Gay Catholics, the Courage Apostolate, and Reparative Therapy

Ahead of this evening’s CPCSM educational forum, “Holding the Courage Apostolate Accountable: The Catholic Church, Homosexuality, and Reparative Therapy,” Jeff Strickler has an article in today’s Star Tribune in which I and CPCSM-co-founder David McCaffrey feature. Following is Strickler’s article – with added links and some important corrections and clarifications.

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Gays Reject Catholic Church’s Attempt to “Cure” Them

Gay and lesbian Roman Catholics who contact the Archdiocese
of St. Paul and Minneapolis for spiritual guidance can find themselves
directed toward a 12-step program aimed at changing their behavior.
Australian-born Michael Bayly, who is the executive coordinator of the
Catholic Pastoral Committee on Sexual Minorities, has organized a protest
forum. Bayly, who is a member of Spirit of St. Stephens Catholic Community,
believes the Catholic Church needs to be “more accepting of diversity.”

By Jeff Strickler
Star Tribune (Minneapolis)
November 17, 2009

Gay and lesbian Roman Catholics are protesting
a therapy aimed at helping them become celibate.
The programs are provoking national –
and even international – protests from critics.

Gay and lesbian Roman Catholics who contact the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis for spiritual guidance can find themselves directed toward programs aimed at helping them become celibate.

Called reparative therapy, the programs are provoking national – and even international – protests from critics who say they are ineffective at best and, in some cases, harmful. [Strickler makes quite a jump here. Neither the Roman Catholic Courage apostolate or CPCSM consider “programs aimed at helping [gay people to be] celibate” as examples of “reparative therapy.” For CPCSM’s concerns about Courage and reparative therapy, click here. As you’ll see, the Church isn’t actually attempting to “cure” gay people - so the article’s headline is erroneous, which is unfortunate for all concerned, i.e., something false is said about the Church and we look like we don’t know what we’re talking about! It should be noted, however, that the Courage apostolate, does not discourage its members from attempting so-called reparative therapy endorsed and/or offered by other organizations (such as NARTH). In relation to our program this evening at St. Martin’s Table, that’s our issue with Courage, not that it or the wider Church are themselves trying to “cure” gays.]

Many see the programs as an example of the Vatican’s swing toward conservatism, and an insulting blow to a decade of bridge-building between the church and the gay community.

“[Retired Archbishop] Harry Flynn came to us – we didn’t go to them, they came to us – in the late 1990s and asked us to serve as resource people for the church,” said Michael Bayly, executive coordinator of the Catholic Pastoral Committee on Sexual Minorities (CPCSM). “Then a new pope comes in. Now the archdiocese won’t even take our phone calls.” [Okay, for the record, I don’t recall this being a direct quote on my part. For a start, the whole “late 1990s” time frame is wrong. By that time CPCSM was already “on the outs” with the chancery as a result of the Catholic Parents Online-orchestrated backlash to our Safe Schools Initiative within a number of local Catholic high schools. Plus at no time did Harry Flynn personally approach CPCSM. I’m misquoted, plain and simple. A more accurate statement of the relationship between the Archdiocese and CPCSM - and you can quote me on this - is that throughout the 1980s and ’90s CPCSM, an independent grassroots coalition, worked with various parishes and archdiocesan agencies and was approached in 1995 by the archdiocesan education administration office – then called Catholic Education and Formation Ministries (CEFM) – to share its experience and expertise in ministry with gay people in designing and implementing a Safe Schools Initiative for Catholic high schools. A need for competent and compassionate ministry with gay youth in Catholic high schools had been identified by school administrators and brought to the attention of the head of CEFM. Archbishop Flynn was aware that CEFM had approached and was working with CPCSM. This collaboration took place in the mid-late 1990s. For more of CPCSM’s relationship with the Archdiocese, see here and here.]

So they are speaking out on their own. They’re hosting a forum Tuesday at St. Martin’s Table Restaurant and Bookstore in Minneapolis that they say will shine a spotlight on what they term the “pseudo-scientific organizations” that endorse reparative therapy.

Under the auspices of its Office of Marriage and Family, the Catholic church’s programs are modeled after Alcoholics Anonymous and its sister program for the families of addicts, Al-Anon. The programs, called Courage (AA) and Encourage (Al-Anon), are intended to help gays remain chaste.[In the Arcdiocese of St. Paul-Minneapolis, Courage goes by the name of Faith in Action.]

