is going to be a loyal spokesman to the church and for the brethren.
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So it's clear that the brethren absolutely knew about this and hired him anyway.
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So the question then becomes, well, what does this mean?
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And I think that's what we can explore here on this podcast.
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And I'm happy to talk about anything that you want to raise as well.
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But what I think this means, in my estimation, is not that the church is on the cusp of becoming LGBTQ friendly or that the church is on the cusp of performing same-sex temple ceilings or any of the kinds of things that these desnats are terrified of happening.
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What I think it absolutely means is that you can be an LGBTQ ally and still be a member in good standing.
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A lot of people have cited the Temple Recommend question about affiliating with apostate groups or affiliating with anybody whose teachings and practices oppose those of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
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And historically, that question has been the subject of leadership roulette.
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There was a big story in the Salt Lake Tribune a few years ago about a mission president who sent a missionary home because this missionary had a lesbian mother who was married to a woman and he wasn't willing to disavow that.
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And he said, well, your practices and affiliations are not in accordance with church.
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And so he got sent home and eventually That worked its way through leadership and he ended up getting a temple recommend and was invited to go back and serve the rest of his mission and refused to because that was such a negative experience.
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But you have many leaders who will say, look, you can't believe that gay marriage is a good idea because that's contrary to the teachings and practices of the church.
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You also, I mean, this kid that was sent home from his mission was sent home on the basis of you're not sustaining your leaders anymore.
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Because sustaining your leaders means agreeing with your leaders.
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So you have to believe exactly the same way that your leaders believe, or you can't have a temple recommend.
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What this Aaron Sherinian incident, I wish there were some other way to describe it, because it sounds like Aaron did something wrong, and he absolutely didn't.
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But this whole kerfuffle, what this demonstrates is that the brethren do not see that kind of support as disqualifying.
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And I think that is actually a huge step forward.
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And I think the people who are terrified that things are going to change may be a hunt to something here, because while this isn't the event that shows that this is going to change, it is one more piece of evidence that we are moving slowly in that direction, painfully, haltingly, We're sort of being dragged in that direction.
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But the reality is for the church to say you can't support gay marriage and have a temple recommend would disqualify church leadership from holding a temple recommend because the church endorsed the Respect for Marriage Act, which codified the legalization of gay marriage in the United States after the Supreme Court decision.
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And they did it, I think, because they were dragged into doing it, and they were grateful that that legislation provided for religious institutions.
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So the church can continue to discriminate because it's a religious institution, but legally...
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Gay marriage is legal in all 50 states and that no longer relies on a Supreme Court decision.
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That is now the law of the land as a result of legislation that the church has explicitly endorsed.
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So I've thought many times that if any church leader were to come back to me and say, well, wait a minute, don't you support LGBTQ rights?
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I'm going to say, well, I support the Respect for Marriage Act that the church endorsed.
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I embrace that.
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And if you've got a problem with that, then you'll have to take it up with the first presidency because the church has endorsed this position as well.
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So that, I think, is the one concrete thing that this means.
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This means that you cannot deny a temple recommend to somebody who supports gay marriage.
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You cannot deny a temple recommend to somebody who is an LGBTQ ally.
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If you do, then you are interpreting those questions differently than the brethren who hired Aaron Sherinian with their eyes wide open, knowing Aaron Sherinian's background.
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There's no possible way you can look at Aaron Sherinian's resume and not realize that he is a progressive and very likely he is an LGBTQ ally.
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And I know that the church, we've talked about the Strengthening Church Members Committee, we know that the church gathers a lot of information that's out on social media about rank-and-file members.
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You think they didn't gather that kind of information about somebody they were hiring to be the spokesman for the entire church?
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That's lunacy.
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They knew this was there.
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They hired him anyway.
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And that is a signal to the Desnats who have made anti-LGBTQ bigotry the centerpiece of their faith.
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That they are doing something wrong.
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That their exclusion of people who are LGBTQ allies is wrong.
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And they need to get on board with the reality that people in this church don't hate gay people the way they do.
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And they shouldn't.
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I mean, I think that's another message that comes through all of this.
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So I'm coming at this with this background with Aaron Cherinian, a personal background with him, but also seeing how much flack I've taken because I have not been sufficiently anti-LGBTQ for these people's purposes and recognizing that the church has gone out on a limb to some degree and said, look, you can be an LGBTQ ally and still be considered faithful.
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And I think that's a bridge too far for a lot of these folks.
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And they're terrified of where it's going to lead.
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But I'm very interested, you know, when I suggested this as a topic, I said, I want to talk about Aaron Sherinian.
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You responded, who?
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I mean, you're coming at this as a blank slate.
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So coming at this as a blank slate, I'm very interested to hear what, what your first impressions are and what you think this means.
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Yeah, thank you, Jim.
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I listened intently.
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The context, the background, the personal relationship that you have with Aaron and his family, the insights that you have are incredibly valuable and you've articulated them extremely well.
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and raised some really important points there.
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Of course, I don't know this individual, but I did some research, and I have some thoughts and some comments.
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First, in response to some of the tweets or comments that have been made, the derogatory comments against Aaron's family are absolutely shocking and disgraceful from some of the quarters in the church.
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It's clear, and I've seen this a lot over the years in the of social media, comments on church platforms.
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It's clear that politics, to me at least, politics trumps religion.
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And people were not shy in coming forward and seemingly forgetting the principles of the gospel of Jesus Christ, which is love and kindness and benevolence and charity and patience and long-suffering.
00:22:34.273 --> 00:22:42.025
and are very, very quick and very hard to make some very harsh judgmental comments aligned with their political thinking.
00:22:42.945 --> 00:22:59.690
It's also, in my notes here, just listening to you, some of your comments, I am firm in my belief that there's quite a few members of the First Presbyterian Equality of the Two Apostles that are not in lockstep with rank-and-file members.
00:23:00.226 --> 00:23:04.291
politically or even religiously, I think there is a gap there.
00:23:04.913 --> 00:23:18.512
You know, you've got this thinking, this type of thinking from the traditional members, which has been, if you like, it's enshrined in doctrine, it's become entrenched over the years.
00:23:18.972 --> 00:23:23.440
And that has come from similar thinking leaders in the past.
00:23:23.460 --> 00:23:31.099
So those conservative leaders old-fashioned traditional leaders over the years, those prophets, you know, Spencer McKimball, H.F.
00:23:31.119 --> 00:23:36.065
Benson, right up until, you know, to somewhat Howard W.
00:23:36.125 --> 00:23:36.965
Hunter, but certainly H.F.
00:23:37.205 --> 00:23:38.627
Benson, where you and I were serving missions.
00:23:39.067 --> 00:23:41.931
And prior to that, this conservative thinking in the leadership.
00:23:42.571 --> 00:23:51.981
And that was built over the years, 180 years or so, this conservative traditional thinking base over the years, which is deeply embedded across the church.
00:23:52.513 --> 00:23:55.397
Again, it's enshrining doctrine and policies and principles.
