We recently noticed that David Kyle Foster’s Mastering Life Ministries no longer appears on the Exodus affiliate page for Tennessee. When asked, Exodus President Alan Chambers confirmed to XGW that Foster chose not to renew his membership for 2008, and “left the Exodus Network late last year.” Interestingly, Myra Noyes is no longer listed as an Exodus regional representative,either. She was responsible for the Florida region and has been associated with Foster’s ministry for some time (she is still listed on the Mastering Life Ministries website). Whatever led to the split between Foster and Exodus, Noyes’ concurrent departure may indicate a deep-seated difference of opinion.
Mastering Life Ministries has long been part of Exodus, and Chambers worked with Foster on the latter’s Pure Passion television program a couple of years ago. From his writings and participation in that show, Foster appears to be a rather rigid, controlling person. As illustrated in this earlier XGW post, he speaks with the finality of a prophet, and finds it easy to disregard that which is not found in his reading of the Bible, including the findings of science. As in the clip below, he does use generic references to science when he needs to add legitimacy to his own, sometimes bizarre statements. Here, for instance, he debates the kinds of sex a husband and wife may have without sinning.
In what must be the current winner of the “how far can I exaggerate the number of ex-gays in the world contest,” Foster claims there are “millions” of them. Responding to a letter from someone “who struggles with homosexual inclinations,” he writes:
As God heals those things that made you seek other men for sexual pleasure, your natural heterosexuality (which has been there all along, suppressed) will naturally begin to emerge, and like millions of other ex-gays, you will likely marry and have children and praise God for the rest of your life for the incredible miracle that He has done in you.
In the Pure Passion program mentioned above, Foster makes a statement which illustrates the depth of his dogma, claiming that “homosexuals do not exist.” Millions of ex-gays but no homosexuals — how curious.
Another major, longtime Exodus ministry, Where Grace Abounds, left the network in April of this year. A line from their website could be a hint as to why they left.
We also see the sin of self-righteousness as equally heinous in the eyes of God and those who condemn others as equally in need of redemption as any of the people they accuse.
Why don’t we find deeply honest statements like that on the Exodus website? And one wonders how long Wendy Gritter and New Direction can hope to maintain their membership.
While Randy Thomas claimed during an interview in Asheville, NC last week that Exodus has a membership of over 200 ministries, the listing on their website does not reflect this. We will keep track and follow up as necessary.
On a recent blog post I wrote on vulnerability I said:
“There is a common sentiment in the Christian community that goes something like this, “There aren’t any homosexual people, there are only heterosexual people with a homosexual problem.” While I see multiple challenges with this statement, to me one of the significant ones is the hiddenness it perpetuates. “Don’t own the reality that you experience same-gender attraction – because it is just a ‘problem’ and you just need to deal with it.” “Don’t reveal that vulnerable place where it just feels like this is part of who you are – because that just perpetuates this ‘problem’ and will keep you from emerging into your true heterosexuality.”
I want to be a safe person – who offers and receives the gift of vulnerability. I want to be a safe person – because through me, I want my gay friends to encounter a safe place in the embrace of God. The God who chooses to reveal himself through vulnerability. The God who offers the kind of genuine acceptance that dispels fear and hiddenness. The God who allows us the grace and strength to stay present – open to his love – even in the face of rejection, shame and judgment from others. ”
Our reflections at New Direction aren’t driven by a hope to remain in the Exodus network. Nor are they driven by a hope to get booted out of the Exodus network. Our reflections and engagement on faith and sexuality are driven by a deep hunger to represent Jesus Christ and reflect the Love of God. In a place of humility and learning, where we choose to be open to critique, we hope to keep our eyes fixed on Christ and let the chips fall where they will.
https://www.religioustolerance.org/theophostic1.htm
Take a look at Foster’s board of directors. Neil T. Anderson is on it (I tried to put a link to a site on him above). Anderson was one of the principal founders of theophostic counseling, a system of counseling that believes gays and the mentally ill (primarily these two groups, but also some others) are demonized – that is, controlled by demons. This form of therapy is extremely dangerous, as it uses unlicensed professionals to try to recover memories, particularly of so-called Satanic ritual abuse.
