A male believer named XM established a psychological counseling ministry in a place with a developed economy in East China, serving believers or unbelievers with mental illnesses for nearly ten years. During his years of service, he discovers a fact that the more developed a place is, the more people have sexual orientation dysphoria.
XM has met all kinds of people, some of whom are Christians, even pastors or church staff. In addition to people with depression who make up a large proportion of these pastors and staff members, homosexuals also come for psychological counseling.
"As pastors with a long prestige don’t come here, some staff members seeking help are homosexuals," S said to the Christian Times, an online Chinese Christian newspaper.
Though some homosexuals said that they were born gay, XM and his staff workers find that the vast majority of homosexuals are not born homosexual and that their psychological distortion leads to a change in sexual orientation due to their parents who have aggressive or violent behaviors.
XM continued that according to the Bible, being gay is a sin because homosexual activity violates God's creation and offends Him. God never approves of homosexual behavior, but He accepts and loves the homosexual community, as He loves each of us.
While agreeing that homosexuality is a sin, XM believes that it is often caused by their own sin or by that of their parents. "Therefore, we can not simply blame or criticize these special people, or only focus on their behaviors, we need to pay attention to their pressure and anxiety which are the root cause of homosexuality," S added.
Some gay pastors are born into families of origin with serious problems, which cause their sexual orientation to be seriously distorted when they are very young. For some others who don't even know they are latent homosexuals, coupled with the great pressure they endure and many other factors, some pastors eventually become homosexuals, S continued.
Therefore, XM stated that if people intend to solve the problem of "the pastor is becoming homosexual" at the root, it is an effective way to reduce the pressure on pastors in their work of church management and pastoral care.
XM said that as far as he knew, pastors in many churches might indeed be under much pressure. In a healthy church, troubled by problems, Christians should turn to the cell leaders, cell leaders to church staff, and church staff to pastors who can ask the head of the church for help. But many Chinese churches have not established a sound management system and pastoral system, otherwise, pastors only need to be responsible for group leaders or staff workers.
In addition to the pressure from church management and pastoring, other problems such as the pastor's salary, marriage, and family relations should be solved to reverse the situation of pastors being homosexual, as their pressure and anxiety have been greatly reduced.
- Translated by Abigail Wu
