Exclusive Op-Ed: Gay Iraq War Vet Who Confronted Alan Chambers Takes On Ex-Gay, Inc.
Guest author and ex-gay survivor Sean Sala appears in Oprah’s OWN “Special Report: God & Gays,” on “Our America” with Lisa Ling, which airs Thursday. Here, in this exclusive op-ed, Sala shares his experiences with Alan Chambers, the ex-gay movement, and his own faith.
Moments before I was to take my own life, I stared at the closet door in my friend’s room. Behind that door was his loaded gun. In a desperate plea before I was going to end it all, I had flashes of the decade I spent in the Church where I was told I was possessed by demons. Flashbacks of when I was walking into a Sunday service, called a “fag” and was ultimately kicked out of Christian Life Assembly in Carrollton, Texas (under the past leadership and former name) for being gay, and memories of the Exodus International “Living Waters” program where I was told time and time again that I was molested and that is what lead to me becoming gay.
“I’ve never been molested,” I repeated over and over again to the leadership who promised that “thousands had been delivered” from homosexuality. But my questioning and resistance to things that were manufactured within the therapy instantly demonized me. Since I would not “admit” I had been molested I was deemed as “rebellious, insecure and non-deliverable.” Which, in my teenage mind, damaged me and brought me to the point of suicide years later when I was 21. I believe that only the Divine stopped me from ending my life that day.
After coming out to the youth pastor I grew up with, he said to me “just go and indulge with men and come back and repent.” That was his response to my honest and transparent moment about my life. But because the political fallout to him and his effectiveness as a minister was on the line, he basically told me to be a hypocrite in order for the anti-gay church establishment to survive. This happened before Exodus International CEO Alan Chambers finally “came out” and stated that gay “reparative therapy” had caused immense damage, even though just months before he had said in an interview to Lisa Ling that “change is possible, I stand by that phrase.”
Before I came on the “The Great Reconciliation,†I had been involved in national LGBT policy activism for almost three years. In my own work as an activist, I had a growing concern for the anti-gay criminalization laws that were brewing in Uganda’s parliament, along with rumors that other African nations were cooking up genocidal policies against the LGBT community as well. Evangelical Churches in America were a large conduit — psychologically and financially — for these bills of hate to come to fruition. I desperately called my former Pastor who now served as staff of Fellowship Church in Grapevine, Texas — the seventh largest mega-church in the nation. I believed if I could rally mega-churches against Uganda’s proposed laws (although they themselves would never condone being gay) surely they would stand up against genocide?
Well, the moment I contacted the staff of Ed Young, my former Pastor, I was unfriended on Facebook without a word. Multiple emails were never responded to, social media pleas ignored and he has ignored my calls since then. Complete radio silence from Fellowship Church. Not because I asked them to stand up for “being gay” but because I asked them to stand up against genocide. Although I can not say that Fellowship condones genocide, the silence and fear from their end echoes the damage that ex-gay therapy and the larger hatred and second class citizenship of gays has still not truly been addressed in the church. If it’s gay we can not touch it, even if it is to aid someone in need because LGBT people are “evil.”
But the moment my former Pastor found out that I mentioned their Church and their smug attitude towards LGBT Ugandan issues in this expose, I received a phone call. Which I ignored. The tide has turned and they are on the wrong side of history and frankly the wrong side of the Gospel of Christ’s mission. I don’t have time to play PR games with a so called “Church†because now their credibility is on the line, again.
Image:
A photo from Lisa Ling’s “Special Report: God & Gays.”
Left to right are Sean Sala, Lisa Ling, and former board member of Exodus Michael Bussee.
When I headed into that church basement in Los Angeles to film the documentary, Alan Chambers apologized. For me though, that apology will not be enough until Exodus agrees to shut down. Although I can’t share details of the show until it airs Thursday, I am actively working to assure that the tired, old magician Alan Chambers will never be able to wield more damage than he has already done — especially in light of a recent revelation that Exodus could directly have had a ripple effect that has lead to pending genocide in Africa, as revealed by the Reverend Albert Ogle in a recent article.
The world experienced the “Great Reformation.†America has experienced the “Great Awakening.†Now I believe we as a nation stand at the point of what I call “The Great Reconciliation.” The nation has changed. Supreme Court rulings of equality are pending and the Evangelical Church that once ruled the bias against gays, the moral majority movement, has withered almost to extinction.
