On Sacred Ground in Thailand

Mormonism, Colonialism, The Sacred in Thailand

When I received my mission call to Thailand in 2009, I was elated. I remember that February day pretty vividly, and it feels like a seminal moment in my Mormon journey. I was raised on the east side of Salt Lake City, Utah in an affluent suburb called East Millcreek, about a 20-minute walk from the Baldwin Radio Factory. My mother, a Hinckley by birth, had connections to the area and my father had grown up nearby in another part of Salt Lake City and even attended the same high school that I did. 

My Mormon journey to reach the mission call in my childhood home of 19 years was complicated. But I have no regrets. I can’t have regrets about what I experienced in my home away from home in Southeast Asia.

The day of opening my mission call, I attended my classes like normal at Brigham Young University in Provo. I lived in Young Hall with the rest of the men in my freshman ward. Young Hall is named for Susa Young Gates, a writer, a female suffragette, and fourth president of the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers. The female dorm was Whitney Hall, named after Orson F. Whitney, the son of Helen Mar Kimball. I adored the women in my ward and made fast friends with many of them. I didn’t get along quite as well with the men in my ward. My ward was an odd collection of men: our resident assistant was a convert and we attracted Mormon men from across the country and even internationally. Many of us were high-achievers. There was plenty of neurosis. In fact, in retrospect, there were many deeply closeted queer men. Unfortunately, not even the Mormon rumor mill could stop what has happened for ages at a place like Brigham Young University: men falling in love, making love, and being scared of getting caught. 

Yet, I wasn’t ready to love myself quite like that yet. I think deep down I knew I was gay, but I wasn’t ready to accept that part of myself or even come out to myself yet. It wasn’t my time yet. And I think something inside of me told myself that I knew that. But that past year at Brigham Young University had been particularly traumatic. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, along with many other conservative groups in the United States, had recently lobbied hard for members to pass the monumental Proposition 8, which amended the constitution of California to authorize marriage only between one man and one woman in the United States, despite the LDS Church’s incredibly fraught record with polygamy until the 1930s, as recently noted by scholar Dr. Cristina Rosetti of Dixie State University. The hypocrisy seemed pretty clear: my great-great grandfather could have three wives, but people of the same gender aren’t able to commit to a partner and be recognized under the law? The Mormon gag reflex to polygamy was stunning to me. 

But I was still a devout Latter-day Saint with a desire to serve God and follow Jesus Christ. When I spoke up about Proposition 8 in 2008, it was repeated buffetings by Latter-day Saints at Brigham Young University: the calls for phone banks from our student ward pulpit, the group prayer in every Elder’s quorum on my birthday, and the incessant homophobia from one of BYU’s most beloved professors, Randy Bott. He later quickly “retired” after racist remarks about black men and women and priesthood and temple blessings. To this day, I still remember much of the homophobic vitrol flung at queer people in very casual ways over the pulpit, at Family Home Evening, and even in BYU student stake meetings. 

My freshman writing teacher had encouraged us to keep a journal as part of a class project. At first what was a chore and a class project became an exciting way for me to write my own story. I posted everything on that blog during my freshman year in 2008. The day that I received my mission call to Thailand, I called it the Day of Pentecost. Right before I left my apartment for my awful Book of Mormon class, I was reading up on potential new alphabets or scripts that I could learn. The last one that I looked up before I left my apartment was Thai, and I thought to myself, “Wow. I sure hope I don’t have to learn that one!” God had other plans. I opened my mission call and I was called to serve in the Thailand Bangkok Mission. 

Life in Thailand as a Mormon missionary was hard many days. I would wake up most mornings with what Thais called “broken stomach.” At night, I would feel exhausted from hot, humid days trying to find people to teach. We probably didn’t eat as much as we should, so I lost a lot of weight pretty rapidly, as my family made sure to point out in their emails. But the food was incredible. At first, I didn’t ever know what to order at tiny Thai fast food joints called “made-to-order” restaurants because my companions didn’t teach me much about food. We were too busy trying to find people to teach about a young man named Joseph Smith born in upstate New York at the turn of the 19th century and his message for the world: the restoration of the true gospel of Jesus Christ. But eventually, I got the hang of what I liked and disliked. I particularly craved northeastern Isaan food throughout my mission. Crunchy papaya salad with extra peanuts, beef waterfall, laab, and grilled chicken from street vendors were the dream after a long, hard day of not finding anyone to teach. 