00:23:56.098 --> 00:24:03.509
And now we have, I think, members of the Quorum of the Twelve who don't think like that anymore.
00:24:03.528 --> 00:24:04.650
They're softening their position.
00:24:05.230 --> 00:24:20.010
And I see this decision to hire Aaron as incredibly significant, really interesting in terms of what that means, highly strategic, actually, on the part of the church.
00:24:20.070 --> 00:24:30.498
If I was leading the church myself, And I was trying to figure out a way to get off that hard ramp.
00:24:30.778 --> 00:24:35.286
Think of some off-ramp strategy to soften my position on LGBTQ issues.
00:24:36.186 --> 00:24:37.509
How do I change that?
00:24:37.608 --> 00:24:38.911
How do I facilitate that?
00:24:38.971 --> 00:24:43.838
How do I send a message that we are changing, but I need to be very strategic?
00:24:43.999 --> 00:24:44.720
It would be this.
00:24:44.820 --> 00:24:52.807
It would be hiring someone like Aaron into what is, I understand his role, and it's a really important title, Head of Public Affairs and Media Relations.
00:24:54.069 --> 00:24:55.171
That's really significant.
00:24:55.230 --> 00:24:57.273
That title there speaks volumes.
00:24:57.374 --> 00:25:03.520
It's dealing with the public affairs, media relations, it's the face of the church with the world, etc.
00:25:03.902 --> 00:25:21.740
The church, again, professes to be a world religion, and so we see a lot of, to your point there, a lot of countries around the world, not every country, introducing laws and legislation to protect the rights of LGBTQ individuals, and that's absolutely right.
00:25:22.781 --> 00:25:41.772
And so some thoughts and comments come to my mind is, for example, you've mentioned earlier that they were pursuing Aaron for this role for quite some time, which tells me that they were thinking strategically, or thinking along these lines, long before this appointment was made recently.
00:25:41.813 --> 00:25:43.335
So that's interesting.
00:25:43.375 --> 00:25:50.498
This gives you some insight into looking back into the history of thinking about that had these conversations internally.
00:25:51.159 --> 00:25:53.241
They don't make mistakes on stuff like this.
00:25:53.303 --> 00:25:54.203
I don't think they make mistakes.
00:25:54.223 --> 00:25:58.351
The church does make mistakes often, but not too often.
00:25:58.711 --> 00:25:59.992
And they've really thought this through.
00:26:01.075 --> 00:26:06.804
And so they'll have done the background research on him.
00:26:07.464 --> 00:26:15.458
And in researching him, because I didn't know a great deal about this individual, it didn't take me too long to learn that he worked for the United Nations.
00:26:16.066 --> 00:26:38.359
And as a commissioner or individual working for the United Nations, it's important that anyone working, and I've got friends that work for the United Nations, and they tell me that it's very important that you understand the fundamental principles upon which the United Nations are based upon, including issues around slavery and race and LGBTQ issues.
00:26:38.859 --> 00:26:43.366
And on the United Nations website, there is a very clear, defined statement.
00:26:43.867 --> 00:26:44.869
That's fine.
00:26:45.346 --> 00:26:48.630
around the rights of LGBTQ individuals.
00:26:48.789 --> 00:26:49.510
And I'll read it.
00:26:49.530 --> 00:26:50.531
It's very, very important.
00:26:50.652 --> 00:26:52.493
And Aaron used to work for this organization.
00:26:53.295 --> 00:26:57.219
And the church will know that, you know, what the position of the United Nations is.
00:26:57.398 --> 00:26:59.882
It's very, very important, their position on this issue.
00:27:00.623 --> 00:27:01.143
And I'll quote.
00:27:01.202 --> 00:27:28.626
It says, a deeply embedded homophobic and transphobic attitudes often combined with a lack of adequate legal protection against discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation and gender identity expose many lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and intersex, LGBTQI, people of all ages and in all regions of the world to erroneous violations of their human rights.
00:27:29.489 --> 00:27:43.026
Intersection with racial discrimination on the grounds of race, color, descent, national origin makes LGBTQI plus people even more vulnerable to discrimination and hate-motivated violence.
00:27:43.521 --> 00:27:53.998
several international instruments and human rights mechanisms explicitly recognize the impact of intersecting forms of discrimination on the enjoyment of human rights.
00:27:54.518 --> 00:27:57.502
So Aaron will have known that.
00:27:57.583 --> 00:28:10.001
If you look at his comments online, and you've made reference to one earlier, and I can see other comments he's made on Twitter, now called X, I believe.
00:28:10.465 --> 00:28:15.634
where he says, Chris Mosier on Making History is the first trans member of Team USA.
00:28:16.335 --> 00:28:22.806
And then another comment on 27 February last year, where he says, transgender rights are human rights.
00:28:23.547 --> 00:28:26.951
He says very clearly, join us in standing up for trans rights.
00:28:27.894 --> 00:28:30.518
So this information is public.
00:28:31.179 --> 00:28:32.540
The church will have known this.
00:28:33.323 --> 00:28:35.486
So why would they have hired them publicly?
00:28:35.713 --> 00:28:45.669
The only reason I can think of is that they are trying to slowly but surely, to your point, transition strategically, carefully in the direction that they know they have to go.
00:28:45.710 --> 00:28:54.743
The church has lost the argument on gay rights, which has now become a civil issue in the United States, certainly a civil issue across other parts of the world.
00:28:55.163 --> 00:28:56.666
This hiring was no mistake.
00:28:57.768 --> 00:28:58.910
There's a hiring process.
00:28:58.950 --> 00:29:01.733
They will have a role like this.
00:29:01.795 --> 00:29:03.356
They will have researched his background.
00:29:03.396 --> 00:29:03.837
They will...
00:29:04.481 --> 00:29:10.087
have gone into great detail in terms of his politics, his family, his background.
00:29:10.568 --> 00:29:12.310
This is no mistake.
00:29:13.092 --> 00:29:15.574
And what does this say to the rank and file members?
00:29:16.634 --> 00:29:21.980
What does it mean for the missionary program in terms of what we teach on the family?
00:29:22.961 --> 00:29:26.286
You've given us some insights into how the traditional members are reacting.
00:29:26.306 --> 00:29:29.229
At the moment, we have no comment from the leadership.
00:29:29.288 --> 00:29:35.328
I've not seen any quotes in regards to the position from a member of the First Presidency of Parliament of 12.
00:29:35.489 --> 00:29:37.231
If that exists, I haven't found it.
00:29:37.712 --> 00:29:41.960
I don't think they come about and make statements when these posts are read, these appointments are made.
00:29:42.922 --> 00:29:45.365
And what does it mean for the proclamation on the family?
00:29:45.385 --> 00:29:56.904
I think it's extremely significant because the family is now, and not that traditional family unit, that nuclear unit of, you know, male and female, you know, father and mother.
00:29:57.365 --> 00:30:00.190
Family is comprised of all kinds of people.
00:30:00.385 --> 00:30:02.789
different formations, different makeup.
00:30:02.910 --> 00:30:05.073
And so I think this is significant.
