In a recent post on Instagram, The Changed Movement wrote:

Beneath LGBTQ identities are people carrying real wounds.⁠
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Many hoped embracing a label would heal them. It didn’t. We know because not only do their stories mirror ours, but we’ve sat across from hundreds of them and listened. ⁠
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For us and hundreds of others, healing never came from embracing an LGBTQ identity. It only came when Jesus reached the wounds the labels were covering.⁠
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While the world debates policies, CHANGED is stepping in to walk with people… And show them the real paths to healing and peace. ⁠

MY RESPONSE:

Born in 1951, this has been a lifelong journey for me. From a tortured teenager in the 60s when gay men were imprisoned and mental health professionals believed they could be “cured”, to turning to God in 1969 believing he would deliver me from this “evil”, to time in my early 20s in a residential conversion “therapy” program, to getting married believing this would be the final answer to my homosexual thoughts and feelings, to becoming a famous Pentecostal preacher with two lovely children by my side “demonstrating” I was now heterosexual.

All this changed in 1991 when I fell in love with a man and faced the reality that my decades of attempts to change had done nothing and I’d been living in deep denial. My sexual orientation was not about sex, as I’d believed and was taught; it was about love, intimacy, affection and tenderness. I came out and embraced my gay identity.

Since 2000, I have worked with over 4000 conversion “therapy” survivors and an incalculable number of people experiencing faith/ sexuality conflict.

As someone who once believed my sexuality was the wound — and spent years trying to “heal” it and worked with 1000s the same— I’ve learned this the hard way: being LGBTQ isn’t what damages people.

The actual harm comes from a negative sense of self, reinforced by the teachings of many in the church. Being told you’re broken, unacceptable to God, going to hell for being LGBTQ is what does the damage…along with making poor life choices and lack of self-respect.

You can fall in love, have a loving committed relationship, live a happy and fulfilled life, be a person of faith….AND be LGBTQ – millions have.

Read about conversion therapy survivors who found peace by rejecting the self-hatred and embracing their LGBTQ identity HERE. A false and damaging identity caused the harm, not embracing their true selves and living authentically.