It is no secret that religion significantly influences how many people understand and express sexuality. Countless sociologists have explored the extent to which our sexual behaviors, our identities, our relationships – all of these things – can be mediated by religion. Similarly, our religious identities, beliefs, and behaviors can also be impacted by our sexuality. Perhaps one of the clearest examples comes from the lives of women and men who have been a part of the ex-gay movement in North America.
The ex-gay movement is a network of para-church ministries, support groups, residential programs, supportive churches, and Christian therapists, aimed at helping people rid themselves of unwanted same-sex sexual attractions. The first professionalized ex-gay organization was created in 1976, a backlash against the sexual revolution and the gains of the gay and lesbian rights movement (particularly the de-pathologization of homosexuality by the American Psychological Association). Ex-gays believe that people can change their sexual orientation through the right combination of therapy and prayer. People who have same-sex attractions are not actually gay or lesbian, from this point of view. They are heterosexual at their core but through some set of childhood circumstances were knocked off course. In the face of “misguided” feelings, they have made the moral decision to claim a gay or lesbian identity and to act upon their same-sex sexual attractions. Though it has taken some decades to gain recognition within the Christian Right, the movement has arguably been a significant factor in changing how evangelicals talk about homosexuality (Stafford 2007).
Ex-gay ministries and other counselors who use therapeutic means to eradicate same-sex sexual attractions have been widely denounced by countless professional organizations, including the American Psychological Association, the American Psychiatric Association, National Association of Social Workers, and the American Medical Association (Lambda Legal 2011). Over the years there have also been a number of very public departures from the movement. Leaders like John Smid (Wong 2014), John Paulk (Schlanger and Wolfson 2014), Alan Chambers (Steffan 2013), and numerous others (Rhodan 2014) have left and denounced the movement. In 2012, the largest ex-gay organization, Exodus, International, publicly apologized and shut its doors, though a smaller organization, the Restored Hope Network, has since taken the leadership reigns (Throckmorton 2012).
Through my own research of this movement, I spoke to both people actively involved and to people who left. I began my study by attending a week-long annual, national ex-gay conference, hosted by Exodus, International. My days at this conference were full of praise sessions, workshops for women hoping to reclaim their “true femininity” and lose their same-sex desires, panels exploring compassionate pastoral response to ex-gay individuals, and speeches by leaders rallying members for the larger “battle” against homosexuality.
The second part of my research involved one-on-one interviews (across the United States and Canada) with people who had, at one point in their lives, sought help from an ex-gay ministry. Although initially, I thought I would talk to two kinds of people – those who identified as ex-gay and remained involved in the movement and those who no longer identified as ex-gay and left the movement – I quickly realized I needed to add a third group – ex-ex-gay. This group featured people caught in between, marginally connected to the movement and still avoiding same-sex sexual activity yet identifying as gay and feeling they had nothing to “fix.” For each of these groups, the balance of religion and sexuality was keenly felt and central to how they understood themselves. In the sections to follow, I explore the varied ways each grappled with religion and sexuality.
Of the seven women and eleven men, all but three were white. Two identified as Chinese, and one identified as Colombian. Research participants lived in the Southeastern United States, the Midwestern United States, or Eastern Canada, and all identified as Christian. Participants ranged in age from 19 to early sixties. Most were in their thirties or forties. Each ex-gay individual in this study was affiliated with an ex-gay organization at the time. More identified as “a struggler” than “ex-gay,” though they labeled the larger movement as “ex-gay.” Thus, I will use that language interchangeably throughout this chapter.
In many ways, strugglers have their own “coming out” stories. Unlike the typical coming out stories that document and legitimate the process of claiming a lesbian, gay, bisexual, or queer identity, strugglers’ stories do the opposite. Strugglers, often in conjunction with an ex-gay therapist and/or support group, tell their own story of “coming out” of homosexuality.
The primary focus for strugglers is finding their “root.” The “root” is the circumstance or set of circumstances, usually in childhood, that pushed an individual onto the “wrong” track, (i.e., off course from their divinely designed heterosexuality). Any number of things can do the trick: a too-distant mother or father, a too-close mother or father, physical abuse, emotional abuse, mental abuse, sexual trauma, “inappropriate” messages about femininity or masculinity, irreligious parents, family instability, familial drug/alcohol abuse, neglect, or bullying by peers. “Digging up” the “roots” in a Christian therapeutic setting, according to strugglers, allowed them to address the issues head on, and, through that work, to diminish or even eradicate their same-sex attractions.
