Ex-gay group Exod Internatnal shuts down, print apologiz | Natnal Catholic Reporter

Contents:

• FORMER 'EX-GAY' LEARS DENOUNCE 'CONVERSN THERAPY' IN A NEW DOCUMENTARY
• THE DOWNFALL OF THE EX-GAY MOVEMENT
• WHAT COM AFTER THE EX-GAY MOVEMENT? THE SAME THG THAT CAME BEFORE.
• MY SO-CALLED EX-GAY LIFE
• WHAT IS EXOD INTERNATNAL, THE EX-GAY CHRISTIAN GROUP AT THE CENTER OF NETFLIX'S PRAY AWAY?
• AFTER EXOD: EVANGELILS REACT AS EX-GAY MISTRY STARTS OVER
• GAY CONVERSN THERAPY DOC ‘PRAY AWAY’ RELEAS EMOTNAL TRAILER (EXCLUSIVE)
• PRAY AWAY GO DEEP INTO THE 'EX-GAY' MOVEMENT THAT BEGAN THE '70S
• NETFLIX’S “PRAY AWAY” CONONTS THE LI OF THE EX-GAY MOVEMENT
• PRAY AWAY TRAILER FEATUR REGRETFUL LEARS OF THE ‘EX-GAY’ MOVEMENT
• EXOD INTERNATNAL SAYS S ANTI-GAY VIEW WAS NOT ‘BIBLIL’
• FILMMAKER CHRONICL GAY EXOD 'DERT MIGRATN'
• U.S. GROUP THAT 'NVERTED' GAYS CLOS S DOORS AND APOLOGIZ
• 10 ANTI-GAY MYTHS DEBUNKED
• EX-GAY SHEDS THE MOCKG QUOTE MARKS
• EX-GAY GROUP EXOD INTERNATNAL SHUTS DOWN, PRINT APOLOGIZ
• ‘PRAY AWAY’ FILM REVIEW: POWERFUL DOCUMENTARY EXPLOR ‘EX-GAY’ MOVEMENT
• CONVERSN THERAPY CENTER FOUNR WHO SOUGHT TO TURN LGBTQ CHRISTIANS STRAIGHT SAYS HE’S GAY, REJECTS ‘CYCLE OF SELF SHAME’
• ANNE PLK HASN’T GIVEN UP ON EX-GAY MISTRY
• 'LET'S DO SOMETHG DIFFERENT': THE END OF THE WORLD'S LEADG 'EX-GAY' MISTRY
• WHEN EX-GAYS RETURN TO A GAY INTY
• GAY-THERAPY MISTRY SHUTS DOWN, SAYS 'WE'VE HURT PEOPLE'
• THE FUTURE OF THE "EX-GAY" MOVEMENT

FORMER 'EX-GAY' LEARS DENOUNCE 'CONVERSN THERAPY' IN A NEW DOCUMENTARY

As Stott wrote Issu Facg Christians Today back 1982, “In every discsn about homosexualy we mt be rigoro differentiatg between this ‘beg’ and ‘dog, ’ that is, between a person’s inty and activy, sexual preference and sexual practice, nstutn and nduct. As I watch evangelil church and nomatns fumble their way through discsns of sexual orientatn and inty, often enforcg the language and tegori of a failed ex-gay movement, we’re missg the real battle: The surroundg culture has nvced the world that Christians hate gay people. Foc on the Fay lled s new ex-gay mistry Love Won Out and talked about healg and rg for ex-gay movement turned the rhetoric of gay rights agast self: Shouldn't ex-gays be able to pursue therapy and live the liv they want whout facg discrimatn?

Nilosi remas NARTH's most visible are no reliable statistics for how many patients have received ex-gay treatment or how many therapists practice , but the late 1990s and early 2000s, ex-gay therapy enjoyed a legimacy hadn't sce the APA removed homosexualy om s diagnostic manual. Among them were Alan Downg, the lead therapist of JONAH (Jews Offerg New Alternativ to Homosexualy), who ma his patients strip and touch themselv ont of a mirror; NARTH member Christopher At, who was nvicted of "unlawfully, tentnally and knowgly [g] peratn of" a client; and Exod-affiliated Mike Jon, who asked a patient to take off his shirt and do ph-ups for movement also suffered several high-profile fectns. But the sprg of my sophomore year, the disparate parts of myself I had managed to hold together-the part of me that thought beg gay was wrong, the part that slept wh men anyway, the part of myself I let the world see, and the part that suffered silence-me undone.

