Soulforce organized a visit by 60 gay-tolerant students to Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University on April 25.
Inside Higher Ed quotes Jake Reitan, an organizer of Soulforce’s Equality Ride project:
“If a professor here wanted to say that God really loves gay students, he would get in trouble,” Reitan said about Liberty. “If a student told a professor he was gay, he would be reported and urged to attend ex-gay programs,” where people are told that they can change their sexual orientation.
Reitan’s predictions are based on reports that Soulforce has received from gay graduates and other former students of Liberty University — and on comments by current antigay students reported in the Lynchburg News & Advance:
Lacon Burns, an LU sophomore, said she personally doesn’t care if someone is gay or not, but added that the Bible says it’s a sin.
She said any student who admitted being gay would get counseling.
Nathan Tyler Simmons, an LU student from Roanoke, said he is an ex-gay who would like to help people change their sexual orientation.
“I truly believe change is possible,” he said.
That, Reitan said, is why LU needs to develop a safe haven program where students can talk about their sexual orientation without fear of retribution or attempts to “convert” them to heterosexuality.
If organizations such as Exodus and PFOX support “choice,” then what, one may wonder, are they doing to encourage free choice at Liberty University?
And where is the Liberty in sexual coercion?
Um, Falwell’s ex-gay agenda is the acquisition of money. The sooner you realize it, the better you’ll be. Conservative religionism is only about money. I was introduced to that as a teenager in the mid 1960s. It’s only about money. It really is.
hey just wanted to let you know if you have any questions as to what the “agenda” is at LU or even with this event ill be happy to discuss it.
– Nathan Tyler Simmons (ntsimmons@liberty.edu)