Wheaton veteran's battles now on the homefront

Five years of war in perspective
By James Fuller

Joel Gomez's post traumatic stress disorder is on a different level than the more fortunate of his fellow Iraq war veterans.

It's not uncommon for his niece, Sonia Sanchez, to warn him ahead of time if she's about to open a can of pop. That noise, and many others -- including his respirator and the Van Morrison ring tone on his cell phone -- often trigger the dive-for-cover instinct Gomez learned as a soldier.

Only Gomez can't dive for cover. Tomorrow, he'll mark four years as a quadriplegic. On Wednesday, he'll join fellow veterans in commemorating the five-year anniversary of the war that ruined his body.

In reflecting on both anniversaries, it's the latter that seems to cause Gomez the most grief.

His personal life is one of a minor celebrity and local war hero. Gomez's service in Iraq is so revered in Wheaton that the community rallied to raise money to build him a new house loaded with technological amenities to make his life easier.

Yet in the last four years, health is a primary concern for those who love Gomez. He's had bed sores, a hole in his esophagus, pneumonia, a collapsed lung and a blocked artery in his heart. He's set to get skin grafts on his hips later this year.

At one time, his parents thought he'd die.

Now he spends most of his days in bed with his feet and shins wrapped in wool booties and a sheet over his torso.

It sounds bad, but Gomez's humor and spirit is as strong as his body is broken. It's not uncommon for him to top off his dress with a T-shirt that reads, "Trust me, I'm perfect."

Gomez's parents, his sister and his niece and nephew all share the home with him. He never is truly alone.

Except for maybe in his thoughts.

When he closes his eyes, Gomez has two symbolic images of the Iraq war that flash before him.

The first is of a lone soldier who's suffered a traumatic brain injury, or a serviceman, like him, whose limbs are without function or missing.

The other is of a car bombing. Children and civilians are dead and confused loved ones are all asking the same question: "Why?"

That is Gomez's view of the war -- pain on both sides. No winners.

Gomez said he could see as a soldier there was no way Iraq would ever achieve an American democratization.

"I knew it would never be done because the differences and ideals are so varied that it would be impossible," he said. "We are not run by religion in every aspect of life, but they are."

Indeed, Gomez is a veteran who believes the U.S. went into Iraq "based on a bunch of lies and fabrications."

If you can't tell by the calendar that mocks President George W. Bush's talent for making up words, Gomez will be happy to tell you himself that he regards him as a "horrible president."

Maybe, then, it's not a surprise that Gomez breaks from Wheaton's usual Republican leanings to favor Hillary Clinton for president. He even donated a little more than $400 to her campaign.

Politics get Gomez fired up. But it's his dreams for the future that fuel him.

He's trying to find a college with distance learning to study world religions. He wants to write a book about his life. And he wants to shed light on problems in the VA medical system.

Gomez describes his time in various VA hospitals as "almost disturbing."

"They're great people, but their training and knowledge of patient experiences is, I hate to say it, subpar."

Despite it all, Gomez will not wake up angry tomorrow. He won't be in a cold sweat, reliving the plunge of his Bradley Fighting Vehicle off a cliff into the Tigris River.

Gomez has no memory of the accident. "Part of me wishes I did remember, and part of me is really afraid to remember."

This week, and both anniversaries, will pass pretty much like any other. In defiance of the odds, Gomez will be both alive and happy.

"I think God has given up on trying to take me. So far it's Gomez 8, God 0."

New growth towns face challenges that come with more people

By James Fuller

Fairview School was closed last year after more than three decades of serving the Darien area.

The more than 400 students now attend a grade-level center.

Fairview's shuttering and Darien Elementary District 61's revamped system is the result of declining enrollment and an aging population.

Yet, 16 miles southwest, an enrollment boom continues in Plainfield Unit District 202 reminiscent of the old woman who lived in a shoe.

The district's population began to explode with the turn of the millennium. On average, more than 2,500 new students enroll in District 202 every year. It's now one of Illinois' five largest school districts with about 29,000 students in 28 schools. More of both are on the way.

The growth is a reflection of an ongoing migration from suburbs that at one time were considered the outer ring -- such as Darien, Elmhurst and Elgin -- to a newer outer ring -- Plainfield, Oswego and DeKalb, for example.


U.S. Census data and projections from local planning agencies show a decrease in Cook County's population, but an explosion in the far west that will see the population nearly double in the next 20 years. That growth has various levels of government scrambling to keep pace.

Money and melting

Perhaps the biggest impact to the outlying suburbs is the influx of young families with school-aged, or soon-to-be-school-aged children.

That's because families are buying their first homes farther out these days, as the cost of real estate prices them out of areas that once were magnets for such buyers.

DuPage County, for example, has a reputation for good schools. But the median home price in DuPage now is the highest in the area.

"What we see happening is that the younger people that are ready to buy their single-family house or first townhome, we find that we're taking them west and taking them out to the Fox Valley area and beyond that," said Wheaton Realtor Pat Callan, president-elect of the Illinois Association of Realtors. "We're going to Oswego, the west side of Aurora, St. Charles, even DeKalb."

That's resulted in huge tax increases to build new school buildings in some areas.

In the past two years, Plainfield, Oswego and DeKalb residents approved tax increases for a combined $812 million to build 25 new schools and renovate existing buildings.

They'll need those schools to accommodate an influx of children in coming years with different backgrounds than they've seen before. Education is the new spoon that stirs the melting pot.

Unlike the baby boom generation, most newborns in the area now are not white; they're Hispanic.

For example, for every white person who dies in Cook County, only one white baby is born. Meanwhile, there are seven Hispanic births for each Hispanic death.

This phenomenon is playing out farther out, too.

The 1990 Plainfield Unit District 202 profile showed a 96 percent white population in its hallways. Less than 3 percent of the students were Hispanic. And there wasn't a single black student.

By 2006, the population was 62 percent white, 20 percent Hispanic and 9 percent black.

"The face of Plainfield is definitely changing, and it's something that we celebrate," District 202 spokesman Tom Hernandez said. "We are now much more akin to what the real world presents to our students. We are very pleased with it."

Yet that also creates new language and cultural barriers to learning that the school districts must adjust to.


A total of 62 different languages are spoken by students in Plainfield schools. Spanish is the No. 1 language besides English. But now there's a notable Polish community and something District 202's Hernandez never thought he'd see.

"Who would've thunk that Plainfield would've had an Urdu community?" he said.

And don't let the housing market slowdown fool you into thinking the growth is over.

Kris Monn, the assistant superintendent for finance in Oswego Unit District 308, said the new schools will still be built and open eventually. They just won't be at capacity on the first day of school.

"We are definitely a new-construction community," Monn said. "Eventually the residential growth will continue. We've had a lot of the larger retail stores that continue to come on board out here. They wouldn't continue to build if they didn't believe the people were coming."