While took years of unselg to disabe myself of the ias I had learned while unrgog therapy wh Nilosi, was the first time I enuntered profsnals who were affirmg of my sexualy, and the first time I allowed myself to thk was all right to be gay. The new Netflix documentary Pray Away exam the Exod "ex-gay" movement that was found the '70s by five men the evangelil church who sought to pray the gay word got out about the group that was seekg to ex the "homosexual liftyle, " the men received more than 25, 000 letters om folks hopg to do the same, and spurred the formatn of Exod Internatnal, the largt and most ntroversial nversn therapy anizatn the world, acrdg to the film's synopsis for the film om executive producers Ryan Murphy and Jason Blum reads:"But lears stggled wh a secret: their own 'same-sex attractns' never went away. It do so by tracg the stori of six movement lears, one of whom is still active and five of whom have renounced their big lie—that they had changed their sexual orientatn—and reveal more than two tths about the ex-gay movement, their rol , and the damage has done.

THE DOWNFALL OF THE EX-GAY MOVEMENT

” The film rightly criciz the theraptic strand, known as Reparative Therapy, for s false etlogil mol of homosexualy, the lack crentials amongst s practners, and the rank opportunism the llaboratn between a movement search of some measure of legimacy and renega therapists search of clients. Jefey McCall’s gltered posterboard ttimony may be a long way om the Plks’ slick media mpaigns, but his home church looks like almost every ex-gay worship service I’ve been to—which is to say like almost every LGBTQ worship service I’ve been to.

WHAT COM AFTER THE EX-GAY MOVEMENT? THE SAME THG THAT CAME BEFORE.

As Rodgers reunts Pray Away, a new Netflix documentary on the “ex-gay” movement wh wtern Christiany, and her book Outlove: A Queer Christian Survival Story, Chelette preached an enticg, sid gospel of change: that Rodgers’ attractn to women was due to an sufficient bond wh her mother as a child, that such attractns uld be nrologilly altered by mted study, that to do otherwise would be a disappotment to God and the muny that had formed the backbone of her life to date.

The 100-mute film, directed by Kriste Stolakis and executive produced by Ryan Murphy and Jason Blum, exam the stctively mon practice and s larger “ex-gay” movement, often led by LGBTQ+ people who themselv believed they had changed, several of whom later renounced their the film outl, nversn therapy is neher a specific practice nor sgular movement; ’s “this plex amalgamatn of old psdo-psychology that’s disproven, the spirual belief that you don’t have a place God’s kgdom if you don’t change, and then this culture that surrounds you wh the msag that are pable”, Stolakis told the Away foc particular on Exod Internatnal, the non-prof, ter-nomatnal anizatn found 1976 by five evangelil Christians, which propelled and popularized the ia that was possible – and preferable – to change one’s sexual orientatn. ” As the film not s da, youth who experienced some form of nversn therapy are more than twice as likely to die by Away clus numero figur who were formerly volved the ex-gay movement, om Exod -founr Michael Bse (who left the anizatn 1979) to former Fay Rearch Council spokpeople Yvette Cantu and John Plk. (France Orr / Los Angel Tim) A ntroversial Christian mistry that was voted to changg people “affected by homosexualy” had bee “imprisoned” by s own world view and judgment agast the gay muny and had to close, acrdg to a statement posted on the mistry’s webse.

”“We’re not negatg the ways God ed Exod to posively affect thoands of people, but a new generatn of Christians is lookg for change -- and they want to be heard, ” Exod board member Tony Moore said a announcement, which cis wh the anizatn’s annual nference Orange County, is part of an evolutn by the anizatn, which announced last year that believed that the ncept of gay “reparative therapy” didn’t work.

