Canada Banned Conversion Therapy. Is Guy Hammond’s Ontario Ministry Still Selling It?
What Uncloseted’s Investigation Found:
- Strength in Weakness (SIW), a Christian ministry offering programs designed to suppress LGBTQ behavior, remains available to Canadians four years after the country banned conversion therapy.
- SIW denies practicing conversion therapy, but a review of its materials, recorded sermons and a complaint submitted to police found:
- Canadians can still access and purchase SIW’s programs.Uncloseted Media reviewed materials accessible to Canadians that instruct participants to “remove any and all avenues of homosexual behaviour from [their lives].”
- Guy Hammond, SIW’s founder, lives in Canada. Uncloseted Media identified Hammond speaking at Canadian churches at least three times after the federal ban took effect, including a sermon in which he promoted SIW and said “If you ever do become a Christian … you can’t be gay, be bi, be trans.”
- Activists in the U.S. and Canada submitted more than 500 files documenting SIW’s practices to Ontario police in 2023. A detective acknowledged receiving the evidence, but the complainants say they have received no update.
In 2006, Stephen Boehner’s wife discovered Stephen was gay.
Boehner, now a nonbinary 61-year-old, had been holding this secret since they were 12 years old, growing up in the 1980s in rural Nova Scotia. But after 13 years of being married to a woman, the burden was too much to bear. Shortly after their wife found out and not knowing where else to turn, they chose to confide in Guy Hammond, a preacher at the nearby Halifax-Dartmouth Church of Christ. They arranged a private meeting, but it didn’t go as they expected.
“He starts laughing, a big hysterical laugh, and I start crying and thinking, ‘What did I do?’” Boehner told Uncloseted Media. “And then he starts telling his story, and he says he started this online program for people with unwanted same-gender attraction.”
That online program was Strength in Weakness Ministries (SIW), which had launched earlier that year. At the time, it was just a chat room, but Boehner would soon watch it grow: It eventually had an annual membership program, speaking tours around the world, books, classes, workshops and more—all while striving to help same-gender-attracted Christians “recognize that … they do have the freedom in Christ to choose the path of self-denial and obedience to God in the daily decisions they make.”
Over time, Hammond became the de facto thought leader on LGBTQ issues for the International Churches of Christ (ICOC), the federation of churches to which Boehner’s former Halifax congregation belongs. During this time, SIW, now headquartered roughly 80 miles from Toronto in Orillia, Ontario, grew into a global operation, with Hammond claiming to have served over 150,000 people across at least 21 countries over the past 20 years.
Boehner, who says they had been given a free lifetime membership as a gift for being friends with Hammond from the beginning, participated in the program after feeling pressured by Hammond to live a heterosexual life. That repression, enforced by an expectation to report their thoughts and behavior to men at the church, caused Boehner to develop an anger that led them to lash out at their wife and kids and contemplate suicide. Eventually, they decided it was enough and they had to leave the program behind.
“I was angry with myself for not living the life that I was meant to live when my kids were growing up,” says Boehner. “I [didn’t] have that in me anymore.”
SIW claims that it does not practice conversion therapy, a set of discredited practices aimed at changing or suppressing queer people’s sexual orientation or gender.
However, five former participants told Uncloseted Media that SIW’s program encouraged them to suppress their LGBTQ identities and behavior through celibacy, heterosexual relationships and lifelong resistance to same-sex attractions. They say their participation led to isolation, depression and suicidal ideation. In one case, family members of a former participant claim it contributed to them committing suicide.
“I think [Hammond’s] smart enough to have created something that can slip outside the realms of [conversion therapy],” Boehner says. “[But] if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s gonna be a duck.”
Hammond, who now lives in Orillia, Ontario, declined an interview and did not respond to a request for comment on this article. However, in a statement sent to Uncloseted Media via email in response to allegations from a previous article, he denied that SIW practices conversion therapy.
“We strongly condemn conversion therapy. Strength in Weakness does not practice, promote, or endorse it. Neither my staff nor I have ever promised or taught that someone’s same-gender attractions would change or disappear,” the statement reads. “I have read the accounts you have reported, and I take them very seriously. It genuinely pains me that anyone would come away from their involvement with our ministry feeling hurt or harmed.”
