The LDS Church's Response to the Respect for Marriage Act
The church’s longstanding position against gay marriage makes one wonder what the motivation could be behind its current support for this bill.
Last week, on Tuesday, December 13, President Joe Biden signed the Respect for Marriage Act into law. The bill codifies the right to same-sex and interracial marriage at the federal level; both of which are currently legal across the U.S. due to previous Supreme Court rulings, but the recent overturning of Roe v. Wade spurred concerns that those precedents might face a similar fate in the future.
Currently, there’s no case headed for the Supreme Court that poses a risk to either of those precedents, but Congress actually doing its job and codifying those rights at the federal level before a case comes up is a rare moment of proficiency from the Legislative Branch. Not only was this bill passed in a reasonable amount of time, but it’s also a decent piece of legislation. This Twitter thread from Justin Amash, a former member of the House of Representatives, illustrates why this bill is a positive development, even for libertarians like myself who are skeptical of any government action.
In the first article I linked above, Reason’s Scott Shackford summarizes the bill, stating that “the Respect for Marriage Act declares that the federal government will recognize a marriage between two people that was performed in a state where that union is legal, regardless of the sex, race, ethnicity, or national origin of the participants. It does not require that states legally recognize same-sex marriage on their own.” There are also protections for religious freedom, as the bill “specifies that religious organizations, churches, temples, mosques, and the like cannot be forced to provide services or accommodations for the solemnization of any marriage.”
It was the inclusion of those protections that led the Mormon church, officially called the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS), to come out in support of the bill. The passage of the Respect for Marriage Act is newsworthy on its own, but it’s the response from the LDS church that I intend to focus on in this article. I was raised LDS, and while I haven’t been an active member since I was a child and don’t consider myself to be a Mormon anymore (sorry Mom and Dad), I still find the church’s support of this bill fascinating, as the church has quite a grip over its members and the overall culture and politics of my home state of Utah.
(Before straying too far from the subject, for anyone who wants to learn more about what this bill actually does, Scott Shackford wrote another article for Reason that goes into more detail.)
The same week that the Respect for Marriage Act was passed by the Senate last month, the LDS church issued a statement in support of it. This was a notable shift for the church. The statement mentioned that the church’s doctrine about marriage being between a man and a woman “is well known and will remain unchanged”, but the fact that they would come out in support of this bill at all stands in stark contrast to similar situations in the past.
The leadership of the LDS church, as well as Mormons in general, have long been opposed to same-sex marriage. This isn’t all that surprising, as many religious organizations have similar beliefs; and to be clear, they absolutely should have that right. The U.S. Constitution explicitly protects religious freedom, and rightly so. In a pluralistic society, we should allow for varying beliefs regardless of how we personally feel about them. However, the church’s longstanding position against gay marriage makes one wonder what the motivation could be behind its current support for the Respect for Marriage Act.
A great example of the LDS church’s view of same-sex marriage comes from the Family Proclamation, a statement put out by the then-President of the Church, Gordon B. Hinckley, back in 1995. It has been considered church doctrine ever since, and it’s full of socially conservative language such as “marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God”, and that “the sacred powers of procreation are to be employed only between man and woman, lawfully wedded as husband and wife.”
The most troubling part of the Family Proclamation, however, as well as the part most relevant to this article, is the last sentence which states: “We call upon responsible citizens and officers of government everywhere to promote those measures designed to maintain and strengthen the family as the fundamental unit of society.” [Emphasis added.]
Government officials discriminating against people who identify as LGBTQ by banning same-sex marriage would be a violation of the separation of church and state. While religious freedom is a very important right and should be protected, religious beliefs should not dictate what rights are available to which individuals. In other words, individual freedom should take precedence over all else, and insofar as the federal government is involved in the act of marriage (there’s a solid argument that it shouldn’t be), then it shouldn’t discriminate against any particular group of people, as long as all those involved are consenting adults.
