Dan Reynolds, lead vocalist for the
rock band Imagine Dragons, has credited his wife Aja Volkman for
teaching him that “gay is beautiful.”
The Trevor Project, which runs a
suicide hotline for LGBT youth, last week honored Reynolds with its
Hero Award.
In accepting his award, Reynolds, who
grew up Mormon, said that he regrets repeating the Mormon teaching
that being gay is a sin during his two year missionary.
“I knocked on thousands of doors.
For those two years when people asked me what the doctrine was and
they said, 'Hey, I'm gay,' I thought that it was a sin because that's
what I had been raised to teach,” Reynolds said.
“I hold regret about that until this
day. I wish I could re-knock on those doors and tell them I was
wrong. I can't do that. All I can do is come forward to you today
and say I'm sincerely sorry.”
“My wife was my missionary,” he
continued. “She taught me what I already knew in my heart, which
was that to be gay is beautiful.”
Reynolds is helping to organize the
upcoming music festival Love Loud in Provo, Utah. Proceeds from the
event will benefit GLAAD, The Trevor Project, Encircle and
Stand4Kind.