SHANE CARPENTER

On social media, Shane Carpenter radiates a bright smile, a generous heart, and buoyant enthusiasm. His posts are vulnerable, poetic, wide-reaching. One even went viral within 30 minutes as on March 23, 2019, on his IG @iamnotashaned, he was the first person he knew of to come out as gay online while actively serving as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It was an impression he felt inspired to follow—to offer others hope. 

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CAROL LYNN PEARSON

Carol Lynn Pearson has always known she was here on assignment.

“I was born a very smart girl in a very extreme patriarchal situation,” she says, looking back on her life with a mix of clarity, reverence, and that fiery illumination that for so long has characterized her work. “If we did indeed have some sort of plan before we come to this earth, I may have said, ‘I want to go down there and do something really interesting, dramatic, big’.”

And big it has been…

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TRAVIS STEWARD

Travis grew up in the small farming community of Tremonton, UT.  His parents both had had previous marriages and children before he was born, making him the eighth of ten kids total between them.

“As a kid you don’t know how families are supposed to be, you just are there trying to find your place and figure it out as you go along,” he says.  Still, he knew his family definitely didn’t fit the mold of the strong LDS community in Tremonton.  Though his parents and stepparents had their own challenges, Travis shares that he knew and felt love amid the chaos and uncertainty that plagued his young, anxious heart.

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