Bible News Radio host Stacy Lynn Harp interviews Daren Mehl of Voice of the Voiceless. Voice of the Voiceless is a non-profit organization whose mission is to defend the rights of people who are virtually never given a voice in the public square, and — in fact — often told that they don’t exist or are lying: Former homosexuals, individuals that have unwanted same-sex attraction, and the families of these truly marginalized people.
Category Archives: Ex-gay
Conversations That Matter Podcast: Responding to Christian Homosexuality Part 1
Thank you to Jon Harris at Conversations That Matter podcast, from www.WorldViewConversation.com, for the interview.
There’s a lot of talk in Christian circles today about whether or not same-sex attraction is sinful. Daren Mehl answers some questions about whether homosexuality is an orientation, if Christians are delivered from it, and what Churches should do in responding to the LGBTQI+ agenda.
Links:
https://www.portlandfellowship.com/resources/differingviews.pdf << “4 Columns” doctrines intersection of LGBTQ and Christianity
https://www.agapefirstministries.org/darenmehl << Ministry to Churches, Families, Individuals
https://www.voiceofthevoiceless.info << Education & Advocacy for former LGBTQ, Families, and churches around this issue
https://darenmehlblog.com << Some tidbits I’ve written from my journey out of homosexuality, my daily prayers, covenant with my eyes, books I’ve read, testimonies, etc
Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/conversations-that-matter8971/donations
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Former Homosexual Stephen Black Shares How His Ministry Helps Others Escape the Lifestyle
Stephen Black is the president of First Stone Ministries and the author of Freedom Realized. His experience gives valuable insight into the homosexual lifestyle, homosexual counseling ministries, and the “gay Christian” movement
Rumble
Ex-gay Research by Dr. Robert Spitzer is ‘not’ Retracted
Misuse of Science
It is always entertaining when fringe Left-wing actors fall victim to their own theistic worship of the scientific method and its inherent perpetual self-correction. Not long ago, a medical research team published its findings associating a list of disease pathologies uniquely common to homosexual activity. Later, the reseach team published an angry letter protesting “right-wing misuse of their data to advance their arguments.” Oh, really ? People used scientifically proven facts to advance their arguments ? A tragic misuse of science to be sure…
Long time sex behavior researcher Dr. Robert Spitzer was a leader in the removal of homosexuality from the list of mental illnesses in the 70’s. Of course, our understanding of the psychological and medical costs of homosexuality were still quite limited at that time. Spitzer argued that even though homosexuality may be an aberrant adaption, it was a harmless one not requiring treatment. Sadly, the 1980’s would follow bringing the AIDS pandemic that continues to disproportionately haunt homosexual conduct to this day. Heterosexual involvement would come later mostly due to tainted donated blood supplies, bi-sexual cross-infection and shared needle use. It remains exponentially less virulent among healthy heterosexuals nonetheless. Better research and education on the association of disease and homosexuality could have saved millions of lives not only on the subject of AIDS but many other diseases which have demonstrated a higher comorbidity among those engaging in same sex contact. To date, this of course remains a political correctness crime of the highest order – no matter how many lives it costs.
Spitzer found Homosexuality to be Harmless
While Dr. Spitzer found homosexuality to be harmless, he also worked to support the commonly accepted notion that while same-sex attraction had rooted motivations, these motivations could be therapeutically treated to address and correct the desires. This kept hope alive for many who had unwanted same-sex attraction but were unable to change without assistance. In October of 2003, Spitzer published a study to prove his point.[1] Instead of inspiring an exciting intellectual foray into neuro-science and therapeutic psychology, the paper sparked outrage by the well-entrenched LGBT activist community who did not want anyone to know that change, even for those who thought it impossible, was possible. It could incur individual pressure on them to change when they had no desire to do so. The LGBT juggernaut, in full motion by 2003, brought every pressure to bear on Spitzer and anyone having anything to do with his study. Sadly, Spitzer would fall victim to Parkinson’s Disease and begin suffering the deleterious effects throughout the following years. After suffering years of scorn, the aging and sick researcher expressed his sorrow that the study seemed to have caused more harm than good, and that he wished he could retract his interpretation of the data. His comment spread like wildfire through LGBT advocacy channels and the supportive mainstream media as a retraction of his study. However, the study was not and is not retracted.