In the wake of sometimes traumatic pasts, strugglers reported the emergence of same-sex sexual attraction, usually in adolescence. Most, though not all, reported “acting out” on these feelings. For some, “acting out” refers to actual physical intimacy with a person of the same-sex, but it also can mean consuming gay pornography or masturbating to same-sex sexual fantasies. A few even had romantic gay or lesbian relationships. Those who engaged in sexual activity or relationships called this “entering the lifestyle.”
Rather than finding relief or freedom from “entering the lifestyle,” ex-gays noted intense feelings of shame, revulsion, emptiness, and isolation. Most of the ex-lesbians, like Lisa and Anise, emphasized how “unhealthy” and “codependent” their romantic relationships with women were. Some, like Arthur and Miguel, were unhappy with their promiscuity and inability to maintain a relationship. Perhaps, the largest challenge was feeling “very far from God” (Gus). Nearly all of these relationships and sexual trysts were hidden from family, friends, and fellow churchgoers. Ex-gays simmered silently in shame and isolation, a metaphorical ex-gay “closet.”
Nearly every struggler’s story contained a point where they were discovered. A friend, a spouse, a church member, or spiritual leader learned that they were “acting out.” This moment of reckoning usually coincided with a personal reflection that strugglers had “hit bottom” – that is, that they had reached a nearly unbearable level of depression, shame, and unhappiness. However challenging this reckoning and confrontation may have been, they reported relief at their secret being “out.”
You can’t even imagine the shame that you will go through when you’re in something like this… . Cause, I mean, I would never ever … I would never do something like that. I could never sleep with a woman. Oh my gosh. You know, that’s like a cardinal sin… . And so I told my one friend, and I threw up when I told her. It was just like I had to tell someone and it just came out.
(Annette)
Shortly after the relief of this secret, a friend, relative, or pastor connected them with an ex-gay ministry. Through counseling, support group sessions, church support, and prayer, strugglers located their “roots” and moved away from shame. Even as they experienced the “mortification” of confessing their darkest secrets (Kanter 1972), their new religious therapeutic framework simultaneously promised them the opportunity to “transcend” (Kanter 1972) and “heal” from their homosexual pasts.
They met other people like them, which lessened their isolation. They also experienced community with other Christians. Many also discussed how “God’s healing” manifested in their lives. Those who were married to partners of another sex indicated a greater love for their spouse. Some talked about diminished same-sex attractions. Others did not indicate a lessening of same-sex attraction, but spoke of the tools to deal with that attraction. When asked how they identified their sexual orientation, a bulk of participants said something like the following two passages (Creek and Dunn 2012: 315):
What I can say is I’m a child of Christ; I’m a woman of Christ.
(Constance)
I guess it’s more about receiving the grace of the Lord, and you know these things have been all washed away, and that your true identity really is Christ.
(Timothy)
Both of these excerpts reflect the underlying meaning of a saying attributed to former ex-gay leader, Alan Chambers: “The opposite of homosexuality is holiness” (2009: 23). That is, homosexuality and Christianity are antithetical, and, yet the point of seeking help from an ex-gay ministry is not necessarily to achieve heterosexuality. Rather, strugglers claim a religious identity in place of a sexual identity. To “change” orientation from this viewpoint is not to flip a switch from “gay” to “straight” but from “gay” to “Christian.”
For many people seeking help from an ex-gay ministry, a primary motivator is the desire to have a heterosexual marriage with kids. This was especially true for participants who eventually left the movement. These nine men and two women, all identified as gay, except for one man who identified as a “Kinsey Scale 6 Queer.” Nearly all were white, with one man identifying as tri-racial and one man identifying as African American. Most lived in the Midwest, though a few resided in the Mid-Atlantic, the Southeastern or the Western United States. Nearly all were in their twenties to thirties, with one participant in his sixties.
Like the ex-gays in the last section, these individuals sought out an ex-gay ministry to help them eradicate their same-sex desires. They attended support group meetings, visited ex-gay therapists, and took part in retreats. Most became heavily involved in online ex-gay communities. Some, like Taylor, did not spend even a full year working with an ex-gay ministry. Others, like Eric, Jonas, and Eli, spent several years working with an organization to change. Collaborating with others, they revisited their biographies, located their “roots” (with varying degrees of success), and tried to craft their own ex-gay “coming out” narratives.
