The St George and Sutherland Shire Leader reports…
“A Ramsgate church has attracted national attention for its programs to guide people out of sexual “brokenness”.
Of most controversy is a program to help homosexuals overcome same-sex attraction.
But director of Living Waters ministries, Ron Brookman, said the controversy was misdirected.
Mr Brookman married his second wife, Ruth, in 1994, and the pair have three children. But he said he can recall being attracted to men from age five.
“I believe homosexuality is a tendency, not a tyranny,” Mr Brookman said.
After successfully completing the program, Mr Brookman said he had not acted on homosexual impulses.
“I’m so thankful to God, and I want to proclaim his goodness, and give other people hope that change is possible,” he said.
“The years I was gay were the worst of my life … This is the happiest time of my life.”
A Sutherland Shire man, 40, who did not wish to be named, completed the Living Waters program and is now married with two children.
He said he was never content with his life as a homosexual man.
“The gay scene is known for its promiscuity and for its lack of commitment. There were days where I had more casual encounters than people have hot meals in a day,” he said.
“But I dealt with depression, I felt suicidal, because the lifestyle I had conflicted with what I believed in my heart.”
Ben Gresham, 20, went to programs similar to Living Waters. But for him, they did more harm than good.
“I had really bad depression when I realised nothing was changing, and I started to self harm. Then I started to attempt suicide. I thought because I couldn’t change, I needed to be punished.”
He was jolted out of his fixation with change when a fellow program member committed suicide.
Lloyd Jones, 24, was encouraged to embrace his homosexuality when his mother came out as a lesbian after experiencing many conversion programs, including Living Waters.
Despite their experiences, both Lloyd and Ben said they believed that people who ran conversion programs were only trying to do good.
STRAIGHT TALK
Living Waters began as part of Exodus International, an inter-denominational Christian organisation founded in 1976.
It came to Australia in 1972 to help homosexuals change their sexual orientation.
Using Christian counselling and prayer, it is a six-month program that encourages people to confess homosexual acts or impulses and pray for healing.
For some time it was offered as a referral service from Hillsong Church, but this is no longer the case.”
From http://stgeorge.yourguide.com.au/news/local/news/general/church-aims-to-change-gays/1463075.aspx
This is the GoodWeekend Magazine interview with Ron and Ruth Brookman
Rons story brought a whole lot of pain and anguish into many peoples lives. I knew some people who attended Newtown Mission at the time he came out and his first marriage broke down.
I think that there are men who are not gay who avhe had same sex attractions and that these have been symptomatic of childhood or teenage trauma – for these people programs such as LIving Waters could be a help – certainly not for people who are gay
This is the GoodWeekend Magazine interview with Ron and Ruth Brookman
Rons story brought a whole lot of pain and anguish into many peoples lives. I knew some people who attended Newtown Mission at the time he came out and his first marriage broke down.
I think that there are men who are not gay who avhe had same sex attractions and that these have been symptomatic of childhood or teenage trauma – for these people programs such as LIving Waters could be a help – certainly not for people who are gay
For this type of program to work you need to
want to change,
be a Christian (ie trust in God), and
be willing to do what it takes (ie stick at it).
Change doesn’t come over night. It might have taken 10 – 15 years of poor choices to get where you are now. It’s not going to just take 6 months to reverse that.
“For this type of program to work you need to
want to change”
I wanted to change.
“be a Christian (ie trust in God)”
I was a Christian and trusted in God.
“be willing to do what it takes (ie stick at it)”
I absolutely did what it took (to the point of not focussing on anything else) and perservered despite receiving no help from my churches and my Christian co-workers.
“Change doesn’t come over night. It might have taken 10 – 15 years of poor choices to get where you are now. It’s not going to just take 6 months to reverse that”
I gave it close to 20 years. I think 20 years is a reasonable enough time-frame to evaluate whether something is working or not. My same-sex attractions were increasing exponentially because of my total focus on the Living Waters process, which is why I eventually abandoned it, and began studying what the bible does (and does not) say about homosexuality, rather than the Gospel according to Andy Comiskey and Sy Rogers (justification through behaviour modification)
Living Waters is a fully discredited neo-biblical philosophy.
I remember Sy Rogers speaking years ago at PP’s CCC. I and other straight friends thought at the time that it sounded interesting and I guess we hoped it worked for people though of course we had no experience of the program.
It doesn’t surprise me to hear that a same-sex attraction could grow stronger under some types of program – if you were having to focus on ‘not’ being attracted to the same sex, it could easily have the opposite effect.
Sy Rogers seemed very sincere all those years ago. I hope that the program didn’t send people out with more issues than they had when they went in. I hope there was some professional grounding to it, rather than just someone’s untested opinion. I hope it wasn’t a version of Mercy.
“I think that there are men who are not gay who avhe had same sex attractions and that these have been symptomatic of childhood or teenage trauma – for these people programs such as LIving Waters could be a help”
I knew an ex-gay Christian who fit that category and I think that having people in the church understand that you could have a gay background but later be straight, was encouraging to him, though I don’t know if he did the Living Waters program.
“It doesn’t surprise me to hear that a same-sex attraction could grow stronger under some types of program – if you were having to focus on ‘not’ being attracted to the same sex, it could easily have the opposite effect.”
Absolutely. Because when your ‘recovery’ is based on something *not* happening (a sexual attraction) and it does happen..then it’s amplified a million times in your mind. ‘What’s going wrong? Why is that go so strikingly attractive?’….blah..blah blah. The more you’re told not to look at something, the more you want to look at it.
For example. Don’t look away from your computer. There’s a chair over the other side of the room. There’s something fascinating on that chair but….no…don’t look at it. Keep your eyes on the screen. You’re thinking about looking over at what’s on the chair aren’t you? Well, you really shouldn’t. In fact your should never taken any notice of that chair EVER again. Don’t think about the chair, pretend that the chair doesn’t exist. You’re thinking about the chair again aren’t you? I know it’s an attractive chair and ..hey, what’s on the chair is quite something, but, keep focused on the screen. Nobody else is concerned about the chair, so why are you so fixated on looking at the chair? You were going to look at the chair weren’t you? Keep your eyes on this page. Don’t look at the chair, and especially don’t look at what’s on the chair. Yes, I know you can kind of see the chair out of the corner of your eye, but stop fixating on the chair! I mean, God’s grace is there for you if you happen to look at the chair, but don’t look at the chair. Keep your eyes fixed on Jesus.
Etc etc.
Now, I can guarantee that if you read this every day, then from now on ….you’ll take more notice of the chair and what’s on it than you ever did before.
Hi Guys (assuming that everybody that has posted is a man)
Its simply not possible for somebody who is gay to change their sexual orientation and the American Psychological Association has actually warned about the dangers of ex gay programs – in recent times a number of Australia ‘ex gay leaders” have publicly apologized for the damage they caused to people who did their programs .
I know many people who have gone through ex gay programs to try and change their sexual orientation. The programs did not work and caused significant psychological harm . I know of one teenager who attempted suicide after being in a program
Of course everybody whatever their sexual orientation is responsible for their behaviour and how they treat other people but I think that its a scandal that in 2009 churches are still sending young people to discredited programs that do more harm than good and have no scientific or biblical basis