SALT LAKE CITY - Lester Leavitt has made a request of his family: oppose their church's opposition to gay marriage.

Leavitt, from Pompano Beach, Fla., is asking his siblings and children on the West Coast to choose family over a call from Mormon church leaders to support a November ballot initiative to define traditional marriage California's constitution.

A letter from Thomas S. Monson, president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, was to be read from the pulpit in church congregations Sunday.