Roswell Grey

Roswell Grey is well accepted at home, school and at church and hopes to help others flourish

DAVID TAFFET | Senior Staff Writer
taffet@dallasvoice.com

Roswell Grey is out at home, in school and in church. The 16-year-old is trans and Mormon and was recently named a Beloved Arise youth of faith ambassador. Beloved Arise is a national organization that celebrates and empowers LGBTQ youth, particularly those who have been rejected by their faith communities.

Grey always knew he was different but didn’t start learning about queerness until 2017 and didn’t begin coming out until 2020 when there was no school and no activities.

“I first came out to people online and slowly started coming out to my school friends who were trans or queer in some way,” he said. “My school has a big queer and trans population.”

Grey attends Sherman High School in Sherman, about 65 miles north of Dallas. He said his friends are accepting, and most of the older students are accepting. The freshmen can sometimes be jerks, he said, and while most teachers call him by his preferred name, some insist on using his legal name.

“You can’t get your name changed in the [school’s] system unless it’s legally changed,” he said.

Grey explained that bathrooms are gendered, and the school rule is you have to go by assigned sex. So most of the trans students use a staff bathroom that is usually kept unlocked. That’s done with a wink and a nod, he said.

Grey said another trans student saw him come out of a staff bathroom and said, “Oh, those are unlocked. Nice.”

Last year, Grey said he realized younger students aren’t as understanding when he was taking a freshman ASL class. He heard them making comments about another trans student. But he explained it as immaturity: “They’re just trying to fit in.”

Grey lives with his mom and a 3-year-old sibling. His mom’s reaction to his coming out wasn’t great at first. It was, he said, mostly shock.

The family had only been living in Sherman since 2018. Grey was raised in Collinsville, a small town west of Sherman where he knew of just one out lesbian.

Grey said he’s active in his church and spoke to the bishop — the church’s pastor — to tell him that he was trans. The bishop, he said, “was pretty OK and accepting. He asked a couple of questions.”

The Mormon Church, Grey explained, has “a lot of policies that are phrased weird so they’re up to personal interpretation.” So before posting on Facebook that he was nonbinary and bisexual, he said he told the bishop in case he saw it.

“I wanted to let him know my thoughts and give him a chance to ask questions,” the youth said.

He said the bishop asked him how he felt about the church and what he wanted moving forward. Grey assured the bishop he loved the church.

“I love how my faith can connect me with other people,” he said. “I love having a higher being that loves and accepts me and having higher purpose in life.”

That purpose, Grey said, is helping others — something Grey’s already doing.

At church, Grey founded Rainbow Connection, a group for Mormons who are queer or allied. And at school, he runs the gender and sexuality alliance. He became president under the worst of circumstances: The group’s previous leader was kicked out of her house when she came out. She moved in with her partner but dropped out of school.

The GSA meets weekly and attracts anywhere from a dozen to 60 students. Many aren’t out to their parents, but they find a safe space to be themselves at school.

In his spare time, Grey loves going hiking and camping and spending time in nature. “I’m in an outdoor adventure club,” he said. “We’ve been kayaking, canoeing, backpacking.”

To prepare for an overnight backpacking trip, group members learned what they’d need to know — like how to start a campfire and how to cook on one, how to identify native grasses and plants and what to avoid. Grey said the backpacking trip was great.

In addition, Grey has started a business called Party Princess Inc. He said it began with babysitting and became a business. He’s hired to attend to children’s birthday parties dressed to entertain as a character. His first gig was as a cowboy, but he is more often called upon to be the party’s princess. So he always brings his face painting gear.

Does the gender of the character bother him? Not at all, he said. It’s only a character he’s playing. He thinks of it as cosplay.

Meanwhile, Grey is enjoying his newest role as a faith ambassador to help other young people from all faith traditions where LGBTQ+ inclusion falls short.

For more information about Beloved Arise, visit the organization’s website at BelovedArise.org.