David Archuleta Reflects on Coming Out as Bisexual

At 16 years old, David Archuleta became a star after television viewers fell in love with his angelic voice while competing on the seventh season of American Idol. Although he placed runner up, he was still a winner to millions. 

Since then, Archuleta’s career flourished. Known for his boy next door looks, charming smile, and wholehearted kindness, the artist has released eight studio albums. Who can forget his hit bop, “Crush?” 

However, Archuleta received national attention for a different reason back in June. In a lengthy Instagram post, he stated that he is a part of the LGBTQ community. Coming out as gay to his family in 2014, Archuleta then had similar feelings for both genders, suggesting “a spectrum of bisexual.”

Archuleta, who is a devout Mormon, says it was uncomfortable for him to share this personal aspect of his life, but he wanted to bring more awareness to people in a similar situation and thinks people should not have to choose between being LGBTQ and believing in God. 

He was shocked by the impact his coming out has had and took some time to talk more about it with OFM, as well as his new tour dates and upcoming projects.

You have several projects in the works, but I would like to begin by asking about your first-ever children’s book, My Little Prayer. Can you tell us more about it?
My Little Prayer is based off a song I heard in a dream. I try to keep close to God in my life every day, so I start and end my day with a prayer. A lot of times, at night, I’ll fall asleep before I can say a prayer. This happened one night, but then I had a dream where I was praying and talking to God. 

These chords were playing in my dream, and I was singing my prayer over the chords. God told me to get up and write down what I was saying and praying, but I was like, “I’m asleep. I don’t think I know how to get up from a dream.” He said, “If you don’t get up now, you’re going to forget it in the morning.” I was like, “OK, but I might need help.” I got up and went straight to the piano, recorded the chords, and wrote down everything I had said. 

It was super clear in my mind, and I didn’t change anything because I felt like it was given to me. I later released it because I just felt like if it was given to me, maybe it was meant to be shared. Now it’s going to be the book. The lyrics of the song are the words in the book, and it’s illustrated by Sara Ugolotti. She’s Italian, and she has done a great job. It is a beautiful book, and I am excited to just share my dream, and what I’ve learned with people, how prayer has made an impact in my life.

Hopefully, it can help other people know how to talk with God. Know that they can be personable when they talk to him, and we don’t always get what we want and what we ask for. Sometimes, we’re disappointed, but that’s OK too. You can still be happy, and it ends up being better. That’s what I hope kids can learn when they read it.

Were you read to a lot when you were little?
Yeah, I was. My mom had us reading pretty young. I think we were reading books when we were four years old. I don’t remember everything she read to us, but I do remember these Amelia Bedelia and Dr. Seuss books. There were a bunch.

You were finally able to reschedule your 2020 North American tour. What have you missed the most about touring and performing in front of live audiences?

I feel like it’s therapeutic to release all that energy. I am a reserved and introverted person, and I keep to myself a lot, so I would say performing gives me an opportunity to just unleash all this energy that I have built up and haven’t given an aggressive way to get out of me. I have been doing exercises more, so I’ve had more physical activity to get it out of my system, but shows are just a way to get out of my comfort zone, to be more energetic, and to be more charismatic and use the stage and connect with people. That’s not something that is natural for me, but I have learned to get out of my comfort zone, and I have had a lot of fun doing it. It is great to connect with people and just let them have a fun time as well. 

The tour is in support of your Therapy Sessions album, which was released last year during the height of the pandemic. Is it still being received well?
I think so. I feel like I have neglected it a bit because I’ve released some newer songs this year, but from what I see, the fans who are still listening to it are really enjoying it. It’s doing what I hoped it would. That it brings people peace of mind and helps them know that they are not alone if they feel messed up and crazy. They don’t feel alone as they are trying to venture through discovering themselves and trying to find peace with whatever unresolved issues they have. That’s why I wrote the album. I’m like, oh my gosh, I have so many issues [laughs].

Millions of people were struggling with mental health issues last year while being locked down in quarantine, so in a way, this album came out at the right time. How were you coping during the pandemic?
There was a lot of uncertainty. Like, we just had no idea. What’s going to happen tomorrow? Where are we going to be next week? Are we still going to be inside? How do we get our food? Just all kinds of things, but at the same time, I really enjoyed the downtime. I was supposed to be on tour and doing promos for my album right as the lockdown started. I think I needed that time just to be introspective and just look at myself. It gave us all a lot of time to look at ourselves and kind of force us to do some more work within us. I think that was very helpful to me coming into this year. At first, I was worried because I was like, oh my gosh, I live alone. I’m going to be really alone and depressed, but I really liked being alone, to be honest. I really love my alone time. That was when I realized, wow, I really am an introvert. Like, this is amazing! I didn’t realize I would thrive by being all alone for a month. 