As they continued in the movement, though, most were troubled by the growing nuance from leaders regarding the meaning of “change.” Ex-ex-gays commonly shared feeling that leaders had pulled a “bait and switch,” promising them a change in sexual orientation in the beginning, but later emphasizing “holiness” instead. Taylor, who sought help from an online ministry for about eight months with little success, finally emailed the leader of the ministry to ask for guidance:
she told me it was about holiness, not orientation. That’s when I got really confused … the term ex-gay in itself, say you’re ex something, and gay meaning an orientation, means you’re ex that orientation. So now if you tell me it’s not about the orientation, then I have an issue ’cause you’ve been telling me all along by the very term that it’s about orientation.
(Creek 2014: 146–147)
Taylor’s words reflect a common frustration among ex-ex-gays, a sense that the change being offered was not nearly as effective as initially promised. This was compounded by experiences at ex-gay conferences, where participants reported meeting people who claimed to be “changed,” but whose behaviors suggested otherwise.
Seeing no change in orientation over time, many ex-ex-gays reported experiencing depression, unhappiness, isolation, and uncertainty. One participant, Jonas, became suicidal, which caused him to very seriously reflect on his relationship to the ex-gay movement.
I meditated on a very simple thing that was written that Jesus said about trees and fruits. You can judge a tree by the fruit that it bears. A good tree bears good fruit, a bad tree bears bad fruit. And in that analogy, I thought I’m surrounded by bad fruit, a pile of rotting fruit. But I didn’t understand why, I was doing everything I thought was right, you know? I hadn’t touched any men… . Something is wrong here. I don’t know what’s wrong here, but something I’m doing here is wrong. So I wrote a letter to my counselor and said I can’t come back to counseling until I’ve got myself stabilized. I returned to grad school in the fall, and wasn’t doing the counseling thing. Just kind of holding the ex-gay thing at arm’s length. Not truly rejecting it… . And then, boy meets boy. I met Jeff. But it was different this time. Every other time I had a thought, I shut it down, I aborted it as sin. But this time, “I’ve been doing this all my life,” I thought, “let’s see where this goes.”
(Creek 2014: 148–149)
Eventually, each of these 11 participants left the ex-gay movement. They were unable to change their orientation, despite sometimes years of prayer and therapy. They had come to doubt the success stories touted at ex-gay conferences, and more than a few felt they had been lied to by ex-gay leaders. As Eli put it: “At the end of all the emotional hype, I was still gay.”
For the ex-gays in the previous section, their conservative Christian identities were the most salient identities they held. When asked their sexual orientation, they often pointed instead to their Christian identity. For ex-ex-gays, though, religious identities simply would not serve as a substitute. By leaving the movement, ex-ex-gays had to accept that a “change” in orientation was not coming. By admitting that “change” was not coming, ex-ex-gays had to consider that they may indeed be gay. Taking on a gay identity, then, meant reassessing their conservative Christian identity. For Rocky, that reassessment led him to an LGBTQ-friendly denomination, Metropolitan Community Church. Jonas found a Quaker church. Erik began exploring postmodern Christian writing and the emergent church movement. Nathan reported having a hard time finding a new “spiritual home.” Ex-ex-gays in this study offered a compelling example of sexuality informing how individuals understand their religious identity and beliefs. A religious identity that cannot fully explain or make room for unceasing same-sex attractions was simply “unlivable” (Nathan).
Between the two poles of “ex-gay” and “ex-ex-gay,” there was a third, smaller group: celibate gay men and women. These participants held to conservative Christian ideology, believed acting upon same-sex sexual attractions was morally wrong, and identified as gay. At the time of their interviews, two were affiliated with an ex-gay organization, two were affiliated with a ministry that helped people manage their sexual attractions but condoned gay identities, and one had since renounced such ministries entirely. All identified as Christian, and all eschewed same-sex sexual activity. All were white, ranging in age from late twenties to early forties. These four men and one woman resided in the Midwestern United States or in Eastern Canada.
Time with one or more ex-gay ministries led these individuals to conclude that their sexual orientation was not going to change. Yet, unlike most people who leave the movement, they continued to believe that acting on their attractions was wrong. Thus, three remained single and celibate. One man, Walter, had long been married to a woman. Another man, Allen, married a woman who also struggled with same-sex attraction. He explained the rationale underpinning their decision to marry: “[I]f the choice is being celibate alone, or celibate together, I’d rather be celibate together, and if sex doesn’t work in the relationship, I still want to spend the rest of my life with you.”
Allen and Walter were better able to deflect criticism of their gay identification because they were married to women (though this was not true across the board, as I will discuss later). For the other three participants, Erin, Jack, and James, claiming this identity in conservative Christian spaces presented some challenges. All three worked to counter preexisting ideas about what “gay” meant, or even avoided disclosing their identity, if necessary. James, for instance, shared,
I tend to categorize myself as a gay, celibate Christian, but I am very hesitant using that because … in evangelical Christian subculture it [gay] means: “sleeps with everybody five days a week. Might take a couple of nights off just out of sheer exhaustion.”