That commercial growth is exactly the economic development communities such as DeKalb seek.

With every new community, subdivision and neighborhood, municipalities in the far west strive to seek a tax balance between residents and their commercial and industrial businesses.

Controlled growth

DeKalb has long been synonymous with Northern Illinois University. The school is the largest employer in the area.

The continued population growth and a pro-growth city council has the community thinking about that identity. Is the goal to be and stay a college town? Or should DeKalb be a community that just happens to have a college in it?

"I think it's inevitable that we'll transition into the latter of the two things," said City Manager Mark Biernacki.

For now, that means concentrating on economic growth to balance out tax burden on residents.

Ten years ago, the majority of the city's tax income came from the larger apartment complexes in town. Now the cash cows are the major retail and warehouse manufacturing businesses.

The city is edging toward a 50/50 tax burden between residents and businesses mainly through zoning and permitting that allows major residential developments only when the city deems it's ready to handle that growth.

The result is no sudden influx of people, nor an unreasonable expectation of growth that sinks economic projections during a housing market slowdown.

DeKalb is also one of those communities that's nearing capacity in terms of developable lots. Biernacki said there's roughly 300 lots still available for single-family homes and townhouse development.

But the other growth factor the city is watching are the transportation challenges of getting all the new residents to their jobs, and all the potential customers to the new businesses. In recent years, the city has seen double-digit percentage increases in traffic on I-88.

All jammed up

The Illinois Department of Transportation is figuring out what commuters already know.

The road system in far western communities was built for the population that used to exist, not the cars now on the roadway, and certainly not the migration still to come.

The Prairie Parkway Study group is charged with finding answers to that problem. By 2030, the study found the average daily traffic count on state and federal highways in the far west will increase by 76 percent. County highway traffic will increase by 55 percent.

The grid system of roads that works in Chicago doesn't exist in the far west suburbs. Indeed, the farther west you travel, the more spaced out the roads become. That limits the alternative routes for commuters.

And don't even ask commuters how they feel about all the truck traffic on routes 23, 34, 47, 71 and 126 to Plainfield.

Life is somewhat easier for those traveling east into Chicago and west back home. But the Fox River and limited north-south routes in the far west make commutes between suburbs much more difficult.

The lack of suburban connections is the same problem plaguing public transportation options.

"The big challenge is how do you creatively serve that transit market and what should you do with your land use to make it more transit-friendly," said Rick Powell, a studies and plans engineer for IDOT in the far west.

On the roadways, Powell said, the answer is not just adding more lanes on existing routes, he said.

"Widening does address the capacity, but because there's development going on at the same time along these routes, you're still getting more traffic," Powell said. "The road becomes a victim of its own success. Once it's built, it draws even more development."

So the answer may be more roads and highways, but they won't come without a price.

More fuel-efficient or electric cars are expected to be on roads in the next 20 years. That means less money from the motor fuel tax to fund road improvements. Powell said the funding solution is likely to be more toll roads or a replacement of the gas tax by a mileage-based tax. Such a tax is based on the length of commutes as tracked by a transponder placed on cars.

"Of course, there's privacy concerns with that," Powell said. "Some people don't want a device that follows you wherever you go."

Even with all the new challenges of building more schools, balancing tax burdens and crawling through traffic, the far west population continues to grow.

Plainfield's Tom Hernandez said he knows why.

"People want the American dream, but they also want their green and their lawns," Hernandez said. "They have backyards here. The American dream is here."

Election coverage: Candidates find immigration is sticky issue

Second in a series on the issues facing 13th Congressional District Republican candidates Judy Biggert and Sean O'Kane in the Feb. 5 primary.

The national debate about illegal immigration boils down to two numbers: There are more than 12 million illegal immigrants in the United States right now. And there's been more than four years of legislative gridlock trying to decide what to do about
The Republican candidates in Illinois' 13th Congressional District both admit they don't have a magic answer, especially when it comes to the illegal immigrants who are already here. But they do have foundational ideologies for where they'd like to focus the debate.

Closing the borders

Both incumbent Judy Biggert and Republican primary challenger Sean O'Kane agree the illegal immigration debate begins with sealing the borders. Both prefer creating that seal with law enforcement and military personnel rather than fences and walls.

"I don't like the image of a Berlin Wall-type facade along our border," O'Kane said. "But to contain the size of the illegal immigrant population and for national security purposes, we need to know who's coming into our country."

Biggert also believes in closed borders. If borders don't receive priority, Biggert estimates the illegal immigrant population will swell to 20 million before the paperwork for people currently waiting to become citizens is completed.

The major difference in this realm between Biggert and O'Kane is what to do with illegal immigrants caught crossing the borders.

O'Kane favors immediate deportation for illegal immigrants caught while entering the country.

Biggert said that's not enough of a penalty.

"We have to end catch-and-release through mandatory detention," Biggert said.

Biggert doesn't know what the appropriate jail time would be but said it would be nice if there were a way to charge the cost of that time back to the country the illegal immigrant originated.

"We should look at promoting international policies to try and deter the illegal immigration," Biggert said.

Employing illegals

The other side of immigrants coming to the United States illegally is having a reason, which is usually a job.

Both Biggert and O'Kane say Americans must be willing to pay more at the grocery store and for the homes they build. Both want higher wages in the agriculture and construction industries, which employ the most illegal immigrants. They believe Americans will fill the jobs illegal immigrants take if the pay is higher. A higher cost of business will trickle down to consumers.

"I do worry about when farmers can't pick the fruit and you see the oranges left on the trees," Biggert said. "We have to raise the bar to make sure they have legals filling those jobs. Illegals won't stay here if they can't get jobs."

O'Kane said America must also abandon any negative perceptions of citizens who work or train in a trade rather than go to college.

"There tends to be a network for immigrants to get into the trades a little more," O'Kane said. "If somebody likes to work with their hands, we should assist them to help them get the skills they need to enter the work force and be productive in that fashion."

Both candidates believe companies, especially large corporations, need fast, accurate technology available to them for mandatory identification checks of a potential employee's citizenship status. Both Biggert and O'Kane believe employers who hire illegal immigrants should be punished with stiff fines, but not jail time.

"You've got to have a penalty, or what difference does it make?" Biggert said. She suggested fines as large as $250,000 may be appropriate.

The amnesty dilemma

Neither Biggert, nor O'Kane has a definitive action plan for what to do about the illegal immigrants already in the country. Both believe any plan must involve the enforcement of laws already on the books. That includes deporting all illegal immigrants who come into contact with the justice system for commission of a felony.

Both also believe any path to citizenship would start at the bottom of the list, behind people who are already in the process of trying to legally enter the country. Biggert and O'Kane agree all immigrants must be required to display at least a basic proficiency in English to become a citizen.

