May 24, 2006
Column #1,291
Causes & Cures of Homosexuality
by Michael J. McManus
                               
     NEWARK   What causes homosexuality?  Are people born homosexual?
    
     Last week the New Jersey Family Policy Council answered those questions by inviting
Greg Quinlan, an ex-gay, to speak to clergy in six cities.
    
     His testimony begins with his father, "who was Archie Bunker" in manner, but unlike
Archie, was physically abusive, beating his son so badly he was hospitalized twice. One day at
age 8, in front of his friends, Greg asked his dad, "You hate me, don't you?"  His dad cursed and
replied, "Yes, I hate you."  Greg sighed, "I knew that."
    
     When Greg was 9 he "professed his faith in Jesus Christ. "But as things got worse, at age
10, a boy across the street, aged 13, introduced me to sex. I knew it was wrong, but what I got
was affirmation, affection, approval and someone touching me who was not beating me up. I got
involved in pornography, discos, the homosexual lifestyle. I was very, very sexually
promiscuous. It is the providence of God that I, at age 47, am HIV free."
    
     As a registered nurse he volunteered to care for 100 men who died of AIDS before he
stopped counting. Quinlan went to their funerals, reading their favorite Bible verses.
    
     He joined the Human Rights Campaign, responsible for raising tens of thousands of
dollars for one of the largest and most effective lobbies in Washington, which persuaded
Congress to invest in AIDS research. "They taught me how to lobby.  But what the devil trained
me to do, God can use for His glory," he told pastors.
    
      Quinlan started watching the 700 Club. At first, he wanted to "reach through the set and
strangle Pat Robertson. But he saw an ex-gay on the show who shared how he left the lifestyle.
"EX-GAY?" he asked himself.  "How is that possible? But I hated my life. There is pleasure in
sin for a season, but I wanted out."
    
     He called a Christian friend across the country and asked him to lead him in making a re-
commitment to Christ.  When Quinlan prayed the sinner's prayer, "I had peace." He started going
to church.
    
     At age 35, Greg's father, who was dying due to smoking, asked his son, the RN, to care
for him. One day Greg told his dad, "I can't be here tomorrow, due to work."  His father who had
undergone a deathbed conversion, replied,  "That's OK. I love you, Greg."
    
     He was stunned. Prompted by a nurse, he replied, "I love you too, Dad." He died the next
day. When Greg started on a path of truly forgiving his father, his anger and bitterness left - along
with his homosexual desires. "I had a lot of reason to be angry. Three-quarters of gays were
molested at an early age, like me.  Now sex education is telling kids, homosexuality is normal."
    
     He started a ministry in Dayton, the Pro Family Network, which lobbied for passage of
Ohio's one man, one woman Marriage Amendment. He's been on the 700 Club four times, with
his wife.  As a result, he has received death threats, which frighten her.
    
     He answers gay critics who charge that Jesus never said anything about homosexuality:
"Look at Matthew 19, in answer to the Pharisees. Jesus replies, `Haven't you heard, at the
beginning, the Creator made them male and female.' Stop there. Not Adam and Steve, or Eve
and Edith, but man and woman. `For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be
united with his wife, and the two will become one.' They had sex. That's how we all got here.
Jesus is quoting Genesis, and he can because he was there," he says to applause.
    
     "There is no biological evidence, not one repeatable study, not a single genetic test that
gives any validity to homosexual behavior as a "born" trait. No one is born Gay, no one!
Homosexuality is an emotional disorder, a pathology that can be and has been effectively
changed when a person is highly motivated."
    
     A woman once challenged him: "If we find a gay gene, then you will have to accept it."
    
     "No, I won't," he countered. "Last week I heard they discovered a gene that causes
hereditary breast cancer. You think that if there is a gay gene, homosexuals should embrace their
homosexuality. Then she should accept her cancer, and embrace it. NO! That's nonsense.  If
diabetes has a gene, we seek to cure it. If there is a gay gene, let's work to cure it."
    
     "Remember Scripture, `Such were some of you.'  It is a changeable behavior."