National Center for Lesbian Rights head Kate Kendell has quit the Mormon Church over its recent policy statement on gay couples and their families.

From her op-ed in theWashington Post:

I just did something I thought I would never do. I resigned my membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the Mormons) and asked that my name be removed from the records.

Even at the height of church involvement in the passage of Proposition 8 in California, I never seriously considered removing my name. It just didn’t matter that much to me. Spiritually and emotionally, I left the church I grew up in decades ago. And despite being a “known gay activist” to the church, I was never excommunicated, so my name remained on the church rolls as a member. Not anymore.

On Thursday (Nov. 5), it was revealed that the church issued policy changes to “Handbook 1,” the guide for its lay leadership. Under the changes, same-sex couples who marry are apostates and are unwelcome in church congregations. Going further, the new policy states that the children of same-sex couples cannot be baptized in the church until they are 18 and then only if they disavow their parents. It was the gratuitously cruel and stigmatizing treatment of children that pushed me to disavow the church of my childhood. It is impossible for me to be a part of a religion that would attack its own members and punish them by denying their children involvement in the church.

Kate what took you so long?  Why did you belong to an organization that thinks you are less than human for so many years?

Lesbian and gay men need to stop apologizing for the bad behavior of their churches because it’s familiar and leave them en masse.

The LGBT  Religious Abusive Spouse Syndrome must stop.