SALT LAKE CITY — A high-ranking Mormon leader says the church’s policy on same-sex couples was a revelation from God.

Apostle Russell M. Nelson said in a worldwide speech Sunday that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints President Thomas S. Monson received instructions regarding same-sex couples directly from God.

Nelson said that led to the church’s decision to consider gay marriage a sin worthy of expulsion and forbid children of such couples from becoming members of the church. The children can become Mormons once they are 18 if they renounce same-sex marriage.

The 91-year-old apostle described how church leaders arrived at the decisions during a live-streamed speech from the campus of church-owned Brigham Young University-Hawaii.

Nelson is the head of the religion’s governing body and next in line for the Mormon presidency.

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