MY SO-CALLED EX-GAY LIFE

We need to change the way we do thgs, the language that we e, the tth of our story and how we teract wh each other as Christians, ” he told the Los Angel Allen, a former Exod employee who told his fay and iends he is gay 2012, and who appears wh Chambers on the Lisa Lg show, said, “I was credibly proud of him for dog this — and he’s takg flak om all sis.

”ALSO:LAPD fds no evince of Hollywood shootg threatExod mistry to shut down after apology to gay munyUSC-Colism al robs mms of parkg and money, crics sayE-mail: The stori shapg California Get up to speed wh our Essential California newsletter, sent six days a week. When people look back at the fabled history of Palm Sprgs 30 years, they may see the early 21st century as a perd when the cy’s support for the HIV muny beme so notable, Palm Sprgs beme a mag for patients and their loved on om all over the, along wh the d wters and affordable hog, prompted such a gay migratn to Palm Sprgs, people lled Arenas Road “Ltle Castro” and Palm Sprgs general “Castro South” after the street San Francis where Harvey Milk built his gay polil the stigma associated wh homosexualy began to dissipate the last , the name Palm Sprgs, veloped the same impact on real tate valu as monikers like Roo Drive or El Paseo.

But, before 70, 000 to 80, 000 people e to the block party, para and two-day ftivi, the Palm Sprgs Internatnal Film Ftival will prent a film that has already won praise at two other California film ftivals for tellg the story of what attracted such a wave of gay rints to Palm Sprgs and how those people have fared.

WHAT IS EXOD INTERNATNAL, THE EX-GAY CHRISTIAN GROUP AT THE CENTER OF NETFLIX'S PRAY AWAY?

(Rters) - A Christian group that once promoted therapy to enurage gays and lbians to overe their sexual preferenc has closed s doors and apologized to homosexuals, acknowledgg s missn had been hurtful and Internatnal billed self as the olst and largt Christian mistry alg wh fah and homosexualy, operatg sce 1976. Supreme Court is expected to le by the end of June on a challenge to the Defense of Marriage Act, a 1996 law that rtricted feral regnn of marriage to heterosexual upl, as well as a challenge to a 2008 California referendum that banned same-sex marriage that Murray, a spokman for gay rights group GLAAD, lled the closg of Exod Internatnal a step the right directn and weled Chambers’ move away om “divisive and monizg rhetoric. ”“But ’s gog to take a long time for healg to e, pecially for the people who have gone through Chambers’ program and have suffered bee of , ” Murray Internatnal’s missn statement was “mobilizg the body of Christ to mister grace and tth to a world impacted by homosexualy.

Ever sce born-aga sger and orange juice pchwoman Ana Bryant helped kick off the ntemporary anti-gay movement some 40 years ago, hard-le elements of the relig right have been searchg for ways to monize gay people — or, at a mimum, to fd arguments that will prevent their normalizatn society.

AFTER EXOD: EVANGELILS REACT AS EX-GAY MISTRY STARTS OVER

But addn to hawkg that myth, the legns of anti-gay activists who followed have add a panoply of others, rangg om the extremely doubtful claim that sexual orientatn is a choice, to unalloyed li like the claims that gay men molt children far more than heterosexuals or that hate crime laws will lead to the legalizatn of btialy and necrophilia.

Depictg gay men as a threat to children may be the sgle most potent weapon for stokg public fears about homosexualy — and for wng electns and referenda, as Ana Bryant found out durg her succsful 1977 mpaign to overturn a Da County, Fla., ordance barrg discrimatn agast gay people. Gregory Herek, a profsor at the Universy of California, Davis, who is one of the natn's leadg rearchers on prejudice agast sexual mori, reviewed a seri of studi and found no evince that gay men molt children at higher rat than heterosexual men.

The Amerin Amy of Child & Adolcent Psychiatry affirmed 2013 that “[c]urrent rearch shows that children wh gay and lbian parents do not differ om children wh heterosexual parents their emotnal velopment or their relatnships wh peers and adults” and they are “not more likely than children of heterosexual parents to velop emotnal or behavral problems.