O'Kane also said there should be no concessions to illegal immigrants in the form of giving them identification cards or driver's licenses.

However, neither he nor Biggert believes in raiding neighborhoods or businesses for deportation roundups.

"That makes me think of the Gestapo," Biggert said. "I hate to think of this huge mass attacking a neighborhood. That bothers me. I also hate to see people hiding. However, their presence does abuse our social services."

O'Kane said deporting 12 million people isn't even possible.

"It's completely ridiculous to think that we're going to go around and physically round up everyone who's illegal," O'Kane said. "It would send the completely wrong message. It would be kind of a stain on our national image. We want people to come to our country, but we want them to come here legally."

Dealing with haunting memories of war

Vietnam veterans pushing recognition of post-traumatic stress for Iraq war soldiers

By James Fuller, Daily Herald Staff Writer
Published: 11/12/2007

When Larry Van Meter returned from his first tour of duty in the Iraq war this summer, he had the pictures to prove it.

During his time in the Anbar province, he'd snapped many shots of pictures drawn in the sand, local children they gave candy to and picturesque sunsets during sandstorms.

The 20-year-old Villa Park native-turned-Marine craved views of large bodies of water and the smell of grass as his parents visited with him in San Diego, near Camp Pendleton.

And yet there was something about the pictures.

Van Meter's mom, Martha Geiseman, views them as the unseen and unappreciated aspects of Iraqi life that her maturing son is learning to appreciate. But Van Meter's dad, Dennis Geiseman, finds himself uneasy about the amount of time his son spent talking about the war during their time together.

"He was constantly showing us the pictures," Geiseman said. "Some of it was not normal, not natural. It was like he couldn't let go of it."

Geiseman would know. He's a Vietnam War veteran, only recently diagnosed as suffering from lingering effects associated with his exposure to Agent Orange.

Van Meter will return to Iraq for his second tour in January. Because of what he'll likely experience, and because of the experiences of his dad before him, veterans in Villa Park are making a pre-emptive strike.

Instead of a flag-raising today, the Villa Park Veterans of Foreign Wars post will host an information session on post-traumatic stress disorder with doctors accustomed to working with veterans.

The session comes about as Vietnam veterans ascend into leadership roles at local VFW and American Legion posts.

Terry Owens, president of the DuPage County Veterans Memorial, said perhaps unlike their World War II predecessors, they understand the danger of internalizing post-traumatic stress when coming home from an unpopular war. Owens is a Vietnam veteran.

"The one thing that emerged from Vietnam was post-traumatic stress, or at least the label of post-traumatic stress," Owens said. "It's a little more understood. Part of the mission of Vietnam veterans now is not to let what happened to us happen to these kids today. We already know the pitfalls and how awkward and uncomfortable it is to admit you've got a problem."

Indeed, the National Center for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder has an online database already filled with 140 medical studies, essays and books written about post-traumatic stress disorder experienced by Iraq veterans.

It's a phenomenon Bob Adams already is preparing himself to see more of at the Midwest Shelter for Homeless Veterans. Adams is a licensed clinical social worker at the Wheaton-based shelter. Half the veterans the shelter helps have had issues with post-traumatic stress.

Adams said Iraq veterans may have the toughest struggle with post-traumatic stress because they are spending more time in combat than veterans in any war since World War II.

Admitting the problem, Adams said, is half the battle. Post-traumatic stress has a stigma attached to it because it's a psychological condition, and soldiers are trained to not admit a weakness.

"Very often in combat, the only way for people to survive is to bury those feelings," Adams said. "That's the belief. You have to pack that stuff away and keep it there. It's then hard to admit to yourself, or anyone else, that you have a problem."

Adams said family and friends of veterans should approach the topic of post-traumatic stress with a sense of genuine concern.

"Make no judgment about the behavior you see," Adams said. "Talk about yourself and what you see happening. Say, 'This is what you're doing. It concerns me. It frightens me.' But some people won't respond to anything you try."

The Villa Park VFW's session will have similar information and advice for attendees at its Veterans Day session. The event runs from 5 to 8 p.m. today at VFW Post 2801, 39 E. St. Charles Road in Villa Park.

Martha and Dennis Geiseman will be there so they can support Larry when he comes home. Until then, Martha is gearing up for her son to head back to combat and collect more pictures and war experiences along the way.

"He's OK about going back," Martha said. "He's never once said 'I don't want to go,' or 'I'm not going.' He's very positive about it. And I'm OK because he's OK."

Stressed?

Have you ever had any experience that was so frightening, horrible or upsetting that in the past month, you …

1. Have had nightmares about it or thought about it when you did not want to?

2. Tried hard not to think about it or went out of your way to avoid situations that reminded you of it?

3. Were constantly on guard, watchful or easily startled?

4. Felt numb or detached from others, activities or your surroundings?

If you answered "yes" to at least three of the questions, you may have post-traumatic stress disorder.

A taste of Wheaton (all of it, actually)

Sunday September 16 2007
By James Fuller, Daily Herald Staff Writer

If you're an adult, you attend summer festivals for one of two reasons: For the family activity or the endless supply of foods in little booths waiting to harden your arteries.

I'm not a glutton, but I'm fascinated by the warm glow of satisfaction festival food-lovers have in the summer.

That in mind, I hit Wheaton's Autumnfest on Saturday with one goal: Eat one thing from each food booth.

I set one rule. I must eat all of my order and take whatever the vendors offer.

You should know that I'm about 5'9" and 155 pounds. I'm also training for a 12-mile race next month, so I haven't eaten anything that tastes good in awhile.

I find six booths at the fest.

The first booth is Genoa Pizza, where I grab a slice of pepperoni that represents about 25 percent of a large, thin-crust pizza. I add to this the only thing the second booth sells, a 16-ounce apple-cherry fruit juice concoction.

Normally this would satisfy me, but I'm on a mission.

Next is a Bangkok chicken breast from the Pad Thai booth. It comes on a stick, so it must be good.

I'm halfway through. Next up is a booth labeled simply "Greek Food." I order a kabob, but they're out. The chef suggests a chicken gyro.

Remember, I must eat whatever is offered to me. So chicken gyro it is.

"Green peppers?"

"Yes, please."

"Onions?"

"OK."

"Salad?"

"Sure."

"Cream sauce?"

I pause. I'm already staring at an entire chicken with various greens on it. But rules are rules.

"OK, put some on there."

I walk away wishing I had a team of oxen to pull my plate. I find a good seat for the Magic Matt stage performance and dig in.

Half way through the gyro I'm pretty sure my heart stops, but I push on feeling the glow that only too much meat can provide. But by the end, my tasty gyro is a chore to eat. I'm laboring and starting to sweat. Somehow I find room for the whole thing.

