Metro Weekly

Halluhlooya, Miss Thing! For $600 Exodus ‘boot camp’ will prey same-sex desires into suppression

”How many of you are in need of some hope here tonight? How many of you are at the end of your rope? How many are ready for an encounter with the Lord?”

”I live a life of denial and I love it. I didn’t choose my same-sex feelings but I do choose how I’m going to steward them. Freedom is possible.”

”The opposite of homosexuality is not heterosexuality. It’s holiness.”

A few quotes from Alan Chambers, a leader of an Exodus retreat that promises to lead people out of their gay lifestyles and into a blissful life-long of struggle to suppress their same-sex desires. The lengthy examination of ex-gay ministries in the Times newspaper, says that each of the attendants to the seminar has paid $600, some have brought family members. All of the attendants mentioned in the article seem confused and/or saddened by the loss of relationships and are seeking for someone to promise them spiritual redemption and reconciliation with a higher power. (Times Online)


”They stopped going to church, stopped going to work. The only ones who appeared to be doing well were those who accepted that they were gay and got on with their lives…. Really, what the ex-gay movement is all about is salving the conscience of the Christian leaders who don’t like to be accused of homophobia. That way they can say ‘we don’t hate gays – look how we are welcoming them.”’

Jeremy Marks, 56, who once pioneered an ex-gay network in the UK, but realized that “same-sex attraction (SSA) therapy” could have led to the attempted suicide of one of his former residents. He now runs a openly-gay Christian group called Courage. (Times Online)

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