An RTÉ Player Original
Gay conversion therapy has remained cloaked from the public and largely unreported from the media in Ireland. Converted explores the stories of 4 men who have had first hand experience with these practices, including counselling and exorcism. With Senator Fintan Warfield proposing a ban on these practices in the Seanad last year, will 2019 see the prohibition of the conversion therapy bill passed in the Republic?
Considering that homosexuality was decriminalised here as recently as the 1990s, LGBTQ rights in Ireland have progressed rapidly. The country made international headlines with the same-sex marriage referendum in May 2015, and the Gender Recognition Act two months later. This momentum continued into 2017, which saw the instatement of a gay Taoiseach.
However, the attempts at ‘gay conversion therapy’, which are now taking place in an Irish context, have largely fallen beneath the radar of the media.
Senator Fintan Warfield’s bill to ban conversion therapy in Ireland has passed it’s second stage in the Seanad. The bill aims to make the practice of performing conversion or reparative therapies illegal in Ireland and would carry fines for individuals providing the services and prison sentences in extreme cases. However some individuals have not welcomed the bill and said that this bill represents only one ideological perspective and is taking away from our citizens right to choice.
Converted is a visually creative narrative of four unique perspectives on the conversation around conversion therapy in Ireland today. We interview one man who experienced it, one man who provides it, a Christian man who believes that it should be an option for those who seek it and a journalist who went under cover in a Christian group who provide ‘support’ and ‘guidance’ for it’s members on living chaste homosexual lives.
Contributors
Padraig O’Tuama
Padraig is a survivor of Conversion Therapy and now advocates against it. He is still a man of faith and believes that there is a place for the LGBTQ community in the church. As a teenager Padraig was working for a good Christian organisation in Dublin. “I was told by a member of the organisation that if I wanted to stay that I would have to deal with my issues. I had my first public exorcism soon after. The group surrounded me, they were shouting, trying to pull the demon out of me …. “I was 18 a week”. After two more exorcism attempts failed to ‘work’ Padraig went to Conversion Therapy.
Mike Davidson
Mike Davidson of Core Issues Trust claims to help people with ‘same sex attraction’ through therapy. Mike Davidson, the director of Core, is a married man who has described himself as to have been “in conflict with unwanted homosexuality… before finally seeing the light”.
Colin Nevin: The Man In White
Colin Nevin describes himself as same sex attracted, however doesn’t practice because of his Christianity. For Colin, Spirituality comes first. Colin wears his white suit as a symbol of forgiveness. “God has forgiven him for his sins”. Although Colin does not believe that gay conversion therapy works for most, he believes that people should be free to choose how they want to live their life and if they want to seek CT they should have the freedom to do so. “If Christianity did not forbid homosexuality of course I would be happy to be in a relationship but it doesn’t”.
Cormac O’Brien
Journalist Cormac O’Brien went undercover and infiltrated Courage, a group dedicated to living chaste homosexual lives in keeping with the dictates of the Catholic Church. After taking part Cormac has said that the experience left him “feeling more than unnerved and I am a gay man who fully accepts and loves himself. I could only imagine the effect these words were having on the less self-accepting members of the group”.