\u201cGay Rights and the Mormon Church\u201d will be available nationwide in early April. Prince draws from more than 50,000 pages of public records, private documents and interview transcripts to explore the attitudes of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints toward homosexuality. The review looks at the church\u2019s involvement in the traditional marriage debate in Hawaii in the 1993 Baehr v. Lewin case through its response to the U.S. Supreme Court\u2019s landmark 2015 ruling in Obergefell v. Hedges, which made marriage equality the law of the land. Following that ruling the church turned its attention inward with \u201cthe Policy,\u201d declaring same-sex couples \u201capostates\u201d and denying the children of gay couples access to key rites of passage.<\/p>\n

Beyond his important explorations of legal battles and attitudes, Prince conducted numerous interviews with homosexual, transgender and intersex members and former members of the church. Those interviews are at the heart of his narrative, revealing the struggles and sorrows of the church\u2019s LGTBQ members, but also their occasional sense of belonging, with its myriad complications.<\/p>\n

Gregory Prince’s new book will be released in April.<\/p>