I was asked to write about my experience at BYU–Hawaii as a gay member of the Church. I think the best word to describe my journey is “progressive.” I came to Hawaii as a closeted person who had to go through some really rough refiner’s fire to find myself. I had to get acquainted with who I am and what my purpose is in life.
My time at BYUH started from being a single man struggling to heal himself from homosexuality, to the point where I got married because of wrong advice. As a Latter-day Saint, I am grateful to have a testimony rooted in God rather than people. It saved my life and allowed me to make some of the toughest decisions. I lived through some of the toughest tests of faith and endured persecution from people who I thought were friends. Being gay was one thing, but being divorced and gay was an even bigger topic around BYUH.
But these were the refiner's fires I mentioned earlier. It takes courage and real faith to stand alone and grab hold of your life. I learned progress doesn't come only when things are going well. Instead, it was my ability to get back up every time life knocked me down that helped me progress.
I could have become so bitter, but then I realized I was looking for validation among the wrong groups of people and situations. Together with the bad, there was so much good waiting for me, but I had to choose to look beyond the persecutions, the silent whispers of gossip and hate. I had to realize some of my own frailties. I also had to fix my own attitudes of how I dealt with situations.
I decided to stand my ground and push through the bad and discover what my new life offered me.I accepted my homosexuality and realized I wasn’t the one struggling with same-gender attraction. The people around me were struggling with accepting my same-gender attraction. People don’t know how hurtful they can be when they lack wisdom, and when someone gets exposed to so much hurt, they start believing all sorts of things they are told.
So how did I come out of this stupor? Choices, tough choices.
With my new life came a new found love between my family and friends. I realized I needed to embrace the blessing of walking this life as a gay man. I decided I had to stop playing the victim and learn to become my own hero. As I became more real to myself, I became more real to the circumstances and people around me. Because of the trials I went through, I was freed from living a life of pretend and fear, free from constantly living to please others and fighting to fit into their idea of how my life should be.
I started to work on increasing my value, getting ready to conquer the world as a gay, brown, Indian, Pacific Islander man. I have a great job helping others find their potential. I am the president of an NGO (Affirmation Hawaii Chapter) that helps fellow LGBTQ+ friends at BYUH and around Hawaii learn self-empowerment and find their purpose. I also hold a church calling, working with a loving bishop who sees my worth even as I slip and sometimes fall as we all do.
So, “progressive.” My journey has been wholesomely full of God’s refining fire, and it has been amazingly progressive.