Another Good Friday, Another Crucifixion

Whenever Good Friday rolls around, I can't help but think of the continuing crucifixions all over the world, every day, seemingly without end. It seems like a good day to tell you about something Nancy tipped me off about earlier this week.

I first learned about the so-called "Ex-Gay" movement when I was a seminary student. My then-husband and I were the coordinators of the seminary's queer student organization (Oh, the irony!). We were the leaders of the group for several reasons:

1. We were "openly" married and straight (um, at the time we thought so, anyway).
2. We were not members of the denomination that sponsored the seminary, so its politics didn't really affect us. (Our own denomination, by and large has no problems with queers at all levels of Church involvement.)
3. Neither of us were planning to be ordained at that time so our rabble-rousing would not have any effects on our career prospects as it might for students who wanted to be ordained in the seminary's sponsoring denomination. At that time (and this continues to be true in that denomination), out queers who didn't vow celibacy could not "be hired for a position requiring ordination." Catch-22, because in that denomination, you have to get the job before they'll ordain you.

In short, the real queers (irony again) on campus were all closeted but one of our friends. Later, his boyfriend gave up his dream of ordained ministry and came out too. So there were two gay boys on campus and a freaky straight couple leading this group.

One of the things we did a lot of was big public education opportunities. We sponsored the lovely and talented Janie Spahr to lead a few days of workshops and discussions. We put together liturgies and held prayer services for justice and healing for people hurt by homophobia. We screened films and had discussions.

One film we found was called "Escape from Exodus." I tried to find a link, but it doesn't seem to exist anymore, which is too bad. It was an excellent documentary about how two ex-gay "ministry" leaders recovered from the lies in their life, fell in love with each other and dedicated their futures to helping people heal from the spiritual, psychic, emotional and often physical* damage done to them by "ex-gay" programs.

Ever since learning that these programs existed, I've kept an eye out for their risings and fallings. They seem to be mostly in decline, but where they continue, they continue to do vicious violence to people. Comical as they sometimes seem--one strategy they use is to get beauticians to give makeovers to lesbians so they will see that they really are pretty and can catch a man if they just "make an effort"--what they do is prey on the internalized homophobia of people who want to live lives of faith. As a lesbian Christian who has never in my life been told by a spiritual leader--ordained, lay or otherwise--that it is wrong to be gay, this breaks my heart in a million pieces. It just doesn't have to be.

An ex-girlfriend of mine once asked me, as a "religion expert" why I thought she was queer. I told her "because eons ago, when God came up with the idea for you, She said to Herself 'I know! I'll make her a lesbian! That'll be terrific!'" and that's what I believe. I believe that my life is ideally an unfolding of becoming more and more like the person God had in mind when She decided to make me. And coming out was/is a part of that.

If you struggle with these issues, know someone who struggles with them or just want to learn more, I introduce BeyondExGay.Com, a new online community and educational site for those "recovering" from ex-gay experiences. Its founders, together with Soulforce are also sponsoring a "thoughtful response" to the annual Exodus International (ex-gay organization) conference in July at UC-Irvine. If you are in the area, consider supporting them. You can learn more at both the Soulforce website and BeyondExGay.Com.

* No lie. The film documented people who had mutilated their genitals with acid, knives and bleach at the recommendation that they "cut it off" if it "offended" them.

Comments

[Margie]

Thanks, Shannon. Amazing the pain we humans can inflict on one another in the name of our "values." How horrible for the people who have been hurt, physically and emotionally, by the ex-gay programs.

[Lisa]

It always strikes me how, albeit loosely, parellelled the gay experience is to the disability experience.

This demand by our culture that something is wrong with us that needs to be fixed instead of being loved for who we are is what I find so similar. And that if we don't spend all of our time searching and striving to find ways to cure that part of us that others find offensive. Disabled people, and many times parents of disabled children, travel thousands of miles doing "cure tours" to different faith healers and religious types that can touch them and make them walk, see, hear...whatever. And if it doesn't work then you must not have prayed hard enough or believed enough or repented enough.

My mother did not go the religious route with me, instead we did the medical/hospital world cure tour. How nice it was when I finally grew up and could make my own medical decisions and to find out that I was fine just how I was. The emotional affects take longer to recover from, as I imagine it must be with this ex-gay business. It's hard to shake the ugliness of it. I think the support website is a really good idea.

[Gnimaerd]

This issue effects me a lot - not personally (I'm bi but much closer to being gay than being straight, but have been raised in a strictly agnostic household and never felt that it was 'wrong' or 'unnatural' for me to think 'oooh - look at the pretty girls!'), but I have two very dear friends who are gay and Christian and going through so such personal crap as a result. Their parents aren't what I've (kind of over-simply) come to think of as 'sane Christians' - that would be you and a lot of people I know in real life who are Christian and lovely, normal, sane people who believe in God and Jesus and the Bible. Their parents are crazy, homophobic whack-jobs who are using God, Jesus and the Bible as an excuse to be ignorant cruel and biggotted towards their own children.

This pains me SO much to see, because both of my friends are such wonderful, talented beautiful people - but they go through horrible funks where they can't get over their own disgust that they are gay when they've been taught for so long that that is wrong. Even though they both conciously except themselves as bein gay nd have had girlfriends - under that they suffer so much self-hatred and low self-esteem because they can't shake that 'sinful' feeling. One of them was actually contemplatin trying the whole 'ex-gay' thing. I and a couple of other non-straight friends (and a couple of straight ones, too) spent several days very gently but firmly talking her out of it.

They also tend to get into destructive, unhappy reltionships - or they sabbotage the relationships themselves. It's so hard to watch when it's so unnecissary. I mean, people talk about how gay relationships are 'fundamentaly unstable' and crap, but what do they expect when they teach their children to hate themselves like that?

Do you know of any organisations with UK branches, or in the UK itself that hve websites I could send my friends to the next time one of them crashes? I've looked myself but can't find anything specificlly helpful to young people in this situation.

[Steve Boese]

Hey there... thanks for the good words about the Beyond Ex-Gay site. Peterson and Christine are doing some amazing work with it, and I'm pleased to be along for the ride as their web developer.

"They seem to be mostly in decline..."

I'd offer a bit of clarification on that point: While I hope to witness a decline in the number and effectiveness of ex-gay ministries, I'm not seeing it yet. Many local ex-gay ministries have struggled for longevity, but as ministries fades from the scene, others tend to rise up to take their place.

James Dobson's Focus on the Family is expanding the reach of its travelling road show, Love Won Out. Leaders of the national ex-gay group Exodus have lobbied for the anti-gay federal amendment in Washington, rubbing elbows with White House staffers.

The push in the last couple of years has been to encourage conservative parents to get so-called treatment for their glbtiq teens.

People like Richard Cohen and Paul Cameron have volunteered to make fools of themselves on national TV, rightly inviting ridicule. But they are on the fringe. Just like conservatives love to point to Fred Phelps as evidence that they're not that bad, ex-gay leaders are distancing themselves from Cohen and Cameron.

So, the work remains. Folks coming out in millions of American families are still choosing, or coerced or shamed into, participation in ex-gay ministries, therapies, groups, and programs.

[Amy]

>>"because eons ago, when God came up with the idea for you, She said to Herself 'I know! I'll make her a lesbian! That'll be terrific!'"<<

It's like I do think that God made some people to be gay and others not, but I have a hard time /believing/ it sometimes, and that really helped. I mean really. I've been thinking about what you said for days, so thank you so much for that. I'm a bit stuck at the moment, in my head and soul and stuff, and that's really brilliant. Thank you.