Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
Ted Haggard's wife appeared on the Today show this week and declared her husband 100% homosexuality-free.
"Our sexuality is conditioned, and we can be conditioned in any number of ways," she told Meredith Vieira."Ted was dealing with certain compulsions that were unwanted."
However, through therapy, she claims those compulsions -- which she said Ted had suffered from most of his life -- were gone.
And it turns out, unsurprisingly, that the incident with the gay escort was not the first time she had known about him having homosexual affairs:
Haggard admitted that her husband, who once led a church of nearly 14,000 worshipers, had a homosexual relationship early in their marriage."I think at that point I was ignorant of the gravity," she said.
"I felt as though, you know, we all struggle, you know, in different areas of our lives, and certainly in our sexuality, so I was willing to forgive him."
Haggard said he sought counseling then, and told her it wouldn't happen again.
"I felt as though the problem was pretty much solved," she said. But "it would reemerge in his life from time to time, and he wouldn't tell me about it."
In a way, I feel bad for this woman. Human beings have a fantastic ability to rationalize things, especially in relationships. That's why so many people get stuck in relationships where the problems are absolutely obvious to everyone except the people in the relationship. How many times have you seen this kind of thing and thought, "How could you not know he was cheating on you?"
It's because love really is blind, in a very serious way. It does blind us to the faults of the other person, causes us to rationalize them away. And when you add that very human tendency to her religious beliefs, which no doubt tell her that no matter what happens, God is in control and nothing happens outside his will, is it really any surprise that she would genuinely believe what is palpably not true here?
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What blows me away is that he said (at the time of the scandal with the male prostitute) that he had had these "feelings" since he was 5 years old, but they don't equate that to homosexuality being innate rather than a choice. The reality will bite him again and again. Maybe God is using Haggard to tell the religious world the truth about homosexuality, but they just will not listen?
Posted by: BC | January 31, 2010 10:06 AM
Don't feel to bad for Haggard's wife. She is living in the lap of luxury, where denial may as well be a river in Egypt.
But THERAPY? I had thought that Ted was going to be healed in some churchly way, laying on of hands, man-to-man talks with authoritative pastors.
Posted by: Reverend Rodney | January 31, 2010 10:20 AM
Intentional externalisation.It's a theme that's very deeply ingrained in the right-wing approach to homosexuality. They essentally deny homosexuals exist - there are only heterosexuals, some of which are afflicted by unwanted same-sex attactions which can be cured.
Because if there are no homosexuals, there can be no possibility of unfairly discriminating against them.
For the full explanation, just read a better account than I can give: http://www.boxturtlebulletin.com/2007/03/06/243
"So here’s the first lesson: the words “gay,” “lesbian,” and “homosexual” aren’t nouns; they’re adjectives. And even as an adjectives they are never used to describe a person. There are no gay teenagers, there are no homosexual men, there are no lesbian women. Instead these adjectives are always used as modifiers to something else: a problem, a struggle, an identity, or an issue that is separate from the person. "
Posted by: Suricou Raven | January 31, 2010 10:27 AM
given that she has just come out with a new book and is actively promoting it, a skeptical person might suspect that a shared willingness to profit from the gullibility of the faithful is the glue that makes the marriage work.
Posted by: kevin R | January 31, 2010 10:48 AM
I may be mistaken, but hasn't Ted come out fairly recently (within the last year) and claimed that he wasn't completely sure what his sexuality was at this point? I seem to recall some interview he gave in which he admitted that human sexuality is not black-and-white, and I actually experienced a flicker of respect for him.
Posted by: Sadie Morrison | January 31, 2010 11:22 AM
I very much doubt love's what's blinding people most the time. That kind of blindness tends to wear off. Fear and ego are the blindfolds that stay on. Fear of change, fear of being alone, fear of what other might think, not wanting to admit you made a mistake, or that it is beyond your control, these are the kinds things that keep bad relationships alive. Rarely is it love for anyone but one's self that blinds people.
Posted by: Abby Normal | January 31, 2010 11:27 AM
He's gay, as my grandfather used to be fond of saying, a leopard can't change its spots.
You can try to sublimate it with the love of Christ but it never works.
Posted by: Tony P | January 31, 2010 11:32 AM
"I felt as though, you know, we all struggle, you know, in different areas of our lives, and certainly in our sexuality, so I was willing to forgive him."
I don't struggle with my sexuality. I'm straight as a ruler. Where's the struggle?
I can see how a gay man who is meant to lead a vast number of people of the belief that his orientation is an unnatural abomination might struggle though, just a little.
Posted by: Uncephalized | January 31, 2010 12:00 PM
At least his wife Gayle and their kids seem to have followed the Bible and forgiven Ted, unlike their old church.
Posted by: Rob F | January 31, 2010 1:43 PM
Hi Abby
Those links we discussed are up now
Keep prayin away the gay! Most major credit cards accepted.
Posted by: Jen | January 31, 2010 1:48 PM
interesting. we all know what part of his sexuality Ted is "struggling" with, but I wonder what makes her say that everybody struggles with sexuality? what are her struggles with it?
personally, i'd guess that either she's bi/lesbian herself, or she's simply struggling with the fact that she's a human being with sexual desires, but isn't getting laid nearly as often as she should (if at all)
Posted by: Jadehawk | January 31, 2010 4:33 PM
In her defense, she's deeply immersed in a subculture that does not tolerate divorce. If she ditched her husband, she might lose her kids, both in a custodial sense, but also in they reject as a harlot kind of sense.
