Peculiar: A Beacon of Hope for the LGBTQIA2S+ Community in Mormon Land

In this month of Pride events, and in light of the violent threat to peaceful Pride events in Coeur D'Alene, ID by 31 men who call themselves "Patriot Front," along with other daily legislative threats against our community, there was the hopeful story from Utah of the upcoming Pride events in a land well-known for its Mormon heritage.

Salt Lake City Pride was June 4-5, 2022, and it was quite a festive event, wrote religionnews.com reporter Jana Riess (June 10, 2022). Over 70,000 people attended the event, with over 300 booths. In Salt Lake City. Mormon country. Conservative. Republican. 

There are also Pride events to happen in Ogden, UT, as well as Rexburg, ID, both Mormon enclaves.

She reports that last June, and possibly this June, students from Brigham Young University held an unofficial Pride parade, with over 1000 students from the University along with allies. While it was not sanctioned either by the University or the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (LDS), it was well attended and surpassed what people expected. Riess wrote that the reason they don't post the date of the parade too far in advance is because of their concern of hate groups showing up, which could be passive as street protestors shouting as you march by (been there, seen that, done that), or as violent as Coeur D'Alene's Patriot Front gang. 

Riess wrote that life for LGBTQIA2S+ Mormons have slightly improved. Whereas before simply identifying as being "gay" was "sinful" enough to be excommunicated, as well as going in for conversion therapy, forcing gay men to get married to a "righteous woman," self-identifying as being gay no longer has the same level of punishment. 

Riess reports that, sadly, these incremental changes don't come in time to save some of those who feel so alienated by the church that they opt to kill themselves. 

Riess tells of one such story, as lived by "George Deussen, whom I met this past weekend at Pride. His youngest son came out as gay at 13, and although his family was supportive he was sometimes filled with self-loathing because of the homophobic messages he got at church. 'If God’s people hate me, then God must hate me,' he would say.

'His only connection was that this was the one true church, and these must be God's people,' said Deussen. So if they were telling him he was defective, then he must be defective.

The November 2015 anti-LGBTQ policy (of the LDS church) was the 'real explosion' for his son, who too his own life the following June."

Determined to change things, Deussen, along with his wife Alyson Paul, started the group, "Peculiar," which is trying to bridge the gap between the LGBTQIA2S+ community and the LDS church.

While the LDS church has not given any support to Peculiar, Deussen still belongs to the LDS church and is trying to bring about change. He told Riess, "the two great commandments Jesus gave--to love God and love one another--are both about the same thing. 'He wants our love above all things. And if there's anything that you do that separates anybody, you need to change it.'"

Here's a link to the article: https://religionnews.com/2022/06/10/in-mormon-utah-lgbtq-pride-celebrations-meet-a-desperate-need/

In the middle of the bleak news, which surrounds us in the LGBTQIA2S+ community of faith and our allies--from thugs threatening to bring violence to a Pride event in northern ID, to the Florida Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church failing to ordain LGBTQIA2S+ ministers in the process of being ordained at the very last minute--the story of Peculiar was just the antidote I needed. I needed to be reminded that there are stories of hope that bring light and joy to our world as LGBTQIA2S+ people and allies today in the US.

May it be so.