In 2022, Canada banned the practice and promotion of conversion therapy nationwide. Unlike in many U.S. states and other countries, Canada’s ban applies to religious leaders and attempts to repress, not just change, sexual orientation.
Lucas Wilson, a researcher in Toronto who studies conversion practices within white Christian Nationalist movements, says that generally, “efforts to resist and change queer individuals’ ‘same-sex attraction’ definitionally fall under the umbrella of conversion therapy,” and that “such activities are prohibited by the Criminal Code.”
SIW is still active in Canada, offering both free and paid memberships priced in Canadian dollars. Uncloseted Media reviewed materials available to Canadian members that encourage readers to cut ties with LGBTQ friends, detransitionand report progress to other church members.
And in 2024, a group of Canadian and American activists and survivors of SIW reported the program to the Durham Regional Police Service (DRPS), submitting hundreds of files of evidence. Despite this, two of the activists told Uncloseted Media they have received no substantial follow-up or updates from the police, and the detective who received the evidence did not respond to a request from Uncloseted Media to confirm or deny whether an investigation had been opened. SIW and Hammond have not been charged with any wrongdoing.
Experts and advocates consulted for this article say they have been unable to identify any cases where authorities have applied the law since its passage.
“It seems like Canada has passed this legislation but has no intention [of] actually using it on anyone,” Cameron Taylor, a queer 31-year-old from Halifax who was inspired to help collect and submit the evidence due to his experience at Hammond’s church, told Uncloseted Media. “Was it performative, perhaps, the federal government passing this legislation and not following through on actually trying to give it any teeth or enforcement to actually protect vulnerable populations? It’s a letdown in a lot of ways.”
Canada’s former Justice Minister and Attorney General Arif Virani, who helped develop the country’s conversion therapy legislation, says that authorities must remain vigilant.
“Unfortunately, this harm that we were trying to address has not gone away,” Virani told Uncloseted Media.
What the Law Covers
On paper, Canada has one of the strongest conversion therapy bans in the world, closing common loopholes that allow practitioners to dodge accountability and even going so far as to ban the advertising or promotion of the practice.
For example, religious freedom laws allow Hammond to practice in the U.S. in states where conversion therapy bans exist. But that’s not the case north of the border because Canada’s ban applies to everyone, including religious practitioners like Hammond.
And while other countries have bans only for minors, Canada’s law covers adults and children and explicitly includes practices designed to “repress or reduce non-heterosexual attraction or sexual [behavior].”
According to legal experts, just because a program says it does not seek to change someone’s attractions, that does not place it outside the ban’s scope.
“Changing someone’s gender expression and sexual expression in terms of pushing folks into mixed-orientation relationships is a form of sexual suppression or gender suppression,” says Wilson, adding that he experienced conversion therapy himself as a student at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia. “Pushing people to remain chaste, pushing people to remain celibate, or pushing people into mixed-orientation marriages are conversion practices.”
“At its core,” he adds, “any effort to suppress someone’s gender and or sexuality falls under the umbrella of conversion therapy,” regardless of whether an organization explicitly uses that label.
Florence Ashley, an assistant professor of law at the University of Alberta who has advised multiple governments on conversion therapy bans, says the distinction between what an organization calls itself and what it actually does is critical.
“There’s certainly a lot of organizations that, in my view, on the face of their public communications, clearly indicate that they’re violating the law,” Ashley says. The challenge, they add, is persuading police, prosecutors and ultimately courts that the available evidence proves an offense occurred.
SIW Remains Active
In its terms of use, SIW claims that it “does not support conversion therapy and does not use conversion therapy in any manner.” Despite this, just four months after Canada’s bill went into effect, Hammond spoke at a virtual webinar called “A Time to Stand: Christian Leadership in an Anti-Conversion Culture.” Described as a “fast moving 90-minute webinar” that features six of “Canada’s most informed leaders on the topics of conversion therapy,” including anti-LGBTQ pastor Kevin Cavanaugh and a theologian who “encourages pastors to continue to teach a biblical view of sexuality and gender,” the event promised to help people “better understand what this new law does and does not attempt to do.”
