Reparative Ministries Reach Out to Homosexuals
Groups believe orientation can be changed

When Paul's son was born last year, the delivery room experience was "scary, terrifying, confusing - it was exhilarating," he says. "I felt like I was witnessing a miracle. I didn't know I could love another person like I do." What's more, says the Calgary businessman, "I didn't know I had the capacity to love another male this way."

Paul is astonished, because from his late teens until his mid-30s, he lived the gay lifestyle. Paul was often thrilled but never happy in the life, he says. It never added up to anything. He tried celibacy, but in the 1980s, few therapists thought someone's orientation could change.
"Paul" is not his real name. He runs a small firm in north Calgary, his wife is a teacher, he attends a conservative church, and he has a brand new son. "You can stand up in church and say, I'm alcoholic; it's cool. But ex-gay is not cool," he says. "I'm not so worried about my church; in my church alone there are two guys who left the life, have families, and it's no big deal for them. I worry about gay activists. I knew lots of wonderful guys, but activists hate anyone saying all this."

Paul's son is the result of a mainly faith-based movement that grew in the 1990s: reparative ministry to homosexuals. Exodus Ministries (www.exodus-international.org) and its Living Waters program are celebrating their 30th birthday, with 130 ministries continent-wide and 50 more in training. There are Catholic Courage, Jewish Jonah, Mormon Evergreen, the new Anglican Zacchias networks, and scores of independent ministries. Their efforts are backed by secular therapists with the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (www.narth.com). NARTH has 1,000 chartered psychologists, including 50 in Canada, says its president Joseph Nicolosi.

In 2001, psychologist Robert Spitzer, who spearheaded the American Psychological Association's 1973 normalization of homosexuality, published a landmark study affirming sexual orientation changeability.

Last summer, the APA finally accepted reparative therapy as ethical, when offered to people who freely want to change. And last fall, former APA president Robert Perloff publicly called NARTH "a voice crying in the wilderness." "There were positive steps in 2004 to show our culture is becoming pro-change," says Exodus president Alan Chambers, a former homosexual. "The U.S. media still won't let us speak, but hundreds of thousands of men and women like me have now found freedom. There's way more of us than radicals for gay marriage."

Psychologist Jane Oxenbury of Calgary's Edan Counselling Associates thinks sexual orientation therapy is "not very useful" for people. "It buys into a homophobic, heterosexist world that doesn't allow people to be who they are," says Oxenbury. "There are stories of people who seem to change their orientation, and stories of people treated with disrespect, as if there was something wrong with them," she says. "In my experience, a person's sexual orientation is what it is. People who've attempted to be other than what they are, after a few years, find they've dishonoured a part of themselves." Asked if people desiring to change have a right to try, Oxenbury says, "Certainly they do." But she warns they should be watchful of the harm others may inflict on them in trying. "I'd counsel them to go into it with an informed decision,"
Oxenbury says.

Gay-friendly psychologist Donna Gould says she gets worried hearing about sexual orientation therapy. "I heard a supposedly ex-gay speaker at a youth rally, talking about his struggle and that sort of thing. I'd really want to know the motivation. Are they doing something that's good for the individual? Or are they doing something to please the people around them?" Gould asks. "It's a huge challenge for gay or lesbian people to come out, and the role of psychology is helping people be comfortable with who they really are." Gould says the APA ruled gay and lesbian "normal, healthy sexual identities" 20 years ago. So she believes the motive behind any homosexual seeking change is internalization of pervasive societal homophobia.

Paul first tried gay sex while a student at Viscount Bennett High in the late 1970s. "I had a busy, emotionally distant father, and I just didn't feel masculine," he says. "So I longed to be one of the guys. Then I discovered gay pornography. It taught me how guys have sex with guys, so I figured, maybe what I want is sex ... At first, it was exciting." In Grade 11, Paul discovered "cruising for sex." While still in high school, he tried it only a few times. Then he went to the States for college and discovered the bar scene. Paul had a couple or more new friends a week. He tried monogamy, but it was "never satisfying," quickly got boring.

Returning to Calgary in the 1980s, Paul realized he wanted to change.
But therapists "never thought change was possible." A few told him to "just stop the behaviour," but the more he tried, the more he desired. "My self-esteem was low," he says; "I didn't feel I had a masculine identity." Finally in the 1990s, Paul went to an Exodus conference. He joined a Living Waters group and read two important books: Nicolosi's Reparative Therapy of Male Homosexuality, and Yale psychologist Jeffrey Satinover's Homosexuality and the Politics of Truth.

