http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8665812.stm

Mr Rekers said there was nothing inappropriate with the relationship

A US Baptist minister and leading anti-gay campaigner has defended himself against allegations that he holidayed in Europe with a male prostitute.

George Rekers was photographed at Miami international airport last month with a young man whom he allegedly met through a gay website called Rentboy.com.

Mr Rekers said he hired the man as a travel assistant and "was not involved in any illegal or sexual behaviour".

He said he only realised the man's profession once the trip had begun.

The photograph, published by the Miami New Times, shows the pair arriving back in Miami from a 10-day trip to London and Madrid, with Mr Rekers pushing their suitcases on a trolley.

'Nothing inappropriate'

In a statement on his website, Mr Rekers called the report "slanderous", saying he required an assistant to lift his luggage because of an ongoing condition following surgery.

"There was nothing inappropriate with this relationship," he wrote on his blog, ProfessorGeorge.com.

Mr Rekers also apparently replied to a Facebook message from the blog Joe.My.God.

He wrote: "If you talk with my travel assistant... you will find I spent a great deal of time sharing scientific information on the desirability of abandoning homosexual intercourse, and I shared the Gospel of Jesus Christ with him in great detail."

Mr Rekers sits on the board of the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (Narth), an organisation dedicated to changing the sexuality of gay people.

Mr Rekers has testified as an expert in favour of a gay adoption ban in Florida. His published works include Growing up Straight: What Families Should Know about Homosexuality.

How come all these anti-gay guys turn out to actually be gay? There seems to be way to many stories like this one.

It's just like somebody who makes too much noise when they smell a fart. They're usually the ones who farted. And they're gay.

Well i guess he isn't anti-gay anymore.

Psychology/sociology makes us do the darnedest things.

It's interesting that the people who so ardently hate gays are so often gay. The positive correlation between homophobia and homosexuality is weird.

Hypocrisy at its finest.

Homophobes are the heterosexuals with the biggest gay attitude and it's totally true. Very strange stuff.

There's always the possibility that he was setup, wouldnt be highly unlikely that someone purposely had the male prostitute apply for the position so that a scandal like this could be created. Or the minister is a homosexual, who knows. Might as well just wait till the actual facts come out instead of speculation.

It's always best to take the mainstream media with a grain of salt.

@Nirvan_Nut85 are you serious? I doubt someone took the time to set this up. I mean the picture was taken from a different person where they were together. I seen this on another site, not the link form the OP. He was caught with him in the airport and there is a picture of it. He got the guy from Rentboy.com. The media may be overzelous sometimes but this is not one of those times. The old man got caught and there is no way of getting out of this, even the organization he was apart of is turning their back on him. So don't try to make excuses for him. And this isn't speculation, it is confirmed he got the boy from that site and had him go on this vacation with him where the boy rubbed the old man down while both were naked. There wasn't sex but obviously this anti-gay/"gay turned straight" got off with a hot naked twink rubbing down his nasty body.