Despite Hammond’s concerns about the law, SIW memberships are still being sold to Canadians. Taylor shared a recording of a 2023 phone call with SIW staffer Barry Underwood where he described the group’s presence in Canada as “coast to coast.” The group’s memberships are all priced in Canadian dollars. Uncloseted Media reviewed materials that are available on SIW’s website from Canada. In one forum, members could speak directly with each other as well as SIW leadership, including Hammond, and numerous people introduced themselves with the intent to deal with “same-sex attraction.” SIW leaders would frequently respond to introductions with resources like books by Hammond or specific support groups.
We also reviewed articles that offer strategies on how to suppress queer behavior. One of these is a 40-day members-only study series called “Seven Signs of Life.” It lists repression strategies that include cutting off all relationships, even platonic ones, with LGBTQ people, installing internet filters to block sexual content and reporting all behavior related to gender or sexual orientation to an “accountability partner” in the church.
In a document meant to be read on day 11 of the study series, titled “Quenching Our Emotional Thirsts Part 3,” Hammond writes: “There is something you must commit yourself to doing if you truly want victory over impurity and homosexuality. You must, let me repeat, you MUST remove any and all avenues of homosexual behaviour from your life. … If a friend of yours continues to be involved in homosexuality, you must totally detach yourself from that relationship even if it means finding a new place to live. We’ve become so familiar [with] ‘drinking’ the sewer water of homosexuality that unless we cut it off, we will, out of habit, return to it.”
We also reviewed materials encouraging detransition for trans people. One episode of a podcast features a guest who talks about her “profound detransition following a surrender to God’s call” and her experience “discovering authentic belonging in Christ rather than fleeting identities.” The episode’s description also promises that listeners will learn about “the process of detransition” and “why self-autonomy often leads to spiritual slavery.”
Boehner remembers keeping up relationships with multiple “accountability partners.” But they say the conversations they had with them were so uncomfortable that they almost never told the truth.
“There wasn’t a day that went by in my lifetime that I never thought about other guys or looked at other guys or dreamed about having another guy,” says Boehner. “I wasn’t gonna tell them that I was struggling as hard as I was, because I didn’t know how they would react.”
Hammond has responded on multiple occasions to claims from Uncloseted’s previous article concerning alleged mental and emotional harm experienced by former SIW participants.
In an article by Ministry Watch, Hammond stated, “If I have hurt somebody, I want to know it.”
And in an email to Uncloseted, Hammond wrote that “people are free to disagree with our theology. What I strongly reject is the characterization of Strength in Weakness presented in these accounts. The picture presented is simply not truthful. It does not accurately represent what I have taught, what our ministry has stood for, or how we have practiced our ministry.”
Uncloseted Media identified at least three speaking engagements Hammond has made in Canadian churches since the conversion therapy ban was passed: one in 2022 and one in 2025 at Milestone Churches in the Greater Toronto Area, and one in 2022 in Halifax that was also livestreamed to the Ottawa Church of Christ.
While all of these events lack the SIW branding, they include rhetoric that aligns with that of the organization. Hammond opened his Halifax sermon by promoting SIW, later saying that “if you ever do become a Christian … you can’t be gay, be bi, be trans,” and that people should try to recruit others to their religion by showing that Jesus can meet their needs better than so-called “sinful behavior.”
“I would never go back to the gay life I was living before because Jesus truly has been able to meet my emotional, relational, and certainly my spiritual deficits way better than homosexuality or anything else ever could,” Hammond said in his sermon.
Prior to the nationwide ban, Canada had more events explicitly carrying SIW branding, including in jurisdictions that had already banned the practice. For example, Edmonton, Alberta banned businesses from offering conversion therapy practices in 2019, but SIW held a workshop there in 2020 where it met with youth groups and advertised its books and its membership. Similarly, it held events in Vancouver and Montreal in 2019 and 2021 despite municipal and provincial bans, respectively.
On Jan. 11, 2024, Taylor and other former ICOC members with a connection to SIW submitted over 500 files’ worth of evidence to the DRPS to prove that SIW was practicing conversion therapy. This included the full “Seven Signs of Life” series, training videos, lectures, workshop recordings and transcripts documenting SIW’s practices.
Their goal was to spark a criminal investigation. According to emails reviewed by Uncloseted Media, Department Detective Constable Joshua Street briefly corresponded with the group, but they were not informed of any further action being taken.