He was celibate for two years and thought he had it beat. But, over-confident, he crashed - "it was awful" - and returned to cruising for a year. "Then I picked myself up and dusted myself off," he says: He went back to church, deliberately cultivated straight male friends, and found an older man for accountability. "I asked him if I could call him every night for a month, just to say I hadn't been cruising that night," he says. "After a month, I asked for another month, then three more months. When I finally didn't need to call him anymore, he missed the calls."

By now in his late 30s, Paul was resigned to a single life. But in 2001, after being celibate for years, he met Sandra, five years younger. After they dated six months, he spilled the beans. "That was terrifying," he says. "She's a professional, and she'd never heard of anyone changing.
But we were in love." Paul and Sandra married in 2003. Their first son (Paul says Sandra wants more) was born in 2004. "How have I changed? I can still look at a guy and think to myself, he has a nice butt. But it doesn't interest me anymore. I'm in love with my wife."

Reparative ministries have a hard time with gay radicals, says Exodus's Chambers. They react loudly to any hint homosexuality is abnormal. Since such ministries reach out to gays seeking change, they speak quietly and avoid controversy. "The gay lobby thinks we're mean, hateful people, when we're really just trying to tell our stories," Chambers says. "The church lost in the last 20 years, being too passive and too aggressive.

Too passive, when it loved without saying anything. Too aggressive, when it condemned the behaviour without helping. We want to get Christians to treat this with love and truth, not just love or truth."

Chambers says success rates of orientation therapies vary with definitions. APA's Spitzer found that 11% of men and 37% of women had a "complete change," including eliminating fantasies. But that bar is set too high, Chambers believes: "In a pornographic age, monogamous heterosexual males struggle with fantasies." More realistically, Chambers says, the success rate is like Alcoholics Anonymous. "About a third have a complete change, getting married and having a family or living as productive singles. A third end up struggling, and it remains a struggle. And about a third try it, decide change isn't for them and go back to the life."

Larry, 54, with Living Waters Calgary, says the program is "strictly confidential," because of both angry straights and gays. "I know what it's like at the other end, singled out to live with guilt and shame," he says. Larry, molested as a boy by a family doctor, was gay until 1996. "I tried to get out for years and years, but it took getting infected with HIV before I took it seriously." Living Waters Calgary does not advertise. It can be reached only by voice mail, 920-0298, or by visiting www.livingwaterscanada.org. Applicants, struggling with all sorts of "sexual brokenness" from porn to promiscuity, must be vetted before admission to the 30-week program. Yet the 20-plus yearly slots fill quickly. "I can't say they're all sad in the gay lifestyle," Larry says. "Some say they're genuinely happy with their choice. Some are militant the life is totally normal, and anyone trying to leave is crazy. But some live the life as medication for their pain, sex as a way of numbing grief. Faith is key, Larry says. "We can only do so much ourselves; faith carries us beyond," he says. "And I've experienced miracles. For me to forgive people who've hurt me is not natural. To step out of an addict's life is not natural. They're miracles. I was a sex addict, and now I'm straight." Living Waters won't admit anyone without faith: "We do fairly in-depth healing prayer." Exodus's Chambers says no-one can force change on anyone; change depends entirely on motivation. It's like alcoholism, he says: "People have a right to drink," and "Alcoholism happens to good people."

Laurie Arron of the gay advocacy group EGALE is adamant: "Studies show reparative therapy doesn't work in the long run. It doesn't create sexual desire for the opposite-sex. Eventually, people's natural orientation asserts itself." Arron cites Michael Bussee, one of Exodus's five founders, who ran an ex-gay ministry in Anaheim with Gary Cooper.

Both married, but in 1979, they left their wives and kids and moved in together. Cooper died of AIDS in 1988. "That story comes up over and over," says Chambers. "Michael's part of our history, and we celebrate his life, as much as we do the lives of the other four gay founders, who changed for good 30 years ago." Chambers says Bussee's ex-wife is still involved, speaking at Exodus conferences; they attract a thousand ex-gays yearly.

Paul says he's awed by how he and his wife are united by difference.

"She's a professional, so we don't have traditional roles. But there's a complementarity, something in the difference binding us together. No same-sex relationship has that bond." Ironically, on their wedding day, Paul and Sandra went to a park for pictures, and a lesbian couple was there, having their pictures taken. "My heart hurt for them," he says.

"They were trying to do the same thing, but it was a counterfeit reality."