March 15, 2014

The Winter 2014 PFOX newsletter has the first part of a testimony by Steve and Janice Graham. “When Steve and Janice’s son confessed his struggles with homosexuality and internet pornography, they rallied around him with love, and found him the help he was seeking.” Regina Griggs of PFOX hopes the story of these two parents and their son will “offer you a ray of hope and the strength to persevere through your challenges.”

March 14, 2014

The following excerpts are from the article “Gay ‘conversion therapy’ bill withdrawn as advocates pursue regulatory oversight” on the Baltimore Sun website: “Gay rights advocates and the state legislator who introduced legislation this session to ban so-called “gay conversion therapy” in Maryland have withdrawn the bill, saying they will instead pursue regulatory oversight of the controversial practice.” …

“In a joint statement Friday, Cardin and Equality Maryland officials said that in research for the bill, and in talking to “several organizations with expertise in regulatory protections for patients,” they concluded that patients who feel they have been harmed by “conversion” or “reparative” therapy already have avenues to complain to state health occupation boards.” …

March 13, 2014

The following excerpt is from the article “Setting the Record Straight on ‘Gay Conversion’ Therapy for Minors” by Christopher Doyle on the Christian Post website: “… In a senate hearing in February, a representative of the Washington Department of Health, which has jurisdiction over professional licensing and fields approximately 10,000 complaints a year, said that the current staff has 11 years of institutional knowledge and no one was aware of a single complaint alleging that a licensed therapist had attempted to coerce someone into not being gay.” …

“In my clinical experience, I have worked with roughly 50-75 adolescents (mostly young men) who have been distressed by homosexual desires that did not align with their values and life goals. In the vast majority of cases, the youth who entered therapy did not identify themselves as gay, but rather, believed they were inherently heterosexual with unwanted homosexual desires. For these clients, underlying issues for the development of same-sex attractions are identified and resolved over the course of treatment, with outcomes typically consisting of a reduction of homosexual feelings, along a continuum, and an increase in heterosexual feelings.” (more…)

March 11, 2014

The following excerpts are from the blog “Love the Sinner, Hate the Sin” on the Homosexuals Anonymous website: … “We are supposed to love the sinner, but hate sin (i.e. what he/she does or fantasizes about). At first glance this sounds perfectly right. And yet I’ve come to really dislike that statement and I ask my brothers and sisters to refrain from using such commonplaces, especially when it comes to people with same-sex attractions. And this for the following reasons:” …

“3. … Throughout my whole “gay” time (which was many, many years!) I had the feeling that this is not only how I am, but most of all who I am. This is my identity – (more…)

March 10, 2014

The following excerpts are from the blog “Personal thoughts on the Journey into Manhood weekend” on the North Star website: … “My discussion here is confined to these three important points: (a) what are some reasons I should go, or what things can I expect to learn or gain from the weekend, (b) what red flags are there that could mean I’m not ready, or this won’t be a good experience for me?, or that I don’t need to go/won’t benefit from it, and (c) what expectations should I have for the weekend and–even more importantly–the time following it? In other words, will the weekend really change me, and how? (more…)

March 7, 2014

The following excerpts are from the article “Judge not satisfied Boris Johnson told full story about ban on ex-gay bus advert” on the Christian Concern website: “A High Court Judge has ordered the Mayor of London to provide full, unedited copies of internal documents ‘in order to get to the bottom’ of his decision to ban a bus advertisement by a Christian charity that helps people place their Christian identity over their same sex attraction.”

“Mrs Justice Lang who presided at the original appeal against the ban, today said, ‘I am still not satisfied that the full story is being told.’ Her comments follow the revelation of emails between the Mayor’s office and Transport for London (TfL) which were not seen by the Judge at the first hearing. The emails were only revealed following the case after Core Issues Trust (CIT), issued a Freedom of Information request.” (more…)

March 4, 2014

The following comment by Dr. Robert Gagnon was posted on the PFOX website: “Reparative therapy is not a ‘name it, claim it, pray the gay away’ form of therapy. Quite the contrary. Nor does it presume that one will never again struggle with sexual temptation. Nor does it contend that becoming heterosexual is ‘a primary goal of Christianity.’ It aims are more modest: To help persons with same-sex attractions to deal with emotional wounds that contributed to the intensity of such attractions. In this it is no different from numerous other valid therapies that seek to help Christians who struggle with depression, anger, insecurity, and various other intense sinful desires.”

March 4, 2014

The following excerpts are from the blog “Downward Ascent 1: Blessed Poverty” on Andrew Comiskey’s website: … “Today the real poverty of homosexuality masks itself as a kind of wealth—a boast, a right, a celebration of new civil liberties. The morally homeless have found a home with secular powerbrokers of all types: political, academic, in popular arts. But no amount of human advocacy can remove our shameful nakedness.”

“This Lent, I urge you to go with me to the source of our poverty: the sin and disorder that impacts us all, beginning with our first family. Lent insists that we go back to the secrets and lies between Adam and Eve. (more…)

March 3, 2014

The following excerpts are from the blog “A Doll’s Lesson” on Joe Dallas’s website: “Jan Frank, a terrific author, speaker and therapist dealing with women’s issues, made a point decades ago during one of her presentations that I’ve never forgotten. … ‘When someone’s wounded they need healing, when someone’s in rebellion they need to repent, and when they’re bound, they need deliverance. So before advising what action to take, be sure you’re noticed what the need really is!’”

”That stuck with me. To this day, I hear people refer to rebellion as something a person needs to be healed of, or wounds as something someone needs an exorcism for, or bondage as something to repent of. In all these cases, the proposed cure isn’t applicable to the problem. An approach that matches the need is critical, whether we’re dealing with someone we’re ministering to, or dealing with ourselves.” (more…)

March 3, 2014

Following are excerpts of Core Issues Trust response to the “Conversion Therapy Consensus Statement” produced by the UK Council for Psychotherapy: “1. … the document’s main argument is that there is “no good evidence this [type of therapy] works and we believe it has the potential to cause harm.” It implies that this approach is based on religious interpretation rather than science. We note the reference to “no good evidence”. In fact the best study that we have did find good evidence of change in people seeking to reduce or eliminate same-sex attractions (see below). We note too the statement that “we believe it has the potential to cause harm”. This statement is premised on the view that sexual orientation is fixed and unchangeable. They may indeed believe this, but where is the science? Their own flawed claim rebounds against them: there is no good evidence that talking therapies cause harm.” (more…)