Standing is a minority that is spreading like a wild fire, such as churches like MissionGathering Christian Church in San Diego and others. That fire that is spreading? Gays are God’s creation. The nation is embracing it. Pastor Richard McCullen of MissionGathering, he himself a former closeted Charismatic Preacher, has come out and stayed out. Alan Chambers, the man whose eyes I stared into that night on “Our America†says he gets it … but will he? Lisa Ling who sat next to me during the expose said this:
“I am humbled to have been able to be part of one of the most emotional experiences of my life. I was in awe of the courage it took for the survivors to share their stories. My hope is that something really positive comes of it.”
The reconciliation is upon us. Whereas Evangelicals once thought that the world would turn gay, the exact opposite had occurred. Many churches are accepting of LGBT people and those that are stuck to the old ways are waning in relevance.
Chambers now stands in an opportune moment. Will he rage against the silence of Fellowship Church and Ed Young’s cronies who are so anti-gay they can’t even have a conversation about how gays should not be killed in mass numbers? Will Alan Chambers finally end the concentration camp of Exodus? Whatever happens, don’t miss it. Whatever happens, don’t let our poised moment of the reconciliation of the LGBT community and the Evangelical Church wane. This is Our America too and according to Rev. Ogle, He is “Our God, too.”
But Exodus must shut down and you can be a part of that. SIGN THE PETITION
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Sean Sala is a national gay, social and sexual rights activist. He was the organizer of the 2011 Active Duty Military March in San Diego in which over 250 active duty Military marched in San Diego Pride while Don’t Ask Don’t Tell was still national law. He also was an organizer and liaison for the 2012 Active Duty Military March in which he pressured top Military brass resulting in the Pentagon issuing a historical first time blanket certification and approved the United States Military to wear their full uniforms for the first time in a pride parade in US history; where over 450 military personnel participated. He formally was on the national leadership committee of  Servicemembers United the nations largest LGBT military organization, where he participated in a White House Executive office meeting on Southern California and Gay Military issues and sparred in national news against anti-gay Republican Congressman opposed to Gay troops. He also advocated for troops battling PTSD to the San Diego City Council. He has been featured on the ‘Real World,’ MTV sponsored internet casts on gay rights, local, national and international news and an official Library of Congress documentation on the DADT repeal movement. He is a popular blogger and a columnist for San Diego Gay and Lesbian News.
After resigning from Servicemembers United he is in progress of challenging the top ten Mega Churches in United States to denounce Uganda’s Parliament from executing gays and he is the chief organizer of the San Diego rally on March 25th to demand the Supreme Court to rule for full federal marriage equality. He also has formed the “Military Freedom Coalition†to challenge the Transgender ban in the Military. He is also currently working on LGBT issues affecting the continent of Africa.
He served in the United States Navy six years for Naval Intelligence, three combat tours and is an Iraq war Veteran.
Editor’s note: An earlier version of this article included an image that incorrectly identified Sean Sala, Lisa Ling, and Alan Chambers. We apologize for the error.
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Donald Trump is on his fourth day of promoting his false claim that 20,000 undocumented Haitian migrants were dumped on Springfield, Ohio and have destroyed the townsfolk’s way of life, including by stealing people’s pet cats and dogs and eating them. Now, one U.S. Senator is suggesting the Republican presidential nominee is using “stochastic terrorism” to help his flailing presidential campaign.
A bomb threat and another, unspecified threat forced several Springfield elementary schools and one middle school to evacuate or not open Thursday and Friday. On Thursday, the Springfield city hall was evacuated and shut down, as were some state motor vehicle offices.
The emailed bomb threat on Thursday echoed Donald Trump’s and U.S. Senator JD Vance’s racist lies.
“My hometown of Springfield is becoming a thirdworld (expletive) because you allowed the federal government to dump these (expletive) here,” the email stated, USA Today reports. “We have Haitians eating our animals and then you lie and claim this is not happening when we see this happening. I’m here to send a message, I placed a bomb in the following locations…”
RELATED: ‘Hell Isn’t Hot Enough’: Fury at Trump as More School Evacuations Follow ‘Pet-Eating’ Lies
During Tuesday’s presidential debate Trump had falsely said: “In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs. The people that came in, they’re eating the cats, they’re eating, they’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”
On Thursday he used the lie to promote the candidacy of a Republican seeking to unseat Ohio Democratic U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown.
