The practice of the so-called gay conversion therapy can range from electric shock treatment to religious teachings or talking therapies designed to change someone's sexuality. It is already outlawed fully in Malta, Switzerland as well as parts of U.S.
More than 370 religious leaders from around the world including South Africa’s Nobel Peace Prize-winning Archbishop Desmond Tutu are calling for a ban on conversion therapy, BBC News reported.
The idea of the so-called gay conversion therapy is the attempt to change a person's sexual orientation or gender identity. Many leaders of the world’s leading faiths have signed their name to a declaration denouncing the conversion therapy and calling for it to be banned. Some of the other leaders include former Chief Rabbi of Ireland David Rosen, as well as the Anglican Bishop of Liverpool, Paul Bayes.
The practice of the so-called gay conversion therapy can range from electric shock treatment to religious teachings or talking therapies designed to change someone's sexuality. It is already outlawed fully in Malta, Switzerland and in parts of America, Canada and Australia.
Peter Lynas, director of the Evangelical Alliance for the United Kingdom, which represents 3,000 churches in the U.K., told BBC News he supports an "end [to] extreme and coercive behavior without banning change or conversion, which are central to Christianity".
"There are many LGBT+ people who suffer emotional hurt and physical violence to the point of death in countries across the world," Reverend Canon Mpho Tutu van Furth, daughter of Archbishop Desmond Tutu, said in the press release. "For this reason, we are joining forces as faith leaders to say that we are all beloved children of God."
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