Address delivered at the Affirmation Conference on August 15, 2013 Robin Kincaid Linkhart, president of Quorum Six of the Seventy in the Community of Christ (formerly known as the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints)

Thank you for inviting me to participate with you this weekend. It is an honor to be here with you, to share stories, to learn, to support one another in our challenges, and to explore how we can further engage our families, churches, neighborhoods, communities, and nations in the critical work of affirming our mutual worth: the work of Affirmation.

Though I am a guest at your table this weekend, I believe there is much that connects us. I will name three.

First. We, you and I, share a common heritage birthed in the life of a young boy seeking truth through prayer in a grove of trees. Like you, the sacred story of the Restoration, the gift of the prophetic impulse, and God’s dream for justice and peace on the earth, Zion, shapes and forms my story.

Second. My husband and I have four children; our youngest daughter Mollie, age 25, is gay. Since she came out to us three years ago, our family continues to walk beside Mollie and her partner Laura as they embrace their true identity and fully live into the all of who God created them to be in a world fraught with fear, prejudice, and oppression.

Words fail to describe the pain and the joy of that journey. Like you, the reality of God’s Creative Diversity, seen clearly in the beautiful divinely appointed diversity of human sexuality and orientation, challenges me to open my heart and soul to deeper understanding, and to learn more completely the ways of love that always call us to new frontiers.

Last. Regardless of the countless ways people separate themselves, endlessly building walls of division between classes, categories, races, genders, nations, cultures, tribes, religions, sexual orientation, and so much more – ultimately, whether we acknowledge it or not — we share the common experience of humanity cohabitating the earth with all creation.

We are connected. My welfare resides in your welfare — and yours in mine. As someone said yesterday, “We are all God’s family.”

Like you, I believe in the inestimable Worth of all persons.

In recent years the Enduring Principle, Worth of All Persons, brought Community of Christ face to face with traditional practices which exclude our LGBT sisters and brothers. God’s voice would not be stilled.

In 2010, Prophet and President Steven M. Veazey brought Words of Counsel to the church (known now as Section 164 of the Doctrine and Covenants), which opened the door for National Conferences to address pressing issues relative to culture and context that could not effectively be addressed at World Conference (General Conference) due to the fact that we are not all at the same place at the same time on all issues. While several nations are ready to discuss and embrace full inclusion, others are not. In some countries it is illegal to even talk about homosexuality.

Immediately following that conference USA General Authorities began the process of calling a National Conference for 2013 and developing a plan for how we as a people would journey together toward that conference.

We entered a period of discernment, a time of listening for God’s voice and direction. We asked ourselves to adopt a position of Holy Indifference: To set down our personal opinions and positions, to share our authentic selves and stories with one another, to speak from the heart and listen from the heart. All over the nation we met with one another sharing in small groups.

Additionally, we considered the lens through which we study scripture, digging deeper into the exegetical process in efforts to be one with those who first received scripture’s sacred words. So that across 1000s of years we could hear with them in their culture and context, rather than imposing our own lenses, in order that we might more clearly understand eternal truths. We also studied current resources from many disciplines to increase our awareness and diffuse fear around LGBT.