Two booths to go, and already I'm Thanksgiving full.

Next up is Pancho's Mexican Food. I scan the menu for something good, but light. They offer one steak taco for $2. I place my order.

"You want the three tacos for $5 special?"

My own rule will kill me.

"Uh, sure," I say while taking a deep breath. I walk away and find a seat by the men's room just in case. The tacos are good, but I'm so full.

One down. Two down.

By the third I'm on the verge of delirium. Somehow I'm floating while feeling the heaviest I've ever been. I take a walk in hope of finding some room in my belly. I complete a full circuit of the fest, and my third taco. At this point I truly am Jim "Fuller" for there is no one alive who is as full as I am.

The last booth also is the largest. It advertises everything from elephant ears to full slabs of ribs. I consider my options, and my gut, and order the coup de grace - a lemon shake-up.

OK. Fine. I admit it. I failed. I wimped out. You don't have to rub it in. A real festival food fan would've gotten the ribs. But as much as I found a love for fest food, it didn't override my dread of bursting at the seams. Hey, there's always next summer.

Q&A with Jerry B. Jenkins

You asked for it, so here it is. The full Jerry B. Jenkins interview, complete with the questions and answers that didn't make the newspaper article.

Listen to the interview here!


A conversation with “Left Behind” author Jerry B. Jenkins
BY JAMES FULLER
jfuller@dailyherald.com

Estimates say about one in eight Americans have read at least one book of the “Left Behind” series of Christian novels about the end of the world.
That means a lot of people know how the series ends, but maybe not much about how it began or the men be-hind it.

Jerry B. Jenkins wrote the words. Tim LaHaye provided the Biblical background and context.

Jenkins returned to some of his local roots Thursday night when he spoke at a fund-raiser for Wheaton Christian Grammar School. The cam-pus will soon relocate to a new, $20 million expanded facility.

Jenkins spoke on behalf of the value of a Christian education. Before his appearance, he took time out for some questions with Daily Herald Reporter James Fuller.

Q. There are at least 65 mil-lion readers of the “Left Be-hind” series. Out of those, how many of them becoming Christian believers would it take for you to feel fulfilled by your work?

A. Well, any would’ve been great. We don’t know how many, but between Dr. (Tim) LaHaye and me we’ve heard from more than 3,000 who tell us. And that’s personally. They tell us either by phone, or in person, or by e-mail. And we assume that repre-sents a lot more who just never have a chance to tell us.
We’ve never apologized for the fact that, it’s fiction, but we believe it’s really going to happen some day. It is a mes-sage.

Q. “Left Behind” has spurned a lot of the ancillary marketing gimmicks like mugs and pens. But you guys did decide to go ahead and do a video game. It’s got all sorts of reactions, some negative. I’m wondering if you wish that you’d just stayed out of it.

A. We had the fear that people would think it was frivolous. One of the things that we always said anytime people came to us with ideas they wanted to do candles and mugs and pens. If it doesn’t have the message in it, we’re not doing it just to get more royalties. For one thing, we don’t need that, and that’s not what we’re about.

The game manufacturers said they would make sure they got the message in there.
I suggested at one point that you can’t have too tame a video game. I’ve got kids and grandkids and I know that those games are about shoot ‘em ups and who are you going to kill in this game. My suggestion was I think people would accept it if they shot demons and sent them back to Hell. As it turns out, they used the anti-Christ forces. But then this rumor came out that anybody that disagreed with the Christians or didn’t become a believer got killed.

Q. People who had never played the game?

A. Obviously. And it was just asinine. We’d never be involved with something like that. But that has been an impossible rumor to kill. I still hear it. All you can do is say, ‘Read the books, and check out the game.’

Q. How does it feel to leave behind “Left Behind.” Is it really over?

A. Sometimes you wonder. We were afraid that Tyndale (House Publishers) would ask for a book for every year of the millennial kingdom. The first one came out in the fall of ’95. So after 12 years, it was sort of a melancholy thing to write the last one and be done with it. But it was time to move on. It’s been great. It totally changed my life.

Q. You’re a sports fan. You’ve written several auto-biographies with athletes. I know you’re a local guy, so I’ve got to ask you. Are you a Bears fan?

A. I’m a Bears fan, and I’m a Cub fan. I figure any team can have a bad century. Now you’ve heard the rumor that they’re going to move the Cubs to the Philippines, and call them the Manila Folders, right?

Q. Of all the athletes you worked with on those books, who impressed you the most?

A. It’s hard to decide. I got to work with so many impressive people, Hank Aaron and Walter Payton, (Orel) Hershiser, (Nolan) Ryan.

Mike Singletary is pretty impressive. He’s such a quiet guy, and not as huge as you’d think. He wasn’t that huge, but so intense. One of the things that I didn’t realize about Mike is that he’s hard of hearing and uses hearing aids. So to interview him I had to sit next to him instead of across a desk like you normally would. It sort of changes what questions you ask when you’re sitting right next to a guy that intense. He’s one of my favorites.

Q. Was it your love of sports that also got you involved with the comic strip Gil Thorp?

A. It was. In fact, I did that for about eight years. I don’t do it anymore. The guy that did that (Jack Berrill) read some of my kids sports books, and he called me. I think he actually wanted me to write some Gil Thorp books. It never came to that, but he would call every few months. I never met him. We would just talk about Gil Thorpe, and I had been reading it since I was a kid in Kalamazoo, Mich.

When he died, (in 1996) his wife left word with the Tribune Company that he wanted me to take it over. I thought that was a mistake. I had thought he wanted me to write books. I remember asking him about it, how he did it and what the philosophy was. Of course I don’t draw. They had to have somebody else draw it. But I was really honored to be asked. It was a fun period to write those.

Q. You spent more than a year working with the Rev. Billy Graham working on his autobiography. How did that change you?

A. He’s probably the most impressive person I’ve ever met. That was the privilege of a lifetime. It really was. And he’s the same behind closed doors as he is in public. He’s a fantastic man.

Q. His wife, Ruth, recently passed. Obviously he’s get-ting on in years and had some poor health recently. What do you think the impact will be to the Christian faithful when he passes?

A. I think it’s going to surprise the secular world. They’re going to have to have memorials in various cities like Wheaton, Minneapolis, Charlotte. And I think they’re going to be incredibly at-tended, like for a president. I think it’ll really surprise the press and secular world. He’s just been a giant. Anytime you raise his name, some-body in the crowd will tell you they became a believer through Graham somehow.

Q. It takes you six to eight weeks to write a book. What are your daily writing goals when you’re working on a novel?

A. I do work fairly quickly because I got my start in newspapers and you didn’t have time to mess around. I create at the keyboard. I only write when I’m on deadline. I don’t write everyday of the year like Stephen King does.

