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Affirmation: Gay & Lesbian Mormons—Serving LGBT Mormons and Their Family and Friends Since 1977
Surrounded by museums, movie theaters, and coffee shops, the Yerba Buena Gardens are located steps away from the Westin. Enlarge |
This area map shows some of the most important attractions you'll find by the Westin on Market. Enlarge Download in PDF Format |
 Yerba Buena Gardens Interactive Map
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Affirmation Conference’s Exciting Location
Renowned Attractions Are Found Steps Away from the Conference Hotel
The Affirmation Conference will be held this year at the Westin on Market Street, which is located in the hub of one of San Francisco’s most vibrant and exciting districts, the Yerba Buena Neighborhood. This sleek and elegant hotel overlooks a jewel of a park, the Yerba Buena Gardens, which features a beautiful fountain tribute to Martin Luther King Jr., an expansive lawn area for picnics and concerts, and terraces with coffee shops. You can enjoy the outdoors while you contemplate your activities for the day--and your choices are many.
Within less than a block are four of the most fascinating museums San Francisco has to offer. The Museum of Modern Art features a newly completed rooftop garden. The innovative Yerba Buena Center for the Arts showcases everything from edgy installations to experimental film. The culturally rich Contemporary Jewish Museum and the fun and quirky Cartoon Art Museum are also found at this location.
If you care to do some shopping, you are situated perfectly for the best that San Francisco has to offer. Only one block away is The Westfield San Francisco Centre – the largest urban shopping mall west of the Mississippi. A few more blocks brings you to the famous Union Square, shopping mecca for many generations. Within a few blocks are world-class department stores and internationally famous designer shops—not to mention local stores which will make your shopping experiences unique.
In addition to department stores, boutiques, and commercial art galleries, there are many places of historic interest tucked into the area, including the Old Mint, Lotta’s Fountain, St. Patrick’s Catholic Church, The Palace Hotel, and the nearby Chinatown and the Ferry Building.
When you are ready to eat, you have abundant choices reflecting many appetites, ethnicities, palates, and budgets. Represented within blocks of each other are upscale, trend-setting restaurants, pleasant mainstay establishments, informal down-homey cafes, and popular fast-food franchises.
After a meal, you can take in a movie. Two multiplex movie theaters are within a block of the hotel. The Metreon features the best IMAX screen in the Bay Area, and the Century is under the same roof as the Westfield San Francisco Centre. If you are drawn to live theater, you are in luck: A few blocks away is San Francisco's theater district with blockbuster musicals and first-rate drama.
Or maybe you are interested in something more physical. Yerba Buena Gardens offers ice skating and bowling. There are also many fascinating places to take a post-meal stroll, including the Embarcadero with its lovely views of the bay.
For those who care to venture out beyond walking distance, there are several modes of transportation linking you to the rest of this fascinating city, including BART (subway), MUNI (street cars and buses), taxis and cable cars.
And after all of this, look forward to returning to the serene Westin for a good rest on their signature Heavenly Beds.
Affirmation Calendar 2010
June
Pride celebrations held across the world
June 8
Anniversary of the revelation that lifted the ban on African-Americans males holding the priesthood (1978)
June 11
Anniversary. Affirmation was organized on this day in Salt Lake City (1977).
