…A former Lutheran pastor who underwent therapy and hypnosis in an attempt to become heterosexual is to speak at a psychotherapy conference in London in May.
Pink News is reporting that Maris Sants is to appear at the joint Pink Therapy and UK Council for Psychotherapy conference, “Working with Gender and Sexual Minorities”.
The Pink News article says the conference, scheduled for May 15th and 16th, will look at how homophobia in health care and mental health services continues to impact on lesbian, gay and transgender people and other sexual minorities.
Exodus International’s “Love In Action” residential ex-gay program in Memphis, Tenn. promises to free participants from shame, sexual temptation, and spiritual doubt.
But survivors of the program know that LIA often worsens participants’ shame, their feeling of separation from God, and their sexual temptations. For all that trouble, LIA fails to change most participants’ sexual orientation — and it subjects family and friends to weekend “retreats” that consist of verbal and emotional abuse against parents.
Survivor Peterson Toscano is thinking about LIA’s latest round of participants, as they begin a 28-day to three-month residency.
Although some people turn to programs like Love in Action for assistance dealing with compulsive sexual behavior, many of us actually learned more about where to find sex in unexpected public places after hearing other participants spill some of their own stories. In suppressing and demonizing our desires, many of us reinforced the deep shame we felt, which caused some of us to do harm to ourselves.
The heart of LIA’ message is that it is wrong, abnormal, sinful to be gay. This is the message we heard loud and clear in so many ways from the many many stringent and invasive rules to the disturbing Family and Friends Weekend. (For over a year, senior leadership at Exodus, which oversees LIA, have been aware of the bizarre and unethical nature of the Family and Friends weekend yet have done nothing to address the situation.)
After spending a tremendous amount of time and money and energy while also leaving key relationships and careers and homes, most people who have attended the LIA program came to the conclusion that it is fine to be gay, a healthy expression of one’ self. Joy, self-control, love and peace came with understanding ourselves and accepting how we are wired. Being gay or lesbian or bisexual is simply a part of the wonderful design of what makes us who we are. Once we apprehended this truth, then were able to better assess how to live our lives from there with integrity and openness.
Toscano spotlights the narrative of Mark, one survivor whom LIA tried to transform with a lifestyle of loveless and sexless monotony.
In the Sydney Morning Herald, Katrina Fox has penned a first-hand account of her visit to an ex-gay conference sponsored by Living Waters, an ex-gay network. The founder of Living Waters in Australia, Ian Lind, is quoted condemning sexually honest, same-sex-attracted persons to hell and severing such persons from contact with any house of worship.
Or at least not a church that he approves of: (Read More)
Benjamin Gresham, a former ex-gay and college student, observes:
A major ex-gay program, Living Waters, is seeking to expand across Sydney and even the rest of Australia. Led by Christian minister and ex-gay himself, Ron Brookman. Living Waters is located in Ramsgate in Southern Sydney but also runs groups in St Marys, and North West and South West Sydney through various churches and ministries. Living Waters is holding an ex-gay confernce in Sydney in February and starting up a new branch on the Northern Beaches in April 2009. Along with this, Ron brookman aims to release his autobiography in the near future as well as 2 other books which will promote the ex-gay message.
The expansion of the ex-gay programs across Sydney is a major concern as the psychological damage and pain caused by these programs is considerable. Hundreds of young gay men and women who have gone through these programs have committed suicide after not being able to change their sexual orientation. I attempted suicide twice after 3 years of ex-gay programs and I am lucky to be alive today. I have a friend who was not so lucky and after struggling with his sexuality and being told he had to change…he committed suicide back in 2007.
Tennessee businessman Mark Siedlecki tells the Chattanooga Pulse about his ordeal in Alabama and British ex-gay “deprogramming” programs:
“The Christian church I was raised in taught me I was going to hell [for being gay]. I did not want to throw away my Christian beliefs, but I had to be at peace with myself.”
But Siedlecki had seen the director of his Montgomery “reparative therapy” group at an Atlanta gay bar “dancing with men all over the floor.”
