Of Power, and of Love, and of a Sound Mind

Finding out God. And finding out that I’m gay.

Washington, D.C. Temple, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

I first felt God in the textures of my childhood, nestled somewhere in the tough tweed upholstery of pale blue chapel pews, in the scratchy burlap lining the halls, and in the soft family room rug where we knelt in prayer every night. I felt Him in the cold, unforgiving metal of foldable overflow chairs and in the stringy net of a basketball hoop tucked away neatly for Sunday service.

Latter-day Saint chapel in Cedar City, Utah

I smelled Him in the chlorine of the baptismal font. I tasted Him in Wonder Bread and tap water. I heard Him in shrill organs and fragile four-part harmony. I glimpsed Him in the tiny font of impossibly thin pages lined with gold. God, we learned, has a body, and so I discovered my religion in all five senses. To be like God was to be physical and sensuous and glorious.

That’s how I found out God. And, in the same way, I found out that I was gay. I knew God in my body long before I was able to translate Him into coherent thought. And while this new translation would take me years to unriddle, it too was a language of the body and the spirit. I couldn’t say any of it out loud yet, but I felt it in my bones with that same inarticulate inner piety that led me to God.

With this nascent awareness grew a stark sense of loneliness. At 11 years old, I began observing the other boys with a longing sadness that I couldn’t put into words. My classmates, by contrast, had no difficulty finding words for what I was. They were able to pinpoint what made me different with the kind of preternatural skill for exploiting insecurity so instinctive to middle schoolers. To be called “gay” in sixth grade could only be understood as a vile epithet, something to be ashamed of and vehemently denied. Over the years, I got skilled at deflecting these attacks, sometimes with humor and sometimes with aggression. I had lots of practice. I’m not sure if anyone found my denials convincing, but at least I succeeded in convincing myself. My classmates knew I was gay long before I ever did.