June 18
“8: The Mormon Proposition” to Open Nationally
June 24-27
“Facing East” staged at the Rochester Institute of Technology
July 15th
End of Early Registration (Low-Cost) for Conference
July 16-18
Affirmation Leadership Meeting in Portland
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July 24
Pioneer Day
September 1
Deadline for Hotel Reservations at Special Price
September 1
Deadline to send submissions to the Road to Reconciliation Story Contest
September 15
Deadline for On-Time Registration with Meals for Conference
October 8-10
Annual Conference in San Francisco
October 8
Affirmation Leadership Meeting in San Francisco
October 11
National Coming Out Day
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“8: The Mormon Proposition” to Open Nationally on June 18
Cheryl Nunn: “I wish that more members would see the film and then become a voice inside the Church to make sure something like this does not happen again”
One of the biggest hits from this year’s Sundance Film Festival, “8: The Mormon Proposition” will open nationally June 18. The film looks at the Mormon Church’s involvement in promoting and helping pass California’s Proposition 8 and the church’s secretive, decades-long campaign against gay rights. Cheryl Nunn, of the Foundation for Reconciliation, recently attended a special screening in Santa Cruz, California, and wrote the following report:
It was nearly a full theater last night at the screening of 8: The Mormon Proposition. What a great response from the crowd--all kinds of clapping and roars during the movie! People were amazed and shocked. The most common comment was, “How did the Mormon Church get away with this?”
I’m going to buy the DVD and share it with all those we know who missed it; many others who attended the screening mentioned they are going to buy it, too. We had an enjoyable dinner with Linda Stay, her family, George Cole, and others. They did a great job during the Q&A session after the movie.
Carol Lynn and Emily Pearson came across loud and clear and were two of the most persuasive voices of the documentary. Thank you to those who stood up and spoke out for those families who have been greatly harmed by the Church’s action against them in California. Thanks for exposing the illegal and unethical tactics the Church used to achieve its political agenda and fundraising campaign.
I wish everyone in the U.S., especially Church members, could see this important film. Not that long ago I would have thought, like many active members of the Church, that this could not be true--that the film was made by anti-Mormons intending to harm the Church--and I would have refused to see it. It’s my wish that more members today would be open-minded enough to see the film and then become a voice inside the Church to make sure something like this does not happen again.
We had invited members of our book club to come to the screening. One book club member said this: “I thought the documentary was beautifully done. The very human story of this family dealing so courageously with the conflict between the doctrine of their church and the love of their child was the perfect counterpoint to all the political facts and figures. As a non-Mormon, I appreciated the explanation of the church's take on the afterlife--yes, I basically knew this, but the way it was presented really brought home for me why same-sex marriage is such a heartrending issue for LDS families.”
Leadership Meetings Scheduled
In Portland on July 16-18 and in San Francisco on October 8
Affirmation's Executive Committee will be meeting July 16, 17, and 18, in Portland, Oregon. All Affirmation members are welcome to attend any meeting of the Executive Committee. If you are interested in serving Affirmation as a part of the Executive Committee or in another leadership capacity, attending a meeting of the EC is excellent preparation.
The Council of Chapter Leaders, sometimes referred to as the Leadership Council, will be meeting at 1:30 pm, on Friday, October 8, in San Francisco, as a part of the annual conference. Every chapter is permitted to send one voting representative to this meeting, although any Affirmation member is welcome to attend. Each chapter will be asked to report on their activities for the past year, and the council will be voting on amendments to the Affirmation bylaws. The Council and the Conference are Affirmation's highest governing bodies, and so we encourage you to make sure that someone from your chapter or group will be in attendance to represent you.
If you are interested in serving in a leadership capacity, or if you would like to be a part of the committee planning the 2011 Affirmation Conference (the 2011 committee will include members from locations across the United States and from other countries), please contact Executive Director David Melson or any other member of the Executive Committee today.
This picture of the San Francisco harbor was taken about 5 years after the arrival of the Mormon pioneers |
The Brooklyn |
The Way to Yerba Buena
Let’s Go to San Francisco to Loudly Claim Our Right to Practice Monogamy in the Open
by Hugo Salinas
How long will it take you to get to San Francisco for the Affirmation Conference? Thirty minutes by BART? One hour by car? Five hours by plane? I was recently reading about the first Mormons who arrived to San Francisco in 1846. It took them 5 months and 27 days to make their pilgrimage from New York in a ship named The Brooklyn. Will you have a layover in Denver, Atlanta, or Dallas-Fort Worth? The Brooklyn stopped in Valparaíso (Chile), in the Juan Fernández Islands, and in Hawaii.
