Homosexuals Anonymous (HA) is an
ex-gay
The ex-gay movement consists of people and organizations that encourage people to refrain from entering or pursuing same-sex relationships, to eliminate homosexual desires and to develop heterosexual desires, or to enter into a heterosexual relat ...
group which practices
conversion therapy
Conversion therapy is the pseudoscientific practice of attempting to change an individual's sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression to align with heterosexual and cisgender norms. In contrast to evidence-based medicine and cli ...
and describes itself as "a fellowship of men and women, who through their common emotional experience, have chosen to help each other live in freedom from homosexuality."
HA regards
homosexual orientation
Homosexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or sexual behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions" to pe ...
as "sexual brokeness" that may be "healed" through faith in
Jesus Christ
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
.
In common with other
Christian fundamentalist
Christian fundamentalism, also known as fundamental Christianity or fundamentalist Christianity, is a religious movement emphasizing biblical literalism. In its modern form, it began in the late 19th and early 20th centuries among British and ...
groups, HA regards heterosexuality as "the universal creation-norm".
This approach has been criticized for stressing that a person must renounce homosexuality to be a
Christian
Christians () are people who follow or adhere to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. The words ''Christ'' and ''Christian'' derive from the Koine Greek title ''Christós'' (Χρι ...
,
and because there is no valid scientific evidence that
sexual orientation
Sexual orientation is an enduring pattern of romantic or sexual attraction (or a combination of these) to persons of the opposite sex or gender, the same sex or gender, or to both sexes or more than one gender. These attractions are generall ...
can be changed.
Christopher Melilo, Colin Cook and Douglas McIntyre, who had all struggled with same-sex attractions, founded HA in 1980 with financial support from the
Seventh-day Adventist
The Seventh-day Adventist Church is an Adventism, Adventist Protestantism, Protestant Christian denomination which is distinguished by its observance of Saturday, the Names of the days of the week#Numbered days of the week, seventh day of the ...
denomination.
HA uses a 14-step program
developed by Cook, based on his own experiences.
Cook resigned in 1986 following a scandal involving him allegedly having sex with 12 out of the 14 male clients interviewed from 1980 to 1986.
History
HA was founded in 1980 by
Colin Cook (a
Seventh-day Adventist
The Seventh-day Adventist Church is an Adventism, Adventist Protestantism, Protestant Christian denomination which is distinguished by its observance of Saturday, the Names of the days of the week#Numbered days of the week, seventh day of the ...
pastor who was
defrocked
Defrocking, unfrocking, degradation, or laicization of clergy is the removal of their rights to exercise the functions of the ordained ministry. It may be grounded on criminal convictions, disciplinary problems, or disagreements over doctrine or d ...
in 1974 for having sex with a man in his church)
and ex-gay Douglas McIntyre.
Cook founded the Quest Learning Center in
Reading, Pennsylvania
Reading ( ; Pennsylvania Dutch: ''Reddin'') is a city in and the county seat of Berks County, Pennsylvania, United States. The city had a population of 95,112 as of the 2020 census and is the fourth-largest city in Pennsylvania after Philade ...
, as a ministry of the
Seventh-day Adventist
The Seventh-day Adventist Church is an Adventism, Adventist Protestantism, Protestant Christian denomination which is distinguished by its observance of Saturday, the Names of the days of the week#Numbered days of the week, seventh day of the ...
Church to "help people find freedom from homosexuality." HA was one of seven programs offered by Quest,
and people came from around the US seeking assistance from Cook.
Cook developed the 14-step program used by HA, modifying five of the standard
twelve steps
Twelve-step programs are international mutual aid programs supporting recovery from substance addictions, behavioral addictions and compulsions. Developed in the 1930s, the first twelve-step program, Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), aided its members ...
from the
Alcoholics Anonymous
Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) is an international mutual aid fellowship of alcoholics dedicated to abstinence-based recovery from alcoholism through its spiritually-inclined Twelve Step program. Following its Twelve Traditions, AA is non-professi ...
program and basing the other nine on his personal experience.
HA was supported by $47,000 in annual support from the Adventist Church, plus fees paid for treatment.
McIntyre (who, when growing up, identified as gay) said he founded HA based on his belief that "homosexuality is not something you're born with, that it's a spin-off of a trauma that occurs during childhood." He attributes abuse at the ages of three and four, and molestation at the age of five, as having contributed to his homosexual attraction.
Rumours of sexual misconduct by Cook came to light in 1986 when Ron Lawson, a gay Adventist and Professor of Sociology at
Queens College, New York
Queens College (QC) is a public college in the Queens borough of New York City. It is part of the City University of New York system. Its 80-acre campus is primarily located in Flushing, Queens. It has a student body representing more than 170 ...
, began an investigation by interviewing Cook's former clients and writing a letter to church officials outlining his indiscretions.
Lawson interviewed 14 individuals counselled by Cook as part of the HA program; none reported any change in sexual orientation as a consequence of HA, and all but two reported having sex with Cook.
Cook resigned from HA and shut down Quest; the Adventists withdrew their funding support.
With Cook's departure, McIntyre took over as executive director of HA.
