For the Rollins family of Riverton, UT, people sometimes question what they did in their home environment to have not one, but two, gay children. “I promise we had no say in this. It’s just the way they came,” laughs Jenny Rollins, who along with husband Josh, are the parents of Jessica (21), Chelsea (18), Aidan (16), Brinley (12), and Landon (10). The Rollins have also fielded such insensitive (and inane) comments like, “You have two gay kids? That’s just cruel!” and “Wow, you are such a good family. And you still have gay children?” Jenny says her favorite was when a man said, “Often, it’s the sins of the alcoholic father that create gay sons.” Thus, Jenny jokingly blames Aidan on Josh, while she takes credit for their gay daughter, Jessica.
Indeed, this was “the way they came.” From a young age, Jenny recalls Aidan was more interested in playing with dolls and dress-up than the trucks and dirt many boys prefer. He leaned toward the performing arts over sports, and by 8th grade, admitted to his parents he was attracted to boys and couldn’t see a future dating girls. At the time, Josh was bishop, and Aidan was a deacon’s quorum president pursuing an Eagle Scout. While his parents wondered if they should encourage Aidan to live authentically or play the straight card through high school, they knew they could not support their son living in deep shame and pain any longer. Aidan came out publicly two years ago, in the 9th grade, and the Rollins say his mental health has been much better in the past year since he’s stepped away from the church and more fully embraced who he is. Before, he battled the broken record mantra so many gay kids ask, “Why would a loving God make me this way if it’s against His will?”
The Rollins’ eldest, Jessica, was “such an ultra, ultra obedient child and fully immersed in the gospel,” Jenny remembers. So much so that her mom jokingly wondered if the four “normally behaved” children who came after her “might be sociopaths” in comparison. Jessica was a born tomboy – preferring to wear masculine football jerseys and tool belts and to go to work with dad over any “stereotypical girl behavior.” She suffered anxiety and depression through high school that only got worse when she served a mission during Covid lockdown. “It wasn’t until she returned that I realized how suicidal she was.” Shortly after she came home last year, Jessica confirmed what Jenny had anticipated ever since she had seen how her daughter lit up inside the Encircle SLC house the family had visited after Aidan came out: Jessica is also gay. Jessica came out publicly recently via a humorous video and has also had to beg people to stop trying to set her up with their grandsons. Always “the obedient one,” the video was just one way Jessica responded to a prompting she received on her mission that when she returned home, she would “need to be vulnerable in sharing her story.”
Now, the Rollins’ second daughter Chelsea is preparing to serve an LDS mission, a decision they support. And Jenny says she’s equally as excited about what the next few years hold for her straight daughter in terms of marriage and kids, as she is for Jessica. “One will be getting married in the temple, and one won’t. And both futures bring me genuine joy. So no one can tell me this is a ‘wickedness never was happiness’ thing. What am I supposed to tell my kids for the next 80 years? Oh, you get to be alone for the next 80? You can’t even hold hands, because a pamphlet tells you that’s sinful homosexual behavior?”
Both of the Rollins kids came out while their father, Josh, was bishop of their ward, which cast a unique role for Jenny. “In some ways I felt like I was on this journey alone because I didn’t have the stewardship of a whole ward pressing on me simultaneously. There were some things Josh had to put in a shoebox, that now we’re sorting through.” An additional challenge for the family in terms of their ward has been seeing their son lose his sense of brotherhood with his quorums. After he came out, he felt isolation and a lack of camaraderie with the young men he once called friends. “For him to want to go back to church, it’s just not going to happen. Not only is the doctrine difficult, but socially it’s too hard when all they talk about is ‘serve a mission, marry a woman.’ What about those kids who don’t connect with that?” Jenny recalls getting called out for speaking up once in a lesson about how the Family Proclamation doesn’t address every family situation. She finds it ironic that church leaders are now acknowledging the same (in recent conference).
“I separate the church from the gospel. My gay children still observe gospel principles – they’re light seekers and bearers, and do it a lot better than a lot of Christians. They have taught me to love better like the Savior does. This a blessing, not a trial. The trial is seeing them in pain,” Jenny says. As for their place in the church? “I really believe it’s all about changing one heart at a time. Often, the big changes don’t come from the pulpit. They have to come through people’s hearts. It’s hearing stories, listening, that hearts are changed. We need to truly listen and trust people’s experiences. And not just sit there while they’re talking and be thinking of the right reply, or ‘praying for them.’ That’s not listening. Just listen.”
Recently released from their tenure as bishop, the Rollins were asked to be ward missionaries. Jenny hesitated about the call, and told their new bishop, “My goal is to get to the same place that you are – thinking I’m suited for this call. I’ll say yes, but have to go home and work through this.” She has since settled into a place of vulnerability and advocacy in her calling and in life, recently telling her ward mission council, “We need to listen and make our ward safe places. There are so many who appear to be doing well, but they’re not. And they’re too afraid to talk about their stories because we can ostracize out of fear and judgment. We need to be more open to being wrong about things. We don’t know everything. It’s a living church – there are more things to be revealed.”
Of her family’s future, Jenny confidently says, “I’m more comfortable with the hereafter than I am with this mortal journey, because of the way people treat my family. My kids’ sexuality isn’t the problem; it’s the way people treat them. I’m not going to claim to receive revelation for the church, but for my children, I know there’s a plan and it’s all going to be okay.”