On of the biggest ironies of the 1846 journey is that when the Saints set sail to San Francisco, they were escaping persecution by the U.S. government, and thought that Yerba Buena, as it was then called, would still be part of Mexico. By the time they arrived, it had just been claimed by the U.S. “There is that damned flag again!” Samuel Brannan exclaimed as they approached the harbor. Yet when an U.S. officer climbed on board and announced, “Ladies and gentlemen, you are in the United States,” the Saints responded with three hearty cheers.
Even though generations of gay Mormons have fled from Utah to San Francisco, often to escape the abuse they experienced in church and with their families, California is no longer the place it was just two years ago: In a campaign inspired by lies and by fear, LDS leaders who are great-grandchildren of proud polygamists raised millions of dollars to ban marriage equality. I wonder what Parley P. Pratt, who when visiting San Francisco had to introduce one of his wives as his sister, would have thought of the flagrant meddling of the Church in civil affairs.
Think of this trip to the Affirmation conference as a Mormon pilgrimage. While the Saints of 1846 practiced polygamy in secret, let’s go to San Francisco to loudly claim our right to practice monogamy in the open. Two years after angry demonstrators gathered at the Oakland Temple, let’s go to San Francisco’s City Hall to tell the world that we, too, were disgusted by the lies and the money flowing from Salt Lake City.
Let’s go to San Francisco October 8-10 to STAND UP for what’s right. Let’s go to San Francisco to turn upside down the misconceptions Mormons have about Californians and the stereotypes Californians have about Mormons. And in two years, when Californian voters repeal Proposition 8, let’s respond with three hearty cheers.
Returned missionary Troy Williams is one of the people featured in the article |
Out Magazine Features Utah’s LGBT Community
“Dustin Lance Black was incredibly generous and thoughtful in his writing”
Affirmation friends Jim Dabakis, Valerie Larabee, and Troy Williams are
some of the people featured by Dustin Lance Black in an article he just
published for the June-July issue of Out magazine. Black, who grew up in a
Mormon family, describes his personal discovery of Utah’s vibrant LGBT
community and recounts several recent milestones: the incident in which a
gay couple was arrested for kissing at Temple Square, the passing in Salt
Lake City of a church-sanctioned anti-discrimination bill, and the Sundance
festival premiere of 8: The Mormon Proposition, which he agreed to narrate.
“As a once-devout Mormon from Texas who grew up thinking of Salt Lake City
as the promised land, it had taken the fight over Prop. 8 to fully open my
eyes to the lengths the leaders of my former church would go to ensure my
inequality,” Black writes. “And it was why I agreed to narrate Reed Cowan’s
8: The Mormon Proposition, a documentary that holds the Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints accountable for their political and personal
investment in the passage of that iniquitous law.”
“[Black] was incredibly generous and thoughtful in his writing,” commented
gay returned missionary Troy Williams at his blog, QueerGnosis.com. “The
LGBT community is making great strides in Utah due to the hard work of many
different people and organizations. ... Thanks Lance for recognizing and
acknowledging the work being done in Mormon Country!”
To see the full story, visit http://www.out.com/detail.asp?id=26885.
People cheer as the Logan City Council passes an ordinance banning discrimination in housing and employment based on sexual orientation or gender identity |
With LDS Approval, Utah Cities Pass Protections for LGBT People
“We are all tax paying citizens and deserve the same protection”
from stories in The Salt Lake Tribune
On May 18, the Logan City Council mandated that employers and landlords cannot discriminate against LGBT people in the city limits. Modeled after anti-discrimination laws recently adopted in Salt Lake City, Logan’s housing and employment ordinances passed with four votes and one abstention. Following the tally, the crowd erupted in applause and rewarded the council with a standing ovation.
In the days leading up to the meeting, Council Chairman Jay Monson said he received more than 250 calls and e-mails “for” and only 10 “against” the ordinances, all from Logan residents and business owners.