When I have a deadline, I figure out how many days I have and how many pages per day I need to write. Usu-ally it’s between 10 and 20 finished pages per day, which is pretty fast. And yet I never turn in a manuscript that I’m not totally happy with.
So I write my 10 or 20 pages, the next day I do a real heavy edit of those and write the next 10 or 20. And then when I’m done I go through the whole thing again until I’m happy with it. So I do work fast, but I tend to compartmentalize. When I’m writing, that’s all I’m doing. I get away in the mountains in Colorado, and I only write.

Q. Religion is always a touchy subject. People have differing beliefs. How do you respond to people who think that you’ve just gotten Jesus’ message wrong?

A. Well, the only time it bothers me is when they question our motives. There are people who disagree, and there are people that we ad-mire and respect, and people who we believe are believers who disagree with us. And that’s OK.

We live in a free country, and we’re just competing in the marketplace of ideas. Our feeling is if you disagree, write your own book, and get it out there, and see what the market decides. I know my motive, and I know Dr. LaHaye’s motive, and it’s simply to try to tell people what’s coming.

If people disagree, or scoff, or laugh, or reject it, that’s their right. And we’re not going to fly airplanes into buildings because people disagree with us. We’re not going to kill people. We’re supposed to love people, even our enemies. So my goal would be to say, ‘Look, we’re just sharing this, and what you do with it is up to you.’

Q. Nicolae Carpathia is your favorite character in the Left Behind series. Why? And do you think that would be shocking to fans of the series given his character’s role?

A. He’s the ultimate villain. You can’t have a better villain than the anti-Christ. I think the most fun part of him was, for the first three-and-a-half years, until he showed his true colors, he’s going to be so impressive that people will think he’s God incarnate.

I remember one of my sons was in high school, and I’d finished the first manuscript. He’s reading the manuscript and he’s about halfway through and he said, ‘I hope this Carpathia guy isn’t the anti-Christ because I really like him. And I thought, well then, we really nailed him because he has to be that impressive.

I clearly don’t like the anti-Christ, what he’s up to, but it’s a novelist’s dream to write with a villain like that.

Q. There’s a lot of people out there who read the Bible and struggle with various parts of it. What are the parts of the Bible that you struggle with, and what are the parts that strengthen you?

A. I get a lot of strength from the Psalms and Proverbs and the New Testament, a lot of writings of Paul and the Gospels. But Revelations was always the toughest one for me, too, because it always seemed like it was so symbolic and figurative. Any time I’d ever heard anybody speak of it, they always tried to do it allegorically.
When I met Dr. LaHaye, he said, ‘Look, I’m not a wooden literalist. I don’t believe everything that it says is literal like Jesus will slay people with a sword from his mouth. Clearly that’s the word. But where you can take it literally, do it, and see how it makes sense.’

Using that, I wrote the nov-els that way. When John the Revelator, instead of com-paring and saying like unto or as unto, he just says I looked, and I saw this, and it was hail and fire and blood from the sky. We used that, literally, and put the characters in the way of that. And millions of people said it just came to life for us for the first time. In-stead of trying to figure out 200 different ways to inter-pret it, just take it literally where you can.

Doctors who err still get clean bill of health

This one is a blast from the past, but it's still one of the articles I've written that I'm most proud of. I accomplished it as A Chicago Sun-Times intern while attending graduate school in 2001.

Chicago Sun-Times, Jun 24, 2001 by JAMES FULLER

SPRINGFIELD When you're ailing, you hope the doctor will cure you, not scramble your internal organs or prescribe radiation treatment for a cancer you do not have.

And if the doctor does do something horrific, you can sue. The doctor might have to pay for the mistake, and it will become a matter of public record, albeit filed away in a courthouse somewhere.

Yet physicians who hurt patients are rarely if ever punished-or even mildly reprimanded-by the state agency that licenses and monitors doctors, the Illinois Department of Professional Regulation.

The doctors' transgressions, though they may have led to a court judgment or an out-of-court settlement, are not posted on the state Web site, and the agency will refuse to reveal such information even if you call to ask.

"It utterly confounds logic," said Gail Siegel, executive director of the Coalition for Consumer Rights, a watchdog group that identified cases of malpractice for the Sun-Times. "Not only do we have incompetent doctors practicing incompetence on people, but we have a culture of incompetence at the regulatory agency that's supposed to be protecting patients."

When to sanction

An analysis of state, federal and court records showed that 85 doctors in Illinois have been hit with malpractice awards of more than $2 million since 1991. Of those, only seven have been disciplined by the state.

In five of the seven discipline cases, the punishments meted out by the nine-member Medical Disciplinary Board were so mild-a reprimand or probation-that the doctors continued to work without interruption.
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Of the 85 cases, six doctors had multiple settlements or judgments against them. Yet none received as much as a slap on the wrist.

"If that was you or I driving, our licenses would be revoked," said Rep. Mary Flowers (D-Chicago), chairwoman of the legislative House Health Care Availability and Access Committee.

In defense of its policies, DPR points out that juries in malpractice cases operate under far less stringent standards than state regulators. It's easier to win a six-figure malpractice award than to identify clear violations of state law.

"Somebody was in contact with a doctor, something didn't go right, and someone has a . . . substantial problem as a result," said DPR Director Leonard Sherman. "But that doesn't, by any means, (make) a violation of the Medical Practice Act."

The law outlines 43 instances under which the state can recommend sanctions against a doctor's medical license, including the charge of "gross negligence." Ultimately, the semi-autonomous Medical Disciplinary Board makes the call. Since 1991, the board has revoked 68 doctor licenses, suspended 255 others and issued 258 reprimands.

Physicians have been sanctioned for owing back taxes and child support, failing to repay student loans, misdiagnosing ailments and demonstrating incompetence.

But consider the cases in which the state stood silent:

A 55-year-old Joliet woman undergoing surgery in 1992 for a bowel obstruction had her bowel punctured by mistake-an error her physician neglected to tell her about. For 10 days, Arlene Johnson's stool seeped out of her surgical incision at a rate that approached 8 liters per day. Yet Robert Chambers dismissed the secretions as a normal part of the healing process. Subsequent surgeries by other doctors could not correct Chambers' mistake, and Johnson died.

"In my eye, in my family's eye, it was murder," said Johnson's daughter, Cheryl Ryan. "Dr. Chambers just left her to lay there and die. You don't let somebody's bowels ooze into their bodies and think that they are going to heal themselves."

Chambers, now practicing in North Dakota, declined to discuss the case, other than to say: "The state was very aware of what was going on. The state medical board looked at it and did not feel that there was any reason to have concern." He was not disciplined. Johnson's family was awarded $5.2 million in 1995.

