This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2015, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

Oh, to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, how does the Utah Legislature love thee?

Let me count the ways.

The announcement this week from LDS Church leaders that they support legislation to protect gays and lesbians from housing, employment and public accommodation discrimination as long as religious liberties are also protected brought comments from legislators that indicated a shift from the body's reluctance to entertain that issue in the past.

"It drives a lot of what we do in the session when you have an announcement like that," said House Speaker Greg Hughes, R-Draper. "Religious liberty is an issue we'd better take very seriously. The anti-discrimination component, we heard today."

It was a carefully worded statement. But it sent the message the Legislature is listening to what the church is saying and possibly will act in a way no one believed was possible as recently as a year ago.

"I feel very confident that, with the LDS Church at the table, we will move forward, and I'm extremely confident that now we will pass the legislation," said Sen. Steve Urquhart, R-St. George. He is the sponsor of the anti-discrimination bill and has sponsored it in the past, only to hit a brick wall in a Legislature not willing to consider the idea.

This year, because of the beloved church, it will.

Similar shifts in deference to church pronouncements have occurred before.

Several years ago, when Salt Lake City passed an ordinance protecting gays and lesbians from housing and employment discrimination, then-Republican Sen. Chris Buttars of West Jordan vowed to push a bill in the Legislature that would prevent local governments from adopting anti-discrimination ordinances without the permission of the Legislature, check-mating Salt Lake City's attempt at fairness.

But then a funny thing happened. The LDS Church came out with an implied endorsement of the Salt Lake City ordinance, and guess who became a convert to the cause?

Why, it was Buttars, along with several other moral conservatives in the Legislature who had heretofore been unbending in the fight to keep gay and lesbian tolerance from infecting our consciousness.

Buttars had long been the most fierce warrior in the Legislature for the moral crusading Utah Eagle Forum and its chief mistress, Gayle Ruzicka. He also had fought diligently to keep gay and lesbian students from forming clubs in schools, a task made more difficult because of Sen. Orrin Hatch's federal legislation barring schools from discriminating against certain clubs wanting use of the facilities. That legislation was intended to protect religious groups.

Once the church spoke, Buttars' hard anti-gay line softened. And so did the Legislature's.

The same thing occurred with immigration.

The moral conservative types in the Legislature, again led by Ruzicka and her ilk, were steadfastly opposed to any legislation attempting to give a carrot to those in the country without legal documentation.

Until, of course, the Mormon church gave its implied endorsement to the Utah Compact, which preached compassion and the need to keep families together.

Then, still against strong opposition from the more right-wing squealers of the Republican Party, the Legislature passed a bill that would allow undocumented folks to remain in the state and earn guest worker permits.

The anti-immigrants tried desperately to get around the church's position of tolerance, claiming church leaders were duped, or worse, brainwashed. Still, once church leaders showed tolerance and understanding to those previously considered pariahs by the right wing, the conservative Legislature stepped up and passed the guest worker bill.

Then there is liquor.

It always has been understood that no bill governing the sale and distribution of alcoholic beverages would ever pass without the blessing of the LDS Church.

My favorite story on this issue was when former Democratic Rep. Grant Protzman of Ogden spent a year writing a comprehensive bill reforming state liquor laws, with an eye toward balancing responsible regulation with economic development interests.

He went to every stakeholder to get their input and eventual endorsement, including the LDS Church.

When the bill was introduced and Republican leaders learned the church endorsed the bill, they introduced an identical bill in the Senate, sponsored by Senate President Arnold Christensen and co-sponsored by every Republican senator, so it would be the Republicans, not a Democrat, who would push the church-anointed liquor reform. —