00:30:05.113 --> 00:30:06.095
I think it's timely.
00:30:07.076 --> 00:30:08.659
I think it's extremely encouraging.
00:30:09.701 --> 00:30:30.766
And it's interesting that you're getting this, and not surprising, frankly, getting this very ferocious, in some quarters, attack on Aaron and his family and on whoever's running the church offices, you know, he actually knows what we're doing.
00:30:30.806 --> 00:30:35.555
So it's interesting and raises lots and lots of questions.
00:30:35.575 --> 00:30:37.419
So they're my thoughts, comments.
00:30:38.200 --> 00:30:40.084
I don't know Aaron as well as you do.
00:30:40.144 --> 00:30:40.884
You know him personally.
00:30:40.924 --> 00:30:46.154
He sounds a remarkable individual, a very kind individual, him and his family.
00:30:46.174 --> 00:30:51.305
And at the end of the day, it's not, you know, our...
00:30:53.218 --> 00:31:04.954
I think politics or our position on gay rights, which is the very important position to hold, it's really who we are as people, that we act with kindness and love and compassion.
00:31:05.675 --> 00:31:08.098
And really, at the end of the day, that's what's important.
00:31:08.358 --> 00:31:11.743
It's what we do and it's who we are that defines us.
00:31:12.164 --> 00:31:21.901
And the kindness and love that we show, especially when they show that love to your family, you know, supported your family in that difficult time when your father passed away.
00:31:21.941 --> 00:31:26.566
In the end, I think that's what is important, and Christ recognizes that.
00:31:27.026 --> 00:31:34.012
It's not these political positions or other positions that people hold.
00:31:34.073 --> 00:31:38.457
It's really how we behave and support each other with love and kindness.
00:31:38.477 --> 00:31:40.920
So they're my thoughts and comments.
00:31:41.200 --> 00:31:45.163
And so I think your insights there are really important.
00:31:45.624 --> 00:32:00.855
And I hope people listening to this will appreciate the importance of getting the facts before they make any statements or the accusation or allegation, which could be very hurtful to the family.
00:32:01.596 --> 00:32:02.417
No, I think you're right.
00:32:02.738 --> 00:32:03.798
And I appreciate that.
00:32:03.818 --> 00:32:19.592
It's interesting you talk about love and kindness because a lot of these people who are expressing these vicious attacks on Aaron and his family preface it with, well, we should love everybody and we should be kind to everybody.
00:32:19.751 --> 00:32:21.153
I mean, yeah, we understand that.
00:32:21.213 --> 00:32:28.103
We should love and be kind to LGBTQ people, but they're terrible, awful people that are going to burn in hell.
00:32:33.088 --> 00:32:48.160
Kindness to LGBTQ people for many members of the church is an abstraction because when you say, okay, let's be kind to them, So if your son marries another man, what are you going to do?
00:32:48.240 --> 00:32:54.188
Well, I'm never going to let them be in my house, that's for sure, and I'm never going to let them corrupt my family, and I'm going to preach to them.
00:32:54.228 --> 00:32:57.633
That's the practical reaction.
00:32:58.473 --> 00:33:05.963
And when you try to point out that there's no kindness or love in that approach, you get a blank stare.
00:33:06.625 --> 00:33:08.027
You're an apostate.
00:33:08.067 --> 00:33:08.867
You don't get this.
00:33:09.809 --> 00:33:14.334
And What's interesting to me, so there's a guy named Kwaku L.
00:33:15.615 --> 00:33:18.178
He's one of what used to be called the Midnight Mormons.
00:33:18.278 --> 00:33:19.798
I've done several podcasts with him.
00:33:19.858 --> 00:33:21.721
I've met Kwaku on a number of occasions.
00:33:21.861 --> 00:33:33.192
I find him to be a very pleasant guy, although he claims that my daughter was trying to hook up with him on the mutual app, and my daughter has never had the mutual app, so I have that kind of...
00:33:34.554 --> 00:33:36.355
Kwaku and I have a bit of a disagreement there.
00:33:36.695 --> 00:33:38.637
But he's a bit of an opinion leader.
00:33:39.458 --> 00:33:47.589
He's an African-American young Latter-day Saint in his 20s who put up a poll on X.
00:33:48.029 --> 00:33:50.794
I hate calling it X because X doesn't make any sense to me.
00:33:50.834 --> 00:33:51.955
I still want to call it Twitter.
00:33:53.077 --> 00:34:09.677
But anyway, he put up a poll on X that says, if the church embraced same-sex marriages and same-sex temple ceilings, and the prophet directed it to be embraced and implemented by his authority and in the name of Jesus Christ, Would you stay a faithful member?
00:34:09.697 --> 00:34:12.121
I was the first person to answer the poll.
00:34:12.681 --> 00:34:19.994
I clicked on it and it said 100% yes, 0% no, and I was really excited until I realized I was the only one who would answer.
00:34:21.096 --> 00:34:31.612
But the final results, at one point the no was leading, but the final results are yes, 53.5%, no, 46.5%.
00:34:31.711 --> 00:35:11.282
So in other words, if the church were to allow for same-sex ceilings, 46.5% of the members, at least responding to this poll, would leave the church, which I find astonishing and find an example of the fact that, because the way he frames it is, this isn't just something, this is, if the prophet would come and say, God wants this, this is a revelation that we have received that you need to embrace, 46.5% feel so strongly about maintaining exclusion of LGBTQ people that they would leave the church over this.
00:35:12.784 --> 00:35:17.452
But what's instructive, too, is what you find in the comments.
00:35:18.452 --> 00:35:34.711
And the people who are opposed to this over and over again essentially say, Their answer is, this will never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever change.
00:35:35.833 --> 00:35:37.175
I mean, there are variations of that.
00:35:37.275 --> 00:35:43.945
I mean, here's a guy named Shane Trump, 2024, not going to answer such a question as it flies in the face of the plan of salvation.
00:35:45.248 --> 00:35:46.088
And here's another one.
00:35:46.710 --> 00:35:47.210
Stephen M.
00:35:47.251 --> 00:35:49.815
Booth says, I have a better and more reasonable question.
00:35:50.255 --> 00:35:54.922
If a double-sized Tyrannosaurus Rex appeared on my front lawn at 2.43 a.m.
00:35:54.961 --> 00:35:59.668
next Saturday morning, would he be able to win in a one-on-one tennis match with Venus Williams?
00:36:00.673 --> 00:36:05.818
You know, over and over again, the likelihood of that ever happening is 0%.
00:36:06.179 --> 00:36:11.264
It won't, says Andy, the latter day bean.
00:36:11.284 --> 00:36:28.862
I mean, just over and over again, the continual response, whatever you raise the possibility, not just of same-sex ceilings, which is, I think, way down the road, but any kind of inclusion.
00:36:29.570 --> 00:36:42.485
The church today, without any doctrinal change, could say, we will take no disciplinary action on anyone who is legally and lawfully married.
00:36:43.626 --> 00:36:47.952
They wouldn't have to frame it in terms of gay, same-sex, or traditional marriage.