Suffering pain in her pelvis, 52-year-old Ruta Ivey of Zion underwent radiation and chemotherapy after Alfonso Mellijor incorrectly diagnosed the return of cervical cancer. Mellijor made the diagnosis without taking a biopsy.

As a result of the treatment, a severe ulcer developed on Ivey's buttocks, and her pelvic pain continued.

Finally, a Wisconsin surgeon, while preparing to amputate her left leg and part of her pelvis, discovered the true source of her pain: two sponges left inside her from an earlier hysterectomy or ulcer surgery. Neither of the earlier surgeries involved Mellijor.

A jury awarded Ivey $6 million in 1995 for Mellijor's botched cancer diagnosis, but the state DPR took no action against him.

Ivey's attorney, James H. Canel, acknowledges that Mellijor had no way of knowing about the sponges. "On the flip side, you say, `Wait a minute, you took this patient and you assumed she had a recurrence of cancer and exposed her to all sorts of bad things, radiation and chemotherapy.' Clearly a jury thought that that was negligent."

While declining to comment on specific cases, the Illinois State Medical Society-the voice of doctors in Springfield-said it favors sanctions against incompetent doctors. At the same time, the group says, it's not uncommon for doctors in high-risk fields to be sued multiple times because they take on cases where the outcomes are far from certain.

"Filing a suit is easy, but proving that there's true malpractice is another story," said Dr. Ronald L. Reucker, the group's president. "Malpractice isn't the same as bad medicine."

Secret findings

Although Illinois law requires insurance companies to report all malpractice judgments to DPR, a 1997 report by Auditor General William Holland showed that most of these cases never were investigated.

When the DPR does investigate a malpractice case, it keeps its findings secret unless the investigation leads to a formal complaint or disciplinary action. These cases are posted on DPR's Web site, www.dpr.state.il.us.

For more details, a consumer may have to check court records in 102 county courthouses, assuming the doctor has practiced only in Illinois. Or pay $200 for access to the National Practitioners Database, which contains information about the malpractice suits filed in a particular state. Or rely on the Jury Verdict Reporter, a publication of Law Bulletin Publishing that provides summaries of some malpractice cases for $645 a year.

Flowers, the state lawmaker from Chicago, pushed legislation last spring requiring DPR to compile physician profiles so people could compare doctors.
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The profile would list criminal charges, disciplinary actions, hospital privilege revocations and medical malpractice awards.

Flowers' bill was never voted on by the full House, in large part because of opposition from the Illinois State Medical Society and, initially, DPR. The agency now is neutral on the issue.

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Religious and gay: A two-part series

Part 2: Proud to be ordained -- and gay
Published: 9/25/2007 12:03 AM
By James Fuller

Jay Johnson once lived a secret existence he didn't even have the words to describe.

On the outside in 1980, he was a Wheaton College freshman who represented all the ideals of the Christian community he grew up in, right down to thoughts of wearing a collar himself someday.

On the inside, confusing thoughts and impulses haunted him. He knew he wasn't like his peers, but couldn't figure out why.

Johnson had a loving family. He attended the local schools, dated the local girls. His father was a member of the Wheaton College faculty.

And yet, that freshman year he began living two lives. He even kept two separate journals. One was about his everyday life. He locked the other in a drawer in his dorm room.

"I posed a lot of questions to God in that journal," Johnson recalled. "What's wrong with me? Why is this happening?"

He felt increasingly isolated. Then, sophomore year, he was called into a counselor's office.

Johnson was not getting along with his roommate, so he wasn't surprised when the counselor told him the living arrangement wasn't working.

Then, out of a desk drawer, the counselor pulled out photocopied pages of Johnson's locked-away journal.

"It was akin to finding yourself naked on stage in front of a whole auditorium of people," Johnson said. "I thought my life was over."

Johnson had been outed by his roommate. The journal recorded inquiries about why his relationships with women were unfulfilling.

"I thought it was a phase, and sooner or later the light switch will flip on," Johnson said. "I thought I was just sort of late. No one talked about it."

The counselor sent Johnson to therapy.

"I thought maybe there is a problem that can be identified and fixed," Johnson said.

He dedicated himself to a cure by taking his secret journal and setting it on fire. He would burn his thoughts and, he hoped, his problems with them.

It was too late. His secrets were no longer hidden. Summer plans to backpack through Europe ended when two students said they no longer wanted to travel with him.

"I was not defensive, but I was certainly hurt," Johnson said. "I just completely acquiesced as if it was a natural thing for people to not want to be around me. I was terribly sad. I was isolated and alone."

Six months of therapy did not flip the switch as Johnson had hoped.

"I still walked out of there with the idea that this is a problem that needs to be fixed," Johnson said. "The good news was I was not alone. The bad news was I've got a serious problem that needs to be fixed."

Johnson knew the college had a policy against being a practicing homosexual, but no one ever checked in with him to see the results of his therapy. He decided to pursue answers to his questions on his own.

That's when Johnson was invited to go to church by a resident assistant in his dorm. It wasn't his regular Sunday church outing. This was Mass at St. Barnabas in Glen Ellyn, an Episcopal church.

Johnson found several other Wheaton College students attending the church and was hooked by the active participation and enthusiasm. He had found a new social outlet in these friends.

Johnson didn't come out and say he was gay in those conversations. That didn't happen until spring of his senior year. By then he decided it was time to tell someone about his feelings. He chose a friend he'd known since junior high. Turns out, both were gay.

Still, the conflict between his sexuality and religion was strong. Abandoning his faith was not an option. He was even majoring in theological and biblical studies, where he found a talent for ministry work. At the same time, Johnson believed abandoning his sexuality would be akin to cutting off a leg in an effort to be a better dancer.

"There was no sense that I could get rid of one in favor of the other," he said.

So even though his Wheaton College education gave him all the academic and critical thinking tools and spirituality to examine the texts and traditions of his Christian faith, the key to solving his struggle did not come in his college years. But those tools would come in handy later.

Six months after graduation, Johnson decided to go back to therapy. This time it would be with a therapist of his choosing. By now, he'd decided he wasn't looking for a cure, but a way to put all the facets of his life in harmony.

He believed he'd also found his calling. He entered the process of ordination in the Episcopal Diocese of Chicago. The process begins at the parish level. That meant interviewing with his local rector and being honest about his sexual thoughts.

It would be a big risk. Coming out at his church meant possibly alienating himself from his spiritual home.

The reaction was better than he'd hoped.

"It was supportive and encouraging," Johnson said. "But the rector did think it was important that I promise to be celibate in order to move forward in the ordination process."

A lifetime of celibacy did not seem unreasonable at that moment.

"I did not recognize that this was a false choice that was put in front of me," Johnson said. "I believe there are some people who are simply called to be celibate, but I think that's a very small number."

Johnson's path to ordination began. In the fall of 1985, he was off to a theological seminary in Wisconsin.

