well gang,

The catalyst for this latest diatribe is this bit of hooey in the news:

[1] http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2010/10/12/mormon-leaders-remarks-spark-outcry-on-same-sex-issues/?hpt=T2

Here’s my reply, addressed to a close gay friend in New York.

MY ANSWER

Dear Ray,
As no doubt you have seen in the news the uproar that a certain Boyd K. Packer caused in the city of Salt behind the Zion Curtain, no doubt you immediately thought of me when you heard the news.
When I heard the news and read it on cnn.com, be assured that the bile rose in my throat.  But then again I could expect no different rhetoric from “Elder” Packer.  I heard that rhetoric all my life, as no doubt you could construe from reading my charged editorials and postings on gayportlandblogspot.com.
I have always hated that man.  Even as a denying deeply closed teen- when I did that idiotic struggle, that pathetic struggle to fit in to that mindset.  It is not just that the LDS mindset demands it’s adherents to be sheeple, it isn’t merely that they constantly preach to their flock that when the General Authorities speak, the thinking has already been done, (so how dare you blasphemous infidel question their sacred scribbling.)  It isn’t that their massive money machine poured vast sums into California to defeat the marriage thing.  I understand their true logic in ways that few outside the institution can.  And furthermore I have an insight that even the faithful of that cult cannot and will not even contemplate.
The whole trip runs down to this:  The mere acknowledgement of our existence upsets the whole applecart of their doctrine!  ‘Tis cute and romantic Magical Thinking to consider God our “Heavenly Father.”  Tis the epitome of Walt Disney faith to consider Joseph Smith as the intercessor between humanity and Elohim, because, after all, Joseph Smith was the only man to be given all “the keys to the Kingdom.”  As a result, the main pillar of the LDS faith is that Families are Forever and that to obtain “Eternal Exaltation” you MUST be married in the LDS Temple with all the prerequisite Names Signs and Penalties so YOU (and your female wife) can bestow bodies to some of the millions of “Spirit Children” that Elohim and his wife(s) have created on the planet Kolob, just waiting to be hatched out by the “Daughters of Zion” fertilized by all those clean cut Mormon Return Missionaries.  ALL faithful Mormons must do that to gain their “Eternal Exaltation.”  And if you are “faithful to your Covenants and Testimonies,” YOU TOO can become a God on your own fucking planet after you die, to have many polygamous wives spouting forth billions of Spiritual Children to populate another inferior planet with good Brethren and Sisters of the ONLY TRUE FAITH, the ONLY TRUE CHURCH!!!  This is Mormonism in a nutshell.
When Packer (what a hell of a gay name for an Apostle!) spouts “why in the world would Heavenly Father create gays,” you must picture that statement in the light of Mormon Doctrine and their “plan of Salvation.”  How could Heavenly Father create Blacks?  (Until recently the “revelation” from “Church Authorities” was that Blacks were the Children of Cain and were forbidden to indulge in the LDS Church’s deepest darkest magical thinking in the Temple.)  As Gays, we cannot create (procreate) the six to ten children that the Church demands it’s faithful to produce, so to not only make more Mormons, but also to give physical bodies to the most elect, fortunate and “WORTHY” Spiritual Children on Kolob, just waiting to be blessed with a Mormon family and live happily ever after in Provo, Utah! (Happy Valley)
Speaking of the word “WORTHY,” I was shackled by that word and THEIR conception of what was “worthy” since I was a child!  Although I attempted several times to be “worthy” of the “blessings” of the “Priesthood,” I NEVER felt “worthy” enough!  What a hell of a millstone to hang around any gay Mormon teen’s neck, their definition and requirements of what is and is not “WORTHY!”  A gay teen is not “worthy” of “Heavenly Father’s” love, not “worthy” of the Priesthood, not “worthy” of a “Daughter of Zion” to procreate that huge family.  It took me years or therapy and courage to develop the SELF WORTH I have now, independent of some institution’s definition on what is and is not “worthy!”
Ray, this is the shit that they tried their damndest to brainwash me with ever since I was knee high!  Yet when I was knee-high I also read Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn.  In that book, Huck gets holed up with two frauds and flim-flam men.  A town where the flim-flam men tried to work their crap became wise to them and then some other flim-flam men came to town and got in an argument with the first pair. Suddenly it dawned upon the crowd that “the whole bilin’ of ‘em were frauds!”  I have had my gut full of terror, guilt and horror from living as a closeted gay among them.  I am one of them-one of so many in that culture who attempted suicide to escape that guilt.  Yet I am one of the few who had the guts to throw the fucking baby out with the basket and recognize that ALL organized religions are frauds!
The 12 step programs have taught me that there is a world of difference between Spirituality and Religion.  When I was a teen, I was one of the few Mormon youth that didn’t play basketball. Even then I knew the reason why.  Even then I was attracted to all those cute guys in their basketball uniforms.  Rather to endure such “temptation” I hid away at home like some rodent.  Yet even the news that leaks out these days from Behind the Zion Curtain lets the world know that there are tens of thousands of gay Mormons even in their fucking citadel!  And we will no longer keep our mouths shut over the blatant hatred and discrimination disguised as the “Sacred Plan of Salvation” practiced by that Church!