And on Friday, despite the bomb threat and other unspecified threat, Trump said in a press conference he would travel to Springfield and vowed to do “large deportations” from that city and send the legal immigrants he removes to Venezuela.
The “20,000 illegal Haitian migrants” are reported 12,000 to 15,000, ABC News reports, and they are not “illegal.” They are in the country legally, and the town as far back as a decade ago resolved to invite immigrants to help rebuild their failing economy and businesses.
Trump: We will do large deportations from Springfield, Ohio. Large deportations. We’re going to get these people out. We’re bringing them back to Venezuela pic.twitter.com/41CdKtcmwq
— Acyn (@Acyn) September 13, 2024
Also on Friday, while reportedly not repeating the racist pet-eating lie, Trump dismissed the bomb threats as unimportant.
Reporter: The mayor of Springfield, the police chief, the Republican governor have all debunked this story about pets. And now there are bomb threats at schools and kids being evacuated.
Trump: No no, no, the real threat is what’s happening at our border pic.twitter.com/oDvbGDURYB
— Acyn (@Acyn) September 13, 2024
U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-HI) is not dismissing them, but he is asking how anyone could function again under a Trump presidency, and suggesting Trump is engaging in stochastic terrorism.
RELATED: Loomer Invokes Hannibal Lecter as Trump Triples Down on Lies About Immigrants Eating Pets
“Think about what it would be like to have four years of a President engaging in overtly racist stochastic terrorism against people pursuing the American dream and then just ask yourself what your immigrant grandparents would want you to do. Kids deserve to go to school safely,” Senator Schatz wrote.
Wajahat Ali is a New York Times contributing op-ed writer, Daily Beast columnist, and author of “Go Back to Where You Came From.” Responding to the news Friday of more school evacuations, Ali wrote: “Stochastic terrorism thanks to Trump and Vance.”
Mother Jones’s D.C. bureau chief David Corn, an MSNBC analyst, also noted: “Trump and Vance incite. Look up stochastic terrorism.”
And Mother Jones on X posted: “Days after Trump went on a racist rant during the presidential debate, the city of Springfield, Ohio, received a bomb threat that was explicitly hostile to immigrants and Haitians. This further proves that Trump’s demonizing rhetoric portends violence.”
Watch the videos above or at this link.
READ MORE: Trump Faces Increasing Calls to Participate in Second Debate
For the second day in a row, elementary school children in Springfield, Ohio, were forced to be evacuated due to threats: a bomb threat on Thursday and an unspecified threat on Friday. The threats come after Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and his running mate, Ohio U.S. Senator JD Vance, have repeatedly spread lies about Haitian immigrants in Springfield this week, including that they are stealing residents’ cats and dogs and eating them.
Thursday’s bomb threat specifically mentioned the false claims about Haitian immigrants eating people’s pets, USA Today reported.
“Three schools in Springfield were evacuated or closed Friday, based on guidance from police, school officials said,” local NBC affiliate WLWT reports. “Officials with the Springfield City School District said that based on information they got from the Springfield Police Division, students at Perrin Woods and Snowhill Elementary were evacuated and moved to another district location.”
A Springfield middle school was also ordered closed Friday morning, before classes began, and “at least one Springfield location of the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles is closed.”
READ MORE: ‘Screaming About Eating Cats Is Not a Solution’: Walz Rallies Michigan Crowd, Slams Trump
On Thursday, a bomb threat targeting Springfield city hall and an elementary school forced evacuations of those buildings.
“Police Chief Allison Elliott said that due to the seriousness of the threat, officials evacuated multiple buildings in addition to City Hall, including BMV Springfield Driver’s Exam Station, Ohio License Bureau Southside, Springfield Academy of Excellence and Fulton Elementary School.”
Despite the reports of the bomb threat on Thursday, hours later Donald Trump used his Truth Social platform to promote the Republican nominee working to unseat Democratic U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio, by spreading more anti-Haitian immigrant racism.
“Bernie Moreno has a very good chance of winning Ohio against a Radical Left Democrat, Sherrod Brown, with what is happening in Springfield, and other parts of the State,” Trump declared Thursday afternoon, referring to the far-right extremist Republican who is currently leading in the polls by low single digits.
Trump then invoked his racist Haitian immigrant lies.