Counseling sessions with Cook included giving his clients nude massages, ostensibly to desensitize them to male–male contact and homosexual desires;
however, this was counter-productive since counselees began having sexual encounters with each other.
Cook admitted in a 1987 interview that he had "fell into the delusion" that such actions were a legitimate part of his HA counseling activities, stating: "I allowed myself to hug and hold my counselees thinking I was helping them... But I needed it more than they did."
Psychiatrist
Ralph Blair in his 1982 monograph ''Ex-Gay'' describes practitioners of sexual orientation conversion through religion as often being "individuals deeply troubled about their own sexual orientation, or whose own sexual conversion is incomplete". Blair reports a host of problems with such counselors, including the sexual abuse of clients;
Haldeman describes Cook as "the most notable of such ministers".
Cook himself also admitted to "occasional falls" before (and throughout) his marriage.
Despite his 1974 defrocking and the 1986 revelations of his client abuse, Cook remains dedicated to the belief that homosexuality can be changed. In 1993 he moved to Colorado and returned to counseling, which ended in 1995 when ''
The Denver Post
''The Denver Post'' is a daily newspaper and website published in Denver, Colorado. As of June 2022, it has an average print circulation of 57,265. In 2016, its website received roughly six million monthly unique visitors generating more than 13 ...
'' reported Cook was engaging in phone sex and asking "patients to bring homosexual pornography to sessions so that he could help desensitize them against it".
As recently as 2007, Cook has still been promoting the ability to "heal homosexuals". Under McIntyre, HA has also taken on more political advocacy. In 2009 he led a conference held in Kenya promoting the ex-gay movement, controversial to homosexuals as an example of ex-gay advocacy events held in Africa which are followed by incidents of
homophobic
Homophobia encompasses a range of negative attitudes and feelings toward homosexuality or people who are identified or perceived as being lesbian, gay or bisexual. It has been defined as contempt, prejudice, aversion, hatred or antipathy, m ...
violence.
Organization
The headquarters of Homosexuals Anonymous is in Houston, Texas. , the organization has chapters in the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
,
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
,
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...
and
El Salvador
El Salvador (; , meaning " The Saviour"), officially the Republic of El Salvador ( es, República de El Salvador), is a country in Central America. It is bordered on the northeast by Honduras, on the northwest by Guatemala, and on the south b ...
.
HA is a member of the
Positive Alternatives to Homosexuality
Positive Alternatives to Homosexuality (PATH) is a coalition of groups that purport to help "people with unwanted same-sex attractions (SSA) realize their personal goals for change—whether by developing their innate heterosexual potential or by e ...
(PATH) group. HA is affiliated with JASON Ministries, headquartered in Germany. It publishes a newsletter and web site and organizes a "Homosexuals Anonymous Annual Conference".
Program
The HA program relies on belief in Jesus Christ to effect sexual orientation change.
Similar to Alcoholics Anonymous, the change takes place over a lifetime, according to HA. Local chapters conduct meetings at regular intervals where members provide fellowship and support to one another. Unlike AA's 12-step program, HA has 14 steps which are used by about 50 chapters of HA throughout North America.
Nine of the steps were based on the experiences of founder Cook, while the other five are adaptations of AA steps.
One analysis of the 14 steps commented on the "alleged generosity" of the HA approach, noting that while both approaches emphasize avoidance of undesired behaviors, "AA groups accept the person along with their problems,
hereasHomosexuals Anonymous stresses that the person is guilty of the sin of homosexuality, must admit it, renounce it, and then accept heterosexuality as a necessary condition to becoming a Christian."
According to
gay affirmative psychotherapists Kathleen Ritter and Anthony Terndrup, ex-gay organizations like
Exodus International
Exodus International was a non-profit organization, non-profit, interdenominational ex-gay Christianity, Christian umbrella organization connecting organizations that sought to "help people who wished to limit their homosexual desires". Founded ...
and
Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays (PFOX) use this adapted model developed by HA.
Effectiveness
The organization cites several cases where it claims people have changed their sexual orientation.
Reporting on Lawson's 1986 findings, the ''
Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...
'' reported that counselees' reactions to the Cook revelations followed a common pattern: "a loss of faith, loss of trust in other human beings, and a lack of motivation to get on with their lives". In addition, many of the counselees stayed in Reading, "unwilling or unable to go home to families who expected them to be changed".
Wayne Besen states that former HA clients have reported that the program is ineffective. Besen quotes one former client "One thing that really clued me in was
eetingwith my sponsor every week and hearing him talk about his struggles and talking to other people in the group, and there were people in that group who had been going to HA for four, five, six, seven years and they seemed to be at the exact same spot I was. I didn't see any graduates. I saw people that were still there, that hadn't changed. They were still struggling. ... I don't know anybody from my ex-gay group ... who claims to be ex-gay now."
Criticism
One critic of HA is
Cindi Love, the executive director of
Soulforce
Soulforce is a U.S.-based social justice organization that works to end the religious and political oppression of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and intersex (LGBTQI) people. The organization's co-executive directors are Alba Onofrio ...
, who states that "the message that homosexuality can be 'repaired' doesn't just ruin lives – it ends them".