Obviously, the world knows you by stealing the hearts of viewers on season 7 of American Idol. What path in life do you think you would have gone down if you never auditioned for the show?
I feel like I would have done the more traditional route. I would have finished high school, and then after high school, I would have gone on my mission for my church, which I did do, but just at a different time. Then I would have gone to college, then I figured I would have met someone, created a family, and got married. That’s what I thought, but who knows what would have happened? I had no idea American Idol was going to happen and everything that followed. So, I really don’t know. That’s what was planned in my mind.

And usually, whatever’s in your mind ends up not happening.
Yeah! I wish I believed more because I am always like, oh my gosh, what if the world ends? I always imagine the worst things happening. Like, everything is going to fail. I’m going to lose my job, lose my house, lose my car, lose my relationships. I am always expecting that everything is going to go wrong, and it never does, but I need to stop giving so much attention to that negative thinking.

What are your thoughts on the new American Idol?
The new American Idol, I wish it had the same pull that it had in the past. Like, it was such a platform, and I think it still somewhat is. For example, Gabby Barrett. She has had a great career from being able to be on there, but the show is just different now. I feel like it is still a great platform because it gives people a chance to be in front of an audience that normally would not be looking at them. That is a great opportunity. I think it is cool how they do a lot of the celebrity duets early on. Man, that would have been so cool if we had that on our season. 

Who would you have loved to do a duet with?
I was kind of bummed because Natasha Bedingfield came on as a guest performer during my season, but I wasn’t able to sing with her. That would have been fun. I am also into gospel music, and Jonathan McReynolds is one of my favorite artists, so I would love to sing with him because I have listened to so much of his stuff. 

What more do you hope to accomplish with your platform as a musical artist?
I just want to make music that is fun, but also makes people think and discover a little bit more of who they are. I always want to help people discover the potential that they have in themselves.

How has the overall response been to your coming out?
It has been an overwhelmingly positive response, which I was not expecting, to be honest. I thought, “This is probably going to be a controversial thing and whatnot,” especially because I grew up in a very conservative, religious upbringing, and I am still a part of that. Faith and God is still very central in my life and everything I do, but also the culture behind it, too. I didn’t know how those people were going to take it. 

I was like, “Oh my gosh,” and I was kind of having a crisis. Am I going to have to leave this in order to give more space to accept what I go through with who I am attracted to, not knowing what my sexuality is, and not understanding how that works? To have more compassion and not be so judgmental towards myself, to not have hate and anger towards myself, do I have to leave behind this part of my life that is so important to me?

 I was like, “I am going to take a chance and try to find a balance between the two.” If I believe in God, and if I believe that he is perfect and loving, and if I’m his child, then he should understand me better than I understand myself and love me more than I love myself. I need to learn how to love me more like he does. If that is who I believe in, then why isn’t there a way to find a better balance between the two?

So, I came out letting people know, like, “Hey, I don’t know what my sexuality is.” This has been my journey so far, and I am just somewhere on the spectrum of bisexual, but I still don’t know. My beliefs are still important to me, but I feel like there needs to be more conversations happening because I feel like where we are currently with how religious culture looks at the LGBTQ community, I feel like we are not where it can be, yet. It is a really awkward place to be, but I feel like it needs to be done. 

So, I am just going to go for it. I don’t have the answers; I don’t expect to be able to tell people how to go about this, but if I can at least invite people to come with me on my journey and have the conversations with me, then that’s all that matters to me. Then we will make progress.

Do you now believe that God made you this way for a reason?
Yes. I feel like I’m David, and there are a lot of things that I don’t like about myself. For a long time, I didn’t like that I could not control my feelings for other people. I really hated that about myself because I was like, this can’t be right, from what I understood. It got to a point where I was like, I am either going to hate myself for the rest of my life, or I need to look at myself differently. I prayed a lot of times saying, God, please change this. Please remove this flaw from me, I want to be close to you. It basically got to a point where he, even though I was in a faith crisis, he just said, ‘David, you need to stop asking me that. You need to stop asking me to change this flaw that I don’t see as a flaw.’ 

That really caught me off guard because I wasn’t expecting that. I was like, what do you mean it’s not a flaw? Of course, it’s a flaw. Being gay is not okay, at least, I don’t think it is for you. He was like, ‘David, I don’t see it the same way as how a lot of church culture sees it, and that happens a lot of times. I want you to take more time to understand why I created you the way you are, and I intended for you to be this way.’ That was hard for me as well because I assumed that’s not how it was. No, this isn’t okay, but that’s when I realized I needed to be more willing to listen to what God has to tell me instead of trying to tell him what I think is right. So, things evolve, and I am evolving with how I see myself, and I feel like culture evolves as well with time.

What about your family? You initially came out as gay to them in 2014. How have they responded to this?
My family has always been so respectful to me. I feel like I have always had their trust, and it means so much to me. They have always loved me, and when I came out to them, they all gave me hugs and loved me. I didn’t come out to my dad, I wasn’t talking to him, which is kind of funny because he is probably the most open minded out of anyone else in my family. My dad has always been a curious person. He has always gone against the norm, and he is very intense. He’s had a reputation for being a stage dad and everything with the news and stuff, so I didn’t really talk to him. 

