The Awakening: Where I Am Now and Why I’m Staying

March 01, 2012 By: Jenna Category: Religious

My baptism into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, April 1993

Overall, my Awakening series has been a wonderful experience. Writing about media choices, motherhood, the Priestesshood, and homosexuality has largely brought peace and happiness into my life. I felt good as I was writing them. I feel good knowing that I can be myself without accusations of hypocrisy, and that I continue to develop relationships with kind people like Kari. I like questioning things. Questioning everything actually. I have several boxes on a shelf in my mind, and I want to sort all the issues out . A box for the things I know, a box for the things I’m puzzling through, a box of ideas that others accept which I’ve rejected, and a box for things I will never understand no matter how I search, ponder, and pray.

This idea of a “box on the shelf” is not a concept of my own invention, it’s a pretty common idea passed around within Mormonism. We are encouraged to build up our faith like a house, laying the bricks that form the foundation, and then moving on to the pillars and windows and shelves, fortifying along the way. If we don’t have a strong testimony*of something, we put that idea in a box on the shelf and come back to it again later.

There are two small differences between my approach now and the approach I used to have. First, I am building my own house from the ground up. No one else gets to lay a single brick, no matter their age or status within the Church hierarchy. I have no way of knowing if certain ideas or beliefs are the result of personal history, cultural background or God, and so I must puzzle it through on my own. Second, I added another level to my sorting, a box titled “Commonly Held Beliefs I’ve Rejected“. Sometimes, ideas preached from the pulpit are not what God would say. They are the product of man’s thinking, and I believe this to be true because of the things our own Church history demonstrates to us. We’re all down here on earth trying to puzzle through as best we can. We all make mistakes, and I want my mistakes to be made because of my own thinking, not because I oversimplified my analysis of another person’s views.

There are the parts of Mormonism that I find really beautiful and fulfilling. These are 10 of the (many) reasons why I stay, and why I will continue to encourage others in an exploration of the faith I love.

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The Awakening: Homosexuality

February 16, 2012 By: Jenna Category: Religious

Note: This topic is deep, controversial, and extremely sensitive in our current social climate. It is not possible for me to cover every facet of every argument with one post. I am using this platform today to voice my current thinking and explore some of my past views. I wanted to remind everyone of the importance of being civil in the comment section. I will be watching the comments closely and deleting anything that resembles a personal character attack.

With this post I wanted to acknowledge other Mormons who have voiced their thoughts even though it might be difficult. I am proud to stand with them and say that I think we can only move toward perfection as we explore our weaknesses.

Recently, I found a quote by a well-known church leader suggesting that solo masturbation would lead to mutual masturbation with someone of the same gender, which would eventually lead to homosexuality and continue to progress until the most deprave acts were committed. I had never considered before that this might be how some LDS Church leaders view homosexuality. Not as a state of being that is part of an individual’s personhood, but a sort of perversion of the normal state due to letting your guard down and exploring the immoral. My thoughts and views on homosexuality have certainly evolved over time, but when I think back to the homosexual people I have encountered throughout my life, I can’t ever remember thinking that they became that way because they watched too much pornography or masturbated too frequently.

Homosexuality is not a product of masturbation, of someone neglecting to bridle their passions. It is not about choice, nor is it something you “fall into” as you race down a slippery slope to damnation. Science really hasn’t come to a conclusion yet regarding the roots behind homosexuality. Is it nature? Nurture? A combination of both? While we don’t have firm answers, simply choosing to be attracted to the same sex is not one of the options.

Recently, I’ve started praying and pondering everything, and I realized that I’ve never prayed to find out if God really condemns homosexuality. I always felt sure that what I had been told by Church leaders was right because we know of the Plan of Salvation, where we would eventually pair up in male/female pairs for eternity, and from this perspective it made sense to condemn homosexuality as a perversion of God’s intended order for the universe. However, if you accept the possibility that homosexuality is an innate characteristic, that has to mean that God implanted an overwhelming desire to sin as part of a homosexual person’s daily life. For many who identify as homosexual, the idea of heterosexual romantic relationships is actually a repulsive thing. Why would a God who told us “Men are that they might have joy” deprive so many of his children from one of the greatest joys we can experience during mortality, that of a committed, and yes, sexual, relationship?

My praying and pondering has not led me to any firm answer for any of my questions yet, but I do know that I’m no longer able to sentence so many good and loving people to lives devoid of companionship, sexual fulfillment, immediate family bonds with progeny, and love. It is as impossible for me to imagine having a life-long marital relationship with a woman as it is impossible for a homosexual man to imagine forcing himself to be with a woman for the rest of his life.

