Today is what I call Sexual Honesty Day — otherwise known as National Coming Out Day.
Sexual Honesty Day was developed by Dr. Robert Eichberg and Jean O’Leary in 1988. It was popularized with the artwork of KeithHaring.
Sexual Honesty Day affirms the decision of same-sex-attracted persons to be honest with friends, family, and neighbors. Sexual honesty makes healthy living possible: It enables informed, transparent, and responsible behavior; it allows people to obtain emotional, physical, and spiritual support; it spares heterosexual spouses the trauma of an ex-gay “marriage”; it allows same-sex-attracted people to un-closet the romantic side of their lives.
In short, National Coming Out Day events around the world the pro-equality movement a familiar face for friends and peers of those who are same-sex-attracted.
Sadly, Sexual Honesty Day is hated and parodied by a handful of ex-gay activists, who created a Dishonesty Day in response.
For years, HIV-positive ex-gay activist Michael Johnston chaired “National Coming Out of Homosexuality Day.” NCOHD was promotedannually by Focus on the Family and Peter LaBarbera — until 2003, when Virginia attorney Michael Hamar contacted TruthWinsOut.org founder Wayne Besen. Hamar had two clients who claimed to have had unsafe sex with Johnston, and one client believed he may have been infected with HIV from Johnston. After admitting a vague “moral fall,” Johnston’s “ex-gay” Kerusso Ministries collapsed in shame. Johnston later returned to ex-gay politics and finance, however, through the so-called “Pure Life Ministries” in Kentucky. Johnston has never apologized nor made amends for endangering the lives of his male sex partners.
Dishonesty Day lived on, albeit feebly: Exodus International tried to resuscitate NCOHD in 2006, while the Traditional Values Coalition promotes Dishonesty Day — and Michael Johnston — on its web site. Neither organization warns readers about Johnston’s potentially lethal abuse of gay men. (Perhaps we need a Double Dishonesty Day?)
Whether one calls it National Coming Out Day or Sexual Honesty Day, today offers people from all walks of life an opportunity to reflect on their level of honesty and openness with their families and neighbors - and to think about secrets that might be eating away at their emotional or physical health.
Posted October 11th, 2008 by Rev. Steven F. Kindle
By the Rev. Steven F. Kindle, Clergy United, Inc.
The question is not: Will marriage survive the inclusion of non-heterosexuals into its mix? Of course it will. No, the appropriate question is: Can America be America if it does not end its oppression of gay Americans? Will we become a nation that is willing to endure second-class citizens after two centuries of steady emancipation of other oppressed groups? I suggest to you that America’s soul is at great risk by this moral failure. This is a justice issue that needs to be addressed and resolved in favor of the oppressed. Offering same-sex marriage is the final step in recognizing the full, unencumbered humanity of non-heterosexuals, and their inclusion as fully emancipated American citizens.
The history of the United States can be summarized, quite accurately, as the slow but sure realization of the vision of its founding document, the Declaration of Independence, that all are created equal.
The same founders who agreed that “All men are created equal” also said, “Slaves shall represent 3/5 of a human being.” They and their successors also denied women the right to vote and upheld “separate but equal” Jim Crow laws, making interracial marriages illegal and restricted immigration to maintain white majority.
The founders had something in mind when they wrote the Constitution, but it’s not the republic in which we now live. In fact, their prejudices went so deep that they didn’t even feel the need to write “all white, landed, protestant, heterosexual, free men are created equal.” Forget about their slaves, forget about women, forget about those without land, forget about gay people-the only ones who had the right to vote, and thus the right to participate in the building of this new republic were people exactly like them.
In the intervening years, slavery has been abolished, women have been fully emancipated and nonwhites have been given the full dignity of the law. The inalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all Americans is now the realized dream of that distant day.
There is, however, one exception: non-heterosexual Americans, who are described by Harvard sociologist Byrne Fone as victims of the last acceptable bigotry in America.
It is my contention that withholding marriage rights for non-heterosexuals is unconstitutional, unchristian, and un-American. I will make the case for same-sex marriage being beneficial to America by providing four bedrock reasons why same sex marriage rights deserve to be placed on par with heterosexual marriage rights.
Posted October 10th, 2008 by Rev. Steven F. Kindle
Millions of lives are destroyed, relationships are uprooted, and fortunes are wasted in the false hope of becoming ex-gay, all because of the blatant misuse of one biblical passage.
It is well-known that the ex-gay movement is based on very faulty psychological premises. What is not so well-known is that the biblical basis for their assumptions is equally bankrupt. It may be good to remind ourselves that every time oppressed groups began to make headway in America they were all opposed by those who claimed to have the Bible on their side. Eventually, their arguments were perceived as the rantings of self-serving demagogues and carry no weight today among mainstream Christians and biblical scholars.