00:36:47.992 --> 00:36:51.717
They could just say today, we will take no disciplinary action.
00:36:53.159 --> 00:36:58.746
And the church could do that, and you would have people flying off the handle.
00:36:59.362 --> 00:37:00.382
Absolutely not.
00:37:00.422 --> 00:37:02.186
This flies in the face of the Family Proclamation.
00:37:02.226 --> 00:37:02.967
This flies in the face...
00:37:03.007 --> 00:37:10.597
And we've talked about the Family Proclamation because the Family Proclamation actually doesn't say what most of these people who weaponize it think it says.
00:37:11.458 --> 00:37:13.021
But that's another discussion altogether.
00:37:13.641 --> 00:37:27.902
But the thing that I want to reinforce here is the idea that saying something will never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever happen comes from a place of profound weakness.
00:37:28.737 --> 00:37:29.699
not strength.
00:37:30.539 --> 00:37:39.690
It comes from a place of profound fear and a recognition that not only can it happen, but it likely will happen.
00:37:40.492 --> 00:37:46.820
And I think that's what people are seeing or people are doing in their response to Aaron Sherinian.
00:37:46.860 --> 00:37:48.282
They see this.
00:37:48.302 --> 00:37:57.653
I mean, this is not an announcement from the church that we are changing our doctrines or policies or whatever you want to label them.
00:37:58.114 --> 00:38:01.038
with regard to LGBTQ people at all.
00:38:01.918 --> 00:38:06.786
We are not beginning the process of temple ceilings for gay couples.
00:38:07.226 --> 00:38:16.818
We are not even saying that legally, lawfully married people who don't go through the temple are welcome in our church.
00:38:17.360 --> 00:38:18.320
We're not saying any of that.
00:38:18.440 --> 00:38:19.483
We're not saying anything.
00:38:19.523 --> 00:38:34.090
And yet people see this, just this one sort of tiny difference And really, it is tiny, although we're saying it's significant because it represents to some degree a greater acceptance than we had before.
00:38:35.070 --> 00:38:49.505
But even this, the idea that the brethren aren't going to exclude somebody from working for the church because they support gay rights, that's a bridge too far for them.
00:38:49.905 --> 00:38:52.268
And it's terrifying to them.
00:38:52.288 --> 00:38:54.750
And they see this as a slippery slope.
00:38:55.521 --> 00:38:59.827
And I think to some degree they are right to see it as a slippery slope.
00:39:01.027 --> 00:39:15.844
Because the church has changed so drastically on this issue in such a short period of time that it's foolhardy to think we won't continue to change.
00:39:16.847 --> 00:39:23.293
And the only response that these bigots have to those changes is to deny they've even happened.
00:39:23.842 --> 00:39:33.534
Because when I say that, when I had that big, you know, Jacob Hansen, I don't even like to call attention to him, but I had that sort of online debate with the guy.
00:39:33.554 --> 00:39:36.900
He insisted the church has never changed on this.
00:39:37.039 --> 00:39:43.068
And I pointed out it's changed very radically in a very short period of time.
00:39:43.688 --> 00:39:44.750
No, how?
00:39:44.829 --> 00:39:45.530
How has it changed?
00:39:45.731 --> 00:39:47.614
Well, it's changed, one, radically.
00:39:48.001 --> 00:39:54.369
We now acknowledge that people do not choose which gender they will find sexually attractive.
00:39:55.230 --> 00:39:59.815
In the days when I was growing up, in the days of For Young Men Only and The Little Factory and Boyd K.
00:39:59.856 --> 00:40:08.206
Packer, Elder Packer gave another talk that was about as awful as For Young Men Only.
00:40:08.226 --> 00:40:09.407
It was called To The One.
00:40:09.447 --> 00:40:37.791
And it talked about the idea of of homosexuality he said i'm only going to use the word homosexual once uh i'm only going to use this word once and then he said homosexual and he says i describe it as a temporary condition because nobody is born this way and nobody uh has to live this way uh no way on earth is anybody born homosexual And of course it's changeable.
00:40:38.293 --> 00:40:42.219
And the reason people are homosexual is because of a deep and profound selfishness.
00:40:43.300 --> 00:40:50.851
And he describes this selfishness, and it's, you may not even realize it, but you're being selfish by being, it's like, this doesn't make any sense.
00:40:51.532 --> 00:41:02.130
And the church has moved so far away from that position to the point where we now explicitly say, you do not choose which gender you are going to find sexually attractive.
00:41:02.690 --> 00:41:10.978
And the second part of that that is significant is sufficient righteousness does not change your sexual orientation.
00:41:11.900 --> 00:41:25.994
You do not expect that if you pray and if you keep all the commandments and if you fulfill all of your callings and you do everything right, do not expect that suddenly this will be taken from you because it won't.
00:41:26.775 --> 00:41:29.838
And they've retreated to the idea that this will all be fixed in the afterlife.
00:41:30.800 --> 00:41:40.494
That when you die, If you're a gay man, you will suddenly transform into being a straight man, and then you will be attracted to women, and then this will all be fixed.
00:41:41.295 --> 00:41:49.407
And what's remarkable too, and this is maybe another discussion as well, is that the focus is almost entirely solely on gay men.
00:41:50.409 --> 00:41:59.083
No mention of lesbians, no mention of non-binary, no real mention of transgender in a lot of the things that the church has done.
00:42:00.065 --> 00:42:03.413
And Absolutely no mention of intersex people.
00:42:04.092 --> 00:42:13.362
You know, you have some more, I think it's about 1% of the population that is intersex, that have both male and female physical characteristics.
00:42:14.585 --> 00:42:16.507
Where do they fit in the plan of salvation?
00:42:16.947 --> 00:42:20.190
Well, the church has just ignored that question forever.
00:42:20.251 --> 00:42:24.936
But the point being, we have changed.
00:42:25.456 --> 00:42:27.038
We have changed drastically.
00:42:27.518 --> 00:42:30.461
We have changed in ways that I think gave...
00:42:30.753 --> 00:42:39.483
Elder Packer fits because he saw it before he died, which is why he gave his talk in 2010 where he insisted that nobody is born gay.
00:42:39.523 --> 00:42:42.706
And the first presidency made him change it.
00:42:43.487 --> 00:42:58.043
The first presidency corrected publicly and embarrassingly the president of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles in a way that everybody had to notice and everybody had to deal with.
00:42:58.784 --> 00:43:07.987
So it's It's just stunning to me that people think this can never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever change because it's already changed.
00:43:09.047 --> 00:43:16.657
And what's important also with that is we are a church that ought to embrace change.
00:43:17.438 --> 00:43:21.922
We are the church of modern revelation, of continuing revelation.
00:43:22.744 --> 00:43:28.510
What is the point of continuing revelation if nothing new happens?
00:43:28.929 --> 00:43:32.793
can never happen if everything has to stay the way it was.
00:43:33.514 --> 00:43:36.757
Of course, continuing revelation is going to change things.
00:43:37.159 --> 00:43:43.324
We should not only think that it's possible, we should expect it and welcome it and be seeking it.
