When Ben Williams, 71, opens his blue shoebox, history comes pouring out. From being a young BYU student who was kicked out for being gay to coming out during the AIDS epidemic of the ‘80s, history pours out.
Williams was raised in southern California and converted to the Latter-day Saint faith as a teenager. “I look back now on it and it was mostly to overcome my homosexuality,” Williams said of his conversion. In high school, he said he remembers being in love with a boy named John who didn’t love him back.
His family didn’t convert, he said, and was accepting that he did. Homosexuality wasn’t something his family talked about. Once, he recalled, he was upset about telling a different boy that he was gay. Williams said his mother tried to comfort him, without knowing he was gay, and the conversation got awkward.
But when Williams later met with his bishop, he said he couldn’t take the shame any more and confessed. Williams eventually was kicked out of BYU, without getting his teaching credentials. When asked if he regrets his decision to convert, he doesn’t answer “yes” or “no.” Like most things, it’s complicated.
Instead, Williams says it all came from grassroots organizations that the local gay and lesbian community created.
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