Homosexuals Anonymous
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| Founded | 1980 |
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| Founder | Colin Cook, Douglas McIntyre |
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Key people
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Douglas McIntyre, National Director |
| Mission | A fellowship of men and women, who through their common emotional experience, have chosen to help each other live in freedom from homosexuality. |
| Website | www.ha-fs.org |
Homosexuals Anonymous (HA) is an ex-gay group which practices conversion therapy and describes itself as "a fellowship of men and women, who through their common emotional experience, have chosen to help each other live in freedom from homosexuality." HA regards homosexual orientation as "sexual brokeness" that may be "healed" through faith in Jesus Christ. In common with other Christian fundamentalist groups, HA regards heterosexuality as "the universal creation-norm". This approach has been criticized for stressing that a person must renounce homosexuality to be a Christian, and because there is no valid scientific evidence that sexual orientation can be changed.
Christopher Melilo, Colin Cook and Douglas McIntyre, who had all struggled with same-sex attractions, founded HA in 1980 with financial support from the Seventh-day Adventist denomination. HA uses a 14-step program developed by Cook, based on his own experiences. Cook resigned in 1986 following a scandal involving him allegedly having sex with 12 out of the 14 male clients interviewed from 1980 to 1986 .
HA was founded in 1980 by Colin Cook (a Seventh-day Adventist pastor who was defrocked in 1974 for having sex with a man in his church) and ex-gay Douglas McIntyre. Cook founded the Quest Learning Center in Reading, Pennsylvania as a ministry of the Seventh-day Adventist Church to "help people find freedom from homosexuality." HA was one of seven programs offered by Quest, and people came from around the US seeking assistance from Cook. Cook developed the 14-step program used by HA, modifying five of the standard twelve steps from the Alcoholics Anonymous program and basing the other nine on his personal experience. HA was supported by $47,000 in annual support from the Adventist Church, plus fees paid for treatment. McIntyre (who, when growing up, identified as gay) said he founded HA based on his belief that "homosexuality is not something you're born with, that it's a spin-off of a trauma that occurs during childhood." He attributes abuse at the ages of three and four, and molestation at the age of five, as having contributed to his homosexual attraction.
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