[Vision2020] Conference Hopes to Change Gays

[Tom Hansen]

>From WXIA-TV (Atlanta, Georgia) at:

http://www.11alive.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=87061

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Conference Hopes to Change Gays
Reported By: Jaye Watson

Close to 1,000 people are planning to attend a controversial conference this
weekend in Atlanta. Organizers for the event are promising they can turn
homosexuals straight. 

"I spent thousands of hours on my knees, praying for the Lord to make me
straight," said Daniel Gonzales. "And he never did."

Gonzales was so desperate not to be gay, he tried the kind of therapy taught
at this weekend's Love Won Out conference, held at the First Baptist Church
of Woodstock.

The billboard on the Downtown Connector says that it is possible to become
straight with God's help. Will Blankenship of First Baptist says it worked
for him.

"My compassion is for people," he said. "And I simply want to say that God
didn't make us that way."

Other clergy disagree.

At Outwrite Bookstore in Midtown, clergy members joined doctors, parents and
gay activists to protest the theory that sexual orientation is something
that can be changed -- a promise made by Christian group Focus on the
Family.

"These groups offer promises they can't deliver, and deliver disasters they
didn't promise," said Wayne Besen of Truthwinsout.org. "The destroy families
in the name of family values."

Hattie Ellis' 25-year-old son is gay. She has a message for the hundreds of
parents who signed their children up for the church group's conference.

"Don't do it," she said. "If you try to change your child, you will lose
your child. You will break their spirit and you may never get them back."

This weekend's conference is scheduled for Saturday at the First Baptist
Church of Woodstock, at 11905 Highway 92 in Woodstock.

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Seeya at thepolls, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho


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"People walking up to you
Singing glory hallelujah
And they're trying to sock it to you
In the name of the Lord."

- Joe South (from "Games People Play")
 
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