Mormon Leader Reaffirms Prop. 8 Support

A statement from Mormon leader Boyd K. Packer reaffirms the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' opposition to marriage equality, which a recent apology from another Mormon leader seemed to soften.

According to AOL News, which reported via conservative gay blogger Andrew Sullivan, Packer, the president of the Church's Quorum of Twelve Apostles, spoke to 20,000 people at the LDS conference center in Salt Lake City and millions more tuned in via satellite.

"There are those today who not only tolerate but advocate voting to change laws that would legalize immorality, as if a vote would somehow alter the designs of God's laws and nature," Packer said. "A law against nature would be impossible to enforce. Do you think a vote to repeal the law of gravity would do any good?"

Last month Marlin K. Jensen, the church's historian and a prominent member of the general authorities leadership hierarchy, told a group of Mormons gathered in Oakland, Calif., that he was sorry for the pain caused by the church's substantial involvement in the Proposition 8 campaign.

According to the report from Fox 13 in Utah, the timing and severity of the words from Packer caught some critics off guard.