| OCR Text |
Show 238 the best "performers" of the ritual are usually those with the highest social standing in the community, their performances perceived as a sign of spiritual superiority and high status. 98 By contrast, gay "testimonies" bore witness to the pain of being misunderstood and disadvantaged within the church. over Reversing the process that privileged the church individuals, gays affirmed individual experience over official LDS renditions of their lives. Just as bearing testimony gave tangible form to an abstract, inner acceptance of God, gay LDS narratives articulated long-suppressed feelings in a public "coming out" gesture. Like the often formulaic content of spoken testimonies which conveyed one's sense of belonging to the LDS community, gay testimonies fostered collective identification among those similarly affected by the church's policies. In so doing, they publicized and politicized what were once private matters and addressed homophobia as a social phenomenon. Insofar as Mormon gays remained committed to changing social attitudes rather than their sexuality, Kimball and Mormon intellectuals were apt in calling them "rebellious." Although many LDS gays continued to experience coming out as a crisis of faith, those who experienced homosexuality as something positive and creative proclaimed the disparity between Kimball's assertions and the realities of their lives. One of the more ambitious efforts to publicize gays' experiences in the Mormon Church was a 1978 television documentary produced by former Utahn Andrew Welch. The film included interviews with forty gay men and two BYU psychologists, as well as 98David Knowlton, "Belief, Metaphor, and Rhetoric: The Mormon Practice of Testimony Bearing," Sunstone 15, no. 1 (April 1991): 24-25,27. |
