ADVOCATE – Progressives Lash Out Against Air Force Academy’s ‘Ex-Gay’ Counselor

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Striking while the iron of public shaming is hot, the Military Religious Freedom Foundation is set to reveal its third billboard in Colorado Springs, Colo., blasting the Air Force Academy’s employment of a fundamentalist Christian and “ex-gay” therapist as the chief of the academy’s mandatory counseling program at the Center for Character and Leadership Development.

Since news broke last week that the academy hired Mike Roshbush, Ph.D., to lead the mandatory counseling program and develop the academy’s program for examining fitness of character, the Air Force Academy has been in full damage-control mode.

And the Air Force won’t be able to go off the defensive any time soon, if the Military Religious Freedom Foundation has anything to say about it. Earlier this month, the Foundation, which aims to maintain the separation between church and state in U.S. military institutions, put up a billboard in Colorado Springs exposing an academy staffer’s promise that he “will talk about Jesus Christ my Lord and savior to everyone I work with.”

And this week, the MRFF will unveil a new billboard, taking aim directly at Rosebush’s well-documented involvement in the “ex-gay” movement that aims to turn gay people straight through prayer and counseling. The practice, sometimes called “reparative therapy,” has been disavowed by every major medical and psychological organization in the country, and banned for use on minors in California and New Jersey.

Featuring a rainbow arching over the words “We Ask. We Tell. We ‘Cure!'” the rainbow morphs into an American flag, which underlines what MRFF sees as the academy’s unspoken motto: “U.S. Air Force Academy — Graduate Straight.”

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