“But you’ve officially had your name removed since?” I had to ask. It would hurt Kurt deeply, and even though I understood Kenneth’s choice, it hurt me, too. It meant our eternal family now had a Kenneth-sized hole in it, since he would not allowed to be part of our family in the celestial kingdom of heaven. The covenant that sealed us forever to our children even before they were born had been broken by the resignation.
“I knew you were busy getting Samuel on his mission, Mom, and I didn’t really want to open it up for family discussion. But yeah, I went to see a lawyer who said he’d file the letter officially, so I didn’t have to go through the harassment and the waiting period the church wanted to set. It was official in March.” His words were clipped and sounded almost rehearsed.
“Oh,” I said softly.
Then Kenneth started apologizing. “Mom, I know I should have told you about all this before now. I kept telling myself I should bring it up at every family dinner, let it all hang out. But I guess I was a bit of a coward. I knew how disappointed you and Dad would be.”
“I love you, Kenneth. I will always love you.” That was the most I could manage.
Kenneth sat on one of the stools and after a little silence said, “I’ve never told you this before, but one of my companions during my mission, Elder Ellison, was gay. He told me in confidence, but I was scared of him. I’d been told so many times that gay people were pedophiles and perverts that I believed it. I called the mission president and outed Ellison to him.” Kenneth shivered at this.
“What happened?” I asked, feeling a well of sympathy for the poor gay elder who must have felt so alone in the world.
“The mission president immediately came to interview him and Ellison was transferred to the mission office, assigned directly to the Prez instead of another missionary companion.” He took a shuddering breath, and couldn’t seem to look at me. He was ashamed of himself. “And then, two months later, I heard Ellison was sent home because of ‘emotional problems.’” There were air quotes around those two words. “He committed suicide the day before I was released from my mission. He was only twenty-one.” He looked at me, and then looked away.
I’d never known any of this back when Kenneth had returned from his mission, and I could see now why he hadn’t told me. I thought of Samuel, who could be hurt by a companion who treated him like this. At least Samuel wasn’t in the closet, but there had to be hundreds of other missionaries who were. I was glad Kenneth was ashamed of himself. I felt a bit of shame, as well, that I had raised a son who could do this.
But sadly, it made sense of so many things. No wonder Kenneth had refused to go back to church for weeks after coming home from his mission. No wonder he hadn’t done the typical post-mission talk in church, telling everyone about his converts and funny stories about his companions. No wonder he’d become inactive since then, and had struggled with the new policy.
Kenneth rubbed at his face, and his hand lingered there, half-obscuring his eyes. “Mom, I’ve been sorry about this every day of my life since then. I’ve tried to think of some way I could make it up to Ellison, but I never will. The only thing I can do is to figure out how to prove to myself that I’m not the person I was then, that I’m never going to be like that again. I’m not going to be part of making more gay Mormons commit suicide. I’m doing everything I can to make sure they know I’m not like that, that I understand them.”
I reached for Kenneth’s arm, but he pulled away, as if he didn’t believe he deserved my sympathy.
“The truth is that Ellison was the best companion I ever had,” Kenneth added, talking more to himself than to me, I think. “He was a really good person. He wanted to help others. And he believed in God. Really believed that every prayer he said was being heard and answered in some way. And still, I was afraid of—I don’t even know what.” He clenched a fist and then looked back at me, his eyes bleeding emotion.
“Whenever I think about Samuel on a mission,” he said, his voice almost testimonial, “I can’t help but think of Ellison, and how things turned out. I really hope Samuel never has a companion like me. But the way the Mormon church talks about gay people, I don’t know if the average church member is any more enlightened now than they were when I was a missionary. Or maybe they’re worse, if they think that their prejudices have been justified by this ridiculous policy.”
I felt horribly guilty about this. What kind of person was I, that I hadn’t talked to my sons about loving the whole rainbow spectrum before now? I hadn’t even told them about my marriage to Ben until last year, as if I was ashamed of it—and him.
“I had planned to tell you after I resigned, but it was harder than I thought it would be. I mean, I probably hadn’t gone to a church meeting in my own ward for a year. But that Sunday, I felt horribly guilty. I couldn’t sleep for fear that God would punish me somehow.” He rubbed at his eyes.