(Although this blog is in regard to the passing of the anti-conversion therapy legislation currently happening in New Zealand, the issues are universal)
For those of us who have been through Conversion Therapy (CT), the issue is pretty clear – ban it!
But of course, the devil is in the detail, and boy are there some details!
Now I’m not really talking about the details of the legislation itself, although there are areas that need cleaning up and redefining etc. and there are others who have a really good handle on this.
I’m talking about far deeper implications and the paradigms that exist around the entire topic.
There are two main areas that CT can be addressed through – religious beliefs and human rights. There are cultural considerations, but they are mostly driven by these two foundations.
Human rights are reasonably obvious as most humans recognise our rights to “be who we are” within the constraints of inflicting harm on others.
But the religious aspect is an extremely large can of worms and the water can become very muddy when we try to use those worms to fish in the deep waters of religious beliefs. In fact, to do justice to the topic would require an entire book, so I’ll try to keep it specific.
Ultimately, it comes down to interpretation of the bible. After we peel away all the issues around religious freedom the whole thing hinges on “what does the bible say” and for most Christians, the bible appears to be very clear; being LGBT+ is wrong, and by wrong I mean anything from a sin that God can free us from to an abomination that God despises and condemns to hell.
For those of us who have done the hard work, we know that there is an entirely valid interpretation of scripture using concise exegetics and theology that completely reverse that interpretation. But for many Christians, they won’t even consider the possibility. So this is where the battle will always end up – always!!
We will get this bill passed, but the religious traditionalists will fight to the death to conserve their scriptures and will use whatever tactics they can to undermine the human rights aspects and morality of your average church goer/Christian, convinced they are doing God’s work.
This will be promoted through the new face of CT, where being LGBT+ is just another sin that a loving God will help us through. Or there’s the approach where it’s absolutely OK but we are called to celibacy. These approaches do have biblical support, and it would be foolish of us to think they don’t.
At the end of the day, we are faced with the difficult fact that the bible has, for as long as it’s been around, been interpreted in vastly conflicting ways. There are literally thousands of denominations, sects and cults, all claiming they alone have the true interpretation of scripture as revealed by God.
So we must chose our battles wisely. If you are addressing fundamentalists on biblical issues, make sure you know your stuff, because they do! Also be aware that they believe they are expressing God’s love for us by freeing us from sin. Far too often, I’ve seen well meaning LGBT+ folks attempting to present biblical arguments and only ending up looking foolish and actually reinforcing the views of the opposition. It’s often wiser to walk away.
We’ll win this battle, but the “war” is far from over.