So today we should not be surprised that the Bible is trotted out once again to keep another oppressed group under wraps. And just as before, a careful look at their arguments finds this current effort wanting.
The leading ex-gay ministry, Exodus International, typicallyclaims that they can deliver “freedom from homosexuality through the power of Jesus Christ,” and that 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 proclaims that “Some Corinthian Christians had formerly been homosexuals, but now were counted among the saints. “
I certainly would not want to argue against the power of Jesus Christ to change lives. This, for Christians, is so basic a reality that it needs no proving; examples abound in any congregation. What is at stake here is not change, but what kind of change. Does this text really say that former homosexuals in the Corinthian congregation were transformed into heterosexuals? Let’s take a good look at this text.
Do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived! Fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, male prostitutes, sodomites, 10 thieves, the greedy, drunkards, revilers, robbers–none of these will inherit the kingdom of God. And this is what some of you used to be. (NRSV)
The English word “sodomites” has a very recent etymological history. It was coined about 1,000 years after the New Testament was written, in 1051 AD. In its English definition it encompasses a wide range of sexual behavior that includes many heterosexual sex acts. Basically, it condemns most anything other than the missionary position, including all forms of oral and anal sex and mutual masturbation. (At one time it included naked sexual intercourse.) The straight teenagers who take a vow of chastity until marriage who engage in anal and oral sex, thinking they are really not having sex, are guilty of sodomy.
If we simply stopped here and asked what kind of sexual activity Paul had in mind, there is nothing to indicate he meant homosexual sexual behavior. Corinth was noted as a particularly licentious city where it is presumed that all forms of sexual practices were undertaken. The use of the word “sodomites” does not tell us with specificity what exact practice(s) Paul had in mind.
But the English meaning is irrelevant here because it is an anachronism; there is no word in the Greek of Paul’s day for homosexual or the like. To import such a meaning into a text is to commit the worst sin of translation: to alter its meaning. In this case, the NRSV translators actually put modern words into Paul’s ancient mouth.
So, what does the meaning of the Greek words employed in the text tell us? There are two Greek words that are at the center of understanding these verses:
Malakoi, is a well-known Greek word with a range of meanings: extremely self-indulgent, soft, weak, effeminate, and often used for (cultic) male prostitutes as used in this translation.
Arsenokoitai (translated “sodomites” in the NRSV) was used only by Paul, but etymological studies suggest a usage for very sexually active men who have sex with men or women, including visitors to cult prostitutes.
One of the practices of Paul in his listing of vices, which was typical of Greco-Roman rhetoric, is to group similar vices together. This is a helpful clue in determining Paul’s precise meaning. We have already seen that a perfectly suitable use of arsenokoitai is visitors to cult prostitutes. In keeping with the rhetorical device of coupling, the passage should read:
Do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived! Fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, cultic male prostitutes and those who visit them, 10 thieves, the greedy, drunkards, revilers, robbers–none of these will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And this is what some of you used to be.
Some in the Corinthian church were idolaters who had visited cultic prostitutes in their past, and now, being transformed by the power of Jesus Christ, were free from this sin. I think we can all agree that visiting prostitutes of any stripe is inconsistent with Christian morality!
With this understanding of how to translate 1 Corinthians 6:9-11, it is immediately apparent that to demand that gay Christians somehow appeal to Jesus for a transformation of their sexual orientation is not supported in this text. The many thousands who have tried it and failed, only to live lives of loneliness and self-condemnation, are a stark testimony to the gross misuse of this passage.
A former board member of Exodus International, Dan Puumala, himself an ex-gay ministry leader, after years of watching little success in reprogramming gays into straights, suggested in a speech* to EI in 2002, that Exodus should change its motto from “Freedom from homosexuality through Jesus Christ” to “Come suffer with us.” What a waste, and what a terrible misappropriation of the purpose of Jesus which is to bring life, “and that abundantly”, to all people.
[*DVD: Cloak of Humility: Responding to Critics of Ex-Gay Ministry]
Connecticut’s Supreme Court ruled Friday that same-sex couples have the right to marry, making the state the third behind Massachusetts and California to legalize such unions. The divided court ruled 4-3 that gay and lesbian couples cannot be denied the freedom to marry under the state constitution, and Connecticut’s civil unions law does not provide those couples with the same rights as heterosexual couples.
“We are delighted that the court has ruled in favor of equal marriage rights,” said Wayne Besen, Executive Director of Truth Wins Out. “This is a historic day that underscores the unstoppable momentum of marriage equality for our families.”
