Same look, new tastes

Let me tell you what you believe. I haven’t lived your life, but I know your type. You are all the same anyway. You’re a bigot. You hate gays. You have a dozen wives. Your Christ isn’t the same as my Christ. Mitt Romney is your Savior. Steve Young was the only good thing to come out of Utah. I’m a Mormon, and I have heard them all.

Being a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints hasn’t always been a cake walk at the bake sale that is my life. I was born into the church, meaning my parents were baptized members of the church when they had me. I have been attending the church since then, and was willingly baptized when I was eight. As I grew older, colleagues and schoolmates regularly bullied and ridiculed me for the beliefs that I held.

Nevertheless, I still believed and found the answers to my spiritual questions in the LDS church. I chose to follow the principles and doctrine of my beloved gospel, which helped me to guide and shape my life.

When I got to high school, I started to become interested in politics. I soon found that members of the Mormon Church tend to have very conservative views. I studied the major issues and still, even with my religious background, found that I agreed mostly with the Democratic Party. I was almost ashamed to talk to my parents about it, thinking I had disappointed them in some way. I realized that I was essentially preparing to come out to my parents; “Mom, Dad, I’m a Democrat.”

As it turns out, I’m not the only one. Surprisingly, there are many influential Mormons who turn to the left. U.S. Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada is a famous Mormon Lib. A few others include: the first ever female state senator Martha Hughes Cannon, former president of the LDS church and JFK-appointed civil rights committee member James E. Faust, and famous record holding Jeopardy! contestant Ken Jennings.

Members of the Mormon Church are taught to be free thinkers because we believe in the law of free agency. Free agency allows us to choose and think as we like because we are in charge of our own minds, as God intended us to be. These choices include political preference and opinion.

Not all members of the church are Molly Mormon or Peter Priesthood. I choose to believe the principles of the LDS church and support gay marriage. I’m a Mormon of a different generation.