Wickedness thrust upon them?
I should be doing homework, but Abelard Enigma posted the most beautiful, realistic, appropriate, well-rounded, fair, qualified, informed, and educated descriptions of the three options that Latter-day Saints with SSA face. Please read them.
Option 1 Mixed Orientation Marriage
Option 2 Celibacy
Option 3 A Homosexual Relationship
Reading these options and the well developed pros and cons of each one sent me down a thought path I'd like to share. What do I expect from the Church, and is it a reasonable expectation?
Personally, I expect the Church to one day find a healthy option for same-gender-attracted Latter-day Saints. I don't believe that mixed orientation marriages or celibacy (or suicide) are healthy options. I believe that same gender relationships, even marriages, are healthy options. I won't say it's the only option, in case my imagination isn't good enough, but I will say it is a healthy option.
Is it reasonable (doctrinally and socially) to expect the Church to sanction same sex relationships? I vote yes. In fact, I believe the Church has several resources that put it in more of a position to accept same gender marriages than other religions. Here they are:
1. Revelation. We claim the divine right to learn new doctrines that haven't previously been revealed. We can make changes. We have a fluidity that other Churches don't allow. Generally speaking, the members of the Church follow these revelations when the Prophets receive them.
2. Three books of scripture written for our day that don't condemn or warn against homosexuality. Seriously, if homosexuality is such a big problem, why doesn't the Book of Mormon warn us against it when it was written with our day in vision? Unlike other Churches which rely solely on one book of ancient scripture, we have books of both modern and ancient scripture. And I don't see any incompatibility with any of those books, even the Bible. I think a same gender marriage would work with the standard works.
3. Sealing power. We have the power to seal people together beyond mortality. Why can't it be a man and a man? We use the sealing power to unite a child to parents who aren't biologically theirs. Why can't we use the power to unite a homosexual family? We don't need genes and blood to create families, we just need love, covenants, and Priesthood authority. Let's not forget we have a history of unorthodox marriages that were sealed with this power. Now, it is God's power, and we must use it the way He wants it used, but if he could sanction it for sealing a man to twenty seven women, or to children that aren't his, I have a hard time understanding why God wouldn't want to seal two same gendered people together.
See? It's not impossible for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to accept homosexuality. I think it would work quite well. I hope and pray that one day the Church will do it. I wish it would be more progressive about it, but historically speaking it's not a progressive Church. A black man and a black woman couldn't be sealed together in the Temple until 1979. That's disgusting. I hope that one day a man and a man can be sealed together. And I hope that my children will say, "That's disgusting" when they think that it couldn't happen until 2027.