Focus on the Family blames committed gay couples for a lack of commitment among gender-biased heterosexual Christian couples.
On Oct. 9, Focus cited one supposed victim of marriage for gay couples: An antigay California couple whose marriage license was rejected after they marred it by crossing out inclusive language and replacing it with sexist language.
Focus also complained that an antigay New Jersey retreat, the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association, lost its special tax breaks after it violated its legal commitment to make a boardwalk pavilion equally available to all taxpayers in exchange for that tax exemption.
Focus further complained that two federal courts “rudely” foiled two Massachusetts antigay couples in their attempt to force overworked public-school teachers to warn them prior to any lessons that the parents deemed to be politically incorrect.
Also on Oct. 9, Focus on the Family indirectly protested California law which requires primary-school children to be educated about marriage. Again, it seems, Focus only wants kids to be educated about marriages that it deems to be politically correct — in other words, evangelical, heterosexual, and Republican.
On Sept. 28, Truth Wins Out protested a Baptist Press article by ex-gay activist and longtime Exodus member Bob Stith. While mourning the sexual honesty of Christian contemporary singer Ray Boltz, the article unnecessarily and falsely quoted Human Genome Project former director Francis Collins as saying:
Homosexuality is not hardwired. There is no gay gene. We mapped the human genome. We now know there is no genetic cause for homosexuality.
Collins never said that; ex-gay political activist Greg Quinlan did. Good As You made the same observation.
Collins had said almost the opposite: He told Ex-Gay Watch:
The evidence we have at present strongly supports the proposition that there are hereditary factors in male homosexuality — the observation that an identical twin of a male homosexual has approximately a 20% likelihood of also being gay points to this conclusion, since that is 10 times the population incidence. But the fact that the answer is not 100% also suggests that other factors besides DNA must be involved. That certainly doesn’t imply, however, that those other undefined factors are inherently alterable.
Collins added:
No one has yet identified an actual gene that contributes to the hereditary component (the reports about a gene on the X chromosome from the 1990s have not held up), but it is likely that such genes will be found in the next few years.
Ten days later, Baptist Press finally changed the wording of the article — without acknowledging to readers the nature of the falsehoods that had previously been conveyed, without apparent effort to correct syndicated copies of the article that were circulated around the Internet, without apology to Dr. Collins, and — most importantly — without apparent reforms necessary to prevent future errors.
The only hint of the two-week deception appears at the top the article with this brief note:
REVISED: October 8, 2008 to reflect more accurate wording from “The Language of God” by Dr. Francis Collins.
Stith’s article now accurately conveys what Collins said — but the damage has already been done among readers who walked away from the article (and more than a dozen syndicated copies) believing that a leading geneticist had declared homosexuality a purely environmental choice.
Thus far, it seems Stith might walk away from the damage with nothing more than a quiet admission of fault to one web site, Ex-Gay Watch, which his regular audience never reads. Meanwhile, Quinlan has not acknowledged any deception whatsoever. We have asked Stith for assurances of complete remedial action; he has declined to respond.
Stith’s peers say that he is a man of good character; at one time I believed that, but I became very doubtful 10 days ago and now I am nearly convinced otherwise. True accountability, transparency, and penitence require more effort and integrity than I’m seeing, at present, from a prominent Exodus speaker and policy wonk for the Southern Baptist Convention.
Ex-gay fugitive from justice Lisa Miller continues to violate Virginia and Vermont court orders that she comply with the visitation rights of former partner and co-mother Janet Jenkins.
As Truth Wins Out has previously reported, since 2004 Miller has worked with religious-right activists to undermine U.S. family law by demanding a special right of ex-gays and religious extremists to move from state to state to escape their family obligations. Had she succeeded, the ability of U.S. states to enforce custody and deadbeat-dad laws could have been damaged.
But on June 6, the Virginia Supreme Court upheld Vermont’s jurisdiction over her former partnership and the resulting child.
The Liberty Counsel vowed to find other ways to sidestep the nation’s laws, but on Oct. 27, Miller’s case returns where it belonged from the start: In Vermont, the state from which Miller fled justice in the first place.
Vermont courts are virtually certain to uphold earlier rulings in favor of Jenkins’ visitation rights.
Now the Liberty Counsel, Concerned Women for America, and antigay activist Peter LaBarbera are launching a scare campaign and a political mobilization. They warn that on Oct. 27, a Vermont judge might strip Miller of custody due to her persistent and continuing violations of family law and court rulings in two states.
Total loss of custody seems unlikely to me. However, even if it were likely, Miller can pre-empt that loss — and end her career as a fugitive — by respecting law, order, morality, and the welfare of her child.
