New South Wales’ LGBT conversion therapy ban criminalises efforts to change or suppress sexuality through prayer or counselling, replacing Christian teachings with a new state-imposed belief system.
In New South Wales, it is now illegal to offer prayer or counselling to help someone overcome unwanted sexual attractions.
The Conversion Practices Ban Act 2024 was passed last year by the Labor government under Premier Chris Minns and took effect last Friday. It imposes penalties of up to five years’ imprisonment for those who attempt to help an individual “change or suppress” their sexual orientation and are found to have caused “substantial harm.”
According to Anti-Discrimination NSW, prayer is not strictly prohibited by the new law. However, “praying with or over a person with the intent to change or suppress their sexuality or gender identity” is now a criminal activity.
Moreover, helping someone in this way is unlawful “even if that person has asked you to pray for them to be able to change,” according to the state’s discrimination watchdog.
Other potential violations of the new law include telling someone in a same-sex relationship to stop being sexually active, or advising an LGBT person not to marry.
The act also outlaws using shame to create an “aversion to same-sex attractions”, causing someone to believe “their sexuality or gender is defective or disordered”, in addition to certain types of deliverance ministry.
Bible studies, youth camps and mentoring relationships are potential venues for the newly criminalised activities, according to the government agency.
“Often, LGBTQA conversion practices are difficult to recognise because the forms they take might at first appear to be non-threatening, such as group study, mentoring and counselling, or camps and courses,” the regulator warns.
Moreover, the new legislation has unlimited geographical reach. Anyone who sends a NSW resident interstate or overseas for conversion practices, arranges for someone outside the state to carry them out, or facilitates such practices online, could also serve up to three years in a NSW correctional facility.
Implications of the New Conversion Therapy Ban
By enacting the new law, Australia’s most populous state has set itself in opposition to historic Christian teaching. For example, in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11, the apostle Paul warns that those who practice homosexuality or engage in sexual immorality “will not inherit the kingdom of God” — a passage addressed to people who once lived in such ways but were “washed” and “justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.”
Paul likewise urges Christians to “change or suppress” sinful behaviour in Ephesians 4:22-24, where he writes, “put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires… [and] put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness”.
Colossians 3:5-10 is another such passage, which reads, “Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed… [and] put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator”.
In defending the legislative update, Anti-Discrimination NSW has articulated a new state-sanctioned belief system to supplant traditional Christian theology.
An explainer video on the agency’s YouTube channel asserts that “there’s nothing wrong with being heterosexual or straight, nor with being lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or asexual. All of these are perfectly natural and valid.”
Additionally, prayer is powerless to bring about change in people, according to the regulator.
“Some individuals believe that… actions like counselling, endless referrals, prayer, or pastoral conversations can stop a person from being LGBTQIA+ or fix them,” the video continues. “But we know these so-called conversion practices… don’t work and damage the entire community.”
Furthermore, the agency draws on recent capitulations within mainline Christian denominations to support its secular framework.
“Some also believe that a person with a different sexual orientation or gender identity can’t be a person of faith,” the narrator instructs. “Faith and identity are not mutually exclusive — numerous faith communities actively support LGBTQIA+ people.”
In contrast to the Bible’s teachings that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23) and that the “wicked [should] forsake their ways” (Isaiah 55:7), Anti-Discrimination NSW claims that “there’s nothing wrong or broken about LGBTQIA+ people. It’s damaging and inaccurate to say they should — or can — be ‘fixed’ or ‘healed.’”
Notably, New South Wales allows and even encourages people to adopt an LGBT identity, while simultaneously banning its citizens from seeking help to transition away from such beliefs and practices. This inconsistent legislative approach has led critics to label it an ‘LGBT apostasy law’.
While the legislation was passed by the current Minns Labor government, the previous Liberal-led government under Premier Dominic Perrottet expressed “in-principle” support for a conversion therapy ban.
New South Wales is the fifth state or territory to come under some variation of a conversion therapy ban, joining Queensland, the ACT, Victoria and South Australia in criminalising the practice.
Last October, Christian leaders from every major Australian denomination drafted and released The Australian Creed for Sexual Integrity to uphold Biblical teachings on sexuality and to provide a legal safeguard for churches and Christian institutions facing faith-based restrictions.
Members of the public can sign The Australian Creed for Sexual Integrity here.
Republished with thanks to The Daily Declaration. Image via Unsplash.
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