00:43:44.346 --> 00:43:55.697
And I think when this finally changes, and I am absolutely convinced that it will, and I don't have to stand here and say, it will absolutely change, it will change, it will change.
00:43:56.097 --> 00:43:59.581
because I think I'm coming from a position of strength and not weakness.
00:44:01.244 --> 00:44:02.385
I know it's going to change.
00:44:03.226 --> 00:44:04.248
And so I'm patient.
00:44:04.347 --> 00:44:07.932
The Lord has asked me to be patient about this, and so I'm going to be patient.
00:44:08.753 --> 00:44:10.436
But this is going to change.
00:44:10.936 --> 00:44:13.119
We are going to get to where we need to be.
00:44:13.139 --> 00:44:16.123
I am not going to put conditions on that.
00:44:16.583 --> 00:44:21.730
I'm not saying the church is absolutely going to do same-sex ceilings in the temple, because...
00:44:22.114 --> 00:44:26.559
I do not want to put any preconditions on what the Lord will do.
00:44:26.579 --> 00:44:29.603
I don't want to put any limits on what the Lord will do.
00:44:29.884 --> 00:44:41.960
I believe that the Lord is going to open the doors for greater LGBTQ inclusion in ways that most of us do not anticipate or do not understand.
00:44:41.980 --> 00:44:49.010
I think it's going to happen in ways that are going to be really remarkable and really stunning.
00:44:49.826 --> 00:44:53.210
But so I don't have to tell you.
00:44:53.231 --> 00:45:02.125
I mean, I've had so many of these kinds of people approach me and say, are you saying the church is going to do same-sex temple ceilings?
00:45:02.545 --> 00:45:05.409
Are you saying the church should do same-sex temple ceilings?
00:45:06.030 --> 00:45:08.034
And my answer to both of those questions is no.
00:45:08.735 --> 00:45:10.458
I'm not saying either one of those things.
00:45:10.898 --> 00:45:12.981
I'm saying I trust the Lord.
00:45:13.021 --> 00:45:16.867
And I know the Lord loves his LGBTQ children.
00:45:17.768 --> 00:45:25.516
And We now know and accept as a church that they do not choose their orientation.
00:45:26.137 --> 00:45:28.121
Their orientation does not change.
00:45:28.460 --> 00:45:33.509
And their gender identity does not change when they pray hard enough.
00:45:34.210 --> 00:45:39.358
You know, the terrible, terrible quote from Miracle of Forgiveness from Spencer W.
00:45:39.398 --> 00:45:39.737
Kimball.
00:45:40.219 --> 00:45:42.141
Of course this can change.
00:45:42.722 --> 00:45:47.230
How do you know the door will not open until you pound it on the door until...
00:45:47.905 --> 00:45:48.907
You're bloody.
00:45:50.108 --> 00:45:53.693
You know, we have changed.
00:45:54.094 --> 00:45:55.454
We will continue to change.
00:45:56.016 --> 00:46:05.568
Aaron Sherinian is one more step in that direction and a remarkable step that I wouldn't have anticipated.
00:46:05.588 --> 00:46:10.132
I did not think that this is how we would get a step towards greater inclusion.
00:46:10.773 --> 00:46:12.016
But the Lord surprises us.
00:46:13.016 --> 00:46:16.041
And I believe he will continue to surprise us.
00:46:16.882 --> 00:46:32.822
And It just flabbergasts me that the 46.5% who answered no in this poll think that they're somehow more righteous and more faithful than the 53.5% who said yes.
00:46:33.682 --> 00:46:41.271
Because the 53.5% are saying, look, we'll do whatever the Lord wants us to do.
00:46:42.452 --> 00:46:48.519
And if the Lord wants us to more fully embrace our LGBTQ brothers and sisters, Yes, of course we'll do it.
00:46:50.041 --> 00:46:53.005
I don't understand why that's even remotely controversial.
00:46:53.065 --> 00:46:53.346
Do you?
00:46:53.385 --> 00:46:53.465
No, I
00:46:58.291 --> 00:46:58.632
agree.
00:46:59.313 --> 00:47:03.900
You've articulated again a lot of my thoughts and feelings on this subject.
00:47:04.019 --> 00:47:09.065
In fact, you've covered some things that I was thinking about before we did the podcast here.
00:47:09.626 --> 00:47:11.590
You know, I joined the church when I was 16.
00:47:12.010 --> 00:47:22.021
And in my experience, which is very clear to me, the church did hold a very firm position on same-sex attraction and homosexuality.
00:47:22.061 --> 00:47:23.744
It was completely opposed to that.
00:47:24.405 --> 00:47:26.967
I was taught that as a young man.
00:47:27.007 --> 00:47:31.594
As a missionary, we had very clear guidelines about interviewing.
00:47:31.653 --> 00:47:42.586
In fact, we were told by President Dunn, Ella Jacobs and I were knocking on doors in Dunn-Firmland, and we did report to President Dunn that we'd met an homosexual couple on the door.
00:47:42.626 --> 00:47:45.150
These are the words that we used at the time, back in the 80s.
00:47:45.346 --> 00:47:48.690
And President Dole was very clear that we don't teach people like that.
00:47:48.769 --> 00:47:49.391
We walk away.
00:47:50.152 --> 00:47:59.184
And we've walked away from a number of doors where we thought at the time as missionaries that those individuals are homosexual, that they had no place in the church.
00:47:59.885 --> 00:48:13.121
The church has been very clear and very firm on its position over the years that it opposes such activity or relationships or behavior of that kind.
00:48:13.762 --> 00:48:16.324
And again, Elder Packer, look what he said here.
00:48:16.344 --> 00:48:25.173
He said, we teach the standard of moral conduct that will protect us from Satan's many substitutes and counterfeits for marriage.
00:48:26.094 --> 00:48:33.322
We must understand that any persuasion to enter into any relationship that is not in harmony with the principles of the gospel must be wrong.
00:48:33.943 --> 00:48:37.527
From the Book of Mormon, there is again, it's enshrining doctrine, right?
00:48:37.947 --> 00:48:40.990
From the Book of Mormon, we learn that wickedness never was happiness.
00:48:41.512 --> 00:48:53.436
Some suppose that they were precepts and cannot overcome what they feel are inborn tendencies towards the impure and unnatural, not so.
00:48:53.956 --> 00:48:58.742
And then the infamous question comes, why would a heavenly father do that to anyone?
00:48:58.782 --> 00:49:00.443
Remember, he's our father.
00:49:00.463 --> 00:49:11.056
And again, we fast forward, skipping many, many references to the church maintaining its very direct position.
00:49:11.476 --> 00:49:12.717
You referenced miracle of forgiveness.
00:49:13.090 --> 00:49:14.652
We talked about proclamation of the gospel.
00:49:15.012 --> 00:49:24.684
There's countless references by church leaders maintaining, it's very fixed and firm position, opposing same-sex attraction.
00:49:25.085 --> 00:49:33.215
And then we read, and it's very important to share this actually, the latest statement on same-sex attraction that the church has in terms of position.
