CONTENT ADVISORY: This article contains discussions of sexual assault.
“From a Judeo-Christian perspective, gay, straight or otherwise, we’re all prodigal sons and daughters. Exodus International is the prodigal’s older brother, trying to impose its will on God’s promises, and make judgments on who’s worthy of His Kingdom. God is calling us to be the Father — to welcome everyone, to love unhindered1.”
These are the words of Alan Chambers, the former president of disgraced organization Exodus International. From 1976 to 2013, Exodus was an organization that advertised “hope” for LGBTQ+ Christians: a way to change sexual orientation and gender identity through prayer and psychotherapy2. Exodus International touted a form of “conversion” or “reparative” therapy, which Merriam-Webster defines as “the use of any of various methods… in an attempt to change a person's sexual orientation to heterosexual or to change a person's gender identity to correspond to the sex the person was identified as having at birth3.” By 2013, the ineffectiveness of such treatment was apparent even to the founders of Exodus, and Chambers issued a sincere apology for all the harm he had done. In 2018, the APA released a statement, articulating that “homosexuality… is not a mental disorder” and that attempts to change one’s sexual orientation or gender identity are “unethical.” Presently, “all mainstream medical and mental health organizations” condemn conversion therapy4. However, to those whose religious convictions state that homosexuality and transgender identities are immoral, attempts to change these aspects of their lives might be welcomed regardless of the overwhelming body of literature indicating the ineffectiveness and harm of such attempts.5, 6, 7 Hence, religious communities have often been primary supporters of conversion therapy efforts, including the Seventh-day Adventist church. This brings us to the story of a man named Colin Cook and his program, Homosexuals Anonymous.
Colin Cook was a former SDA pastor who had been ousted from the ministry in 1974 due to numerous sexual encounters with underage teenage boys within his congregation, though Cook publicly claimed he resigned voluntarily. In the years that followed, Cook authored a number of articles in Adventist publications such as Insight and Spectrum, claiming that “[t]here is a way out of the homosexual life…. You can find new emotions and enjoy the rich possibilities inherent in love for someone of the opposite sex” (Lawson). Cook, who was then located in Reading, Pennsylvania, began holding counseling sessions in a health center where he worked, and developed a following of individuals hopeful that Cook held the key to being “delivered from same-sex attraction.”
In 1980, Cook founded the Quest Learning Center in Reading. Featuring a program called “Homosexuals Anonymous” — inspired by the 12-step program practiced by the well-known “Alcoholics Anonymous” — the institution aimed to help “deliver” individuals from homosexuality. People from all across the country flocked to Reading during the 1980s in hopes to find the “cure” for homosexuality. The program, which received almost $50,000 a year from the Seventh-day Adventist church, appeared to have living proof of its claims in Cook himself, who was now married and had two children. The program prominently featured personal counseling sessions with Cook, which participants later stated were less than innocent. As one former participant recalled, “every private counseling session started with a hug. Not a hug like when you say goodbye to Uncle Bill, but a full body hug where you felt him [Cook] pressing against you” (Japenga). The program continued to grow and receive support from the Adventist church until October 1986, when a letter by Ronald Lawson was delivered to church leaders and support for Cook’s “ministry” was rescinded. The letter contained details of sexual abuse that occurred within the program, collected in a series of interviews Lawson conducted with “graduates” of the program. While the details are too graphic to share here, these interviews make clear that Cook was manipulating and taking advantage of struggling young men and using them for sexual gratification.
Unfortunately, Cook’s misdeeds didn’t end with the withdrawal of financial support from the Adventist church. While Quest Learning Center closed its doors in June 1987, Cook continued to “minister” in Reading until 1993, when he moved to Denver, founding FaithQuest Colorado. Within this organization, the sexual abuse continued, but the Christian churches and groups — including the well-known evangelical organization Focus on the Family — supporting Cook in Denver were far more reluctant to renounce him when the abuse was uncovered. As recently as 2017 Colin Cook was still the face of the ministry.