For many months, I heard a rumor about early Thai converts who joined the LDS Church and a visiting General Authority who tried to implement “gospel culture” with respect to sacred Thai traditions. Whenever Thais enter a home, a temple, or another sacred space, they take off their shoes as a sign of the utmost respect. Thais also don’t shake hands in most contexts; they wai (ไหว้). The wai is very intricate. There are rules about who should greet the other person first, where the hands should be, and what message the wai communicates. It is quintessentially Thai. 

Taking off my shoes in Thailand was always difficult because I’m not terribly flexible. I have terrible feet that tire very easily. But I loved this tradition. Every home we would visit, we would take off our shoes as a sign of respect before crossing the threshold of the home. And then we would sit and talk about religion. And then we would wai them upon leaving. Every week, the elders and the sisters would arrive to church meetings early because we wanted to wai everyone who came to church. But members didn’t take off their shoes anymore. I couldn’t help but wonder why. 

I learned about sacred removal of the shoes in three contexts: Latter-day Saint temple worship , my Advanced Placement Art History class, and ancient scripture about Moses and the burning bush. During my temple endowment, I removed and replaced my shoes as a dictated part of the ceremony, an indication of the holy nature of our actions in the temple. Many pieces of art from antiquity reference the idea of removing your shoes on sacred ground. Moses was told to remove the sandals from his feet because “the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” I found value in approaching a sacred threshold with respect and kindness with respect for the sacred. Every time I entered a Thai home, I observed that custom with respect. But it was not until I visited many sacred Thai Buddhist temples with my parents when they picked me up from my mission did I understand how incredibly sacred this action was. As I entered many of these temples and observed how truly sacred these spaces were, I was in awe at the respect that Thais had once offered Latter-day Saint meetinghouses. They saw this action as the deepest respect, not only for the religious beliefs of a space but the space itself. Why did this stop? 

The word that we eventually adopted for “Church” (as in church building) comes from the Thai word bot (โบสถ์). In a Thai Buddhist temple, the bot is a sacred space where only monks can step foot. The removal of the shoes expresses the sacredness of the space. Early Thai Latter-day Saints were showing that they were walking on holy ground. But Salt Lake City didn’t understand that. They thought it wasn’t compliant with “gospel culture.” So sometime between the dedication of Thailand for Latter-day Saint missionary work and 2009, a white man in a suit had come to Thailand and tried to stop a local practice. Why not stop the wai? 

Sadly, I have now discovered that one tradition was stopped and another was rightfully preserved, even though both were discouraged. We could still wai the other members of the ward, but they certainly did not take off our shoes. Thais almost assuredly felt like they needed to be obedient to a white authority in Salt Lake City, Utah. I was always upset that this tradition stopped, but I didn’t speak up because I didn’t fully realize the implications of this prohibition on shoe removal. LDS “Gospel Culture” is a construct rooted in Salt Lake City, Utah culture not Bangkok, Thailand culture. Christianity, on the other hand, has adapted to the local culture in radical ways such as Meskel in Ethiopia and kozhukattai in India. There are clearly commonalities across the world in terms of liturgy, sacred texts, space, and worship, but Christianity is an incredibly diverse tradition. LDS Mormonism relies on a narrow set of “gospel culture” parameters that limit its ability to adapt to local circumstances, grow, and progress as a faith. 

Colonialism, authoritarianism, and the excision of a sacred tradition felt so wildly unnecessary in Thailand. I was a colonizer because I didn’t stand up and say more. But I also connected to the sacred in Thailand, and I credit it with my transition to the Episcopal Church and also a strong sense of universalism. There is sacred space all around us if we are willing to find it. From Thai Buddhist temples and homes to other sacred spaces of worship from a variety of traditions, there are sacred places where we can feel close to God (the universe, our shared humanity, whatever label you wish to ascribe to the Sacred). I felt closest to God in exquisite moments of trauma and sorrow when God called to me to do and be more. In my broken moments on my mission, I needed God more than I ever had before. God was there. 

Maybe I was on sacred ground in Thailand every time I took off my shoes.