If the debate about same-sex marriage is ultimately about commitment, here's a sure sign of commitment: Orem's Bruce Bastian, the openly gay ex-Mormon co-founder of WordPerfect, is donating $1 million to the "No on Prop 8" fund - which is fighting a California ballot measure that would amend that state's constitution to ban same-sex marriage.

According to an article by the Tribune's Rosemary Winters, Bastian was prompted to make the donation when the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints issued a statement in June, calling on members to "do all you can" to pass Prop. 8. Bastian said:

The LDS Church has no business [sticking] their big nose in something that's a legal matter, not a religious matter. Constitutions are meant to protect minorities, not to take rights away from people.

Winters' article notes that the campaign supporting Prop. 8 has received donations from 37 Utah residents, totaling $120,550. Also, according to a pro-Prop. 8 spokesperson, many of the 25,000 volunteers are LDS.

(By the way, actor and open heterosexual Brad Pitt is donating $100,000 to the No on Prop. 8 campaign.)

LDS church members were also active eight years ago in getting a no-gay-marriage ballot measure, called the Knight Amendment, passed in California. This time around, the drive isn't as successful: According to a Los Angeles Times poll in late August, 54 percent of likely voters oppose Prop. 8, while 40 percent support it.

What's changed? Life.

Eight years ago, same-sex marriages were more of an abstract concept than a concrete fact. Now, with couples getting married in Massachusetts and (since the state Supreme Court's ruling) California, gay marriages are happening to people in the neighborhood or celebrities you've heard of (like Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi, pictured). Every time two men or two women share vows of commitment, it kills the myth that somehow everyone else's marriage will be weakened.

(Photo: Danny Moloshok, AP)

Labels: LDS, politics