In October 2008, Truth Wins Out reported:

…We learn from Ken Avidor (via Pam Spaulding) that U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar is requesting $500,000 in U.S. taxpayer money for Minnesota Teen Challenge, a pray-away-the-drugs program whose parent organization — strangely enough — hires ex-gay speakers, utilizes ex-gay media, and is operated by the Assemblies of God, the world’s largest Pentecostal denomination.

The “Teen Challenge” network apparently offers no reputable professional counseling; instead, its amateur employees program youths with church ideology while blaming teens’ problems on “Satanic” influences such as Halloween and Harry Potter. It offers no well-designed tracking of success and failure rates; its reports and supposed success stories appear to consist of isolated anecdotes and head counts which exclude youths who failed to complete a treatment program.

In January 2009, we published a follow-up article:

Strapped for cash and suffering from a former board member’s alleged role in a Ponzi scheme, the Minnesota Teen Challenge now sees profit potential in launching a taxpayer-subsidized religious and cultural war against Haiti — a Caribbean neighbor that the organization falsely accuses of being demon-possessed.

Ken Avidor explains.

The Minnesota Independent reported today that the state still has not halted aid: In the past seven years, the evangelical, antigay program has received more than $10 million in government funds with little accountability. Instead of treating people for drug addiction, the taxpayer-funded program converts participants to a conservative pentecostal ideology and discriminates against non-Christian and gay would-be employees.

Its parent organization, Teen Challenge, still hosts ex-gay speakers around the country.

“To me, I think, that the legislature is setting special rates for a pervasively sectarian organization is enough to make that funding unconstitutional,” said Alex Luchenitzer of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State. “You have clear favoritism and endorsement of a religious program.”

Last month, Truth Wins Out reported:

…We learn from Ken Avidor (via Pam Spaulding) that U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar is requesting $500,000 in U.S. taxpayer money for Minnesota Teen Challenge, a pray-away-the-drugs program whose parent organization — strangely enough — hires ex-gay speakers, utilizes ex-gay media, and is operated by the Assemblies of God, the world’s largest Pentecostal denomination.

The “Teen Challenge” network apparently offers no reputable professional counseling; instead, its amateur employees program youths with church ideology while blaming teens’ problems on “Satanic” influences such as Halloween and Harry Potter. It offers no well-designed tracking of success and failure rates; its reports and supposed success stories appear to consist of isolated anecdotes and head counts which exclude youths who failed to complete a treatment program.

Strapped for cash and suffering from a former board member’s alleged role in a Ponzi scheme, the Minnesota Teen Challenge now sees profit potential in launching a taxpayer-subsidized religious and cultural war against Haiti — a Caribbean neighbor that the organization falsely accuses of being demon-possessed.

Ken Avidor explains.

Your Republican tax dollars at work, ladies and gentlemen.

Last week, Truth Wins Out expressed concern that the ex-gay Exodus Global Alliance is helping to draw youths with drug and alcohol problems into involuntary and antigay “Teen Challenge” programs in the United States and New Zealand.

Now we learn from Ken Avidor (via Pam Spaulding) that U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar is requesting $500,000 in U.S. taxpayer money for Minnesota Teen Challenge, a pray-away-the-drugs program whose parent organization — strangely enough — hires ex-gay speakers, utilizes ex-gay media, and is operated by the Assemblies of God, the world’s largest Pentecostal denomination.

The “Teen Challenge” network apparently offers no reputable professional counseling; instead, its amateur employees program youths with church ideology while blaming teens’ problems on “Satanic” influences such as Halloween and Harry Potter. It offers no well-designed tracking of success and failure rates; its reports and supposed success stories appear to consist of isolated anecdotes and head counts which exclude youths who failed to complete a treatment program.

Treatments, by the way, reportedly include up to a year of residency in isolation, denial of medical treatment, and relentless assaults upon Jewish and other non-evangelical faith perspectives. Supporters include U.S. President-elect Barack Obama’s rumored choice for drug czar, former congressman Jim Ramstad.