“Ohio is being inundated with Illegal Migrants, mostly from Haiti, who are taking over Towns and Villages at a level and rate never seen before.”
On Truth Social, Trump on Thursday also posted memes of cats, including one with them holding a sign that says, “Don’t let them eat us, vote for Trump.”
RELATED: Loomer Invokes Hannibal Lecter as Trump Triples Down on Lies About Immigrants Eating Pets
During Tuesday’s presidential debate, Trump had falsely claimed, “In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs. The people that came in, they’re eating the cats, they’re eating, they’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”
USA Today also reported that the “false rumor that Haitian migrants were stealing and eating pets began to circulate in the days leading up to the debate and was further popularized through posts from running mate J.D. Vance about his own state and AI-generated images shared by Trump, Elon Musk and the Republican House Judiciary Committee.”
J.J. Abbott, former press secretary to then-Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf, responded to ABC News immigration reporter Armando Tonatiuh Torres-García’s viral social media post reporting Friday’s threat and evacuations:
“In 2018, the GOP and Trump’s anti-immigrant conspiracies led to the deadliest mass shooting in recent PA history at a synagogue in Pittsburgh. The gunman took him seriously and literally. There’s nothing funny or intriguing about this dangerous racism.”
In 2018, the GOP and Trump’s anti-immigrant conspiracies led to the deadliest mass shooting in recent PA history at a synagogue in Pittsburgh.
The gunman took him seriously and literally.
There’s nothing funny or intriguing about this dangerous racism. https://t.co/W3nCdSQEAw https://t.co/xMn9fGCOjG pic.twitter.com/ol0gXbNFQG
— J.J. Abbott 🦅 (@jjabbott) September 13, 2024
Many others responded to that reporter’s post.
“No sanitizing this. @jdvance and @realDonaldTrump bear full responsibility. They’re promoters of terrorism; and they did it intentionally,” wrote columnist, reporter, and former editor in chief of Crooked Media Brian Beutler.
“Ohio should look at this insanity and vote accordingly. Conspiracy peddling has real consequences. You can’t unring that bell. Donald Trump and JD Vance don’t care,” noted constitutional law professor and political scientist Anthony Michael Kreis.
“Donald Trump and JD Vance are terrorizing schoolchildren. They are unfit for any public office, let alone the highest,” responded attorney Andrew L. Seidel.
“JD Vance and MAGA influencers whipped up a blood libel panic and now children in Springfield are being traumatized by their lies. Hell isn’t hot enough,” commented the co-executive director of the progressive group Indivisible, Leah Greenberg.
“There’s a line from Charlottesville to Jan 6 to this. Trump speaks, his supporters act,” wrote political analyst and researcher Arieh Kovler.
“Trump could stop this but he won’t because he believes it serves his interests. It’s the same J6 behavior of spreading false conspiracy theories to inflame his supporters and then sitting back and watching instead of stopping it,” noted political science professor Michael McDonald.
READ MORE: Trump Faces Increasing Calls to Participate in Second Debate
Minnesota Governor and Democratic Vice Presidential nominee Tim Walz took aim at Donald Trump Thursday night at a rally in the battleground state of Michigan, where the Harris campaign is leading the ex-president by an average of less than two points.
The Detroit News’ Craig Mauger posted a photo of the overflow crowd at the Grand Rapids Public Museum:
A portion of the crowd at a museum in Grand Rapids to hear from Tim Walz tonight: pic.twitter.com/LdH5CSIVXV
— Craig Mauger (@CraigDMauger) September 12, 2024
Gov. Walz’s speech (full video here) was decidedly down-home and neighborly, but he had no trouble going on the attack as well.
He told the audience that their friends and neighbors had watched Tuesday night’s presidential debate, during which Trump had lied that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, are “eating the dogs” and “eating the cats. They’re eating — they’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”
Walz did not denigrate Trump supporters. Instead, he said that after the debate, “I don’t hear them out there much. I don’t see them out there much. They’re a little bit – because they’re good people. They’re our neighbors. They’re like, ‘that didn’t look very presidential.’ Screaming about eating cats is not a solution. It’s not a solution.”
