When the attendees of the Love Won Out conference head outside of the church tomorrow, they are going to have to look into the faces of the gays and lesbians they are supposed to help.
Focus on Family, a conservative religious group, will be holding the conference at Central Church of God.
The Charlotte Rainbow Action Network for Equality, or CRANE, will hold a silent protest outside of the Sardis Road Church. Matt Comer, the protest organizer, said at a press conference earlier today that he knows how hurtful messages from the church can harm a young gay person.
“I live in Charlotte now, but I grew up in Winston-Salem in the Baptist church. I remember hearing the pastor say from the pulpit that all of the homosexuals should be loaded in a boat; a hole drilled in the side and pushed out to sea. I don’t want another young person to feel what I felt,” Comer said.
Wayne Besen, executive director of Truth Wins Out and an advocate for gays who have been discriminated against because of “ex-gay” laws, said, “You can’t pray away the gay.”
The Rev. Jay Leach, pastor of Unitarian Universalist Church of Charlotte, said the message Focus on the Family is preaching with it’s Love Won Out conference is “bad science.”
According to a press release from Focus on The Family, their take on homosexuality is:
Love Won Out addresses homosexuality from a Christian perspective, and upholds the biblical truth that change is possible for those who have unwanted same sex attractions. Most of the conference’s speakers used to self-identify as gay or lesbian and now identify as heterosexual – something that gay activist groups, which often espouse a “born gay” perspective, deny is even possible.
“I may not have chosen to have same-sex attractions, but I was able to make the decision to steward my sexuality according to my deeply held faith values, just as thousands of other men and women do every day” says LWO host and speaker Melissa Fryrear. “Yet gay activist groups criticize our decision to do this. How can those groups deny us our right to self-determination and still say they stand for tolerance?”
“It doesn’t go with what we know about human beings,” said Leach. “Here at Unitarian Universalist, we don’t believe religion trumps science. We are concerned when a religious group purports to know more than top scientists.”
Besen said groups like Focus on The Family do nothing but demean and marginalize gay and lesbian people. And while the group is quick to show wedding photos of “ex-gays” who are now married, “they never show the divorce papers. There is nothing wrong with us.”
“It’s the negative attitudes and stereotypes that need to be changed,” Besen said.
The silent, nonviolent protest begins at 11 a.m. and Comer said at least 50 people are expected to participate.
The church is located at 5301 Sardis Road.
This article appears in Feb 17-24, 2009.