When I did finally talk to him, like, I might as well call him because the news is already everywhere. Like, it’s all over, so I thought I should talk to him. When I was growing up, he would be like, ‘I use to go to the gay bars and stuff just because I was curious, and I wanted to know what it was like instead of what other people said about it. I wanted to know for myself.’ He is just that kind of guy. I would be like, dad, I don’t want to hear this. That’s weird, I don’t want to hear this because I was a kid. I didn’t know that that meant, and I didn’t want to know either. I was uncomfortable by it, but this time, I was able to hear him more in an open way. 

He has always been more progressive when it came to that, even though he raised me as a Latter Day Saint, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, the Mormons, but he has always been able to be objective. He just said, ‘David, we don’t talk all the time and stuff, but I want you to know I fully support you.’ He was also like, ‘This is pretty amazing. If someone would have done this 20 years ago, it wouldn’t have gone down this way, especially in our church.’ He is very proud of me, and I thought that was great because I think it is always awkward, especially as a guy, to admit that you are attracted to other guys. What is your dad and other guy friends going to think of you? Especially if they are straight, I don’t want them to think I am trying to hit on them and stuff. I don’t want them to be uncomfortable, but my dad was super cool about it, and most of my friends have too. Whether they are straight or not, everyone has been super cool.

You are very lucky to have a progressive family. There are millions of people who have been rejected and ostracized by their families because of religious beliefs.
I feel blessed, I feel like that’s how it should be. If someone really follows faith and believes in God, then they know what it’s like. That everyone’s path is not the same. Everyone has a unique experience with how they experience life, and I think that is the most Christ-like way to go about things. I am grateful for my family because I know not everyone has that experience, and it usually comes from fear. How religion has culturally progressed, I don’t think that’s how God sees it, but I think with time, people will be less afraid to talk about sexuality and things like that.

Does it feel like a giant weight has now been lifted off your shoulders?
Yeah, it does. It’s hard because I want to understand this better, but if I talk about it, I’m going to scare people. So, I just have to keep it to myself or try to get rid of it, but you can’t. You don’t get rid of it. I’ve tried, tried, and tried, and it is still there (laughs). There is no point in trying to get rid of it when it’s a part of you, and that’s hard until you realize, maybe you need to take a different approach on this.

Would you say coming out has empowered you in ways?
It makes me less afraid of myself, and it makes me feel like I don’t have anything else to hide. I think that was the biggest secret I felt like I had to keep with myself, and I wasn’t even honest with myself about it. So, for a while, it was a secret to me. I just feel like I am a lot more relaxed and a lot less judgmental towards myself.

Since coming out, have you had a fair share of men sliding into your DMs?
Initially, when the first announcement came, I had a lot of messages from people going through the same thing. A lot of people in religious settings who did not know what to do, didn’t know who to talk to, and were too afraid to tell someone, and it was great letting them know, hey, you’re not alone. I usually don’t look at all the messages and stuff, but I was just trying to find as many people just to let them know they were not alone, because it can be very lonely to not know who to talk to and what to do when you are trying to change yourself, and you are realizing that’s not how it works. So, yes, at that time, I had lots of messages from people, but it’s died down now. It’s not really my thing to talk to strangers. 

What is the best advice you can offer someone who is struggling to choose between their sexuality and faith?
It is not an easy place, but I would challenge you to have courage and go into that uncomfortable territory of making room for both, because it can be done. It’s not easy because it’s a lot easier to just choose one or the other. That is kind of how our society is built right now. Is it this or that? What are you going to choose? Whose side are you on? It’s like, why choose a side when there is no need to? You shouldn’t have to. 

When I posted my posts, a lot of people were sort of like, are you not going to go to church anymore? Are you no longer participating in church? Do you not believe in God anymore? I’m like, being open about this part of me, why does that automatically make people assume that I am no longer choosing to be with God? I am going on this journey because I am following God. I am trying to understand where he wants me to go with this, and this is where I am up to now with it. I am walking side by side with him even if I make mistakes and don’t know what to do. 

I am still leaning on him, and I think a lot of people in the LGBTQ community feel like there is a lot of trauma. Like, we weren’t accepted, our church tried to put us through therapy to correct our sexuality. There is a lot of trouble with that, which I really feel for. That is going to be hard to feel safe with if they relate God with their experience with religion. Again, I feel like it is about trying to find that balance because that is where I am taking it. I am hoping to create a safer place for everybody. Not just for me, but other people trying to do the same thing as me. It can be done. 

Connect and stay up-to-date with Archuleta by following him on Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok, or visit his official website.

Photos Courtesy of Cyrus Pamganiban and Zack Knudson