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Paperback
Publisher: Harvest House Publishers
The heart–wrenching declaration that a loved one is a homosexual is increasingly being heard in Christian households across America. How can this be? What went wrong? Is there a cure? In this straightforward book, Joe Dallas offers practical counsel, step by step, on how to deal with the many conflicts and emotions parents, grandparents, brothers and sisters or any family member will experience when learning of a loved one’s homosexuality. Drawing from his own experience and from his many years of helping families work through this perplexing and unexpected situation, Joe offers scriptural and compassionate advice to both struggling gays and those who love them.
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| Making the best out of this hit at home |
| Customer Rating: 5 out of 5 |
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A great practical guide for promoting understanding and relationship between people in difficult circumstances. Provides sound, proven guidelines on how to assess where you are, act constructively, not react in a way that can damage the good in a relationship. A must read for anyone facing this situation.
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| Help for Parents |
| Customer Rating: 5 out of 5 |
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As a parent, I found this book to be extremely helpful. Mr. Dallas recognizes that each person will make their own decisions. We can't make decisions for them but we can control how we respond to them.
The most meaningful line in the book for me is this: "You may never agree on this issue, but you are committed to not letting this disagreement ruin your relationship." This focused my attitude on what had to happen so that I could live in peace with my child. Mr. Dallas helped me see how I could continue to show love for my child without comprimising my values.
I really liked the practcal advise in this book. There is a chapter on negotiating family boundries. He has some good suggestions for respecting everyones beliefs and comfort. I do not need to constantly tell my child my views on homosexuality; I have already told her. He also instructs us how to ask children about our fears for their lives as a homosexual person such as AIDS, drugs, and promiscuity. These things may or may not be a part of the person's life. It is ok to ask; your fears may be relieved. The book helped me feel more comfortable with asking questions about my child's life.
The book also talks about the possible causes of homosexuality. Is it genetic or environmental? He takes a more balanced aproach to this than most of the information I have read. He basically says that it is likely a combination of both factors.
I felt quite a bit of relief from reading this book. It is in line with my evangelical Christian belief system, but doesn't demand that I change my child. Mr. Dallas shows compassion for the gay person and his/her family members.
This book is directed toward Chrisians with a literal interpretation of the Bible. If you are not in this catagory you may disagree with the book. If you are in pain, because homosexuality conflicts with your Biblical views, it mahy help.
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| DANGEROUS AND HARFUL |
| Customer Rating: 1 out of 5 |
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As a licensed professional counselor, I encourage my clients to not purchase a pre-packaged belief system, but instead engage in a free and responsible search for truth and meaning in their lives. As such, I refrain from passing judgment on the beliefs that others choose and instead celebrate the colorful diversity that is found in the tapestry of human ideology. Nevertheless, when I am confronted with principles that are destructive and harmful to the human spirit, I feel compelled, as a health care professional and as a human being, to speak out against such wickedness.
While one's sexual activities and behavior may vary over the course of a lifetime, one's sexual orientation does not. Requiring that individuals whose sexual orientation is something other than heterosexual "change" or "heal" is no different than Hitler requiring that those with the wrong eye color, the wrong hair color, or the wrong family lineage be exterminated. One does not need to "heal" or be "cured" from something that is not an illness. This book does not simply state an alternative opinion on homosexuality; it causes significant and severe damage to the psyche of those who know, beyond a shadow of a doubt that, even if they can change their activity, they cannot change who they are at their core. Rather than offering the hope and healing it claims to provide, this book inflicts emotional violence on its readers.
Everyone has a right to his or her own beliefs. In the case of this book, the author has chosen to act on his beliefs. Discriminatory acts, based on prejudice, have a damaging effect on the lives of innocent people--they hurt, they demean, they humiliate, they wound, and sometimes they kill. I do not accept the label "religious" to excuse beliefs and actions that are designed to hurt people. Is religion about abusing others? Is that part of the moral game plan--demonize people who are different from you, condemn them and exalt yourself in the name of a religious conviction?
When I walk into the music store with my 13-year-old daughter to buy a CD, I notice that some of the CD's are labeled with "warning" stickers. As a parent, I appreciate this so I can steer my daughter toward purchases that will fill her mind and soul with affirmative messages. This book needs to come with a similar "warning" sticker, for anyone who reads it is going to be a victim of emotional and spiritual abuse by the worst kind of perpetrator...a bigoted wolf in sheep's clothing!
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| Things We Must Not Forget |
| Customer Rating: 3 out of 5 |
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This book made it clear that the performance of homosexual acts is sinful. Those with same-sex attractions carry daily the cross of a disordered condition they did not choose and science still doesn't know the cause of. Homosexuals who takes seriously the requirement to order their lives as best they can to live celibately should never forget that they are guilty of no sin for making these efforts, and are as infinitely loved by God as are all human beings. You do the best you can with the "hand you're dealt" in life, and in the end all will be well, exceedingly well.
The worst we could do to a homosexual family member would be to reject them or love them any less, especially by pushing unproven reparative therapy to change their orientation which is permanent for true homosexuals, regardless if ultimately pronounced heterosexual behavior is clearly exhibited. The psychic damage done in trying to coerce someone to change the unchangeable is cruel, unconscionable, and in no way remotely consistent with Christianity.
Yes, the goal for permanently homosexual Christians, as it is for unmarried heterosexual Christians, is the same as it was for Jesus Christ: celibacy. Not a bad role model.
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| This book is a gift. |
| Customer Rating: 5 out of 5 |
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I have really struggled with my thoughts and feelings about how to respond to a loved one who recently announced they were gay. I spent many hours considering how to engage in a way that was both loving and true to my own, strongly held, Christian beliefs.
This book is a real gift for those of us who hear the words, "I'm gay." Joe Dallas is Biblically centered (I believe), sensitive, and steadfast. I found particularly helpful chapters that speak specifically to moms and dads, brothers and sisters, spouses, and extended families.
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