00:49:33.695 --> 00:49:34.175
And I'll read it.
00:49:34.297 --> 00:49:34.817
It's important.
00:49:35.257 --> 00:49:43.699
The church of Jesus Christ, the latterly saints, acknowledges that same-sex attraction is a sensitive issue that requires kindness, compassion, and understanding.
00:49:44.442 --> 00:49:46.103
Again, I'm quoting from the church website here, Jim.
00:49:46.704 --> 00:50:04.012
The same-sex attraction section of the Church of Jesus Christ.org reinforces the reality that the words of one Latter-day Saint's scripture, God loveth his children, 1 Nephi 11.17, and seeks to help everyone better understand same-sex attraction from a gospel perspective.
00:50:04.632 --> 00:50:14.949
Here's an interesting part in that statement, which is very different, has changed significantly, He says here, the church does not take a position on the cause of same-sex attraction.
00:50:15.510 --> 00:50:17.353
In 2006, Ola Dallin H.
00:50:17.373 --> 00:50:27.943
Oaks said, quote, the church does not have a position on the causes of any of these susceptibilities or inclinations, including those related to same-gender attraction.
00:50:28.342 --> 00:50:30.885
The reality is it did, Jim, prior to that.
00:50:31.206 --> 00:50:32.166
It absolutely did.
00:50:32.628 --> 00:50:33.108
Absolutely did.
00:50:33.268 --> 00:50:33.768
I know that.
00:50:33.909 --> 00:50:34.429
I taught that.
00:50:34.489 --> 00:50:35.030
I was taught that.
00:50:35.050 --> 00:50:37.231
I was trained to think like that as a bishop.
00:50:37.632 --> 00:50:42.621
He says it goes on here, Feelings of same-sex attraction are not a sin.
00:50:43.583 --> 00:50:44.164
President M.
00:50:44.224 --> 00:50:53.856
Russell Ballard said, 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.
00:50:54.237 --> 00:50:57.199
The attraction itself is not a sin, but acting on it is.
00:50:58.101 --> 00:51:04.650
Even though individuals do not choose to have such attractions, they do choose how to respond to them.
00:51:05.282 --> 00:51:13.893
He goes on to say, with love and understanding, the church reaches out to all God's children, including those with same-sex attraction.
00:51:13.913 --> 00:51:14.954
There's more to the statement.
00:51:14.974 --> 00:51:17.197
You can find it online on the church website.
00:51:17.798 --> 00:51:25.708
And so I see this as a seismic, a small, medium, I'll say medium seismic event.
00:51:26.731 --> 00:51:31.416
I'm trying to rank it in terms of seismic activity.
00:51:31.577 --> 00:51:36.519
I think it's like a, a five or six point not on the church Richter scale.
00:51:37.061 --> 00:51:37.882
It is significant.
00:51:38.043 --> 00:51:38.764
It is strategic.
00:51:38.903 --> 00:51:39.666
It is encouraging.
00:51:39.846 --> 00:51:40.507
It is welcome.
00:51:41.128 --> 00:51:46.257
And it's another step, to your point, in the right direction.
00:51:46.336 --> 00:51:52.907
And the church knows, Jim, it knows it's on the wrong side of history on this issue and other issues, but still in this one, it is.
00:51:53.668 --> 00:51:55.893
And it's increasingly isolated, Jim.
00:51:55.932 --> 00:51:56.432
We know that.
00:51:56.472 --> 00:51:57.114
We see that.
00:51:57.856 --> 00:51:58.918
It's lost the fight.
00:51:59.809 --> 00:52:09.641
My goodness, it fought tooth and nail over the years to try to influence policy and legislation in the United States, not elsewhere, anywhere else.
00:52:09.681 --> 00:52:20.315
You don't see the kind of resources that the church has committed to opposing these issues anywhere outside of the United States, certainly not here in Canada, certainly not in the UK, elsewhere, etc.
00:52:20.655 --> 00:52:25.105
But in the United States, you know, the The church follows and gets directly involved in the politics.
00:52:25.485 --> 00:52:26.407
It's lost the fight.
00:52:26.527 --> 00:52:27.688
It's a civil rights issue.
00:52:28.208 --> 00:52:37.019
The question now, I think, if I'm flying the wall there, if I was in those meetings, I suspect that they are talking about, well, look, we've lost the fight.
00:52:37.860 --> 00:52:38.762
We have to embrace this.
00:52:39.422 --> 00:52:40.945
The question now is, how do we do it?
00:52:41.525 --> 00:52:51.777
What's that strategic plan, that positioning, that tactical, those tactics that you have to deploy in order to strategically reposition the church?
00:52:52.289 --> 00:53:09.436
away from all that embedded and fixed and firm, unchanging position of doctrine and principles that the brethren have built a concrete fence around, an iron fence that this is our position.
00:53:09.797 --> 00:53:11.018
You're with us or against us.
00:53:11.039 --> 00:53:12.721
It's black or white.
00:53:13.262 --> 00:53:14.664
The church doctrine never changes.
00:53:14.744 --> 00:53:15.686
God never changes.
00:53:16.385 --> 00:53:18.208
and the doctrine will always be the same.
00:53:18.268 --> 00:53:23.333
How many times we've been taught that the doctrine never changes, God never changes, otherwise he would cease to be God.
00:53:23.373 --> 00:53:25.596
I've heard that many, many times.
00:53:25.896 --> 00:53:32.143
Well, the reality is God does change, and the reality is that the church is changing, and thank goodness.
00:53:32.422 --> 00:53:45.538
You said very well, we're a church that believes in revelation, and revelation continues to come to the mouthpiece of God.
00:53:46.146 --> 00:53:53.393
That's a fundamental tenet of the church that is essential to the fundamentals of the church.
00:53:53.432 --> 00:53:54.855
We're not in an apostasy anymore.
00:53:54.894 --> 00:53:59.579
We have the claim that we're the only true religious church upon the face of the earth.
00:53:59.599 --> 00:54:01.541
President Nelson is the mouthpiece of God.
00:54:02.422 --> 00:54:04.224
God is very much involved in the church.
00:54:04.885 --> 00:54:13.833
And the prophet speaks on behalf of the Lord, who is very active in sending, and the prophet receives constant revelation.
00:54:14.402 --> 00:54:17.347
Every day, every week, it happens.
00:54:17.427 --> 00:54:23.599
The heavens are open, end quote, and revelation continues to pour through the mouthpiece of God.
00:54:24.119 --> 00:54:27.085
And so is this revelation from God?
00:54:27.105 --> 00:54:28.807
I think it is.
00:54:28.887 --> 00:54:29.369
I hope it is.
00:54:30.311 --> 00:54:34.137
And so this is another step in the right direction.
00:54:34.690 --> 00:54:38.974
to address the rights of LGBTQ people.
00:54:39.235 --> 00:54:56.052
And the other point that you made, a really good point, of course, is if you plot the trajectory of this going forward, if you were to put this in a graph, it would be great to see this in a graph, if you were to plot this forward, you could tell I'm a bit of a project manager here, where does this lead?
