Pridesource.com today published an interview with the Rev. Mel White, head of Soulforce, the U.S. network of gay-affirming, faith-based, nonviolent activist organizations.
White has much to say about having ghostwritten autobiographies of religious-right leaders; about living as a gay man across the street from Jerry Falwell and attending Falwell’s church; about the religious-right takeover of the Republican Party; and about ex-gays:
“For 40 years I tried to get over it — being gay — with exorcism and electroshock and aversive therapy and ex-gay therapy,” he remembers. “My marriage lasted 20 years, and we were in therapy almost all of that time. Finally I slit my wrists one day at a crazy moment and my wife said after I got myself bandaged up, ‘You know you’re gay and you really need to have a life of your own. You’ve been a good husband and a good father, but it’s time.'”