Given the fact that the Mormon Church was so front and center in the battle over the gay marriage amendment—Proposition 8—which was recently passed in California, I felt the need to speak out about them.
I have a special insight into the hypocrisy of this particular situation in that I, myself married a Mormon. Now don’t get me wrong, the man that I married was at the time a “jack” Mormon, or one who had gone astray and no longer attended church. He had been born into this faith and at the age of 18 when he left home for college never attended church again.
But my marriage to him and my exposure to members of the Mormon faith, his family and others, also gives me perspective about their unique culture, and because I lived in Utah for three years allows me to comment on the absurdity of the “marriage is between one man and one woman” philosophy which is at the heart of Proposition 8, and which they now supposedly find it necessary to whole-heartedly support.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints a.k.a. the Mormon Church or the L.D.S. Church has clearly and visibly stepped over a line when it comes to the separation of church and state. The Church’s top prophets commanded Mormons “to do all you can” to work for Proposition 8 and donate money to the campaign. Mormon leaders throughout California read the instructions to their members which number 750,000, according to Mother Jones Magazine.
“The Church has a single, undeviating standard of sexual morality: intimate relations are proper only between a husband and a wife united in bonds of matrimony . . . Any dilution of the traditional definition of marriage will further erode the already weakened stability of marriages and family generally . . . with harmful consequences for society,” as was quoted by Mother Jones.
Having taken a class in Utah History, which could have been subtitled Mormon history, I find this push for a constitutional amendment led by this particular group, whose members donated $19 million, which was 4 out of every 5 dollars given, as was reported by the Salt Lake Tribune, more than absurd.
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