There he met another gay man. Through their conversations, Johnson realized he needed to go to confession.

"I needed to confess my sin of not appreciating God's gift of sexuality," Johnson said. "I realized not accepting and receiving this gift of sexuality was actually sinful."

Johnson had always considered his sexuality a thorn in his side, a birth defect, but now realized he could be wrong. It was a revelation that allowed him to feel happy in his own skin for the first time.

A visitor to Johnson's room at that point would have seen evidence of that revelation in a bumper sticker that he cherished. It read, "What causes heterosexuality?" It was a bizarre twist on the question he asked himself even before he knew he was gay.

"Sexuality is far too complex to reduce to any one cause," Johnson said.

The next step was making sure his beliefs were compatible with his calling by coming out to his bishop. Johnson wanted there to be no questions about him going through the ordination process.

The bishop told him to worry about his sexuality only insofar as necessary to integrate that sexuality into the rest of his life. Concealing his urges from the world would only wreck havoc in Johnson's life, he said.

The bishop behind that advice was Frank Griswold, who went on to become the presiding bishop and chief pastor for the Episcopalian Church. Griswold is now retired.

Johnson was ordained in June 1988 and served as curate at St. Simon's Episcopal Church in Arlington Heights. He made the decision to not make himself known as a gay man while in the parish. He was still afraid.

"While I was not engaging in outright deception, it did start to feel like leading a double life, which eventually takes a heavy toll," Johnson said. "The folks at St. Simon's were great, and I loved working with them, but I made the decision after my three years there never to closet myself again."

And he never did.

In 1991, Johnson began a doctoral program in Berkeley, Calif., and fell in love with the Bay area. He is currently the acting executive director of The Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies in Religion and Ministry at Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley. Since achieving that position, he's begun to focus his research on integrating spirituality and sexuality, not only as a gay man, but as a Christian.

"Christian churches don't know what to say about sex except who to do it with and when," Johnson said. "By focusing on a very few biblical passages that supposedly condemn gay and lesbian relationships, Christians are missing the forest for the trees."

Instead, Johnson focuses on biblical sources and historical theological traditions where he said he's found the language of erotic desire and homosexuality to be comparable to the language used to talk about human desires for God, as well as God's desires for us.

This language doesn't relate to literal sexual attraction to God, but rather a deep desire for communion. Such language gets to the root of man not being meant to live alone, Johnson said.

He's taken steps to help ensure other Wheaton College students and alumni aren't alone as he was in his struggles on campus. Johnson is active in the college's gay alumni association. And, he recently returned to the college to take part in a panel discussion where he told current students it's OK to be gay and Christian.

"I'm very happily a gay man, and I'm not grudgingly a Christian," Johnson added. "This is not a thorn in my flesh. In fact, if I were presented with a pill that would 'cure' my sexuality I would pretty likely not take it. This is who I am."

Religious and gay: A two-part series

Part 1: Leaving the gay lifestyle behind
Published: 9/25/2007 12:03 AM
By James Fuller


The last time Angela Yuan saw her son was when he threw her out of his house. It was Christopher's retribution. His parents cast him out of the family after he announced he was gay. Angela prayed every day for God to save her son.

Now they reunited inside prison walls. They were still separated by the bulletproof glass, but joined in prayer for the first time. She didn't know the dark path her son had walked. He didn't know her prayers were about to be answered.

Thou shalt not covet

Christopher Yuan's first sexual thoughts came at age 9, when he found a trove of adult magazines in a friend's bathroom cabinet.

"It was that rush of doing something wrong," he said.

With the rush came the realization he felt attracted to both genders. When puberty hit, Yuan bought his own adult magazines.

The attraction to men felt instinctual. At 16, he met an older man at a gay social club and had his first sexual experience.

When his mother found out about it, she forced Christopher into counseling.

"We thought I was fixed after that," Yuan recalled. "Basically, we just didn't talk about it."

He tried dating girls, but was still attracted to men. After finishing Hinsdale Central High School, he sought a rugged image to squelch his thoughts and joined the Marine reserves.

It wasn't a cure. The weekend training sessions in Gary, Ind., took him away from the watchful eyes of his parents. After training, he'd rush to Chicago's gay clubs.

"I decided, 'I've just got these urges, and I'm just going to satisfy them,' " Yuan said.

He decided to become a dentist like his father. He enrolled at Louisville University in 1992, where gay bars were just blocks from campus.

"For me, that was just like freedom." Yuan said. "I felt like I belonged. I was in school. I was smart. I was in shape. I was a Marine."

With all that going for him, it was easy to tell his parents he was gay.

Angela recalls it well. It was "worse than receiving news of his death."

Her life was crumbling. Her son rejected her. Her marriage was failing. At night she'd tape her eyelids to control the swelling caused by her tears. She decided to visit Christopher.

Then she'd kill herself.

Before boarding a train to Louisville, Angela visited a chaplain for advice. She left town with just a purse and a pamphlet. It told her God loves all sinners. He hates only sin itself. For the first time she believed she could love her son even if he were gay.

Christopher was shocked by the transformation.

"All I remembered is them kicking me out of the family," he said. "I really thought she'd just flipped her lid."

No gods before me

Yuan was deeply rooted in the gay community by then. Much of his social life was at gay clubs. That's where he discovered drugs, but didn't have much cash now that he was cut off from his family. So he started selling to friends to support his habit.

He soon found he could sell up to 100 hits of Ecstasy in just one weekend at the clubs. He quickly added his classmates and even one of his professors to his clientele.

Being the man everyone came to for a good time was addictive. The money was fast and easy. Yuan used the business skills he'd learned at his dad's dental office. He began flying to other states to buy and sell more drugs.

Yuan's schoolwork did not improve with his travels. The university decided to expel him for his absences and poor grades. Yuan asked his parents to convince the university to let him stay on.

"By then I was just praying to God to do whatever was necessary -- that could even mean death -- to make him do right," Angela said.

Yuan's parents supported the expulsion. He was furious. It was another reason to disown them.

He moved to Atlanta, and gained a foothold in the gay club scene by dealing drugs. He sold Special K, cocaine, marijuana, LSD, mushrooms, steroids, Ecstasy and a pure form of methamphetamine known as "ice."

It was a Hollywood lifestyle: all the drugs he wanted, a new sports car, an expensive apartment with a pool, his own personal bodyguards.

"I had become God," Yuan said. "I would walk into a club and, literally, a sea of people would come up to me."

Honor thy mother

Angela didn't know about the drugs. She just knew her son wasn't living right.

She'd play Christian songs on Christopher's answering machine. She'd mail cards every other week. Every space on all four sides was filled with her words. They all ended with "Love you forever, Mom."

On holidays, she'd send Yuan a plane ticket home and wait for him at the airport. He'd never show up. He'd never call.