The chaplain of the local Courage chapter, the Rev. James Livingston, was out of town Monday and unavailable to comment. In explaining the programs, the archdiocese’s website contains links to material that some gays find objectionable. That includes a Q&A with the director of Courage’s national office, the Rev. Paul Check, in which he says, “People are relieved to know the condition [of homosexuality] is both treatable and preventable.”

“Homosexuality is not an illness,” objected David McCaffrey, one of the people who founded CPCSM in 1980. “You shouldn’t be treating it because there’s nothing to treat.”

Check also was not available to comment, but a person in his office became angry when she heard about the forum. Although not an official spokesperson, she said, “We don’t tell anyone what to do. We just try to help them live according to the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church.”

A decade ago, the CPCSM was asked to conduct sensitivity training sessions for the archdiocese. “That’s how much things have changed recently,” Bayly said.

He pointed to an article last November in the Catholic Spirit, the archdiocese’s newspaper, endorsing the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH). Describing itself as a nonprofit educational organization serving people with “unwanted homosexual attraction,” it maintains that through therapy, homosexuals can “develop their heterosexual potential.”

In 2006, the American Psychological Association (APA) issued a statement challenging reparative or “conversion” therapy: “The APA’s concern about the positions espoused by NARTH and so-called conversion therapy is that they are not supported by the science,” it said. “There is simply no sufficiently scientifically sound evidence that sexual orientation can be changed.”

NARTH does have its supporters, however. In 2003, Psychology Today magazine ran an editorial citing data “which suggests that sexual orientation conversion therapy is at least sometimes successful.”

NARTH is not connected to the Catholic Church and is endorsed by some Protestant denominations, also.

Minnesotans aren’t the only ones objecting. There have been protest marches outside NARTH meetings in Dallas and London, and there’s a NARTH protest page on Facebook.


A Courage drop-out

Tonight’s forum features a panel that includes Bayly; Dr. Simon Rosser, a professor in the University of Minnesota’s School of Public Health, and Philip Lowe Jr., a former member of the Twin Cities chapter of Courage.

They will present an APA report that recommends that therapists address the distress of Catholic homosexuals “but not aim to alter sexual orientation,” which it says “has the potential to be harmful.”

Lowe spent 15 months in the Courage program in hopes of finding a way to reconcile his religion and his sexuality.

“I went to weekly meetings, I went to confession, I did everything you were supposed to do,” he said. Through it all, he battled with the feeling that he was supposed to distance himself from who he is. “It wasn't a positive experience.”

He quit the group and the church a year ago. He has since found a partner and a new church home, St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral in Minneapolis.

“We’ve been embraced by that community,” he said. “I wish that everyone could experience that.”

So, why don’t other homosexuals leave the church?

“We identify the church as the people in it, not the hierarchy that runs it,” McCaffrey said. “Besides, we’ve been Roman Catholics all of our lives. It’s part of our lives. It's who we are.”

Bayly doesn’t expect the forum to change the church’s stance on homosexuality, but he does hope that it might open a line of communication.

“All we’re trying to do is start a discussion,” he said. “We’re trying to do a little consciousness-raising about the needs and gifts of the gay and lesbian community.”

Jeff Strickler • 612-673-7392

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Holding the Courage Apostolate Accountable:
The Catholic Church, Homosexuality, and Reparative Therapy

When: Today. Soup supper at 5 p.m., program at 6:30.

Where: St. Martin’s Table Restaurant and Bookstore, 2001 Riverside Av., Minneapolis.

Cost: Supper is $5; program is free.



UPDATE: A Report on CPCSM's 11/17/09
"Holding the Courage Apostolate Accountable" Event


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Holding the Courage Apostolate Accountable
• Beyond Courage
• The Real Meaning of Courage
• The Many Forms of Courage (Part 1)
• The Many Forms of Courage (Part 2)
• The Many Forms of Courage (Part 3)
• The Many Manifestations of God's Loving Embrace
• Debunking NARTH (Part 1)
• Debunking NARTH (Part 2)

Recommended Off-site Link:
Reflections on the Churches and Pastoral Outreach to Gay Persons in Light of the Ex-Gay Movement - William D. Lindsey (Bilgrimage, November 18, 2009).

Image: David Joles. (Note: The image pictured behind me is of St. Sergius and Bacchus).