A Christian psychotherapist has been found guilty of “professional malpractice” after trying to help a gay man become straight.

Lesley Pilkington, 60, faces being struck off from the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy after it came down on the side of her client, Patrick Strudwick.

Mr Strudwick approached Mrs Pilkington, a practitioner of reparative therapy, at a Christian conference on therapy for homosexuality and pretended that he wanted treatment to help him overcome his same-sex attractions.

He was in fact a gay journalist working undercover.

Mrs Pilkington and Mr Strudwick had two therapy sessions together, during which Mr Strudwick secretly recorded their conversations.

He then used the material gathered during the sessions to make a formal complaint against Mrs Pilkington to the BACP, the professional body for counsellors.

A decision was communicated to both parties by the BACP last week but its contents were to remain confidential. However, Mr Strudwick wrote an article giving details of the BACP’s decision in the Guardian newspaper.

In response, the Christian Legal Centre, which is supporting Mrs Pilkington’s case, also released excerpts of the ruling.

The BACP found that Mr Strudwick had “in significant ways deliberately misled [Mrs Pilkington] into believing that he was comfortable and accepting of her approach” and “lulling Mrs Pilkington into a false sense of security”.

It also stated that Mr Strudwick had “manipulated the content of the sessions to a considerable extent in order to meet his own agenda”.

The BACP nonetheless found Mrs Pilkington guilty of “professional malpractice” for extending the session with Mr Strudwick over the allotted hour and for failing to counsel Mr Strudwick after a meeting with her husband while Mr Strudwick had been out of the room.

The ruling stated that Mrs Pilkington’s membership in the BACP would be suspended and that she would be struck off the register if she does not undergo training.

Mr Strudwick said: “I am an out, happily gay man. I was undercover, investigating therapists who practise this so-called conversion therapy (also known as reparative therapy) – who try to ‘pray away the gay’.

“I asked her to make me straight. Her attempts to do so flout the advice of every major mental-health body in Britain.”

Mrs Pilkington is appealing the decision and has made a complaint to the Press Complaints Commission criticising the article and the “subterfuge and deceit” used Mr Strudwick.

She said: “I am deeply concerned that the privileged and confidential relationship between a counsellor and her patient will be undermined by a journalist seeking a sensationalist story without any substance.

“It is an abuse by the Guardian newspaper. Accordingly, I propose to act with restraint.

“Reparative Therapy is a valid therapy that many people want and it should not be damaged by irresponsible reporting. The hearing is still subject to an appeal.”

Her case is being supported by the Christian Legal Centre. Its director Andrea Minichiello Williams said it was “wholly unacceptable” that the BACP had even considered the complaint against Mrs Pilkington.

She said: “Christians are being targeted and increasingly unable to access justice in this country.

“To think a gay activist, engaged in deception, can seek out a Christian therapist by pretending to be a Christian seeking to choose to change his behaviour, manipulate the counselling sessions for the purpose of a story, use a clandestine taping device and then report the therapist to the professional body is almost beyond belief.

“One can only imagine the reaction if a Christian tried to do this to a Pink therapist.”