RELATED: Loomer Invokes Hannibal Lecter as Trump Triples Down on Lies About Immigrants Eating Pets
“Well,” Walz continued, “what Kamala Harris was talking about is things that you actually care about. They might not be sitting down at the bar talking about banning books, but they might down there be talking about, ‘how can I afford a house? I’m working hard. I’m working hard. I want to have a house,’ and because that house becomes a home to some of these folks. Your real estate mogul, venture capitalist, whatever, that’s just an asset to be traded and sold to whoever you want. For us, it’s a place we gather around the kitchen table to talk to our kids about what happened in school. That’s what Kamala Harris wants for you. That’s what she wants for you.”
Tim Walz continues to be very good at this pic.twitter.com/ksbFPrvCRR
— Acyn (@Acyn) September 13, 2024
The 60-year old governor who is the only one of the four candidates on either ticket with a positive net approval rating (Harris comes in second), focused on midwestern values.
“What I am most proud of is because of all the things Donald Trump has stolen and all the things he did, what is unforgivable, is him stealing our joy. So here’s the thing, Kamala Harris is bringing not only solutions that focus on you. She’s doing it with a smile and joy on her face.”
“This guy, this guy on purpose, and make no mistake, it’s on purpose. He broke our political system. He tried to break our faith in one another. He tried to break the thing that makes Midwesterners stick together. We’re positive people, for God’s sakes. We walk on water half the year, we have to be it’s cold as hell,” Walz said. “We don’t care. We dig our neighbors out. This guy is trying to tell you your neighbors the enemy. This guy’s trying to tell you that he knows best about what folks in Grand Rapids need. Well, trust me, nothing could be further from the truth.”
“So here’s the deal, we’re nice folks. We’ll dig you out after a snow storm. We’ll say ‘hi’ at the store. Some of us might even let you merge on the highway. Not all of us,” he joked. “We have a saying for that. It’s Minnesota Nice, is what we call it. I’m sure you have it too. But the one thing I’ll tell you about Midwesterners that stretches across that beautiful blue wall of Northern America here, the one thing about us is, don’t ever mistake our kindness for weakness.”
READ MORE: Multiple-Location Bomb Threat Follows Trump and Vance’s False Dog-Eating Immigrants Claims
Walz also went after school shootings while reassuring supporters Democrats support the Second Amendment.
“Leaves are changing,” Walz said, as The Detroit News reported. “Friday night football’s back. Our kids have a new start and they’re going in. It’s a time of excitement and hope. Everything we want. That’s what we want for our kids.”
“But too many of our kids, these first days of school, are a time of sheer terror. A time that is going to stick with them forever,” he said, referencing school shootings.
“I know guns, you know guns,” he said. “Kamala Harris is a gun owner, by the way, which you found out. I’m not going to take any crap (from Republicans) about the Second Amendment. We support the Second Amendment.”
“But our first responsibility,” Walz continued, “is keeping our children safe. And you can have both.”
He also referred to shootings as “that crap,” and reminded the crowd that it “does not happen in other places in the world.”
Walz, a former U.S. Congressman who served for 24 years in the U.S. Armed Forces, called Donald Trump a “criminal.” Trump was convicted of 34 felony counts in New York for business fraud in an attempt to subvert the 2016 election.
He told the crowd Vice President Harris’s debate performance should have not been a surprise.
“She took on the predators. She took on the fraudsters,” Walz said. “She took down career criminals and powerful corporate interests, which, by the way, was on the stage the other night, all those things so, so this time, just to be clear, that criminal being on the stage got put in his place.”
“And this is what true leadership looks like. And she says this time and time again, and I love it. A mark of true leadership is not who beats people down, it’s who lifts people up, who lifts them up. So so when it’s a bully, and there’s a time she proved she can beat some people down if they need it.”
Walz: That criminal on the stage got put in his place pic.twitter.com/hDgwW4Gi4r
— Acyn (@Acyn) September 12, 2024
Watch the videos above or at this link.
READ MORE: Trump Faces Increasing Calls to Participate in Second Debate
Senator Suggests Trump Engaging in ‘Stochastic Terrorism’ Amid Pet-Eating Immigrant Lies
‘Hell Isn’t Hot Enough’: Fury at Trump as More School Evacuations Follow ‘Pet-Eating’ Lies
‘Screaming About Eating Cats Is Not a Solution’: Walz Rallies Michigan Crowd, Slams Trump
Loomer Invokes Hannibal Lecter as Trump Triples Down on Lies About Immigrants Eating Pets
