The Ethics of Ex-Gay Ministries

c. 2006, Doreen A. Mannion

Ethics is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature of morality, or the difference between right and wrong. What are the ethics involved in telling homosexuals that they can change their sexual orientation? (Note: For the purposes of this paper, the terms “homosexual” and “gay” shall apply to gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender persons.) Thompson (13) notes that the church has implicitly sent homosexuals “the message that they must change their sexual orientation in order to become eligible for our love.” There is little doubt that some homosexuals want to change their orientation to heterosexual. What is more questionable are the reasons a homosexual would want to do so. If homosexuality were more accepted, would people still want to change?

The question that most of us have asked ourselves is ‘Why should we change?’ We know that it is more natural for us to explore loving, responsible attachments to people of our own gender, and we know that the quality of these relationships is no better and no worse than those of heterosexuals around us. For most of us, the disadvantages of social non-conformity are far outweighed by the advantages of accepting and taking pride in who we are as whole human beings (Hilton, 49).

Ex-gay ministries have been in existence since at least 1973 when Frank Worthen founded Love in Action. In 1976, Exodus International, currently the largest ex-gay enterprise, was founded. Ironically, Gary Cooper and Michael Bussee, instrumental in founding Exodus, left the organization and their respective wives when they could no longer deny their love for each other. A similar fate befell former ex-gay spokesperson Michael Johnson. Johnson is featured in the video “It’s not gay,” which is still sold by the American Family Association even though he left the group in 2003 after being caught meeting men online and having unsafe sex. Johnson also worked with Rev. Jerry Falwell and was the founder of “National Coming out of Homosexuality Day” (Besen).

These ministries had a fairly low profile until 1998, when ex-gay advertisements appeared in major newspapers across the United States. Some of the advertisements featured Anne and John Paulk, both of whom claimed to be ex-gay. The couple appeared on the cover of Newsweek in August of 1998. Unfortunately for John Paulk and Exodus, he was spotted in a gay bar in Washington, DC, in September 2000, after which he was removed as the chairman of the board of Exodus and placed on probation by the organization.

The motivation of ex-gay religious ministries has been called into question. While some ministries may sincerely be concerned with the salvation of homosexuals, others have less altruistic motives. Some of these ministries are exploiting, for political purposes, the struggle that some feel between their sexual identity and their religious faith. There is a suspicious alliance among the Christian Right, the Republican Party, and many ex-gay ministries. The Christian Right often uses unsubstantiated claims of successful gay conversions in their anti-gay mailings and advertisements, and provides organizational and financial support to ex-gay organizations and leaders. For example,

Exodus and other ex-gay organizations get referrals from, and maintain close links with, many major Christian Right organizations, including the Family Research Council, Focus on the Family, Promise Keepers, Rev. Pat Robertson's 700 Club, Campus Crusade for Christ, Rev. D. James Kennedy's Center for Reclaiming America, Concerned Women for America, the American Family Association, Minirth-Meier Clinics, and Coral Ridge Ministries (Khan).

If these ministries were truly worried about salvation of the individual, then why would their leaders participate in efforts to ban certain books and gay community newspapers from public libraries?

Biblically, there are disagreements about the handful of verses that some are certain address homosexual behavior. Hilton (20) writes, “We’ve been obsessed with this issue, which the Gospel writers apparently thought to be of such low priority that they include no sayings of Jesus about it—if, indeed he mentioned it at all. And in so doing, we’ve wallowed in self-righteousness—the sin that Jesus seems to have taken most seriously and mentioned most often.” Not many would say that if homosexuality is a sin that it is a “bigger” sin than adultery, gluttony, envy, or any of the other sins listed in the Bible. However, there seems little interest on the part of those who claim to have only salvation in mind to help individuals become ex-adulterers, ex-gluttons, or ex-enviers. This tends to make one suspicious of their true motives.

There is little evidence in objective, peer-reviewed journals that a person’s sexual orientation can be changed from homosexual to heterosexual. Some ex-gay ministries consider the conversion successful if the person marries someone of the opposite gender and produces children. As Herek writes, "...‘success’ has been defined as suppression of homoerotic response or mere display of physiological ability to engage in heterosexual intercourse. Neither outcome is the same as adopting the complex set of attractions and feelings that constitute sexual orientation.”

The “therapies” that have been used to attempt to change one’s sexual orientation include electroshock, nausea-producing drugs, avoidance of disco music, and isolation. Women are told to grow their hair long, wear dresses and skirts, wear makeup, and avoid playing sports; men are told to not wear Calvin Klein underwear, facial hair, or aftershave, and to participate in sports (Tushnet). Reparative therapy “can do more damage to a person’s psyche than good. They do a lot of confrontational shouting, saying the person will go to hell.... It can cause future need for psychiatric help. It will cause a whole new level of guilt when you go back to your old life” (Hilton, 106).

What may be worse is that many who have been through ex-gay therapies or counseling are left with a feeling of abandonment by God and distaste for anything Christian. “Many of them have walked away from God and any sort of faith tradition because they were so disappointed — they’d been lied to over and over again by people speaking in Jesus’ name” (Tushnet).

What would a more ethical Christian-based response to homosexuals look like? First, homosexuality would not fall into a separate sin category. The rhetoric would stop and genuine Christian loving concern would take its place. As Thompson (57) asks, “Can you imagine telling your son or daughter that heterosexuality is inherently evil because America has a divorce rate estimated at 43 percent or because 30 percent of women killed in the United States die at the hands of a husband or boyfriend?”

Ex-gay groups should not give a platform and thereby bestow credibility on people such as Anthony Falzarano. Falzarano, “the founder of P-FOX (Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays), described Matthew Shepard, the 105-pound boy who was brutally beaten and killed by thugs, as ‘a predator to heterosexual men’ ” (Pietrzyk).

Religious groups should recognize that groups such as the American Psychiatric Association, American Psychological Association, American Medical Association, and the American Academy of Pediatrics believe “that people who are troubled about their homosexual orientation have internalized society's prejudice against homosexuality, and that the appropriate task of a therapist is to help them to overcome those prejudices and to lead a happy and satisfying life as a gay man or lesbian” (Herek).

References

Besen, W. (2005). AFA video scandal. Accessed June 12, 2006 at http://www.waynebesen.com/2005/12/afa-video-scandal_06.html.

Herek, G. M. (2006). Attempts to change sexual orientation. Accessed June 14, 2006 at http://psychology.ucdavis.edu/rainbow/html/facts_changing.html.

Hilton, B. (1992). Can homophobia be cured? Wresting with questions that challenge the church. Abingdon Press: Nashville, TN.

Khan, S. (1998). Calculated compassion: how the ex-gay movement serves the right’s attack on democracy. Accessed June 12, 2006 at http://www.publiceye.org/equality/x-gay/Calculated_Compassion_TOC.html.

Pietrzyk, M. (undated). The ex-files: not your usual gays. Accessed June 12, 2006 at http://www.indegayforum.org/news/show/26866.html.

Thompson, C. A. (2004). Loving homosexuals as Jesus would: a fresh Christian approach. Brazos Press: Grand Rapids, MI.

Tushnet, E. (2006). Homo no mo’? A report from the June 10 Love Won Out conference. Accessed June 16, 2006 at http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZmM0ZThlNThiYjc2NjVjZTRlOTkzOTYyZWJmYzhlNzg