To all my LDS friends: When a senior member of the governing body of your church professes hatred, you’re gonna be lumped in. Don’t like it? Do something about it.

This is some crazy bullshit:
Apostle: Same-sex attraction can change | The Salt Lake Tribune
(via @sltrib )

p.s. How about that URL?

Right at the top:

“There are those today who not only tolerate but advocate voting to change laws that would legalize immorality, as if a vote would somehow alter the designs of God’s laws and nature,” Boyd K. Packer, president of the church’s Quorum of Twelve Apostles, said in a strongly worded sermon about the dangers of pornography and same-sex marriage. “A law against nature would be impossible to enforce. Do you think a vote to repeal the law of gravity would do any good?”

To counter Mr. Packer, here’s an interesting story about researching the gay gene:

Fourteen years later, neither Bocklandt nor any other researcher has pinpointed the precise base pairs that might turn a man gay. Part of this is due to the politics of funding for sex research. For a long period NIH grant proposals that included words like “gay,” “condom,” or even “sexuality” were turned down, much to the ire of researchers like Hamer. Shortly after he published his gay brothers study, Hamer completed a similarly designed family study looking into a genetic cause for a certain kind of anxiety. Since then there have been more than 400 independent studies looking into those genes. There have been no such studies for the gay gene.

This “sermon” is from the same guy that gave the world the most awesome anti-masturbation speech in history. It is contained in the pamphlet, “To Young Men Only.” To anybody that says this is a manufactured or made up story. I was THERE when Packer gave the speech. At that time, I had not seen Annie Hall and could not tell Packer “don’t knock my hobbies”.

On a serious note, if you are an LDS member who is gay, might be gay or have a family member who is gay, visit affirmation.org. Click here to read their response to the Packer speech. They bring up a really good point (especially with the kinds of stories making the news of late), that speech of this kind is dangerous:

“Words have consequences, particularly when they come from a faith leader. This is exactly the kind of statement that can lead some kids to bully and others to commit suicide,” said Joe Solmonese, president of HRC. “When a faith leader tells gay people that they are a mistake because God would never have made them that way and they don’t deserve love, it sends a very powerful message that violence and/or discrimination against LGBT people is acceptable. It also emotionally devastates those who are LGBT or may be struggling with their sexual orientation or gender identify. His words were not only inaccurate, they were also dangerous.”

Ellen Degeneres had some words about the culture of bullying and homosexuality (you’ve probably already seen this):

Theories about Packer abound. He’s in line to be the President of the LDS Church. Rumor has it that most of the brethren are terrified that he would ever be allowed to be in that position for the damage he could do to the church. That is a total rumor and I have no source for that information, save idol chatter. They might be all for Packer as president. However, he’s got a history of saying things that push the church hard-right. Here’s a speech he gave at Brigham Young University wherein he told people to marry only those in their same race:

We’ve always counseled in the Church for our Mexican members to marry Mexicans, our Japanese members to marry Japanese, our Caucasians to marry Caucasians, our Polynesian members to marry Polynesians. The counsel has been wise. You may say again, “Well, I know of exceptions.” I do, too, and they’ve been very successful marriages. I know some of them. You might even say, “I can show you local Church leaders or perhaps even general leaders who have married out of their race.” I say, “Yes–exceptions.” Then I would remind you of that Relief Society woman’s near-scriptural statement, “We’d like to follow the rule first, and then we’ll take care of the exceptions.”

I was born in the same city as Mr. Packer. He is/was revered there by LDS church members.