To investigate why this was so, pro-homosexual advocate Alice Dreger, of the leftist periodical Psychology Today, contacted the editor of the peer-review journal ‘Archives of Sexual Behavior’ where Spitzer’s study was published[2] In her article she elaborates a conversation with journal editor Ken Zucker who expressed a willingness to publish any statement by Dr. Spitzer regarding his study but a refusal to retract the study itself due to the fact that the study results remain valid and unimpugned. In response to Dr. Spitzer bemoaning privately that he wished he could retract his interpretation of the data, Zucker responded aptly,
“I said, ‘I’m not sure what you want to retract, Bob. You didn’t falsify the data. You didn’t commit egregious statistical errors in analyzing the data. You didn’t make up the data.”
Personal regrets are no basis to retract a scientific study
Presently, two things have not happened. Spitzer’s study has failed to be impugned or disproven. It remains a highly cited publication. And secondly, Spitzer never did request a formal retraction of his personal interpretation of the data. And so as it stands, Spitzer’s study results remain concurrent with like studies, media reports of the Spitzer study being retracted are simply false and both hope and successful treatment for those with unwanted same-sex attractions continues.
Dr. Robert Spitzer died in December of 2015. It may only be that his formal retraction of his personal views on the data is still making its way through the mail. In April 2012, scientific journal monitor Retraction Watch noted supportively that the study would not be retracted because the personal regrets of the author that the LGBT community did not like the results was no basis on which to retract a scientific study.
[1] Spitzer, R.L. Arch SexBehav (2003)32:403.doi:10.1023/A:1025647527010
[2] How to Ex an “Ex-Gay” Study, 4/12/12, ‘Psychology Today’
New Genetic Study on Homosexuality Repeats Old, Unproven Theory – With Your Tax Dollars!
Media outlets are flush with the rush to promote yet another inconclusive hypothesis attempting to tie biological factors to the penchant for homosexual behavior. After an unusual 7 year tweaking before release, Dr. Alan Sanders of NorthShore University HealthSystem Research Institute et al, compared the genes of 409 gay twin brothers (the largest twin sampling to date). The team argues that they found linkages to the X Chromosome 8 region and Xq28 but were unable to cite any actual gene. This runs contrary to the conclusions of eight other international twin studies examining the same notion[2]with the exception of Dr. Dean Hamer’s claim to find Chromosome 8 involvement 20 years ago but also failing to find any actual gene.
The inability to find and verify gene involvement makes the entire exercise of identifying linkages fruitless since there can be no linkage between non-existent entities. This leaves wide open the interpretation of what these researchers are seeing within these chromosome bands. Sanders himself describes his results as, “not proof but a pretty good indication.” An indication of what remains to be seen. Meanwhile, the reaction by genetic experts ranges from skeptical to completely dismissive. Dr. Robert Green, medical geneticist at Harvard Medical School called the study, “intriguing but not in any way conclusive” and Dr. Neil Risch, genetics expert at UC San Francisco states the data is too statistically weak to suggest any linkage (with homosexual preference.)[3]
Of bizarre concern is Sander’s use of a deprecated genetic method. Genetic linkages have been replaced with GWA (genome-wide association) methodology in genetic science which gives a higher, but still not guaranteed, association between a given gene and a behavior. Sanders admitted it would have been the preferable approach but it was the only way to try to expound on Hamer’s failed attempt 20 years ago. Ken Kendler, an editor at Psychological Medicine admitted it was a surprise to see Sanders submit a study using the old technique and Sanders admits that one publication turned down his submission outright.[4] Sanders has announced his intention of a GWA study using an even larger sample group.
It is the opinion of most in the ex-gay community that scientific research would be better utilized addressing the knowns of same-sex attraction, such as the high child sexual abuse and childhood trauma histories found in research which is more results oriented by healing traumas that often lead to same-sex attractions and therapies that eliminate unwanted same-sex attraction. This more appropriately achieves the goals of the American Psychological Association’s vow to patient self-determination. Much like the already proven genetic components of depression and anxiety disorders, genetic involvement only contributes to predilection and has no bearing at all on outcomes. Thus, any genetic discovery while interesting is irrelevant to ultimate behavioral self-management and choice.
John Ozanich is an Advisory Board member of Voice of the Voiceless and a former United States Marine Corps Anti-Terrorism Strike Team member. An ordained minister, John authors articles on religious history, constitutional issues, science, and religion.He has been awarded the IBM Authorship Award. He is a an award winning professional computer network design architect and I/T project manager who has worked for a variety of Fortune 500 companies.