Exodus International executive vice president Jeff Buchanan last week countered the organization’s recent move away from orientation change.
In an article for The Gospel Coalition (a pious and politically correct organization name, no?), Buchanan accuses people who are honest about their sexual orientation of being “addicted to identity labels.”
Unlike ex-gays (who are presumably addicted to a heterosexual label), Buchanan says LGBT persons’ use of a “self-referencing label creates a personal crisis of identity and purpose.”
Buchanan then purports to offer six reasons why people cannot be sexually honest and also Christian at the same time.
Key among those reasons is Buchanan’s claim that one can only be truly authentic by suppressing oneself and conforming to an ultra-conservative evangelical idol of Jesus-as-Holy-Hypocrite, rather than Jesus as a personal guide or savior.
Instead of affirming sexual honesty, Buchanan counsels people to silence their gay loved ones (or themselves, if they are gay); pray; and wait for a miraculous change of sexual orientation to occur — perhaps through a relationship which the partners will convince themselves is heterosexual.
Exodus International has double-crossed its followers at various times in the past — telling opposing messages to different conservative audiences at the same time, and reinventing and then uninventing itself within just a few weeks.
Exodus appears to be repeating its own history.
I’ve been praying and waiting for a miraculous change – that you people and your dumbness would drop off the edge of the planet. Not likely to happen right? Stands as much chance as one changing one’s sexual orientation.
“In the midst of waiting, we must always have hope. An identity rooted in same-sex attractions serves as an anchor that keeps us docked in our present circumstance. We have accepted our lot in life, and experience now becomes our identity. Should a person ever develop a desire to explore a heterosexual relationship, he or she will find it difficult to overcome the label that can deter interested parties.”
Translation: You’ll always be gay, just don’t call yourself “gay” because that might turn off potential straight partners. Heterosexuality is still the “hope”, change is still possible — even though they dropped the slogan. More semantic BS. Nothing has really changed…
Well, at least the cat is out of the bag. Chambers slipped up and told the truth. Whoops. Too late to go back now.
It seems that Buchanan just doesn’t want to go out and get a real job, so he is working to justify a reason for Exodus to exist. He still has not found one.
Try Monster.com Jeff. The jig is up. We all know the truth about the abject failure of your program already.
Wow, Exodus is really flailing, aren’t they? Talk about a *total* lack of message control and organizational consistency…
More false and confusing rhetoric.
My bottom-line truth; I am gay and Christian. God loves me exactly as God created me.
Buchanan: “Any name (label) outside of Christ will always fall dreadfully short of God’s intent for us.”
Isn’t that just a clever way of saying that God hates gay people?
With labels such as “ex-gay”, “SSA”, “post-gay”, “former homosexual,” “former lesbian,” “made for more,” and “growing into heterosexuality,” it may be Exodus that suffers from an identity crisis.
Exodus international is a great organization, I was a practicing homosexual for 17 years. I went thru Exodus and was set free from the bondage, no longer do I have the thoughts or the temptation. I am married with 3 children and have had a straight heterosexual relationship for 4 years.
Lol — see you at the tubs Marthew. When you are ready to live an authentic life we are here for you.
Matthew, you’re in bondage now, a slave to the bigots who convinced you to loathe yourself, in a marriage not because you want to be but because you think you should be.
” I am married with 3 children and have had a straight heterosexual relationship for 4 years.”
Now that’s bondage.
Is it even physically possible for a woman to have three children in just four years because if it is it sounds like a form of abuse.
My mother had three children in four years and yes, I think it was kind of abusive.
If Matthew tortured his body to be a different sex–you would consider him liberated. If he changes his thinking you conclude he loathes himself.
Month One: Child A is born
Month Sixteen: Child B is born
Month Thirty-four: Child C is born
Melinda, there’s a big difference between willingly altering your body to match your mind and denying what comes natually to you because you were threatened with eternal damnation.
Melinda,
If Matthew changed his body because somebody told him he had to or he’d burn in hell forever I’d conclude he loathed himself. If he changed his thinking and decided he was going to live an authentic life as what he was born to be (gay or straight) despite what anybody thought I’d consider him liberated.
It’s not about pleasing us. It’s about being true to oneself. When will you get it?