I don’t want to beat a dead horse, as I’ve mentioned this on other sites, but I think the GLBT community needs to realize how similar the treatment of the mentally ill within evangelical communities is to the treatment of the GLBT community. Theophostic therapy is merely one of several current therapeutic methodologies (reparative therapy, biblical counseling, etc.) which exploit the poor, the disadvantaged, and the mentally unbalanced for their own profit. I know support for the LGBT community must continue to be Ex-gay Watch’s main focus, but I wish XGW would also highlight the other problematic counseling methodologies present within evangelicalism, and how these methodologies hurt both gays and straights.
The LGBT community has so run away from the label of mental illness that one gets the impression that for both anti-gays and gays and lesbians, mental illness is considered an inferior state of being. As an unintended consequence, mental illness is further demonized by both groups, as an exercise to avoid a pernicious label. By doing this the LGBT community gives into the very normalizing instincts it has so heroically tried to avoid in the past. The mentally ill in evangelical churches end up bearing the brunt of this conflict, as well as gays and lesbians still trapped within evangelicalism. I think sites like XGW really need to interrogate all forms of Christian counseling, not just reparativeExodus style therapy.
Sorry, this is an issue I feel passionate about. I have OCD and have seen firsthand how evangelicals treat the mentally ill with these therapies. I have also seen at least one reparative therapist in action, and if he is any indictaion . . . . Welll, you get my drift.
It seems Foster has been critical of the “campy, gossipy, lispy” mannerisms and immaturity of leaders in the “‘ex-gay’ movement” for some time now. According to an undated article on MLM’s website, Foster provides his interesting insight behind the scenes of the “ex-gay” movement:
I speculate that he must be referring to leaders associated with Exodus (is there another “ex-gay” Christian ministry networking organization?). It doesn’t take much effort to imagine some of the prominent ex-gay leaders turning campy at the drop of hat.
I probably disagree with Foster’s broad judgement about what is or is not masculine/feminine. I’m sure many “healthy” heterosexual men and women contradict his gender stereotypes. However, I can understand why Foster would be critical and weary about associating with leaders who declare themselves public examples of “change” while keeping their more comfortable identities in the backstage closet.
Unlike Foster, I did not notice too much of the “campy, gossipy, lispy old identity” when the stagelights went out — of course, there was some of that. Not surprising. After all, we were still gay.
But what I noticed more was that we were all still talking about how we were still struggling with gay fantasies and still “falling” — even with each other — and I don’t mean just Gary Cooper and me.
There are a lot of skeletons in EXODUS’s closet. I think that’s one of the reasons they don’t like me. I know where they’re hidden.
Would this also be why Exodus staffers, particularly Randy and Alan, obsessively cling to the newspeak of “gay-identified” and “struggling with SSA” etc? It certainly seems that anything which refers to homosexuality as a definite orientation that some people “just are” drives them into overdrive. Then again, if one wants to believe they can change that, it would be most helpful to foster a belief that it is not real to begin with.
David, Bingo! You are right on when you said “Then again, if one wants to believe they can change that, it would be most helpful to foster a belief that it is not real to begin with.”
There is not “orientation”, only “temptation”. There is not gay, just “gay indentified”. There are no real homosexuals, just confused or damaged straight ones.
Language is all important to these ministries. I call it “EXODUS newspeak”. The question, “Can gays change” is easliy answered “yes” — all you have to do is redefine what gay means (or insist that it doesn’t really exist anyway).
And “change” means whatever you want it to mean. You can be “ex-gay” even if you are “falling” several times a week — as long as you “repent” after each fall.
I realize it can sound somewhat self-righteous on my part, and I am certainly no yardstick by which to measure one’s behavior, but at what point did the truth become such an insignificant commodity in these ministries? In a recent post on his blog, we have Randy Thomas essentially redefining transparency to mean accountability to those who are in agreement with him, i.e. friends and family. And we have the entire organization repeating these Orwellian terms over and over as though that will make them true.