GAY CONVERSN THERAPY DOC ‘PRAY AWAY’ RELEAS EMOTNAL TRAILER (EXCLUSIVE)

The Amerin Amy of Pediatrics (AAP) a 2002 policy statement clared: "A growg body of scientific lerature monstrat that children who grow up wh one or two gay and/or lbian parents fare as well emotnal, gnive, social, and sexual functng as do children whose parents are heterosexual. The Amerin Psychiatric Associatn noted a 2000 fact sheet available on the Associatn of Gay and Lbian Psychiatrists, that alg wh gay, lbian and bisexual issu, that sexual abe do not appear to be any more prevalent among children who grow up and intify as gay, lbian or bisexual than children who grow up and intify as heterosexual.

Siarly, the Natnal Organizatn on Male Sexual Victimizatn not on s webse that "experts the human sexualy field do not believe that premature sexual experienc play a signifint role late adolcent or adult sexual orientatn" and add that 's unlikely that anyone n make another person gay or heterosexual. Anti-LGBT anizatns, seekg to promote heterosexualy as the healthier "choice, " often offer up the purportedly shorter life spans and poorer physil and mental health of gays and lbians as reasons why they shouldn't be allowed to adopt or foster children.

Anti-gay activists, who have long opposed addg LGBT people to those protected by hate crime legislatn, have repeatedly claimed that such laws would lead to the jailg of relig figur who preach agast homosexualy — part of a bid to ga the backg of the broar relig muny for their posn. Anti-gay groups have been adamantly opposed to allowg gay men and lbians to serve openly the armed forc, not only bee of their purported fear that bat reads will be unrmed, but bee the ary has long been nsired the purt merocracy Ameri (the armed forc were succsfully racially tegrated long before Amerin civil society, for example).

PRAY AWAY GO DEEP INTO THE 'EX-GAY' MOVEMENT THAT BEGAN THE '70S

At the same time, gays and lbians have served openly for years the armed forc of 25 untri (as of 2010), cludg Bra, Israel, South Ai, Canada and Atralia, acrdg to a report released by the Palm Center, a policy thk tank at the Universy of California at Santa Barbara. Dpe the fact that gay men and lbians have been servg openly the ary sce September 2011, anti-LGBT groups ntue to claim that openly gay personnel are g problems the ary, cludg claims of sexual abe by gay and lbian soldiers of straight soldiers. Though is te that LGBT people tend to suffer higher rat of anxiety, prsn, and prsn-related illns and behavrs like alhol and dg abe than the general populatn, that is due to the historil social stigmatizatn of homosexualy and vlence directed at LGBT people, not bee of homosexualy self.

A report prented by the Council on Scientific Affairs to the AMA Hoe of Delegat Interim Meetg wh regard to reparative (“ex-gay”) therapy noted that most of the emotnal disturbance gay men and lbians experience around their sexual inty is not based on physlogil , but rather on “a sense of alienatn an unacceptg environment. Mark Hatzenbuehler, a socmedil scienc profsor at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia Universy, said that the data gathered the study suggts that “sexual mori livg muni wh high levels of anti-gay prejudice have creased risk of mortaly, pared to low-prejudice muni. Qazi Rahman, study -thor and a leadg scientist on human sexual orientatn, said: "This study puts ld water on any ncerns that we are lookg for a sgle 'gay gene' or a sgle environmental variable which uld be ed to 'select out' homosexualy — the factors which fluence sexual orientatn are plex.

NETFLIX’S “PRAY AWAY” CONONTS THE LI OF THE EX-GAY MOVEMENT

The Amerin Amy of Pediatrics stated 1993 (updated 2004) that “homosexualy has existed most societi for as long as rerd scriptns of sexual beliefs and practic have been available” and that even at that time, “most scholars the field state that one’s sexual orientatn is not a choice … dividuals do not choose to be homosexual or heterosexual.