So his parents went to him.

"All I wanted to do was have sex and do drugs and sell drugs, and they didn't fit into that schedule," Yuan said.

He kicked them out after a couple days, but his dad left him a Bible. When the door closed, Yuan threw it away.

He was now at the peak of his drug-dealing and using. He'd burn 10 days in a row smoking ice, not eating or sleeping until he'd pass out from exhaustion. He dropped from 180 to 130 pounds.

Yuan was also at the height of his promiscuity, sleeping with multiple partners in a day, often not knowing their names.

To make his life seem legitimate, he became a promoter, coordinating parties at clubs. The club would supply the bartenders. He'd supply the drugs and DJs.

"I thought I was invincible," Yuan said.

At home, Angela swooned in spiritual devotion. She fasted 39 days in a row, living only on vegetable juice. Her prayers were desperate requests for her son's salvation.

In 1998, she believes God answered her prayer.

Prodigal son

Yuan was sorting a large drug shipment on his kitchen table when a dozen U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency officers, Atlanta police and two German shepherds arrived.

Drug orders were coming over the fax and phone even as agents stormed through. Yuan ran his drug deals like a business. He kept every receipt and had a ledger detailing all transactions.

Jackpot.

The agents took everything. All told, the DEA busted Yuan with various drugs having an estimated street value of nearly $11 million today.

He began calling friends to bail him out. None of the 20 people he tried took his call.

There was one number left.

Angela Yuan was walking in the door from her Bible study group when her phone rang.

She flew to Atlanta the next day. She saw her son behind a thick pane of glass.

She asked Christopher if he would allow her to pray for him. She pressed her hand to the glass. Yuan met her palm with his own. It was the first time he ever prayed.

Two days later, Yuan paced the facility, beginning to realize his mistakes.

On top of a garbage pile was a pocket-sized Gideon's New Testament. He took the book back to his cell.

"It began to change me," he said. "If I knew that, I wouldn't have picked it up."

There was a lot to change.

"I thought I'd probably stop selling, but not doing drugs or going to clubs," he said. "I didn't even consider giving up the gay lifestyle."

Yuan cut a deal to testify against other drug dealers the government had built a case against because of Yuan's files. He got six years.

"I was just crushed," Yuan said. "I was going to be ancient when I got out."

He was 28.

Yet, a new low was coming.

Hope and a future

Yuan found himself one morning shackled in front of a prison nurse. He saw tears in her eyes as she gave him a piece of paper. It read:

"HIV +"

It was a death sentence on top of his prison stay.

Back in his cell, Yuan gazed at the empty bunk above his own. Etched into the frame was a message: "If you're bored, read Jeremiah 29:11."

The verse speaks of God's plan of peace and happiness for everyone.

"God really used that verse to speak to me," Yuan said. "Regardless of who I was, or what I'd done, he had a plan for me."

Yuan used that hope to conquer the sins he believed led him to ruin: drugs, greed and homosexuality.

He started with support groups, but couldn't accept the ideology of forever being an addict even once he was clean.

"One of God's most important messages is you can be completely changed," Yuan said. "You should never identify yourself by your struggles. My rebellion does not constitute who I am. I don't consider myself an addict anymore."

Yuan made God his addiction. The cravings vanished.

Next was letting go of the drug dealer lifestyle. His prison sentence was enough to convince him to quit.

Sex was last. He hoped to balance homosexuality with the Bible, but only found an ultimatum.

Yuan was not instantly cured of his attraction to men. But he decided his sexual thoughts would no longer define him. He didn't believe thinking about men made him a homosexual any more than occasional murderous thoughts made someone a murderer. Yuan decided to follow God by committing to celibacy.

"People say, 'How can you live without having sex?' " Yuan said. "Well, it's possible. It's not even an aspect of who I am."

The cleansing was complete. It was time to start his second chance at life.

Paroled to God

Federal agents used Yuan's drug files to nail a key figure they'd long sought. Yuan was the star witness.

Testifying risked his safety. In prison, only a child molester is lower than a snitch.

Yuan's new faith became his courage on the witness stand.

In exchange for his testimony, his sentence was cut to three years. He'd already served nearly two. He had to figure out what to do with his second chance. The Bible and ministering to others were all he cared about.

He decided to enroll in the only Bible college he'd ever heard of, Chicago's Moody Bible Institute.

Yuan needed letters of recommendation from people who knew him for at least one year as a practicing Christian. That meant slim pickings. He eventually secured letters from a prison chaplain, a guard and a fellow inmate.

Yuan left the rest to God.

He didn't wait long. Yuan was accepted to Moody after his release in July 2001.

He graduated in May 2005 and was accepted at Wheaton College's graduate school to learn biblical exegesis --a systematic study of the Bible.

He now teaches at Moody and shares his life story with whatever church congregation will hear it, including South Barrington's influential Willow Creek Community Church. He travels around the world in good health thanks to checkups every three months.

Yuan's life is not free from temptations, but he believes his faith continues to deliver him from evil. He rejects the sexual labels of homo, hetero and bi-sexuality. He says God has even opened his heart to female relationships and marriage now.

"Not everything that feels good is right," Yuan said. "Attraction is not a choice, but acting on those attractions is. Acting on same-sex attraction is not encoded into DNA like ethnicity or skin color. Black people can't wake up one day and say, 'I'm no longer black.'

"Gay people can wake up and say, 'I'm no longer gay.'

"I'm living proof of that."

Sidebar: Therapy optional for adult sex offenders

Published: 9/17/2007 6:01 AM
By James Fuller

One of the ironies of Illinois' correctional system results in some sex offenders never receiving a minute of corrective therapy to ward off repeat offenses.

State guidelines call for every sex offender who commits a crime as a minor to receive mandatory therapy while incarcerated. But there's no such rule for adult sex offenders. Therapy for them is optional in prison.

Many of the adult inmates who refuse treatment may be the most likely to commit another crime, said Alyssa Williams-Schafer, state corrections department sex offender services coordinator.

"A lot of these offenders are in denial," Williams-Schafer said. "Some of them don't want to have to deal with their offense."

Many offenders are so adamant in their belief that they've done nothing wrong that they forego the favorable chance at early parole therapy gives them and serve their full sentences, said Dr. Mark Brenzinger, a clinical psychologist in Schaumburg who's treated and evaluated sex offenders.

Illinois' rules only mandate sex offenders on parole to receive psychological treatment. But offenders who've served their full sentence can get out of prison without ever addressing or recognizing their crimes in therapy.

Brenzinger said even the sex offenders who do enter therapy are tough cases.

"Many will tell you whatever it takes just to get back into the community," he said. "Talk therapy just doesn't work for everybody," he added. "And there's a high failure rate because this is a tough population to treat."