Cross-post note: This post is for John Hosty-Grinnell. He originally put it on Know Thy Neighbor.
From the Exodus International website:
“Exodus is a nonprofit, interdenominational Christian organization promoting the message of Freedom from homosexuality through the power of Jesus Christ.
Since 1976, Exodus has grown to include over 230 local ministries in the USA and Canada. We are also linked with other Exodus world regions outside of North America through the Exodus Global Alliance.”
To counter the presence of Exodus Join the Impact MA has invited Wayne Besen to a protest rally outside the Exodus meeting, and later on that same day Besen will deliver a lecture based on his expert knowledge of the anti-gay group. Besen is known as a former HRC spokesman and founded the website TruthWinsOut.org; a site dedicated to bringing anti-gay lies out into the open where the truth can be compared to them. Besen is also the author of “Anything But Straight“.
The protest will be held from 12:00PM to 3:00PM at the Park street station near the fountain. Speakers include: Arline Isaacson of The Massachusetts Gay and Lesbian Political Caucus, Stewart Landers, Scott Gortikov of MassEquality, Tom Lang of KnowThyNeighbor.org, Paul Sousa of Join the Impact MA, and keynote speaker Wayne Besen, founder of TruthWinsOut.org.
Co-sponsors include MassEquality, the Mass G/L Political Caucus, the Anti-Violence Project, Know Thy Neighbor, CourtingEquality.com, and LBGT@MIT.
Here is a YouTube.com video of a 16 year old boy forced to attend one of Exodus international's programs for children.
As a Congregationalist, it is disappointing to me that Park Street is hosting this event. Granted that church is affiliated with the Conservative Congregational Christian Conference rather than the United Church of Christ or even the National Association of Congregational Christian Churches, and helped found the National Association of Evangelicals. However, Park Street does also have a heritage of social action and justice that fits quite nicely with the overall legacy of Congregationalism. I don’t mind a church being a bit more traditional; even the UCC has those, but this is off-the-deep-end territory.
I agree, it is a shame they are hosting this thing. And given their earlier history it makes it even worse.
I was having a heck of a time getting the video to go up correctly. I felt it was important to let those interested that Wayne Besen was coming to town so people here would have a chance to go to the events, or at least talk about those events here.
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p>Thanks again.