“Ex-gay” battle-axe James Hartline has confronted the powers of darkness represented by gay rodeo, San Diego Pride (multiple times), Starbucks, and even the insane Lou Sheldon.
Those links take you to deranged rants, but you cannot understand the depth of Hartline’s inner torture and self-loathing until you’ve read this latest entry, “My Gethsemane: Wrestling With Death To Gain Eternal Life – From The Journal Of James Hartline.” It leaves you breathless.
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I have had to go to Gethsemane many, many times to wrestle with God and my flesh in dealing with AIDS. Each time, the wrestling has brought me closer to Him. Most bound in homosexuality will die in their sins rather than repent and surrender to Christ. The mind, once given to that reprobate state, will rarely find its way out of that pit of delusion and eternal damnation. I am most fortunate. For, in my wrestling over this disease of AIDS, I have surrender my flesh and all homosexual desires to God. In the process of seeking healing from AIDS, I have been completely delivered from homosexuality. Gethsemane has served me well in the eyes of God.
…Living inside of Hillcrest, the homosexual stronghold of San Diego, California, it seems as if I have been swallowed up at times, into a great caldron of hostility and bigotry because of my faith. What have I done wrong? What have I said that has germinated such anger towards me. Simply, standing for Christ and proclaiming the Word of God, has brought me into a war that I did not invent. Nevertheless, by surrendering to the will of God, I have enlisted in such a battle. It is a war over philosophies. It is a war over ideas. And most assuredly, it is a war with titanic spiritual dynamics: it is the war of ages between God and the rebels under satan’s spell. Everyone who chooses to pick up the cross of Jesus Christ will enter into this conflict. To wave a white flag in surrender to satan, is to drop the cross and deny Christ.
There is a permeating emnity between those bound in the snare of homosexuality and those that speak the truth of the Bible. Once I renounced my former life and its sinful attire, I too, became the focus of a major campaign of hate and intolerance by San Diego’s homosexual advocates. On a daily basis, I am ridiculed and mocked by those that claim that I am hateful and demented because of what they term “religious zealotry.” They claim that opposition to the sin of homosexuality is intolerant zealotry. I say, in stark opposition to them, that those who will actually die in their quest for sexual fulfillment, are the ones who are demented zealots.
Simply sad, isn’t it?
Also:
* Hartline STILL fixated on San Diego Pride
* Six Years In Sodom: From The Journal Of James Hartline
* The Blend cited on fundie ‘ex-gay’ blog
Hat tip, Autumn.



16 Comments





HartlineI think James Hartline’s the one who will actually die in his quest for sexual fulfillment
Why Does He Live In a Gay Mecca?I’m with Holly. Why does Hartline stay in that pit of sin and temptation, if it isn’t to check out cute butts and wish he could have one? (Sorry, Holly; you wouldn’t have been that graphic.)
because“On a daily basis, I am ridiculed and mocked…”
Why, oh why are you so persecuted, James? Let’s see, maybe it’s because you keep opening your bigoted, stupid trap. When you say stupid and hateful things, you’re bound to be attacked. DUH!
And, what is it with these nuts that view themselves on an equal plane to Jesus Christ? He’s going through his Gethsemane…like Christ. He’s being persecuted…like Christ. He’s struggling and wrestling with himself and his God…like Christ. But, yet, he can’t love his brother like himself…like Christ.
People like James are into the BDSM version of Christianity, where they torture themselves to get closer to God, but ignore the hope, compassion, peace, and love of their Christ.
Yes, it is sad.
Poor JamesI really do feel sorry for this guy. It’s obvious he’s experiencing AIDS related dementia. I’ve seen it before in late stage cases.
He needs help. He’s being used by the religious right and he’s very ill.
Insanity“If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you.
If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.”
- Gospel of Thomas (a Gnostic gospel, and so one he would reject as heretical, despite its being correct)
Were you referring to his HIV disease?Or were you thinking that he’s likely to pop a blood vessel in his brain trying to give himself a big ol’ orgasm of righteousness?
‘Cause that’s what popped into my head. He seems to have a full-blown fetish for his own holiness.
Pam mentions self-loathing. But this rant (Most bound in homosexuality will die in their sins rather than repent and surrender to Christ…. etc.) sounds like megalomania to me. Perhaps one is the flipside of the other.
Yikes!One way that we know if my aunt is having a particularly schizophrenic episode is when she gets overly religious. It’s sad too. I didn’t know that AIDS could cause dementia, is it caused by lesions on the brain or something like that?
Until I saw this thread I thought that this was the most crazy religion based thing that I was going to see all day. I was particularly interested in the irony of a young earth creationist talking about a “somewhere-over-the-rainbow wedding reception”.
Off to lunch and to meet my new little baby niece for the first time!
Internalized homophobiaHe’s internalized his homoophobia to an incredible degree. He’s traded his drug and sexual addictions for an equally destructive faith addiction.
I’d feel sorry for him, but his internalized homohating does real damage to real LGBT people when he directs his homohating outward.
