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look out for an article in this Saturday's SMH 28 Feb

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Anthony Venn-Brown
 
Joined in 2005
February 26, 2009, 10:53

A number of us have been interviewed about Living Waters and the ex-gay movement. Unless the story gets bumped because of other news….it should appear in Saturdays SMH.



Anthony Venn-Brown
 
Joined in 2005
February 27, 2009, 08:00

it went in today


http://www.smh.com.au/national/straight-and-narrow-20090226-8j9y.html?page=-1


and you can read more comments here


http://alifeofunlearning.blogspot.com/



orfeo
 
Joined in 2007
February 27, 2009, 13:30

You know, the only bit of that really raised my hackles was the assertion that there’s no such thing as a gay Christian – you can’t sit in the pew and be both.


…so what the heck was I doing for all those years, hmm? Even if I was ‘struggling’ with my sexuality, it was still there. And the article opens with the idea that you have to admit your homosexuality before you can be cured of it.


As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, the great thing that Living Waters actually gave me was a space where I could honestly share my feelings for men. That was its benefit. But it sounds as if Ian Lind denies the existence of having feelings for men and being saved at the same time.


Or does he think you’re only ‘gay’ if you act on those feelings??


I just get really annoyed when people tell me I don’t exist. šŸ˜†



Anthony Venn-Brown
 
Joined in 2005
February 27, 2009, 16:32

Once again Orfeo…..I dont think they have really thought these things through.


….and that is pretty obvious by the statements that are made.


When I was in the US at the ex-gay survivors conference in 2007. …..the exodus conference was being held in the same suburb.


It was at the Exodus Conference they decided to use the term struggler instead of ex-gay…….not much hope in that term or identity is there.


I really feel sorry for these people.



frogger
 
Joined in 2005
March 2, 2009, 13:50

The things I found saddest is Ron Brookman and the other guy will never free to be and so will never have a wholeness in themselves..


It makes me more than cranky just how many people kill themselves because of the lies these two men tell themselves



Anthony Venn-Brown
 
Joined in 2005
March 2, 2009, 14:24

its a tragedy isn’t. the people who run these progams have no contact with people that have left as far as i know.


I remember when I left the 6 months program that I was told that I was not to have any contact with people from the church unless I was truly repentant. I remember that Shirley actually send messages to church leaders and my friends to have nothing to do with me as I was an apostate…..I’d been handed over to the devil apparently.


When I went of visit my friends they wouldn’t allow me in the house and asked me to leave.


as I mentioned on my blog


Unfortunately I have to deal with dark side of the Ć©x-gayā€™ myth. The failures. People like Ron donā€™t see them in the state I do as they have left the programs.


Currently Iā€™m working with a guy who was a leader in Living Waters ministry. At the age of 40 his marriage began to fall apart once he disclosed to his wife that he had had sex with a man. The wife threw him out, turned his daughters against himā€¦ā€¦and all his social network and friends have done the same. He is in grief at the loss of so much. (I know what that is about).


Then there is the doctor in a rural town who injected himself with an overdose of morphine outside the town in his carā€¦.leaving behind a wife and three kids. I donā€™t know if they know the real reason he killed himself. But I know it was because he was gay and a Christian.


Then there is the young guy who went through Ronā€™s program and attempted suicide three times.


ā€¦.and David who jumped off a bridge in the Blue Mountains


ā€¦.the 16 year old who put his head on a railway track down in the Shire


The issue is always the sameā€¦ā€¦the perceived conflict between their sexuality and their faith.


I could go onā€¦..but you get the pictureā€¦ā€¦.itā€™s a very sad state of affairsā€¦..and will continue as long as Ron and other ex-gay ministries tell people that their same sex orientation is dysfunctional and the only life that will be happy and rewarding for them is to overcome their same sex attraction and channel their sexual energy into a ā€˜normalā€™ heterosexual marriage.


its wrong….and very cruel…..and we will never be able to number those we have lost through suicide or…..count the cost on the life of those who’ve walked away with the belief they are a failure and that God will no longer love them as long as they are same sex oriented.



Shane Cathcart
Event Coordinator
Joined in 2009
March 2, 2009, 15:02

It’s sad that they don’t acknowledge failure, or if they do they blame it on a lack of committment on behalf of the attendee. But I’m willing to bet that even some of their “success” stories aren’t all they are cracked up to be. There must be so much pressure to maintain that image and be seen as cured. I wonder how much damage to the psyche that does?



Anthony Venn-Brown
 
Joined in 2005
March 3, 2009, 00:32

yep…..I remember being told I didn’t want to genuinely change……if only they knew of all the tears I cried…..and the constant battle I fought in my mind to never think like a same sex oriented person.


Imagine the torment a heterosexual person would go through trying to shut down every thought, interest or attraction to the opposite sex.


No wonder so many of us end up with mental health issues.



magsdee
Disabled
Joined in 2006
March 3, 2009, 08:13

My niece knows Ron and is quite involved with living waters. The ex-gay side of things most definately needs to be scrapped but dealing with sexual issues and such has brought some amazing healing to my niece and I did find aspects of it very helpful. She accepts that one is born with a predisposition to be either gay or not, she loves my g/f too šŸ˜€


He recently told my niece that scientists have found that a hormone released in the last tri-mester of pregnancy goes a bit wry in some people and affects things in such a way that the baby ends up same-sex attracted (dont quote me but something like that šŸ˜³ ), so the thought that one isnt born gay is starting to slowly slip away…….what your born with cant be changed and to us, its normal 8)



Anthony Venn-Brown
 
Joined in 2005
March 3, 2009, 08:49

thats interesting Maggie…..certainly not what Living Waters teach. What your neice says is true.


I often say its good that people get help with sexual addiction and sexual abuse in these groups….but of course they are often confused about sexual orientation….these are all very different things.


Almost everyone in ā€œex-gayā€ programs live tormented lives of sexual addiction, have self destructive behaviours or been sexually abused. Heterosexuals have the same problems but donā€™t blame their sexual orientation for this.


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