The students’ lawsuit argues that the religious exemption is unconstitutional and that it allows the Department of Education “to breach its duty” to LGBTQ students at religious colleges and universities “where discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity is codified in campus policies and openly practiced.”

Lucas Wilson said he received conversion therapy from a student club called Band of Brothers at Liberty University from 2008 to 2012, when he was an undergraduate student.

Wilson, now 30, said when he visited campus prior to enrolling, he saw an ad for “struggling with same-sex attraction.”

“The biggest factor in why I chose Liberty was ultimately the conversion therapy program because I, in fact, believed that one could become straight,” Wilson said.

He is now one of 33 LGBTQ students who are suing the Department of Education in a class-action lawsuit filed Monday. The students allege that they faced discrimination at 25 federally funded Christian colleges and universities in 18 states.

Wilson said Liberty University is a “thoroughly homophobic institution” and that, in addition to offering conversion therapy in the form of a student club, he also had several classes that taught “the evils of the homosexual lifestyle.”

He said the conversion therapy group, and the culture at Liberty, “amplified and compounded feelings of self-hatred, feelings of shame and guilt and anxiety that ultimately took years to deconstruct.”

The Religious Exemption Accountability Project, or REAP, an organization that advocates for LGBTQ students at taxpayer-funded religious colleges and universities, filed the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court in Oregon on behalf of former and current students.

Liberty University has not responded to NBC News’ requests for comment. A spokesperson for the Department of Education said the Biden administration is “fully committed to equal education access for all students.”

The spokesperson added that President Joe Biden stated in an executive order earlier this month, “It is the policy of my Administration that all students should be guaranteed an educational environment free from discrimination on the basis of sex, including discrimination in the form of sexual harassment, which encompasses sexual violence, and including discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.”

Many Christian colleges and universities receive federal funding and are still allowed to enforce policies that, for example, prohibit same-sex relationships on campus. That’s because Title IX, the federal civil rights law that prohibits sex-based discrimination, contains an exemption for religious entities.

The students’ lawsuit argues that the religious exemption is unconstitutional and that it allows the Department of Education “to breach its duty” to LGBTQ students at religious colleges and universities “where discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity is codified in campus policies and openly practiced.”

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