She describes the expansion of ex-gay organizations around the world as "rearing
heir
Inheritance is the practice of receiving private property, titles, debts, entitlements, privileges, rights, and obligations upon the death of an individual. The rules of inheritance differ among societies and have changed over time. Officiall ...
ugly heads," specifically citing HA's expansion into El Salvador, New Zealand, and Germany, and criticising HA executive director McIntyre's Kenyan conference.
Wayne Besen
Wayne Besen is an American LGBT rights advocate. He is a former investigative journalist for WABI-TV, a former spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign, and the founder of Truth Wins Out. Besen came out to his parents before starting his Truth Win ...
, former spokesman for the
Human Rights Campaign
The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) is an American LGBTQ advocacy group. It is the largest LGBTQ political lobbying organization within the United States. Based in Washington, D.C., the organization focuses on protecting and expanding rights for LGB ...
and founder of
Truth Wins Out
Truth Wins Out (TWO) is an organization formed by Wayne Besen to fight what it considers "anti-gay religious extremism", especially the ex-gay movement.
History
Besen formed Truth Wins Out on June 7, 2006, as a response to the belief that a per ...
, has argued that the
GLBT
' is an Acronym, initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an Hyponymy and hypernymy, umbrella term for Sexuality and gende ...
community needs to challenge the propaganda presented at ex-gay events including those run by HA.
He also advocates covert operations against HA and other ex-gay ministries in an attempt to "catch ex-gay leaders engaging in not so ex-gay behavior", though such attempts to discredit the industry are controversial even within the GLBT community.
Besen has accused HA of re-writing history, omitting details of Cook's past from its web site. "
ading the group's Web page, one would think that Cook was a smashing success and paragon of heterosexuality," he writes.
Haldeman has described the response of the Seventh-day Adventist Church to the 1986 Cook revelations as a
cover-up
A cover-up is an attempt, whether successful or not, to conceal evidence of wrongdoing, error, incompetence, or other embarrassing information. Research has distinguished personal cover-ups (covering up one's own misdeeds) from relational co ...
whilst Lawson titled his 1987 presentation to the annual convention of the
American Sociological Association
The American Sociological Association (ASA) is a non-profit organization dedicated to advancing the discipline and profession of sociology. Founded in December 1905 as the American Sociological Society at Johns Hopkins University by a group of fif ...
: ''Scandal in the Adventist-funded program to 'heal' homosexuals: Failure, sexual exploitation, official silence, and attempts to rehabilitate the exploiter and his methods.''
In Julie Scott Jones' study of Christian fundamentalism, ''Being the Chosen'', HA, Exodus International and NARTH are described as organizations that "particularly target teenagers' burgeoning sexuality, and feed into a wider fundamentalist view that all forms of 'sexual immorality' are destroying the moral fabric of the nation".
See also
*
Christianity and homosexuality
Throughout the majority of Christian history, most Christian theologians and denominations have considered homosexual behavior as immoral or sinful. Today, within Christianity, there are a variety of views on sexual orientation and homosexual ...
*
Ex-Ex-Gay
Ex-ex-gay people are those who formerly participated in the ex-gay movement in an attempt to change their sexual orientation to heterosexual, but who then later went on to publicly state they had a non-heterosexual sexual orientation.
Organizatio ...
*
Courage International
Courage International, also known as Courage Apostolate and Courage for short, is an approved apostolate of the Catholic Church that counsels "men and women with same-sex attractions in living chaste lives in fellowship, truth and love". Based on ...
*
GLAAD
GLAAD (), an acronym of Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, is an American non-governmental media monitoring organization originally founded as a protest against defamatory coverage of gay and lesbian demographics and their portrayals ...
*
Homophobia
Homophobia encompasses a range of negative attitude (psychology), attitudes and feelings toward homosexuality or people who are identified or perceived as being lesbian, gay or bisexual. It has been defined as contempt, prejudice, aversion, h ...
*
Matthew Shepard Foundation
The Matthew Shepard Foundation is an LGBT nonprofit organization, headquartered in Casper, Wyoming, which was founded in December 1998 by Dennis and Judy Shepard in memory of their son, Matthew. The Foundation runs education, outreach, and adv ...
*
Persecution of Homosexuals in Nazi Germany
Before 1933, homosexual acts were illegal in Germany under Paragraph 175 of the German Criminal Code. The law was not consistently enforced, however, and a thriving gay culture existed in German cities. After the Nazi takeover in 1933, the ...
*
Recovering from Religion
Recovering from Religion (RfR) is an international non-profit organization that helps people who have left religion, are in process of leaving, or are dealing with problems arising out of theistic doubt or non-belief. RfR provides support group ...
*
The Trevor Project
The Trevor Project is an American nonprofit organization founded in 1998. Focused on suicide prevention efforts among lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and questioning (LGBTQ) youth, they offer a toll-free telephone number wher ...
References
{{Reflist, 3
External links
Official website
Conversion therapy organizations
LGBT and Christianity
Christian organizations based in the United States
1980 establishments in the United States
Christian organizations established in 1980
1980 establishments in Texas
Seventh-day Adventist organizations