Monson defended his support of the ordinances and clarified the stance of the area’s largest church after calling the LDS headquarters in Salt Lake City on May 17.
“The [LDS] church supports nondiscrimination ordinances, period. Certainly, I was told that this applies to Logan as much as any other place in the world,” Monson said before calling for the vote. “They do and I do and I agree that this is not the answer for everything ... But it is a step in the right direction and it is long overdue in my thinking.”
Gail Hansen, a citizen of Logan for 30 years, said she has been enlightened by the support among her neighbors and friends for the ordinances.
Two weeks later, the West Valley City Council approved an anti-discrimination ordinance similar to the one passed in Logan and other Utah cities. About 60 people attended the meeting at City Hall. Rep. Janice Fisher, D-West Valley City, and about seven others spoke in favor of the proposal to protect gay and transgender residents from housing and employment discrimination. No one spoke publicly against it.
Mayor Mike Winder signed the ordinance during a ceremony at City Hall hosted by Equality Utah, a nonprofit gay advocacy group.
Winder called it a “historic day” for the state’s second largest city. As a Mormon, he said supporting the ordinance is following in his Christian ways to treat people the way you would want to be treated.
“It was the right thing to do,” Winder told the crowd.
Councilman Corey Rushton agreed, saying it was about time city leaders pulled their heads out of the sand and demand “equal protection” for all residents.
Several of the people who supported the ordinance were affiliated with Equality Utah. Todd Olsen, an Equality Utah board member, said the ordinance will show that “West Valley City treats everyone equally and fairly.”
Stacia Ireland, a West Valley City resident, taught in area schools for 30 years. She said she knows the city's growing diversity, but it's not just about including people’s various traditions and cultures.
“Diversity is not just in skin color,” she said. “We are all tax paying citizens and deserve the same protection.”
The 12-page ordinance is essentially a compilation of Salt Lake City’s two anti-discrimination measures on housing and employment, passed in November.
Salt Lake County, Park City and, most recently, Logan also passed similar measures. Other local governments, including Ogden, Taylorsville, and Summit County, are considering similar ordinances.
Other Stories Posted at www.affirmation.org
Mormon Senator Orrin Hatch Makes Offensive Comments About LGBT People of Faith
“Facing East” to Be Staged at the Rochester Institute of Technology
George Rekers Tried to “Spank Away the Gay”
Gay Teens Come Out in Southern Utah, Form Gay-Straight Alliances
Evergreen Director Defends George Rekers
Website Asks LDS Woman to Reassess Plan to Marry Gay Man
Affirmation: Gay and Lesbian Mormons
P.O. Box 1435
Palm Springs, CA 92263-1435
National Phone Line: (661) 367-2421
To see a directory of current Affirmation chapters, visit www.affirmation.org/chapters
Executive Director: Dave Melson
Senior Assistant Director: George Cole
Assistant Director: Micah Bisson
Associate Director & Affinity Editor: Hugo Salinas www.affirmation.org/contact/affinity
Send Us Your Submission!
AFFIRMATION GAY & LESBIAN MORMONS is a non-profit support group serving
Gay and Lesbian Mormons, their families and friends since 1977. AFFINITY
is the official publication of the Affirmation National Executive Committee.
Submissions are welcome and should be limited to 250 words. To contact us, visit www.affirmation.org/contact/affinity. The opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect those of the editors, national committee or publisher, but rather
the individual writers. The Editor reserves the right to edit any material
deemed offensive, libelous, grammatically incorrect or lengthy.
About AFFINITY
AFFINITY is available both as an email text and as a web-based document.
Although both versions are free of charge, we encourage you to become
a dues-paying member and thus help us advance Affirmation's important
mission.
If you wish to receive a text version of AFFINITY by email, simply send a request to Hugo Salinas by visiting www.affirmation.org/contact/affinity. If you are a dues-paying member and do not have Internet
access, you may request a printed version that will be sent to you by
mail.
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