So often when we are young, we are told things that help us but which are not strictly true, even if those telling us would wish it to be so. Knowing from the age of 12 that I was interested in other boys, I was led to believe that it would go away as I grew up, that it was a "passing phase"......

Here is an extract from one of the responses to the questionnaires - I hope the author will forgive me for quoting it, but it is quite anonymous:

"After my mission I was told by the church to marry within 6 months. I tried but couldn't find a girl to accept. I gave up and then a female friend introduced me to my wife and told me she already loved me and I should marry her. I was worried about my same sex attractions and told my bishop in the marriage interview that I thought I should tell her I liked "boys". But he said the prophet had told all bishops to tell men like me to marry and have sex with my wife and all that would just go away. He said I should not tell her anything about it, that it would only make her worry senselessly because it would just go away and that many young men were like me and I was normal."

What the bishop was perhaps "wishful thinking" on his part, but it is far from the truth and as a result can, as we see on these pages, lead to an enormous amount of unhappiness.

I wonder just how many young men and women have been told such things at an early and perhaps impressionable stage in their lives.

The fact is that it will not go away

The reality is that same sex attractions do not go away, and to be told that they will go away is false.

OK, before I get hoards of letters, we can invoke faith and that faith can be very strong - many have tried it and it can (sort of) work in the short term. Again, among the questionnaires responses there are the few who have tried that approach.

But we are talking about a life time here which could be 50, 60 or more years. Can we really live with that struggle for all that time? Can we live with the things like depression or mental illness than can be associated with it?

Would it not be braver to come clean about it? Should we not be more honest with ourselves and with our loved ones, accept it and find better ways of accommodating it?