| BOYD.K PACKER |
So he did.
Speaking at the Sunday morning session of the church's 180th Semiannual General Conference in Salt Lake City, Packer equated same-sex relationships with pornography addiction, telling church followers "you can break the habits and conquer the addictions."
“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?”
[T]he power to create offspring “is not an incidental part of the plan of happiness. It is the key — the very key.” Some argue that attraction that is “impure and unnatural” is “pre-set and cannot [be] overcome, Packer said. “Not so! Why would our Heavenly Father do that to anyone? Remember he is our father.” Alluding to the Utah-based church’s support of laws such as California’s Proposition 8 that would define marriage as exclusively between a man and a woman, Packer said, “Regardless of the opposition, we are determined to stay on course.” “We cannot change; we will not change,” the senior apostle declared unequivocally.
Packer failed to mention that old Mormon notion of polygamy in regards to marriage and all that.
We should note that Packer's managed to time his speech "on the heels of the suicides of at least four teenagers over the past month, all victims of anti-gay bullying or harassment," the Human Rights Campaign has pointed out.
Monday, the HRC released a statement saying that President Packer needs to "correct" his statements.
“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, in a press release. “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.”
The problem with statements like the one from the HRC accompanied by pleas for Packer to "correct" his statements is that they assume Packer gives a f*ck about what happens to gay people. He doesn't. He doesn't. He never will. Further, why would Packer even consider changing his statements which the guy believes simply reflect the mind of god.
No reason to ask Parker anything. There is reason to make the 86 year old Packer's remaining days on the planet a little less fun.
The following is from The Salt Lake Tribune, well, actually from a blog at their site: LGBT FYI
PROTEST PLANNED AGAINST LDS APOSTLE'S ANTI-GAY WORDS
On Sunday, Boyd K. Packer, president of the LDS Church’s Quorum of Twelve Apostles, insisted gay people can overcome same-sex attraction and condemned gay marriage as legalizing “immorality.”
“A law against nature would be impossible to enforce,” Packer said at the church’s semiannual General Conference. “Do you think a vote to repeal the law of gravity would do any good?
Gay-rights activist Eric Ethington has organized a protest of Packer’s speech on Thursday. Protesters are asked to meet at Salt Lake City’s City Creek Park, 102 N. State St., at 7 p.m. and wear black. The group plans to march to the LDS Church Office Building nearby. Ethington says the demonstration will be “creative,” and he warns attendees to be prepared to lie on the ground.
“This kind disgusting hate speech is responsible for more teen suicides every year then we even know,” Ethington wrote on a Facebook invite. “Kids kill themselves, or are thrown from their homes because they are taught by men like this that God doesn’t love them.”
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