Praying for Silence

Anne Heche wants everyone to know that it wasn't the power of prayer that made her go straight. The actress is lashing out at her mother for using her name to promote Christian ex-gay events.

Heche's mother, Nancy Heche, is speaking at a conference held by the Christian group Focus on the Family, which preaches that homosexuality is preventable and treatable. She is billed as "a single parent who experienced the international media rush during her daughter Anne Heche's highly visible relationship with Ellen DeGeneres."

Though Nancy claims the power of prayer led her daughter to abandon her lesbian relationship and marry a man, Anne says she and the talk-show host parted ways because they wanted "different things for our lives."

Following is taken from ANNE'S WEBSITE:

To Whom It May Concern:

This post is meant to address a couple of questions some people have about my mother, Ellen and me. I realize that the break up with Ellen made a lot of people feel many things, but hopefully this will help you have more of an understanding of it.

Ellen and I had a three and a half year relationship that ended sadly, not because we were both women, but because we both wanted different things for our lives.

This NONSENSE about my mother praying for me is really making me angry. My mother never approved of my relationship with Ellen. Her hatred for our relationship is one of the many things that ultimately led to my breaking off all communication with her. (My mother, that is, not Ellen.)

The "Ex-gay" events that are going on right now make me sick. The fact that my mother is using my name to promote this movement makes me even sicker. I could not disagree more adamanty with what she and her group of unloving, unaccepting, Bible preaching hate mongers are doing.

I do not believe that homosexuality is something that should be brainwashed out of someone. I do not believe that homosexuality should be anything but celebrated if that is the thing that makes an individual feel good about their life. I believe, as I have always said, that people should love who they want to love. And for anyone who ever thought that Ellen and I broke it off becuase of sexuality, you couldn't be more mistaken.

And for anyone who thought my mother's prayers had anything to do with me marrying a man, forget it. I can safely say that my mother has nothing to do with any decision I make. It has always disturbed me the way religion can twist something to make people feel badly about themselves. Isn't a loving heart an accepting, caring heart?

Certainly my mother has never been "loving." But that's just my humble opinion.