A promised dialogue between the virulently homophobic Methodist Church of Fiji and the country's gay community has arrived in the form of primitive faith-based “therapy” programmes, rather than understanding. Speaking to Radio New Zealand, a representative of the Church has claimed that homosexuals can be “cured” through such programmes and say a small number of gays have been “saved” already. The New Zealand AIDS Foundation says the Church would do better to adopt an inclusive and accepting attitude rather than trying to fix something that doesn't need fixing. “Authoritative medical and psychiatric organisations the world over have condemned these so-called reparative therapies as dangerous, unnecessary and likely to produce harm rather than good,” says NZAF Executive Director Rachael Le Mesurier. “They are based on assumption that homosexuality is an illness or aberration. It is not. Since 1973, homosexuality has been recognised as a naturally occurring variant of human sexual orientation, not chosen, and not something that that requires treatment or cure.” Christian colonialism has had a lasting negative effect on gays in the Pacific. Ratu Epeli Nailatikau, Speaker of Fiji's House of Representatives, told the Pan Pacific AIDS Conference in Auckland last month that Pacific leaders and churches needed to “return homosexuals to their traditional accepted place in society and encourage legislation for equal human rights for gay men and other minorities.” Another address at the Pan Pacific AIDS Conference, by Fijiian Sexual Minorities Project spokesman Carlos Perera, is said to have prompted the Methodist Church to put off plans for an anti-gay march, the second they would have organised this year. The Church claimed it had been misunderstood by the gay community and wished to encourage dialogue “to listen to their [gays] side of the story” before proceeding further. The Church has been previously issued press statements calling for gays to be put to death.
Credit: GayNZ.com News Staff
First published: Thursday, 10th November 2005 - 12:00pm