In fact, Utah leads the nation in suicide rates amongst men ages 15-24.
Yet there is hope. A leading Mormon writer and performer, Carol Lynn Pearson, shocked the community in 1986 with her book, Goodbye I Love You, in which she revealed that her husband, Gerald, the father of her children, had left her after he admitted he could not deny his being gay, then died in her arms years later when she brought him home to care for him as he succumbed to AIDS.
She has spent the decades since diligently communicating in every way possible to heal the judgments within families.
In 2006, her play, Facing East, was produced in Salt Lake City, drawing full houses and tearfully cathartic audiences, as she revealed a Mormon couple at the graveside of their gay son who had ended his own life, first dealing with their own mixed bag of guilt and relief, and then meeting for the first time their son’s partner. The production also traveled to Off-Broadway in New York and San Francisco, where it was also extremely well received.
But the best result for me was this. My daughter said there was a new fellow at their school, in her Drama class. They hit it off immediately, and it wasn’t long before he told he was gay, but it wasn’t going well with the family. In fact, he said that the recent family move from out of state was at least in part because of his relationship with another young man.
When I first considered writing about Proposition 8, I looked for our copy of the play, Facing East, only to find out that our daughter had loaned it to this young man, who was looking for material for a monologue.
His mother found the book in his room. It stopped her in her tracks. She sat down and read it, and wept. Since then, his life has changed for the better.
That’s all a writer can ever ask for. I know. For, I, too, hope that I’ve said something well, and that it is read, despite (or because of) discomfort, and as a result, someone see things differently.
I return to Percy Bysshe Shelley, who states, in conclusion: The most unfailing herald, companion, and follower of the awakening of a great people to work a beneficial change in opinion or institution, is poetry.
This is my gift to you, dear reader: the truth, so you can share it, and together we can more accurately align cause and effect, and embrace our families.
Remember, forgiveness is essential in families. So is accountability and indictment in government.
BECAUSE I KNOW THIS, I ALSO KNOW MY FAMILY, SPECIFICALLY MY HUSBAND AND ME, WILL COME TOGETHER AGAIN.
With this I wish you a Merry Christmas, and for those who do not celebrate Christmas, I encourage remembrance and celebration of the Thought and directive itself within all the world’s versions of the Golden Rule.
