The ministry’s board knew it could not survive another public scandal, so it questioned Chambers rigorously before deciding to hire him. The movement traditionalists believed would be their saving grace in the fight against LGBT rights was quickly becoming their Achilles’ heel.īeing chosen to lead Exodus in 2001 was like becoming the ex-gay Pope following the Catholic sex-abuse scandals. He was ousted from his position and later confessed, “I do not believe that reparative therapy changes sexual orientation in fact, it does great harm to many people.” “I never saw one of our members or other Exodus leaders or other Exodus members become heterosexual, so deep down I knew that it wasn’t true.” And in September 2000, Exodus’s chairman John Paulk was photographed cruising for men at a gay bar in Washington, D.C. Bussee would later admit, “I never saw one of our members or other Exodus leaders or other Exodus members become heterosexual, so deep down I knew that it wasn’t true.” Throughout the 1980s and ‘90s, many former Exodus members became vocal critics of the ministry, claiming it had caused them psychological distress. But over the years since its founding in 1976, many of the leaders Exodus’ touted as success stories had become cautionary tales instead.Ĭofounder Michael Bussee left the group in 1979 and entered a relationship with another Exodus leader, Gary Cooper. And by 2001, Exodus needed all the help it could get.Īt its peak, Exodus International had an annual operating budget of more than $1 million, had 25 employees, and served as an umbrella organization for more than 400 local ministries across 17 countries. “We love it and value it because we worked hard for it.”Īs a former Exodus participant who once lived a “gay lifestyle” but was able to achieve a successful straight marriage, Chambers was the perfect candidate to lead the organization.
“While many relationships are built on sex, ours just includes sex,” Chambers says. In My Exodus, he recounts his inability to consummate the union for eight months, but he says their sex life is now “good.” In 1998, Chambers married his wife, Leslie, with whom he adopted two children. But, he says, Exodus’s emphasis on “change” made it “fatally flawed.” At the time, there was no national network for LGBT Christians and most churches were not places of sexual transparency. While the ministry did not make Chambers straight, he claims that it saved his life and many others because it provided a “safe space for many” to talk about their sexuality. At 19, he connected with an Exodus-affiliated ministry where he hoped to rid himself of same-sex attraction once and for all. Most of his early sexual encounters with men were anonymous, which bred in him a deep self-hatred. And his story of transformation, detailed in a new memoir, My Exodus: From Fear to Grace with a foreword by CNN’s Lisa Ling, will likely resonate with many traditionalists who are searching for new ways to think about LGBT issues.Ĭhambers, 43, was raised by an ex-military father in a Southern Baptist home and realized he was attracted to other males at a young age. Chambers’s decision effectively delivered the deathblow to the beleaguered ex-gay movement. In 2013, he publicly apologized to the LGBT community for the “pain and hurt” Exodus had caused and announced that the ministry was permanently shutting down. Ex-gay leaders traveled to churches and appeared on television news programs citing a litany of examples of happily married “former homosexuals” to demonstrate that sexual orientation is a choice and that change is possible.īut Chambers would undergo a radical change of heart. During the latter part of the 20th century, Exodus and similar conservative groups promoted the idea that gay people could-and should try to-become straight. Like most conservative Christian leaders at the time, Chambers considered the countercultural nature of his work a point of pride. The Revolt Against Homelessness Olga Khazan