00:54:56.112 --> 00:54:58.375
Does that lead to further policy changes?
00:54:58.795 --> 00:55:00.056
What about the rights of...
00:55:01.217 --> 00:55:09.485
LGBTQ individuals within the church to access the blessings of eternal marriage or to be sealed to the family?
00:55:09.887 --> 00:55:11.668
Can they be sealed to the parents of the temple?
00:55:11.688 --> 00:55:21.878
Can they go into the temple physically and receive a recommend to go into the temple and be sealed to their parents as a gay individual?
00:55:23.800 --> 00:55:34.179
Yes, I think if we follow the logic of this and these changes over time, over the coming decades, years, perhaps a decade.
00:55:35.599 --> 00:55:37.422
I think it's going to happen quicker than we think, by the way.
00:55:37.481 --> 00:55:38.583
I think the next 50, 50...
00:55:39.043 --> 00:55:41.326
You've said that the church looks...
00:55:41.887 --> 00:55:44.650
Compared to Joseph Smith, the church is a very different organization, right?
00:55:45.170 --> 00:55:51.356
Compared to the time when you and I were serving in missions back in the 80s, look how much the church has changed in the last 30, 35 years.
00:55:51.836 --> 00:56:05.617
And if we could plot those changes going forward, I think the next 10 to 15 years is going to usher in even more change that we would say, you know, 10, 15 years ago when we talked about this, there's no way we would have seen this happening back then.
00:56:05.677 --> 00:56:12.989
But in the next 15 years, I anticipate significant change in particular on this issue and rightly so.
00:56:13.391 --> 00:56:28.184
It's long overdue and thank goodness, you know, common sense is prevailing and to protect the rights of of LGBTQ individuals, important that we have a principle and policy of equality and fairness.
00:56:28.565 --> 00:56:41.498
And again, love, and he says it very clearly, and I'll finish my comment on this by quoting the scripture here, 1 Nephi 11, 17, God loveth his children.
00:56:41.737 --> 00:56:45.581
And I take from that all, Jim, all of his children.
00:56:46.722 --> 00:56:47.923
Amen and amen.
00:56:48.623 --> 00:56:50.286
I just want to add two things.
00:56:51.074 --> 00:56:52.215
Coming up on the end here.
00:56:53.197 --> 00:56:56.179
At one point you said in that God changes.
00:56:56.199 --> 00:57:01.766
And I would push back on that to say God does not change.
00:57:04.110 --> 00:57:12.880
But what his imperfect children understand about him changes.
00:57:14.902 --> 00:57:20.449
When people say doctrine never changes, I think they are confusing doctrine with truth.
00:57:21.250 --> 00:57:23.132
Because I don't think truth changes.
00:57:24.315 --> 00:57:25.896
Absolute eternal truth.
00:57:26.097 --> 00:57:28.780
I think there is such a thing, and I think it is unchanging.
00:57:28.800 --> 00:57:38.356
And I think human understanding of absolute eternal truth and divine reality is infinitesimal.
00:57:39.036 --> 00:57:39.617
It's tiny.
00:57:40.018 --> 00:57:50.153
Our understanding of God's perfection and of the bedrock truth that leads and guides the universe is just...
00:57:50.945 --> 00:57:52.407
indescribably tiny.
00:57:53.648 --> 00:57:58.954
And our doctrines reflect our understanding of that truth.
00:57:59.655 --> 00:58:07.005
And when we get more light and more knowledge and we understand that truth better, our doctrines change to reflect that.
00:58:07.865 --> 00:58:12.871
That's why I always say there is such a thing as false doctrine.
00:58:12.911 --> 00:58:15.315
There is no such thing as false truth.
00:58:16.335 --> 00:58:20.780
And I think where people get into trouble is when they equate the church.
00:58:21.802 --> 00:58:23.603
It comes back to this idea of infallibility.
00:58:23.643 --> 00:58:25.126
The church can never make a mistake.
00:58:25.586 --> 00:58:28.050
And so clearly we've never taught a false doctrine.
00:58:28.469 --> 00:58:29.331
And that's nonsense.
00:58:29.771 --> 00:58:33.115
We've taught a number of false doctrines for a long period of time.
00:58:33.416 --> 00:58:35.179
And we shouldn't be surprised by that.
00:58:35.219 --> 00:58:38.282
The Bible teaches a number of false doctrines.
00:58:38.402 --> 00:58:50.213
Dan McClellan has taken a lot of heat in his podcast over people who get mad when he points out that the Old Testament or the Hebrew Bible explicitly endorses slavery.
00:58:51.554 --> 00:58:53.336
We know that slavery is bad.
00:58:54.077 --> 00:58:55.179
Slavery is wrong.
00:58:55.219 --> 00:59:05.090
And yet we have, in the language of God, endorsements of slavery and sort of management of how slavery should be handled.
00:59:06.632 --> 00:59:11.539
So I don't think slavery is a creation of God.
00:59:11.900 --> 00:59:22.563
I think that all of the changes that are necessary, that have brought us closer to God, are not that God has changed, that God now suddenly realizes slavery is bad.
00:59:22.603 --> 00:59:26.786
It's that God has been waiting for us to realize that slavery is bad.
00:59:26.827 --> 00:59:32.273
And I see the changes in the church with regard to LGBTQ people.
00:59:32.293 --> 00:59:44.286
I mean, I hate the term same-sex attraction because it tries to sort of isolate this part of a person's sexuality as if it's some kind of a disease, some kind of a foreign object.
00:59:44.961 --> 00:59:56.954
And the reality that we are slowly beginning to understand as a church, and I think that the world has understood for a while now, is that that's a basic integral part of who we are.
00:59:56.974 --> 01:00:04.784
Our sexuality is very much a part of who we are on a very basic level.
01:00:05.525 --> 01:00:15.668
So that's a little bit of a quibble, but I get so frustrated with church members who insist doctrine can't change.
01:00:16.289 --> 01:00:24.179
And then when you point out moments where doctrine has changed, they insist, well, that wasn't really doctrine.
01:00:25.041 --> 01:00:25.882
It was policy.
01:00:25.902 --> 01:00:26.722
It was something else.
01:00:27.585 --> 01:00:41.322
And it's like, why not just embrace the reality that we are imperfect people who do not fully understand the mind of God and that our doctrines, we hope, reflect the mind of God.
01:00:41.443 --> 01:00:45.347
But when we find out that they don't, We embrace the new light.
01:00:46.409 --> 01:00:46.809
Bruce R.
01:00:46.849 --> 01:01:04.211
McConkie, in one of the most candid moments of his life, after the 1978 priesthood revelation, when confronted with all of the garbage that he had said about race prior to that time, finally said, forget everything I ever said.
01:01:04.831 --> 01:01:08.277
We were operating with a limited amount of light and knowledge.
01:01:09.038 --> 01:01:12.181
And it was contrary to the light and knowledge that has now come into the world.
