"You know what you need? A relationship with God... God can transform anybody."

Oh dear: I am still a paedophile therefore I don't know God. Really? You sure about this theological logic? It leads directly to sick people feeling guilty for being sick, and ultimately churches kicking people who aren't healed out of their fellowship because they obviously don't have faith.

Mental illnesses are as much an ILLNESS as any other form of disease. Just because a person doesn't have a leg in a plaster cast doesn't mean that they aren't just as disabled. I've a number of friends whose lives have been seriously damaged by clinical depression: the sight of a person sitting crying their eyes out for no good reason is horrible. And telling them that it's THEIR fault is the most obnoxious thing that you can possibly do.

Once you start looking, there are several stories in the New Testament that indicate that God doesn't heal all physical illness in this world. Timothy is the most obvious 'Take a little wine for your stomach' proves he had a chronic problem with his digestion. Epaphroditus in Phil 2 clearly was only cured after an extended illness, and it's described as 'God having mercy' rather than being what Paul expected.

It's dangerous and divisive theology to blame the Christian victim of disease for their illness without VERY specific indications. And that's the category into which I would put being a BL, and, given my own understanding of the issue, being gay, though that's rather more controversial.

[For the sake of clarification, don't baulk at the term 'theology'. EVERYONE has a theology, it's the correct term for their understanding of God. That they've got a wrong one, an over academic one, a liberal one, or even an atheist one doesn't stop it being a theology. The only question is whether my theology, or yours, is consistent with the data presented in the bible. To the extent that it's not, it's ultimately wrong. That God has been gracious or merciful to someone beyond what is promised in the bible, is wonderful for them, but offers no justification for generalising that expectation to everybody.]