Posted by: History Punk | January 31, 2010 4:37 PM
Both Haggard and Wife did an interview on Oprah last week as part of her book promo. It was hilarious. He talked about all his gay encounters and kept insisting he wasn't gay. He insisted he was straignt. His therapist said so. He just has "unwanted sexual attractions" that he can get over. He said he must be straight because, after all, they have kids! It was one of the most inadvertently seriously funny interviews I have every heard.
Posted by: Ann Klein | January 31, 2010 4:48 PM
Re Ann Klein
Former Congressman Robert Bauman from Maryland also was married and had 4 kids but, after 20 years of cruising Washington, D. C.s' gay neighborhoods, was discovered and forced out of the closet.
Posted by: SLC | January 31, 2010 6:07 PM
Posted by: Modusoperandi | January 31, 2010 6:25 PM
I'm hardly an expert, and as a straight guy many would say I have no claim to any "gaydar" at all, but he always sets it ringing like a four-alarm fire (ditto Joel Osteen, Gary Bauer and Alan Keyes). The first time I saw him on TV I thought that he was some kind of avant-garde performance artist doing a piece about channeling the spirit of Paul Lynde as a televangelist. To this day I can't believe anyone with an IQ of at least room temperature buys his shtick for even a nanosecond.
Posted by: MS | January 31, 2010 6:46 PM
Love this clip of Haggard declaring homosexuality a sin. Then, leaning into the camera and pointing at the viewer, he says:
I think I know what you did last night... if you send me a thousand dollars I wont tell your wife.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6rSjrBhUIA
Posted by: Dr X | January 31, 2010 7:05 PM
Dr X- Yes, that bit from "Jesus Camp" is creepy/hilarious. And Haggard has gone on the record slamming the film and its directors for "having an agenda" and setting out to "make them (Haggard) look bad".
It's a bit like Sarah Palin's criticisms of "gotcha media" because they, y'know, asked a question and filmed her answering it.
Here is the response to Haggard from the makers of "Jesus Camp"-
http://www.jesuscampthemovie.com/haggard_response.html
Posted by: Rick R | January 31, 2010 7:29 PM
What kind of 'conditioning' did Ted go through that causes him to keep returning to the staff of life?
I guess it must be Pavlovian conditioning. He sees a goodlookin' guy and he salivates.
Posted by: Gingerbaker | January 31, 2010 10:55 PM
Is this true? I mean not the rejection part but the idea that a divorce court would award custody on the basis of religious dogma.
Posted by: Matty | February 1, 2010 4:37 AM
Dr X,
Have you left out parts of that quote? lets see.
I think I know what you did last night...[because I was the one on the other side of that glory hole. You did run off without paying for my services but] if you send me a thousand dollars I wont tell your wife.
Yes makes much more sense now.
Posted by: Matty | February 1, 2010 7:17 AM
While it's possible that she's also gay, it's more likely that she's just living with the fundagelical double standard when it comes to sex. Most people like sex, and that includes women. But the way fundagelicals describe it, you'd think that "normal" women have no sex drive at all. It's one of the reasons that female "purity" is prized so much more highly over male "purity". They think of sex as a something that women give to men in exchange for kids and marriage, or they view it as a chore that women owe to their husbands. It really sets up a great system where nearly everyone feels guilty about their sexuality. When women inevitably realize that they actually do like sex, perhaps more than their husbands, they feel like they are abnormal and sinful, and they don't realize that other women also feel that way.
Posted by: catgirl | February 1, 2010 11:01 AM
MS can't believe anyone with an IQ of at least room temperature buys his shtick
I think he was buying someone else's shtick.
Posted by: cdrealist | February 1, 2010 1:12 PM
History Punk @ #12:
So, you're saying her kids would reject her as a harlot if she divorced their father for cheating on her with another man (from whom he purchased illegal and dangerous drugs) and publicly and repeatedly lying about it, then disgracing the family and church and making her a laughingstock when it finally came out? So these kids are insane assholes with no concept of justice, loyalty, honesty, or compassion, whose moral compass is so badly calibrated it points only to blaming the victim? And, given that that imaginary god they claim to worship is supposed to have a pretty damn big problem with what Teddy did, the kids apparently don't know a damn thing about their own religion either.
I'd say that if the Haggard kids have been brought up to be such monsters, then that's proof enough that neither Haggard is a fit parent. Though given their culture's disdain for women, the father should get the brunt of the blame, since he would never have allowed a mere woman to make any meaningful decisions about the children's upbringing in the first place. But of course we all know the fundies won't see it that way. They'll celebrate raising children as hateful bullies, and blame the mother for the slightest deviation from their ideal, while denying her any power to change anything.
Matty @ #20:
There was a custody case in Alabama that went all the way to the State Supreme Court. Roy Moore, the Chief Televangelist, felt compelled to deny custody to the lesbian mother and insert a call for state-sanctioned murder of all gay people in the official decision. So yeah, cases decided on the basis of religious dogma are sadly plausible, but I wonder if Ted Haggard would necessarily get the better of such a situation, given that he's of the group whose mass execution the aformentioned decision calls for.
Posted by: phantomreader42 | February 1, 2010 1:41 PM
Abby at #6
Wow. Very profound. A keeper quote!
Posted by: SharonB | February 1, 2010 3:56 PM