The Church’s policy today is that those who identify as homosexual are loved and embraced, but they are not to act upon their sexual desires in any way, as doing so would mean church discipline. Up until very recently, I equated what homosexuals were being told about “choosing not to act” to what we all were being told about choosing not to act on our own sexual desires outside of marriage. If I could fight off the temptation, shouldn’t my gay friend be able to as well?

In 1998 President Gordon B. Hinckley said:

“People inquire about our position on those who consider themselves so-called gays and lesbians. My response is that we love them as sons and daughters of God. They may have certain inclinations which are powerful and which may be difficult to control. Most people have inclinations of one kind or another at various times. If they do not act upon these inclinations, then they can go forward as do all other members of the Church. If they violate the law of chastity and the moral standards of the Church, then they are subject to the discipline of the Church, just as others are”

The thing is… homosexuality isn’t just about sex or inclinations. Being a homosexual doesn’t just mean that you want to have sex with people of the same gender, just like being a heterosexual doesn’t mean that my existence is defined by having sex with a man. The person I once was used to think “Oh yeah, sometimes I want to lie or be selfish or XYZ, and I have to control that inclination.” In other words, I am a mostly honest/unselfish/sexually-in-control person who falls prey to the temptations of the Great Deceiver and must work to stay close to the Spirit to overcome such tendencies. But by this logic, I would thus need to consider a homosexual person to be a mostly heterosexual being who at times has inclinations to experiment with the same gender.

I was told that I had to control my sexual desires for a season, because eventually I would marry and this would no longer be an issue for me. I also considered the message to homosexuals to be similar. Just hold off on your evil desires until kingdom come, and then we can all be perfected and freed of these sinful urges together. Aside from no longer being sure that I even think homosexuality is a sin, I realize that I had never thought about the life I was condemning homosexuals to when I took this position. If a homosexual lives by the current plan that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has laid out by avoiding any and all homosexual activity, they will never get to have the love, companionship, trust, and sexual bonds that I experience with my lifetime partner (this is assuming, of course, that they can’t choose to find fulfillment in a heterosexual relationship). They are condemned to a life of being the third wheel or a forced marriage with someone of the opposite gender who ignites no passions for them.

We can continue to fight this out within our own religious belief system, but we do no good by declaring war on civil unions. When the idea for this post formed, my intention was to simply state that I disagreed with the Church’s position on Prop 8 and in other states where they are fighting against the legalization of gay marriage and that I don’t see any non-theological merit in the arguments that allowing homosexuals to form a union would destroy the family or limit my personal activity (including how we use our temples). I’ve reasoned through every version of the various stories regarding lawsuits concerning gay rights and civil liberty and I tried a thought experiment where I replaced the homosexual individuals in those stories with a man or woman with dark skin. Does it feel right for a photographer to say she won’t photograph a wedding because of the color of someone’s skin? What about a cake baker or a pavilion owner?

What if a non-white couple were out driving through the countryside in the middle of the night and they pulled up to a small inn owned by a family who denied them a room because of their skin color? That doesn’t feel right to me. Now replace that non-white couple with a lesbian couple, and replace the inn owners with a conservative Christian family who denied the room based on religious beliefs. That doesn’t feel Christlike to me either.

Homosexuality isn’t just about inclinations. Homosexuality isn’t only about sex. I don’t know exactly where I stand on things yet and I’m going to keep thinking about homosexuality, eternity, and what the sin really is here.

What I do know this is: I feel more at peace. I want to believe in a Christ, in a God, with arms open wide and hearts full, welcoming everyone. This is the person I am working to become. I am much closer now than I was before.

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The Awakening: Priestesshood

February 08, 2012 By: Jenna Category: Personal

Another note: I intended to reply to several comments on my last post, but I want to be very thoughtful in my responses and school has left me little time to devote to my blog. Again, I’m reading and considering all of them, but these posts are quite time intensive to write, edit, etc, and so I’m not going to be able to address as many comments as I’d like. Thank you to all those who are taking the time to add to the discussion. It’s been a wonderful experience thus far.

The topic of women getting the priesthood in the LDS church has come up quite frequently on my Formspring page. Questions related to this issue can be found here, here, and here. As I change, it’s hard not to want to feel embarrassed about what I said, but back then I really believed it and felt it was right. I think what I said here was key:

But for me, this is never an issue, because I feel like it’s asking “Why can’t I have more responsibility in life?” I don’t know about you, but I have more than enough responsibility. There are a million areas that I want to be better at already, and heaping the job of cleaning the church each week isn’t going to make me feel happier or draw closer to God. That will happen through praying, reading scriptures, etc.

I didn’t understand those who wanted women to have the priesthood, because in my mind they were saying that they wanted to be the bishop. Why would anyone want that? If God wants someone to lead one of His congregations that is certainly a great honor, it’s time-consuming, emotionally exhausting, and makes spending time with family difficult because you’re working full-time at your job while simultaneously managing a church congregation.