In a report on Cook published in 1998, Ronald Lawson featured a section in which he discusses the role of the Adventist church in Cook’s ministry. In it, he indicates that Cook’s editorials written prior to Quest’s founding revealed to church leaders that there are, in fact, gay people within the Adventist church. It forced the church to finally face the question of what to do with queer individuals and how to address the issue. Perhaps it seems logical that they would support an organization like Cook’s — given the traditional position that homosexuality is sinful, a group claiming to be able to remove the orientation itself would probably be viewed as doing a service. However, given the insights of modern study, we can now understand that sexual orientation, generally speaking, cannot be changed. Unfortunately, the response of the Adventist church and related institutions to homosexuality has been spotty at best. The student handbook for Andrews University still cites Yarhouse and Jones in order to claim that conversion therapy may result in increases in heterosexual attraction. This study has been discredited for, among other things, failure to exclude participants who had a financial/occupational stake in a positive outcome of conversion therapy, failure to include individuals who did not remain in the program, and failure to establish a baseline level of psychological harm prior to the introduction of conversion therapy5. In addition, leaders at modern institutions associated with the Adventist church, such as Coming Out Ministries and Know His Love Ministries, still suggest pseudoscientific Freudian explanations for the development of a homosexual orientation or a transgender identity, such as molestation in childhood or an unbalanced relationship with one’s parents — explanations that have been thoroughly refuted by modern scholarship.8, 9
It should be clear that in our modern society, queer people aren’t going anywhere, and the Adventist church needs to continue to engage with the question of how best to welcome queer individuals into worship. Hopefully, as an institution, we can look back on our mistakes, acknowledge them, and ask God how best to move forward in a way that displays His radical love. As Chambers saw it, “God is calling us to be the Father — to welcome everyone, to love unhindered.”
WORKS CITED
1Payne, Ed. “Exodus International Shutdown: Group Apologizes to Gay Community, Shuts Down ‘Cure’ Ministry.” CNN, 8 July 2013, www.cnn.com/2013/06/20/us/exodus-international-shutdown/index.html. Accessed 1 Dec. 2023.
2Lovett, Ian. “After 37 Years of Trying to Change People’s Sexual Orientation, Group Is to Disband.” New York Times, 20 June 2013, www.nytimes.com/2013/06/21/us/group-that-promoted-curing-gays-ceases-operations.html. Accessed 1 Dec. 2023.
3“Conversion Therapy: Definition.” Merriam-Webster, 2023, www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/conversion%20therapy. Accessed 1 Dec. 2023.
4“The Lies and Dangers of Efforts to Change Sexual Orientation or Gender Identity.” The Human Rights Campaign, 2023, www.hrc.org/resources/the-lies-and-dangers-of-reparative-therapy. Accessed 1 Dec. 2023.
5Panozzo, Dwight. “Advocating for an End to Reparative Therapy: Methodological Grounding and Blueprint for Change.” Journal of Gay and Lesbian Social Services, vol. 25, no. 3, July 2013, pp. 362–77. https://doi.org/10.1080/10538720.2013.807214.
6Higbee, Madison, et al. “Conversion Therapy in the Southern United States: Prevalence and Experiences of the Survivors.” Journal of Homosexuality, vol. 69, no. 4, Nov. 2020, pp. 612–31. https://doi.org/10.1080/00918369.2020.1840213.
7Haldeman, Douglas C. “Introduction: A History of Conversion Therapy, From Accepted Practice to Condemnation.” American Psychological Association eBooks, 2022, pp. 3–16. https://doi.org/10.1037/0000266-001.
8Blosnich, John R., et al. “Sexual Orientation Change Efforts, Adverse Childhood Experiences, and Suicide Ideation and Attempt Among Sexual Minority Adults, United States, 2016–2018.” American Journal of Public Health, vol. 110, no. 7, July 2020, pp. 1024–30. https://doi.org/10.2105/ajph.2020.305637.
9Bailey, J. Michael, et al. “Sexual Orientation, Controversy, and Science.”
Psychological Science in the Public Interest, vol. 17, no. 2, Apr. 2016, pp.
45–101. https://doi.org/10.1177/1529100616637616.
SOURCES USED THROUGHOUT
Lawson, Ronald, Ph. D. The Troubled Career of an “Ex-Gay” Healer: Colin Cook, Seventh-day Adventists, and the Christian Right. Queens College, CUNY, 22 Aug. 1998, ronaldlawsonnet.files.wordpress.com/2018/06/the-troubled-career-of-an-ex-gay-healer-docx.pdf. Accessed 3 Dec. 2023.
Japenga, Ann. “It’s Called Change Counseling : Troubled Pioneer Maintains His Faith in Program - Los Angeles Times.” Los Angeles Times, 12 Mar. 2019, https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1987-12-06-vw-26838-story.html
Seibold, Loren. “The General Conference and Colin Cook’s ‘Gay Change’ Ministry.” Adventist Today, 13 Apr. 2023, atoday.org/the-general-conference-and-colin-cooks-gay-change-ministry. Accessed 1 Dec. 2023.
The Student Movement is the official student newspaper of Andrews University. Opinions expressed in the Student Movement are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors, Andrews University or the Seventh-day Adventist church.