(Creek 2013: 131)
Each of the gay celibates in this study had relationships with both ex-gay and ex-ex-gay people, a circumstance that offered community and conflict. On the one hand, both ex-gays and ex-ex-gays understand a significant part of the dilemma faced by gay celibate Christians, and this mutual understanding was the basis of many friendships. “They continue to be some of the most important significant relationships. And even those that are in very different spaces from me,” Allen shared.
On the other hand, at times, both ex-gays and ex-ex-gays challenged gay celibate Christians on their sexual identities and behaviors and their religious beliefs. In ex-gay settings, for example. Allen sometimes found his identity attacked on theological grounds.
[T]hey would say, the charismatic ones would always put it in, “It allows entry into evil spirits.” … Or others would say, “It’s the language of bondage.” “It’s idolatrous language.” And I’m like, “It’s no more idolatrous for me to say ‘I’m gay’ – it’s describing a situation of my life – anymore than me saying, ‘I’m American’ is idolatrous.” And, you know, yeah, it’s an important part of my identity, that doesn’t mean that it’s the central part. You know? They always seem to say, “If you say that you’re gay, then that means that you’re sinner, that’s the center part of your identity.”
(Creek 2013: 129)
Similarly, in ex-ex-gay or gay settings, gay celibates were also questioned. Jack lamented problems he and others have encountered on a gay Christian online forum.
[Non-celibate gays] will come into the [gay celibate] forum and ask a very honest, but loaded question. Two or three of us will respond, and then they’ll start the debate. “I disagree because, dah, dah, dah.” … And we say, “Wait a minute, this is our safe space.” I even said to [a friend] the other night, “Well, sometimes I just wish that there was a place just for us.”
(Creek 2013: 130)
Each of these settings – ex-gay and ex-ex-gay – remained crucial to gay, celibate Christians because of the connections and relationships they represented. Celibacy met a variety of their needs and complimented their identities, while also creating a lack of intimacy and companionship. In the absence of this kind of contact, friendships, particularly friendships rooted in an understanding of the struggle between religion and sexuality, were extremely important.
Each participant in this study had to balance the expectations of conservative Christianity with their very real same-sex sexual attractions. How they ultimately managed this balance held significant implications for their sexual identities, sexual behaviors, and religious identities. The groups explored in this chapter represent three possible paths.
Ex-gay women and men argued that their “identities in Christ” were the most important identities they held, and, regardless of the degree of cessation of unwanted sexual attraction, they were unwilling to identify as “gay” or “lesbian.” To do so, they believed, would directly compromise their religious identities. This group was older than the other two groups, and less likely to have engaged with online ex-gay ministries. They were more willing to embrace nuanced understandings of “change” and to accept that they might never be free of same-sex sexual attraction.
Ex-ex-gays, or people who left the ex-gay movement, were ultimately frustrated with the lack of change in their orientation. Despite prayer and therapy, their attractions did not abate, and heterosexual marriage and kids remained an elusive goal. Eventually, they embraced their sexual attractions and a “gay” identity, and instead begin to reframe their religious identity. Some abandoned the label “Christian” altogether, whereas others reworked the meaning of the label “Christian” to one that had room for their changing sexual identities and behaviors.
Finally, celibate gay Christians were unwilling to let go of both their conservative Christian identity and their belief in the immorality of acting on same sex attractions. Yet, they also believed identifying as gay was an honest reflection of who they were. It was not, as ex-gays contended, “idolatrous.”
The lives of these women and provide clear examples of how religious and sexual identities inform one another. Although the experiences of these men and women may seem extreme to those unfamiliar with the ex-gay movement, the experience of juggling the demands of religion with the realities of one’s sexuality is a widespread experience that transcends time and cultural context. Be we devout or atheist, a closer examination of our own sexual identities and behaviors (and of public policy and laws that regulate those very behaviors and identities) will undoubtedly show the influence of religion. Such an examination might also yield the knowledge that our shifting views on sexuality have, at one time or another, influenced our religious beliefs, behaviors, and labels.
S.J. Creek is a digital experience designer at 1904labs. They were previously director of the Creative Strategy and Behavioral Science Center in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. They earned a PhD in sociology and a graduate certificate in women’s studies from Southern Illinois University, USA. They have co-authored numerous articles on the intersection of gay identity with conservative Christian religious identity, particularly for men who have sought therapy from “ex-gay ministries.”