And his experience in England, which he describes as “deprogramming,” did not work. “I never changed in my attraction to men,” he says. He was genuinely committed to trying, he says, and had decided, “If God requires me to be celibate, I am prepared to do that.” Yet when the principal of the program told him, “Mark, you need to move back to Chattanooga, find the nearest woman available, settle down, have kids and be happy,” he was repelled at the hypocrisy. “Marrying a woman for “cover’ is not Christian-like,” he says. During the next couple of years, he realized his “life was empty,” he says. “I had given it my all. I had discussions with other people and [reparative therapy] didn’t work for them either.”
The former leader of an Australian “ex-gay” ministry has been named one of the continent’s most influential gay people. Brisbane Times reported Dec. 17:
During the 1980s, Paul Martin was at the helm of an ‘ex-gay ministry movement’ – one that tried to turn homosexual people into heterosexual people – in Melbourne.
Providing ‘treatment and religious counselling’ to hundreds of men and women, the group still operates in cities across the country.
However, Mr Martin, 45, eventually “saw the light” and confronted his personal demons.
“At the time I truly believed I was on a journey to being repaired, I was convinced my sexuality could be changed,” he said.
Two decades on, the counselling psychologist helps confused and troubled gays and lesbians come to terms with their own sexuality.
The organization that Martin led is said to still be in existence, misinforming participants that they are psychiatrically disordered and violating the will of God if they practice sexual honesty.
Mr Martin was this week named as the sole Queenslander in samesame.com.au’s annual Gaylies list – for the 25 Most Influential Gay and Lesbian Australians. …
While he disagrees with their methods and beliefs, Mr Martin does not believe the organisers of such groups are deliberately hateful people.
“The people involved with these groups don’t actually mean harm – they are lovely individuals, I’m sure. However, they are genuinely ignorant and driven by personal belief that is not in tune with reality.”
Of the dozens of so-called reformed gays Mr Martin worked with 20 years ago, only a few are still heterosexual and the majority wound up leading “messy lives”, he said.
“Some of those people got married but it inevitably ended in divorce and the sad part is most situations involved children.”
Martin, now a counseling psychologist, helps confused and troubled gays and lesbians come to terms with their own sexuality.
At Andrew Sullivan’s blog, an ex-gay survivor discusses his first-hand experience with emotional damage at evangelist Rick Warren’s ex-gay program, Celebrate Recovery.
The survivor recalls Warren’s phony 12-step program damaging the lives of married men and their wives.
Rev. Warren needs to clarify … if he disagrees with President-Elect Obama’s belief that there should be no place for these insidious practices in true communities of faith.
There should be no room at the inaugural pulpit for a pastor who would put young people’s well-being at risk. There is nothing to “celebrate” about endangering the lives of those we love.
When I heard that NARTH planned to hold its annual conference in Denver, I knew I had to come forward today to tell my story. NARTH and Focus on the Family work in unison to spread a message that threatens the healthy development of young people who are gay and lesbian.
Over the years NARTH has developed its faulty theories and anti-gay treatments all under the banner of offering hope and help. Focus on the Family, using its extensive media arm, has disseminated NARTH’ message of “change” to millions of homes; to families much like mine that looked to Focus on the Family for reliable information.
In addition, for the past 10 years Focus has aggressively provided a platform for NARTH leaders and other ex-gay spokespeople to speak to tens of thousands of parents and pastors through an event they call Love Won Out. This day long conference held around the country, and now even overseas, targets people looking for answers.
Sadly, attendees leave with misinformation and false promises. Ministers and parents head back home to pressure the young gay and lesbian people under their care to pursue a treatment that the APA and every major US medical association states is unnecessary and harmful.
During the weekend of November 7-9, NARTH, a national association of “gay conversion” therapists, is holding its annual conference in Denver. Two local survivors of ex-gay programs, Christine Bakke and Daniel Gonzales, along with Beyond Ex-Gay, and a coalition of local and other gay organizations, are forming a response to speak to the harm groups like NARTH can cause.
Former ex-gays will rally at the conference site, then gather to discuss the deception and harm done to them by the ex-gay movement, and offer workshops to assist mental-health professionals in meeting the recovery needs of former ex-gays.