01:01:13.025 --> 01:01:19.958
You know, you very seldom get moments like that, especially from someone like Elder McConkie.
01:01:20.719 --> 01:01:25.786
But, you know, so that's the only thing that I would push back on.
01:01:25.927 --> 01:01:27.449
And I want to end with a story.
01:01:28.751 --> 01:01:33.920
So I've told the story, I think, of my uncle that I lived with when I went to college.
01:01:34.041 --> 01:01:35.182
His name was Howard Anderson.
01:01:35.704 --> 01:01:39.050
He was the stake president of the Los Angeles, California stake.
01:01:40.065 --> 01:01:49.059
And he at one point was conducting a support group for people in his stake who were gay.
01:01:49.081 --> 01:01:52.545
And the LGBTQ acronym didn't exist back then.
01:01:52.585 --> 01:01:56.672
Transgenderism really wasn't on anybody's radar in the church.
01:01:57.753 --> 01:02:00.378
So this was for gay and lesbian members of the church.
01:02:01.159 --> 01:02:05.746
And it became so popular that Elder Ballard came to him and told him to shut it down.
01:02:06.929 --> 01:02:19.434
And Uncle Howard said to him, all right, I'll shut it down if you can promise me that when I get to the other side, the Savior will say it's okay that I abandoned these people who were under my stewardship.
01:02:20.074 --> 01:02:22.018
And that was enough to get Elder Ballard to back down.
01:02:22.679 --> 01:02:23.579
But then they released him.
01:02:23.800 --> 01:02:26.804
They released my Uncle Howard within months of that.
01:02:27.905 --> 01:02:28.987
But that isn't the story.
01:02:29.027 --> 01:02:30.148
I've told that story before.
01:02:30.188 --> 01:02:34.134
The story I want to tell is the story of there was a guy in the L.A.
01:02:34.213 --> 01:02:34.914
First Ward.
01:02:35.115 --> 01:02:35.396
The L.A.
01:02:35.416 --> 01:02:36.697
First Ward was the singles ward.
01:02:37.313 --> 01:02:37.994
in Los Angeles.
01:02:38.576 --> 01:02:43.922
The bishop was a man named Bob Reese, and Bob Reese reminded me of this story when I talked to him.
01:02:44.762 --> 01:02:56.077
There was a gay man in his ward who had a partner, and gay marriage was not on anybody's radar back then either, but he was living with another man, and this was his life partner.
01:02:57.179 --> 01:02:58.260
And he was dying of AIDS.
01:02:59.722 --> 01:03:09.110
And he came to Bishop Reese and said, I'm dying of AIDS because And my partner and I are not intimate anymore.
01:03:10.331 --> 01:03:12.416
And I want to go through the temple before I die.
01:03:14.097 --> 01:03:18.164
And Bishop Reese said, I can see no reason why you shouldn't.
01:03:19.065 --> 01:03:23.452
And he went to my Uncle Howard and says, I've signed off on a temple recommend for this man.
01:03:23.612 --> 01:03:26.177
And my Uncle Howard said, I can see no reason why you shouldn't.
01:03:26.697 --> 01:03:27.920
And he also signed off.
01:03:28.721 --> 01:03:38.454
And this man went to the temple and spent much of the last months of his life as long as he was healthy enough to get out of bed and get to the temple.
01:03:38.534 --> 01:03:40.155
He spent it in the Los Angeles temple.
01:03:41.117 --> 01:03:51.329
And my uncle Howard got a call from a bishop who said, I'm getting reports from members of my ward that you have given a temple recommend to this man.
01:03:51.369 --> 01:03:53.813
Do you realize this man is a homosexual?
01:03:55.235 --> 01:04:01.521
And members of my ward are very, very concerned that you have led a homosexual into the temple.
01:04:02.844 --> 01:04:12.411
And my uncle Howard said, well, Could you please give me the names of the members of your ward who are complaining so I can bring them up on church discipline for not sustaining their leaders?
01:04:13.291 --> 01:04:15.273
Because I know who this man is.
01:04:15.293 --> 01:04:17.295
I have signed off on his temple recommend.
01:04:17.416 --> 01:04:26.686
And if you're not willing to sustain me in that decision, then it sounds like your members need to have some church discipline in order to do that.
01:04:26.786 --> 01:04:32.494
I don't think Howard, I think he was bluffing because the bishop backed down very quickly.
01:04:33.409 --> 01:04:43.641
But Howard Anderson, and this is over 40 years ago, Howard Anderson realized 40 years ago that this is the direction we need to go.
01:04:43.661 --> 01:04:48.547
And he was shut down, up, down, and sideways to do that.
01:04:49.168 --> 01:05:01.242
And Howard Anderson passed away about 10 years ago, and I think would be astonished and delighted by the amount of progress that we have made in the time since his passing.
01:05:01.730 --> 01:05:03.532
I mean, it's been a very short window.
01:05:03.572 --> 01:05:14.768
I'd say that all of these positive changes, ironically, have happened in the wake of Proposition 8, which, as you point out, represents the church's loss.
01:05:15.409 --> 01:05:19.635
The church has lost on this issue in every way it is possible to lose.
01:05:20.898 --> 01:05:24.603
And so, going forward, how do we deal with that?
01:05:25.364 --> 01:05:29.630
And I think going forward, I am optimistic and I am hopeful.
01:05:30.411 --> 01:05:39.083
And Aaron Cheridian, gives me an additional measure of hope, but he's not the only thing that gives me that measure of hope.
01:05:39.184 --> 01:05:54.726
What gives me a measure of hope is the reality that God lives and that God's hand is in this church and that eventually the weaknesses of his children will not stand in the way of his purposes being done.
01:05:56.789 --> 01:05:58.492
So that's my summation.
01:06:00.545 --> 01:06:03.730
And I become, we, we've just gone over the hour.
01:06:03.829 --> 01:06:05.431
So I think we can leave it at that.
01:06:05.452 --> 01:06:06.753
Do you have any parting words?
01:06:07.755 --> 01:06:09.317
I have nothing to add to that at all.
01:06:10.639 --> 01:06:21.853
So I just want to, again, thank you for leading us on this conversation and I just want to wish Aaron and his family the very best and success in this, in this new role.
01:06:21.893 --> 01:06:25.737
I'm sure he'll do what I've heard about him from you, Jim.
01:06:25.918 --> 01:06:28.561
He's an amazing individual and I think he'll do extremely well.
01:06:28.641 --> 01:06:32.451
And yeah, I think it's a good day for the church, actually.
01:06:32.530 --> 01:06:35.697
So I want to give praise to the church because this is a good day.
01:06:35.737 --> 01:06:37.521
Whoever made that decision, well done.
01:06:37.721 --> 01:06:38.202
You got it right.
01:06:39.625 --> 01:06:40.045
Amen.
01:06:40.365 --> 01:06:45.896
So with that, we will leave you with this episode and we look forward to seeing you next time on Inside Out.
01:06:46.137 --> 01:06:47.840
Thank you very much, Ian.
01:06:47.860 --> 01:06:48.240
Thank you, Jim.