ABOVE: Edward Smart. (Photo from Smart’s Facebook page)
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) | Ed Smart says the first miracle on his life happened when his teenage daughter returned home after being kidnapped from the family’s house in Salt Lake City in June 2002.
He says the second miracle was being warmly accepted by his neighbors, friends and family after he came out as a gay man earlier this year at age 64.
Smart spoke at a conference on Dec. 7 in Lehi, Utah hosted by a nonprofit organization that helps LGBTQ youth find support.
The Salt Lake Tribune reports it was the first time Smart had spoken publicly since coming out.
Smart says he first told friends that he was gay in August through a Facebook message intended only for them, but it quickly went public.
Smart and his family have frequently been in the public eye since Elizabeth Smart, then 14, was kidnapped.
She was held captive and repeatedly sexually assaulted before she was rescued nine months later while walking along a street in Sandy with her two kidnappers.