One day I clicked over to Feminist Mormon Housewives, and it all clicked with this post. These women aren’t asking for the priesthood, they want the priestesshood. They want something of their own, a direct way to conduit the power of God for righteous purposes. It was brought up on that site in 2010, and way back in 2005.

Wow. This is something I can believe in. A Heavenly Father and Mother who are their own Beings, separate, but truly equal. During our time on earth, my husband would be a priest, and I would be a priestess. We would exercise the power of God in our own ways bringing about good works and changing the world for the better.

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The Awakening: On SAHMs

January 25, 2012 By: Jenna Category: Personal

Note: I have done my best to write a clear post that presents my current thinking, but I know there are going to be many questions. I appreciate the conversation we have with each other, and will do my best to step in and clarify when possible, but it will not be possible for me to address every person and every concern. Thank you so much for all of the encouragement I’ve received thus far!

To understand this next shift, I think you have to take a moment to try to understand where I was coming from. Raised as a member of the LDS Church I understood that the living Prophet was God’s literal mouthpiece on the earth. Whatever the prophet said in an official capacity it was as though God Himself was right there letting me know what He wants for all of us. At least that’s how I interpreted things. Throughout this period of Awakening, I have realized that I am no longer interested in just accepting what I am told, I want to figure out for myself why the advice in question is right/wrong/best for me/best for everyone.

Lately That Husband has been pointing out some of my tendencies toward being a martyr. I would think, “We should move to Poland!” Why? Because maybe God wants/needs us to build up the Church there. Living in Poland would be difficult due to language and cultural barriers, but by golly, we would be able to serve as the bishop and relief society president and provide an example to the new converts of what a happy little Mormon family is like (no matter that it would mean never seeing my husband between his work and church responsibilities). In some weird way I felt that the only way to please God was to suffer a little bit. The natural man is an enemy to God, and so I needed to put my own desires aside, look toward the men who lead the Church, and let them tell me how to deepen my relationship with my own Father in Heaven.

What I didn’t understand until recently is that the leadership of the Church can do no more than teach general principles. With a membership that numbers in the millions, filled with members from Japan, Poland, Africa, Brazil, Utah all looking to the same handful of men to tell them how to fit the Gospel of Jesus Christ into their culture and lifestyle. One of those leaders, Elder Oaks, once said:

“As a General Authority, it is my responsibility to preach general principles. When I do, I don’t try to define all the exceptions. There are exceptions to some rules. For example, we believe the commandment is not violated by killing pursuant to a lawful order in an armed conflict. But don’t ask me to give an opinion on your exception. I only teach the general rules. Whether an exception applies to you is your responsibility. You must work that out individually between you and the Lord.”

I wrote a post about one of these general principles titled Mothers Working Outside the Home and made a lot of people really angry. As I said before, this was not my intention. I needed to believe that this was the key to being what God wanted me to be, because then the sacrifice of myself would be worth it. It was a topic that kept coming up, and I wanted to explain my perspective on what I considered LDS doctrine to be on the subject. I think this sentence from my previous post is key:

I try to seek out the teachings that I believe came from God and apply them in my own life

I was seeking, but I wasn’t asking. I looked at the source (church leaders) and then tried my best to fit the idea into my life, because I was *going to be obedient*. It’s that martyr thing popping up again. It didn’t matter if I enjoyed staying home, or if I’m the best at it, I would force myself to work harder every day to make it work because that’s what we’ve been told to do.

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The Awakening: R Rated Movies

January 19, 2012 By: Jenna Category: Personal

My first change is subtle and nuanced, but the decision to alter my thinking regarding the type of media I watch is a change I’m looking forward to. To understand the change that has happened, reading this post on my media standards is essential. In short, I’ve decided to watch my first R-rated movie. (I have watched “clean” version of R rated films like Amelie, Memento, Man on Fire, but those are difficult to find because movie studios have said they don’t want people editing the films to clean them up.)

I was reading through the things I wrote previously, and when I say out loud that I’ve decided to watch R-rated movies now it sounds much more dramatic than it is. My standards for violence, profanity, and sexuality haven’t changed all that much. What is dramatic is that I’ve decided not to worry about what is said in the Strength of Youth pamphlet when I choose what to watch. Previously, I read what was said about movies (or other things in that pamphlet) and made my list of what I should or shouldn’t do, and that was it. Now, I make my own list.

You know what I’ve always wanted to watch? Schindler’s List. But I never did because it was rated R, and I wanted to hold on to the statement that I had never seen a rated R movie. Not because I thought it made me “better” in some Mormon sense, but because I wanted to be able to tell my kids that I had done it, and they could to. Now I guess I will tell them that I’d like them to follow my example through high school, and that I think they will likely be better off for it, but once they are in college and developing their critical thinking skills it’s up to them.

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