Christian Therapist May Be Fired for Prayers to 'Convert' Gay Patient

A veteran psychotherapist in the UK is facing possible termination after trying to "convert" a homosexual patient by "praying to God" to "heal" the patient.

"I told him I only work using a Christian biblical framework and he said that was exactly what he wanted," Lesley Pilkington said, referring to her patient.

What Pilkington didn't know was that her patient was actually a homosexual rights campaigner who secretly recorded their sessions before reporting her to the British Association for Counseling and Psychotherapy. Now, Pilkington is being called for a disciplinary hearing this week where she may be stripped of her accreditation.

The Daily Mail reports:

She treated journalist Patrick Strudwick at her private practice based at her home in Chorleywood, Hertfordshire, after he approached her at a Christian conference.

He recorded the sessions on a tape machine strapped to his stomach. Asked if she viewed homosexuality as a 'mental illness, an addiction or an anit-religious phenomenon', she replied: 'It is all of that'.

In the disciplinary letter sent to her by BACP, she is accused of having an 'agenda that homosexuality is wrong and that gay people can change and you allegedly attempted to inflict these views on him.'

Mrs Pilkington accused Strudwick of entrapment. She said: 'He told me was looking for a treatment for being gay.'

Mrs Pilkington's own 29-year-old son is gay, but she simply describes him as having a "homosexual problem."

Pilkington says her method -- Sexual Orientation Change Efforts -- is legitimate and effective.  But her counseling has been described as "absurd" and the Royal College of Psychiatrists reported condemned the "so-called treatments of homosexuality," claiming it merely extended prejudice.