Maia Szalavitz of The Huffington Post is alarmed at Teen Challenge’s substitution of brainwashing for sound medical treatment:

Further, according to Teen Challenge, “Addiction is a sin, not a disease.” Consequently, the program does not allow the use of medication.

Beyond this, it humiliates and attempts to “break down” people with addictions, using techniques that I have covered extensively elsewhere that are known to do more harm than good.

Since half of all addicts have a co-existing mental illness which often requires medication, banning it is not exactly evidence-based practice. And since there are medications that can help treat particular addictions, this is even more absurd. Given that Ramstad sponsored a bill to change the name of the National Institute on Drug Abuse to the National Institute on Diseases of Addiction, it is deeply troubling that he’d support an organization which views it as sin.

Andy Birkey of the Minnesota Independent says that Teen Challenge’s acceptance of past and future federal subsidies obligate it to submit to public scrutiny and accountability:

If you accept taxpayer money, you have to accept that you’re going to receive public scrutiny. That simple point seems to be eluding Minnesota Teen Challenge (MNTC), the faith-based drug treatment program which secured a federal earmark in early 2008 arranged by Rep. Jim Ramstad and Sen. Amy Klobuchar, for its “Know the Truth” program which aims to prevent drug use.

Operating close to the border of church and state, the group’s members are unrealistic if they think their work is not going to get attention.

…The point of my article was not to suggest that MNTC was not successful or beneficial, as Scherber implies. Rather it was to point out the overtly religious nature of the organization and that the program has historically been controversial. In the interest of brevity, I left some examples out. For instance, MNTC’s stance on Halloween verges on the comical (”Halloween is a day set up totally for Satan … The more people who go out dressed as demons, ghosts, witches and goblins, the more glory Satan receives”). …

I don’t question that faith-based programs can be very effective for those that share the programs’ faith. Faith is a huge motivator in people’s lives. I think MNTC has been very effective for the clients it serves. However, I don’t think it’s appropriate for judges, prosecutors or public defenders to suggest the program as an alternative to jail.

In economic boom times, taxpayer dollars should be restricted to professionally operated and audited facilities with solid, evidence-based performance records. In troubled economic times, taxpayer dollars should not be wasted on one prosperous denomination’s religious indoctrination centers.

GayNZ.com voiced concern on Dec. 1 that Exodus Global Alliance is spreading involuntary and fundamentalist ex-gay programs down under, in the form of Member of Parliament Jonathan Young. His anti-Semitic Christian “Teen Challenge” has been linked to two U.S. ex-gay activists — David Kyle Foster and Janelle Hallman. Australia recovers from the allegation by several women that the global Mercy Ministries involuntarily detained women and denied them access to professional medical and mental-health care.

What if LGBT adolescent substance abusers entered Teen Challenge’s programmes? What if they are exposed to this unhealthy and unscientific message about the allegedly “essential” pathology of their sexual orientation? It is quite probable that they will experience sexual identity conflict, which could seriously impede their recovery from substance abuse problems, and/or face summary expulsion from fundamentalist oriented Teen Challenge programmes if they refused to “degay” themselves, without referral to mainstream counselors or psychotherapeutic professionals.

According to one professional study, the latter behaviour is rife in fundamentalist ‘exgay’ programmes, and not restricted to those alone. Over the last year, I’ve become aware of the toxic environment of “Mercy Ministries Australia,” a fundamentalist organisation that stated to young women that it could assist existing problems from eating disorders, past child sexual abuse, self-harm, substance abuse and sexual identity conflict. They were told that they would receive ‘professional’ help, but did not have such access. Moreover, if young female residents complained about the programme, or were labeled ‘non-compliant,’ they were summarily expelled from the programme.

Survivors of Mercy Ministries have reportedly assembled the following checklist for people to consult before submitting themselves or loved ones to Exodus-affiliated ex-gay programs:

1. Do you abide by a Code of Conduct that outlines client rights? Can I have a copy?
2. Do you have professional indemnity and public liability insurance?
3. Are you a financial member of an accredited professional body?
4. Do you receive regular professional supervision and guidance?
5. Are your qualifications from an accredited program?
6. Have you completed your training as a counsellor?