PRAY AWAY TRAILER FEATUR REGRETFUL LEARS OF THE ‘EX-GAY’ MOVEMENT

A number of "ex-gay" relig mistri have spng up recent years wh the aim of teachg gay people to bee heterosexuals, and the have bee prime purveyors of the claim that gays and lbians, wh the aid of mental therapy and Christian teachgs, n "e out of homosexualy. Tagged wh Alive, Anger, Bible, Birthday, Christ, Christian, Church, Cold, Communy, Culture war, Fah, Fay, Friends, Friendship, Gay, Gay Communy, Givg, God, Gospel, Grief, Healg, Health, Heart, Heaven, Homosexual, Homosexualy, Honor, Hope, Hoe, Inty, J, Life, Lord, Love, Mercy, Mom, Mother, NAMI, Nartics Anonymo, Natnal Suici Preventn Lifele, Passn, Public Policy, Refuge, Relatnship, Salvatn, Scripture, Sexualy, SSA, stereotyp, Suici, Support, Trevor Project, Wrg.

Tagged wh Anger, Bible, Christ, Christian, Christians, Church, Debate, Ex-gay, Fah, Gay, Gay Christian, God, Grace, Heterosexual, Hols, Homosexual, Hope, Inty, J, Judgment, Lbian, Life, Love, Marriage, Pornography, Romans, Science, Sex, Sexual Inty, S, Study, Tth. Tagged wh Addictn, Alan Chambers, Baptist, Battl, Change, Christ, Christian, Church, Emotnal, Emotnal Depenncy, Enurage, Ex-gay, Exod, Fah, Fear, Gay, Givg, God, Guys, Healg, Heart, Help, Heterosexual, Hols, Homosexual, Hope, Journey, Kid, Learship, Life, Lord, Love, Men, Mistry, Prayer, Relatnship, Release, School, Sex, Sexualy, S, Southern Baptist, SSA, Straight, Stggle, Stggl, Support, Temptatn, Trial, Worship.

Tagged wh Alan Chambers, Change, Christiany, Christians, Church, Communy, Ex-gay, Exod Internatnal, Fah, Fear, Friendship, Gay, Gay Communy, Good News, Gospel, Grace, Lbian, LGBT, Lisa Lg, Mistry, Oprah, Relatnships, Rpect, Sexualy, SSA, Tst, Tth. Tagged wh Alan Chambers, Anger, Change, Child, Children, Christ, Church, Dir, Fivens, Friends, Gay, Givg, God, Grace, Heart, Heavenly Father, Help, Heterosexual, Hope, Inty, ternatnal, J, Llie Chambers, Love, Marriage, Natnal, Parents, Repentance, Sex, Sexualy, S, Tst, Tth, Women.

EXOD INTERNATNAL SAYS S ANTI-GAY VIEW WAS NOT ‘BIBLIL’

Tagged wh Alan Chambers, Bety, Bible, Change, Christ, Christian, Church, Communy, Conversatns, Enurage, Foc On The Fay, Freedom, Gay, Gay Communy, God, Gospel, Grace, Honty, Honor, J, Joe Dallas, Love Won Out, Marriage, Oprah, Rpect, SSA, Tolerance, Tst. AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTAn latn verbal attacks by the Polish ernment, wh the support of the Roman Catholic Church, as well as the threat of physil vlence on the streets of many ci, has triggered an exod of gay Mucha for The New York TimFor months, ernment misters spewed vic rhetoric about gay people. But now their numbers are beg add to by gay people fleeg an creasgly hostile environment Limowicz for The New York TimAcrdg to a 2020 survey by ILGA-Europe, an ternatnal gay rights anizatn, Poland now ranks as the most homophobic untry the European Unn.

”Homosexualy has long been taboo Poland, where the Roman Catholic Church, which plays a proment role the untry’s social and polil life, has worked hand hand wh the ernment to promote a nservative way of church, which is particularly powerful ral areas, has adopted an actively hostile attu toward gay people. Neher the ernment nor the print rpond to requts for April 2019 Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the chairman of the Law and Jtice party and Poland’s facto lear, lled homosexualy a “threat to Polish inty, to our natn, to s existence, and th to the Polish state. The relig ex-gay therapy as practiced by Exod and also by a group lled Livg Hope, which was n by a man named Ricky Chelette, is a bastardized and near-ic versn of the psychotherapy doled out by Nilosi and his ilk, wh a leang on clichés about childhood trma as the explanatn for everythg.

