"I think we're all born heterosexual actually, and then stuff goes wrong," he said.
Here's a brain-teaser and a breather for all you culture warriors currently debating the Prop 8 court ruling:
A Lutheran pastor known for his opposition to homosexuals serving as clergy is outed as a homosexual himself and takes a leave of absence -- but then returns to the pulpit the same week his denomination welcomes other gay pastors under a new policy that the anti-gay cleric himself opposes.
Confusing? The Rev. Tom Brock, senior pastor at Hope Lutheran Church in North Minneapolis, explained it to the Associated Press on Monday by noting that he has known for many years that he is attracted to men -- but he doesn't consider himself gay because he hasn't acted on his attraction.
Or, as he put it to the congregation at Sunday service a day earlier: "I am a 57-year-old virgin."
The crux of Brock's argument is that people are not born gay and they can change what he considers sinful desires and behaviors. "I think we're all born heterosexual actually, and then stuff goes wrong," he said. Brock, who believes active homosexuals are going to hell, said he had a distant relationship with his late father, and his older brother was more athletic and more popular, which contributed to his homosexual inclinations. He added that even if scientists were to establish definitive proof that homosexuality is genetic, he wouldn't change his views.
"You can have this struggle with same-sex attraction, say no to it, and still follow Christ," he added.
The latest science does not support Brock's claim about homosexuality as learned behavior rather than largely innate, and recent events have not been kind to the so-called "ex-gay" movement. Besides revelations that high-profile Christian conservatives like Ted Haggard have had secret gay lives, several prominent gay rights opponents have been found to have homosexual affiliations, most recently George Rekers, a leading "conversion therapy" promoter and Baptist minister who was caught going on a European vacation with a gay "rent boy" he solicited online.
But many churches do believe that one can be gay and serve as a pastor as long as the person is celibate and does not act on his or her desires, while others, like the Roman Catholic Church, accept that there are gay men but are trying to keep them from the clergy altogether.
Brock, who has had his own cable-access show for 20 years, got into trouble because he earned a reputation as a vocal opponent of non-celibate gay clergy (and same-sex marriage and other gay rights) without revealing that he himself struggled with same-sex attractions.
For example, last August Brock earned national headlines when, in a radio interview,he suggested that a small tornado that hit the city and bent the cross of a liberal Lutheran church -- while the national Lutheran convention was voting to open the clergy ranks to non-celibate gays -- was a sign of God's disapproval.
Then in June, Lavender, a gay magazine in Minnesota, outed Brock by writing about 12-step-style meetings the pastor was attending to help him deal with his homosexuality. Brock would take part in meetings of Courage, a controversial Catholic ministry that tries to help gays and lesbians live chaste lives, and the outing itself was a matter of much criticism among journalists because secretly reporting on confidential sessions like rehab groups or psychiatric appointments is considered an ethics violation.
But the publicity surrounding Brock's closet homosexuality led the church to suspend him while a task force investigated. Brock was reinstated after the task force found no evidence that he had sex with men.
In the kind of coincidence that some might chalk up to Providence, the same day Brock was welcomed back into the pulpit, seven openly gay clergy from his Evangelical Lutheran Church in America denomination were also welcomed back to the pulpit, the first of several expected services since the ELCA took its historic vote last August.
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