The face we deserveThere’s a quote that Roger Ebert likes to pull out every now and then, that “By the time we hit age 50, we each have the face we deserve.”
Look at that ridiculous face, taut with rage and withered with hate, as surely as if someone had thrown acid into it, and just TRY to tell me it doesn’t reflect who Mr. Hartline really is on the inside.
Same goes for that Lou Sheldon portrait where he looks like the Grinch.
That was… fucking scary.
I’m not a psychiatrist, so haven’t any authority to give any certain conclusion about his mental state; but I will say this. This man is deeply disturbed.
I know of self-hatred and whatnot, but to go this far, and to that level of delusional hatred and narcissism is seriously not healthy. I doubt any psychiatrist/therapist/doctor would say he’s in a healthy frame of mind.
This man obviously has absolutely no value for his own life; and when that goes to a certain degree, you often have no value for anyone else’s, either. It’s very possible he was bonkers when he contracted AID’s – it’s basically transmitted through unprotected sex. And thing is; most people who are happy within themselves, care about their body, physical state and whatnot, will take the precautions to look after themselves.
This man, obviously, did not. To me, that speaks volumes about how much he truly values life, and quite possibly, how much he wants to live. That seems proven by this comment:
“I say, in stark opposition to them, that those who will actually die in their quest for sexual fulfillment, are the ones who are demented zealots.”
That’s how his mind works. He is in such a state of delusion that he believes anyone, absolutely anyone, who is ‘homosexual’ will immediately get AID’s and die. The idea that, a gay person can live happily, in a stable relationship and not have sex with everyone that comes along doesn’t register for him. It’s not possible to him, because he didn’t find that possibility for himself.
His odd belief that his illness can be cured by a God, that he says, hates (him) gays, is a logical fallacy, and just insane. His mind will always connect that fact of gay = buttsex and aids. To me, that seems to be how he’s done his ‘repenting’ and ‘de-gaying’ – he doesn’t fuck guys, so is no longer gay. He can stop sinning and repent those sins; it makes it easier, and it, in his mind, works.
He can’t fathom the idea of a gay person without aids, or a celibate gay, or one living in a happy stable relationship. I have the feeling that if he entertained the thought for even a split second, his mind would shatter. I wouldn’t be surprised if he eventually, had a psychotic episode/break, I truly wouldn’t.
Wow, I just rambled on and on there, didn’t I?
A living (allegedly), breathing real life Stephen King characterAt least we now know whom prom buster Carrie White’s paw is. All that egomaniacally, righteous spittle and prattle must be like sitting in the front rows of a Gallagher show.
These uber-Christofascists don’t get it – a good example is better than a Rovian Do As I Say lecture ANY DAY.
Hartline’s furyHe may be mad, but take him at his word: he, like many other fundamentalists have become Christian Jihaddists. They’ve declared war on America’s pluralist society, and won’t be satisfied until they’ve replaced it with a hall of mirrors reflecting their own extremist beliefs wherever they look.
Here’s the Jihaddist statement of faith, in Hartline’s own words:
“Simply, standing for Christ and proclaiming the Word of God, has brought me into a war that I did not invent. Nevertheless, by surrendering to the will of God, I have enlisted in such a battle. It is a war over philosophies. It is a war over ideas. And most assuredly, it is a war with titanic spiritual dynamics: it is the war of ages between God and the rebels under satan’s spell. Everyone who chooses to pick up the cross of Jesus Christ will enter into this conflict. To wave a white flag in surrender to satan, is to drop the cross and deny Christ.”
This is NOT the formula for a democratic nation. It is the battle cry of a religious war against all ‘non-Christians’ – Jews, athiests, etc. – and would surely extend to anyone whose practice of Christianity did not mirror Hartline’s exactly.
This is precisely the kind of religious intolerance that’s currently tearing Iraq apart.
HartlyingJames Hartline is hiding. He’s gone back into his closet, but not because he’s turned straight. No, it’s because he thinks he has a chance of getting laid as a straight. Truth is, the guy is so plug ugly the only way he can get a date is to pretend he’s heterosexual so he can cruise the church picnics and get the preachers to line him up with eligible females from the congregation.
It’s clear you’re an ally, butI’d like to respectfully suggest that you check yourself around making broad statements about people who contract HIV and why/how this happens:
This is overly simplistic and is closely associated with the “blame the victim” stance, and it was heartbreaking to read from an ally, after decades of the virus decimating the gay men’s community and also taking more and more lives in the black community. Or hell, all the lives that HIV effs up period, regardless of demographic group. Poz people generally and poz Blenders in particular deserve better.
As someone with AIDS, James may be bat sh*t crazy, but it ain’t AIDS relatedHis writing is lucid it’s not rambling and off point. Dementia doesn’t work that way, you aren’t SORT OF Delusional and scattered only on some subjects, you are scattered on ALL subjects.
My lover was found to have three brain lesions, and it changed him totally, even though his heart gave out first, I’ve dealt with AIDS effecting a brain.
HIV/ AIDS info
I’m glad you asked the question, but surprised you didn’t just google first. Has HIV/ AIDS awareness really slipped so far off the radar, even here in the progressive community?