As “Pray Away” go on, and the old ex-gay mistri start to fall apart and regroup only as weakened versns of themselv, there is the sense that this will soon be a ad issue, or at least an issue so small that at least won’t hurt as many people as once did.

FILMMAKER CHRONICL GAY EXOD 'DERT MIGRATN'

A Latter-day Sat unselor who practiced nversn therapy said January that he is gay and that he “unequivolly renounc” ex-gay announced June that he was gay, almost two years after Hope for Wholens’s board of directors fired him, the Post and Courier reported. But crics said that Exod's re msage--one of s longtime tagl was "change is possible"--and s embrace of "nversn" therapy did enormo emotnal, spirual and psychologil damage, perpetuated outdated stereotyp and wholly wrong theori about the origs of homosexualy, and even led to untls breadth of Chambers's apology was unprecented and startlg (you n read the whole text here).

U.S. GROUP THAT 'NVERTED' GAYS CLOS S DOORS AND APOLOGIZ

It’s worth notg how this stance reprents ntradictory doublpeak om the LGBTQ movement, which on one hand sists that gay inty is utterly unchangeable, while on the other suggts sexualy and genr are fluid and that radil self-exprsn mands we n change our inti on any given Tuday. "It's a sad day for the ex-gay movement, where the largt Christian anizatn that's existed for almost 40 years, [that] has really given a lot of hope to people who are tryg to e out of homosexualy, is basilly sayg that people n't change, " Doyle told NPR.

The negative nnotatns and bad memori Chambers is referrg to would be Exod' s-long history as a powerful lobby agast gay rights and leadg advote for "reparative" therapy, a discreded treatment that claims to "cure" or mimize what those the ex-gay movement ll "unwanted same-sex attractns. While Chambers has nounced reparative therapy, stepped back om polics and exprsed a sire to promote acceptance and clivy for LGBT Christians, he hasn't changed his posn on the re prciple that ground Exod' work the first place: that beg gay go agast biblil edicts erng sexualy and that marriage, his view, remas a one man-one woman stutn.

This amg is somethg Chambers pivots back and forth between his nversatn wh Salon, never fully landg on or stickg to an answer about whether beg gay is "OK" or jt "a realy" to al wh; never soundg exactly fortable articulatg anythg beyond a sire to promote peace and acceptance.

10 ANTI-GAY MYTHS DEBUNKED

But acceptance and opportuny for LGBT people is extribly bound up wh a legislative agenda Chambers wants to steer clear of: the drive to secure equal marriage rights and more than 1, 000 attendant benefs for gay upl, to pass the Employment Non-Discrimatn Act to protect LGBT workers om job discrimatn, and a number of other very real, very ncrete ways that LGBT people and their alli are workg to secure digny, rpect and equaly unr the law.

EX-GAY SHEDS THE MOCKG QUOTE MARKS

EX-GAY GROUP EXOD INTERNATNAL SHUTS DOWN, PRINT APOLOGIZ

‘PRAY AWAY’ FILM REVIEW: POWERFUL DOCUMENTARY EXPLOR ‘EX-GAY’ MOVEMENT

CONVERSN THERAPY CENTER FOUNR WHO SOUGHT TO TURN LGBTQ CHRISTIANS STRAIGHT SAYS HE’S GAY, REJECTS ‘CYCLE OF SELF SHAME’

ANNE PLK HASN’T GIVEN UP ON EX-GAY MISTRY

'LET'S DO SOMETHG DIFFERENT': THE END OF THE WORLD'S LEADG 'EX-GAY' MISTRY

WHEN EX-GAYS RETURN TO A GAY INTY

GAY-THERAPY MISTRY SHUTS DOWN, SAYS 'WE'VE HURT PEOPLE'

THE FUTURE OF THE "EX-GAY" MOVEMENT