Or, she can continue to act illegally and use her child as a pawn in a religious-right political war against family values. If she continues, then perhaps it is appropriate that Miller temporarily lose custody until she stops using her child as a political pawn — and starts obeying laws which exist to protect children from fugitive and deadbeat parents.
Far from being persecuted victims, Miller and her allies have become habitual offenders against family values and the rule of law. They are not Christian — they are egomaniacs who believe they are above compliance with any law.
One way or another, Isabella deserves better parenting than she has received thus far.
During the course of 2008, critics of the ex-gay movement have pointed to at least three prominent ex-gay activists whose web pages or recent statements spread unhealthy myths and ignorance about the human health disaster of HIV/AIDS:
Have we forgotten where AIDS originates? … the gay ghettoes, those urban areas where most homosexuals congregate and where gay bathhouses still operate with impunity. These are also the enclaves where intravenous drug use abounds.
and
“[For HIV infection] One of the fast growing demographics is now males, ages 13 to 24 … also points to the likelihood of older HIV-infected men having more sex with teenaged boys.”
Bob Davies, former executive director of Exodus International. The Exodus web site still claims:
Those who practice these sins “receive in their own persons the due penalty of their error” (v. 27). In today’s society, homosexuality is reaping a bitter harvest. Homosexual men are six times more likely to have attempted suicide than heterosexual men. Between 25 and 33 percent of homosexual men and women are alcoholics (the national average is 7 percent). Currently, 70 percent of Americans with AIDS are male homosexuals or bisexuals. Homosexual involvement reaps deep devastation in the lives of many who practice it.
Perhaps most grotesque is an alleged statement by Joseph Nicolosi, former head of NARTH. According to former patient Daniel Gonzales:
I remember Dr. Nicolosi telling me, in response to the question of whether one could easily contract HIV from semen, that if this were the case then gays would be “jerking off in hamburgers all over” to infect people.
All of the above ex-gay myths are discussed and refuted on the linked web sites.
I was reminded of this ongoing pattern of ignorance today when I saw the latest news from geneticists tracing the history of HIV.
The most pervasive global strain of HIV began spreading in humans around 1900 in sub-Saharan Africa, a new study claims.
The research, which is published in the current issue ofNature, found that HIV began spreading between 1884 and 1924, around the same time urban centers in west central Africa were established. This estimated time of origin is decades earlier than the previous estimate of 1930.
As critics have said before: If these ex-gay activists — and those who stand by them — were consistent in their ignorance, they would now blame AIDS on the modernization of Africa or, worse, on “the African lifestyle.”
But they don’t: Unlike same-sex-attraction, ignorance is a choice, and these particular ex-gay activists — most notably, Exodus’ web editors — choose what to be ignorant about. They can choose to “change,” but despite criticism, they have not.
With righteous sass, former ex-gay Daniel Gonzales challenges GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin for claiming, rather absurdly, that being same-sex-attracted is a choice.
But as for homosexuality, I am not going to judge Americans and the decisions that they make in their adult personal relationships. I have one of my absolute best friends for the last 30 years happens to be gay, and I love her dearly. And she is not my “gay friend,” she is one of my best friends, who happens to have made a choice that isn’t a choice that I have made. But I am not going to judge people.
Gonzales’ response:
“Should I choose to pray to become straight?” — He already did that.
“Should I choose to see a gay conversion therapist?” — He spent thousands of dollars on that.
“If I promise to try really hard to be straight and went back to one of those ex-gay programs again, would you want me to marry one of your daughters?”
“Even though you ‘don’t want to judge me,’ it seems pretty likely you view my sexuality as sin, which appears to leave me with one choice: A lifetime of celibacy. I could embrace my sexuality and seek to form a meaningful, lifelong committed relationship with another man and build a family. But no, I think your inner views have convinced me to choose a lifetime of being alone and celibate! Thanks, Gov. Palin!”
Apparently, Palin either doesn’t listen to her gay friend when she’s talking, or Palin rejects the facts in front of her and makes decisions based upon prejudice and denial instead.
Is that the sort of person who should lead the United States when John McCain dies?
Rev. Steven F. Kindle: Tim, you are surely right to point out the unfinished work that lies ahead after the right to marry is...
Tim: "Offering same-sex marriage is the final step in recognizing the full, unencumbered humanity of non-heterosexuals, and their inclusion as fully...
Sexual Honesty Day was developed by Dr. Robert Eichberg and Jean O’Leary in 1988. It was popularized with the artwork of Keith Haring.
On Sept. 28, 
Ex-gay 