The LDS church has indeed attempted to influence laws based on the religious beliefs held by its members, however. In some instances, it has even succeeded in doing so. The best example would be Prop 8 in California back in 2008. That bill, which passed but was later struck down by a federal court, amended the California Constitution to define marriage as being between one man and one woman. The LDS church famously urged its members within California to vote in favor of the bill, and they also financially supported the effort to get the bill passed.
The church did something similar in Hawaii a few years later. However, instead of telling members how to vote, the church leadership encouraged any Mormons in Hawaii to contact their state representatives and urge them to include exemptions for religious groups within the bill in question. While that may have been a far less egregious example than Prop 8 was, it still showcased how the LDS church was willing to use its influence over its members to meddle in various states’ politics.
The church’s effect on state laws hasn’t been limited to same-sex marriage, either. In 2018, Utahns voted in favor of Prop 2, a ballot initiative that legalized medical marijuana within the state. The LDS church came out in opposition to Prop 2 and worked to subvert it. After the initiative was passed, the Utah State Legislature proceeded to amend the proposition that Utahns had voted for.
One of the most notable changes was that the list of qualifying conditions for Utahns to receive a medical cannabis card was shortened significantly. The LDS church was an active participant in those changes, and given how the majority of the population in Utah is Mormon it goes without saying that many state legislators are Mormon as well, which very likely influences the way they vote within the legislature.
Considering how adamantly opposed the LDS church has been to legal protections for same-sex marriage in the past, one would expect the church to be opposed to the Respect for Marriage Act as well, so this recent development is somewhat surprising. Even though the church’s official stance on gay marriage will remain the same for the time being, this recent change in tone is still a significant step. This isn’t the first time that the church has shifted its stance on a controversial issue, however. In fact, some of those shifts have been much more drastic than just simply softening its tone.
By the time the Mormon pioneers settled in the Salt Lake Valley, The LDS church had already been practicing polygamy for about a decade. That practice continued after Utah became a U.S. territory, but proved to be an impediment when it came to Utah being granted statehood due to the federal government’s opposition to polygamy at the time. The church maintains that Wilford Woodruff, the then-President of the Church, had been instructed by God to end the practice of polygamy. But considering that Utah became a state just a mere six years after doing so, the idea that that move wasn’t politically motivated seems hard to believe.
That chapter of Mormon history is oddly relevant to the church’s recent support of the Respect for Marriage Act not just because it’s an example of the church altering its stance for political reasons, but also because the bill that was just signed into law explicitly states that polygamy will remain illegal at the federal level.
Another example would be when the church changed a long-held position in regard to black Latter-day Saints. A policy that was put in place not long into the church’s history and which lasted up until 1978, was that black men were unable to hold the priesthood (LDS men who are considered worthy typically receive different levels of the priesthood, once at 12 years old and another after becoming an adult) and both male and female black members were denied from participating in sacred rites that take place within Mormon temples.
Once again, this change in policy was said to be a revelation from God. I guess the fact that that change took place not long after the Civil Rights movement was just a coincidence. Back in 2020, the leadership within the LDS church attempted to distance themselves from the church’s racist history by coming out in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. The current support the church has shown for the Respect for Marriage Act could also be viewed as more of that same distancing, as the bill codifies the right to interracial marriage as well as same-sex marriage.
Another change the LDS church has made this year was updating the For the Strength of Youth handbook, a pamphlet that is meant to guide young members through their adolescence and into adulthood. The previous version of the handbook took a fairly strict stance on things such as dating, dressing modestly, tattoos/piercings, and homosexuality, but the updated version that was released earlier this year uses a softer approach. While more or less maintaining the same guidelines as the older iteration, the pamphlet has been updated to give adolescent members more leeway to make their own decisions.
Those changes are notable in the context of this article because I think they provide a broader perspective on many of the LDS church’s recent shifts in tone and rhetoric. The Mormon church has been hemorrhaging members over the last several years, largely due to younger members leaving in droves as they reach adulthood. This trend isn’t unique to Mormonism, as practically all religions are dealing with the same phenomenon, but it does help to potentially explain why the LDS church has softened its tone on certain subjects.
