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Автор: Tanya Erzen
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      Straight to Jesus

       Sexual and Christian Conversionsin the Ex-Gay Movement

       Tanya Erzen

      UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS

       Berkeley · Los Angeles · London

      University of California Press, one of the most distinguished university presses in the United States, enriches lives around the world by advancing scholarship in the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. Its activities are supported by the UC Press Foundation and by philanthropic contributions from individuals and institutions. For more information, visit www.ucpress.edu.

      Grateful acknowledgment is made for permission to reuse material from the author's essays “We Shall Overcome: Changing Politics and Changing Sexuality in the Ex-Gay Movement,” in Local Actions: Cultural Activism, Power, and Public Life in America, edited by Melissa Checker and Maggie Fishman, © 2004 by Columbia University Press and used by permission of Columbia University Press; and “Sexual Healing: Self-Help and Therapeutic Christianity in the Ex-Gay Movement,” in Religion and Healing in America, edited by Linda L. Barnes and Susan S. Sered, © 2.004 by Oxford University Press and used by permission of Oxford University Press.

      University of California Press

      Berkeley and Los Angeles, California

      University of California Press, Ltd.

      London, England

      © 2006 by The Regents of the University of California

      Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

      Erzen, Tanya.

      Straight to Jesus : sexual and Christian conversions in the ex-gay movement / Tanya Erzen.

      p. cm.

      Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index.

      ISBN-13 978-0-520-24581-5 (cloth : alk. paper),

      ISBN-10 0-520-24581-4 (cloth : alk. paper)—

      ISBN-13 978-0-520-24582-2 (pbk. : alk. paper),

      ISBN-10 0-520-24582-2 (pbk. : alk. paper)

      1. Church work with gays—California—San Rafael—Case studies. 2. Ex-gay movement—California—San Rafael—Case studies. 3. New Hope Ministries—Case studies. I. Title.

      BV4437.5.E79 2006

      306.6'6183576—dc22 2005023504

      Manufactured in the United States of America

      15 14 13 12 1l 10 09 08 07 06

      10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

      This book is printed on New Leaf EcoBook 60, containing 60% post-consumer waste, processed chlorine free; 30% de-inked recycled fiber, elemental chlorine free; and 10% Fsc-certified virgin fiber, totally chlorine free. EcoBook 60 is acid-free and meets the minimum requirements of ANSI/ASTM d5634-oI (Permanence of Paper).

       For WJQ

      Contents

       List of Abbreviations

       Introduction

       1. Steps Out of Homosexuality

       2. New Creations

       3. A Refuge from the World

       4. Arrested Development

       5. Testifying to Sexual Healing

       6. Love Won Out?

       Conclusion: Walking in a Dark Room

       Acknowledgments

       Notes

       Bibliography

       Index

      Abbreviations

AAAlcoholics Anonymous
AFAAmerican Family Association
APAAmerican Psychiatric Association
CCChristian Crusade
CRACenter for Reclaiming America
CWAConcerned Women for America
DOBDaughters of Bilitis
DSM-IIDiagnostic and Statistical Manual of Psychiatric Disorders, second edition
ECEvangelicals Concerned
ERAEqual Rights Amendment
EXITEx-Gay Intervention Team
JONAHJews Offering New Alternatives to Homosexuality
LGBTLesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgendered
LIALove in Action
MCCMetropolitan Community Church
NARTHNational Association for the Research and Treatment of Homosexuality
SCASexual Compulsives Anonymous
SLAASex and Love Addicts Anonymous
TVCTraditional Values Coalition

      Introduction

      In a run-down community center in San Rafael, California, a middleaged man spoke haltingly in front of fifty people sitting on rickety folding chairs. As he testified to the power of Jesus in changing his life, there were murmurs of assent. He told the assembly, “I will never be the same again. I have closed the door.” What would be a fairly normal evangelical church experience was transformed as he recounted his pornography addiction and his anonymous sexual encounters with other men. Rather than expressing shock or outrage, the members of the audience raised their arms and called out, “Praise him” and “Praise the Lord.” Hank was one of a dozen men who had come to New Hope Ministry to rid themselves of homosexuality.1 At this annual Friends and Family conference, his testimony provided assurance to the gathering that after three years, he was a living example of the possibility for change.

      Listening raptly in the audience was a new member of the program. Curtis, twenty-one years old, with streaks of blond in his hair and numerous facial piercings, had arrived from Canada a month before. Raised in a nondenominational conservative Christian family of missionaries, Curtis believed that having same sex desire was antithetical to living a Christian life. At age sixteen, he had come out to his family as “someone with gay feelings who wants to change.” Instead of attending college, he had been involved in Christian youth groups since he was eighteen. Aside from a clandestine sexual relationship in high school, he had never allowed himself to date men. Eventually, with the encouragement of his parents and youth pastor, he decided that in order to conquer his same-sex attractions, he needed to devote himself to an ex-gay program. His ultimate goal was to overcome what he called his “homosexual problem” and eventually get married. “I don't want to be fifty years old, sitting in a gay bar because I just got dumped and have no kids, no family—and be lonelier than heck,” he reasoned. Unable to secure a green card, Curtis was working in the New Hope ex-gay ministry administrative offices for the year. Whether filing