Well that’s a pretty silly take. I’m not worried about my relationship with God these days, in fact I am far more secure than I ever was before. It turns out that loving my neighbor was pretty important.

Encouraging people to sin because it makes them feel happy is not loving your neighbors. Actually, it contradicts the definition of love. Speaking of love, I suggest you check out 1 Corinthians 13.

I see that you are the kind of people who knew the Truth but intentionally chose to reject it and follow the Devil in order to please the feelings of various ungodly people who are proud of their sinful wicked ways and rebelling against God. Well, 2 Peter 2 has a proper description of your kind: you are false teachers behaving like dogs returning to their vomits. But no matter what you do, and how much you are trying to silence us, your lies and hypocrisies will always be exposed and the Truth will prevail over your lies.

So, are you saying that Arana’s article posted in this thread is totally debunking Spitzer’s study? There were studies done by Shidlo & Shroeder on the effects of repairative therapy, done after Spitzer twice, and they both did not replicate, by showing that people who try it cannot change and can even feel harmed by such therapy. Yet Shidlo & Shroeder did not come to conclusions that SOCE is generally harmful. There was a also a study of Jones & Yarhouse showing positive outcomes of SOCE, and a study done by Lisa Diamond, who interestingly enough opposes SOCE, came to conclusion that there is a fluidity in human sexuality, especially among women.

Just because I am willing to believe based on evidence that in general people can change their sexualities, it doesn’t mean that I support everything that other conservatives advocate. For example, I hate what George Bush did in the Middle East and Afghanistan, even though I’m registered Republican and I’ll probably vote for Trump. Obama seemed a little better than Bush but not good enough for me. I also understand that sometimes abortion is the only necessary option to save a woman’s life, hence, it should be legal, safe, and rare.

Let’s get back to the subject of Spitzer’s study and the issues surrounding it. It was actually he, who contributed to homosexuality being declassified as a mental disorder. Btw, disorder does not mean illness and by 1973, homosexuality was considered so, particularly as a deviation. Like, schizophrenia was/is mental illness, but homosexuality was not, more along claustrophobia. Spitzer and like minded individuals concluded that because homosexuals cannot feel comfortable with practicing heterosexuality it does not make them disordered. They also concluded that homosexuals can, in generally, function well and contribute to society. A lot of it was based on studies of Evelyn Hooker, but Hooker did not specify whether homosexuality itself is either good or bad thing for humanity. I got this information from books “The politics of a diagnosis” by Ronald Bayer and “Destructive trends in mental heath” by Nicolas Cummings, past APA president. Both people, like Spitzer were socially liberal and supportive of gay rights, but they admitted that they felt pressured by activism to remove homosexuality as a mental disorder.

This is why, it was a shock for LGBT community, when Spitzer published his study by claiming that some people can completely change from homosexuals to heterosexuals. His critics accused him for not checking whether these people were telling the truth. Finally, after having conversations with Arana, he publicly admitted that because he did not test credibility of his participants, he no longer has such firm conclusions. I’m fine with it, but I personally find the same thing about Arana’s article: it’s not clear whether everything he said is the truth. Also, SOCE’s therapists argue that when people do not pursue change on their own desires, it would not work for them. Arana’s own words prove that.