LGBTQ rights are a great example of an area where Millennials and Zoomers generally fall out of line with many traditional religious teachings. The LDS church slightly changing its tone on same-sex marriage appears to be a last-ditch effort to try and retain some younger members. The changes to the For the Strength of Youth handbook seem to me like a more blatant example of that same tactic, although how well it will work is yet to be seen.
Even if some or all of the LDS church’s recent changes in tone and policy are purely out of self-preservation, they very well could still have positive effects. Utah’s suicide rate is fairly high when compared to other states, and that’s especially true when it comes to LGBTQ teens. There has been plenty of speculation that the teachings of the LDS church and the effect they have had on the overall culture inside of Utah are a leading cause of the high amount of teen suicides. While there are most likely many other reasons for Utah’s high suicide rate, as someone who’s grown up in Utah and inside the church, I personally don’t find it too hard to believe that the culture that has been shaped by the church’s teachings is a major factor.
I wanted to get the perspective of someone who has been personally affected by the LDS church and its stance on homosexuality, so I decided to talk to my older brother, Richard Craddock, who, along with myself and the rest of our siblings, grew up Mormon. Richard came out as gay right around the same time many young men within the LDS church go on a mission — i.e. being sent to one of many different places all over the world for two years with the intention of converting people to Mormonism (young women are able to go on missions as well, but for men it’s practically a requirement, albeit, an unofficial one). Richard has been in a same-sex marriage for several years now, so when I heard about the LDS church’s response to the Respect for Marriage Act, I was eager to get his thoughts on the matter.
Richard told me he’s glad the LDS church has come out in support of this bill, but he thinks it's a bit strange that the church would change its tone. “It seems like they’re just going with the world,” he told me, suggesting that if they really believe gay marriage is a sin, it would make more sense for them to oppose this bill.
I asked him what it was like to come out as gay after being raised Mormon. “It’s scary,” he told me, “because you’re not sure if your family is going to pick you or their faith.” I can only imagine, but it seems like that feeling could very easily push an LGBTQ Mormon, especially one in their teen years, to struggle with their identity to the point of considering suicide which may partially explain Utah’s high suicide rate.
“I feel like the Mormon identity was stronger at first,” Richard said during our conversation. He then went on to mention that by the time he reached high school his Mormon identity started to take a less important role. He told me he struggled with whether he should serve a mission and “feel like a liar” or if he should come out and risk being ostracized by his family and community. Fortunately, my family accepted Richard after he came out, but many people aren’t so lucky.
When I asked him about his thoughts on the LDS church changing the For the Strength of Youth handbook, Richard more or less agreed with me that it seems like a ploy to retain younger members. Again, I don’t regard these changes as a bad thing, and neither does my brother, but if the church leadership truly believes what they’ve preached all these years, it seems odd that they’d change their stance now. And as I’ve detailed here, this isn’t the first time the church has changed due to social and political pressure, which makes these decisions seem less like “revelations from God” and more like a plea for younger members to stick around.
(Anyone who’s interested can follow Richard’s YouTube channel called Richie’s Thoughts where he covers a variety of different topics. The video most relevant to this conversation, however, would be his coming out video.)
This recent change in tone from the LDS church will hopefully ease the pressure many younger members feel, especially those within the LGBTQ community, but I feel like it’s naive to take the church leadership’s reasoning at face value. Those who run the LDS church are simply human beings who are just as capable of greed, selfishness, and corruption as anyone else. They may claim to speak for God, but it’s important for members of the church to consider the many other factors that potentially go into their decision-making.
I support the Respect for Marriage Act. I’m glad the right to same-sex and interracial marriage is now codified into law, I’m glad the bill provides some room for states’ rights, and I’m also glad that it has protections for religious freedom. This is a big country, and there’s plenty of room for people with socially conservative or religious views to live alongside those who live lifestyles that are contrary to those views. As long as no one violates the rights of another person, we should all be allowed to live and love however we choose.
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