Uncloseted Media submitted a request for records related to the activists’ complaint pursuant to the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FIPPA) on Aug. 5 and was told to follow up if a response was not received within eight business weeks. On Oct. 5, Uncloseted received a follow-up stating that “because your request may affect the interests of third parties, they are being given an opportunity to make representations concerning disclosure of their personal information” and that “a decision on whether the record will be disclosed will be made by November 19.”
With no known action taken against SIW, the program continues to operate in Canada. In addition to Hammond preaching and promoting his programs across Canada, some churches have deputized their own members to spread the word further. Taylor, who grew up as a member of the Halifax church where Hammond once preached, remembers the church calling on him to evangelize to LGBTQ people using Hammond’s program and teachings.
“As it became a more established brand, it was easier to say, ‘Why don’t you go to this website, why don’t you watch this video or podcast’ … or ‘Oh, they’re having a conference, why don’t you join, or why don’t you sign up for their services and be a member and have their support groups and whatnot to deal with this and not be who you are,’” says Taylor, who has since left the church. “It’s all salesmanship.”
Taylor remembers one instance where he managed to convince a friend who was in a relationship with someone of the same gender to come to church and to break up with their partner. While the friend later left the church and continued their queer life, Taylor says their friendship never recovered.
“[I have] a lot of guilt around being used as a blunt instrument against other queer people,” Taylor says.
The Challenge of Enforcement
Wilson says he is not surprised SIW is still operating in Canada.
“The ban [was] obviously a victory in some sense, but it’s been mostly symbolic,” he says. “We know that there are still organizations practicing conversion therapy.”
Canada’s Department of Justice (DOJ) declined an interview with Uncloseted Media. In an email, their senior adviser for media relations wrote that they cannot comment on individual cases, but that the application of the ban is “limited to ‘practices, treatments or services’, all of which imply an established or formalized intervention. It would not criminalize conversations in which a person expresses an opinion or religious belief about sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression, unless that conversation forms part of an intervention designed to make a person heterosexual or cisgender.” They also noted that “provinces are responsible for enforcing Criminal Code offences within their respective jurisdictions.”
Adrienne Smith, a social justice lawyer in Vancouver, isn’t impressed with the DOJ’s response. They told Uncloseted Media that “what people need” is “an answer that [says] ‘we have passed on this concern to law enforcement in the jurisdiction who is actively investigating and we’ll give you an answer by a reasonable timeframe.’”
Smith says the lack of proactive enforcement on issues like conversion therapy is a major reason that enforcement is so rare. And due to a 2007 decision by the Supreme Court of Canada, officers are not required to pursue every suspected offense through to charges, though a decision to exercise discretion must be rationally justified.
“[You have to] not only convince them that the crime happened, but that it’s bad enough to be worth pursuing because there’s no obligation [to do so] on either police or prosecutors,” Ashley says.
“And then there’s a criminal system that has an extremely high burden of proof,” Smith says. “Charges for hate speech, for hate-motivated crimes and for conversion therapy, we can expect them to be … rare because it’s not an accessible system that has the effect of really protecting people.”
Attorney General of Ontario, Doug Downey, did not respond to a request for an interview. Durham Police did not respond to Uncloseted Media’s request for comment, and Detective Street wrote in an email that protection laws would prevent him from commenting on investigations outside of a FIPPA response, which Uncloseted is still waiting on.
Wilson stresses the need for officials to be willing to identify practices as conversion therapy, because a lot of survivors don’t initially recognize that they experienced it.
“A lot of survivors don’t identify as survivors until years and years later,” he says.
That was the case for Boehner. They left the program around 2017 and came out publicly in 2022. But it wasn’t until this year, now happily dating a man, that Boehner began to understand that they experienced conversion therapy.
“Knowing Guy, he probably was manipulating me,” Boehner says. “And I’m just afraid there’s gonna be more people that are gonna take their lives.”
For Ashley, the problem in Canada is that enforcement of the country’s conversion therapy ban ultimately depends on whether authorities choose to use it.
“Federal law is enforced by police, and that’s basically it, right?” Ashley says. “And so if the police are not interested … then nothing happens.”
