THE controversial claims by some Christian leaders that gay men die younger than heterosexual men appear to have originated from flawed US research that was funded by a Christian research group.

Sydney's Anglican Archbishop, Peter Jensen, drew strong criticism for comments on ABC TV's Q&A on Monday night that the gay lifestyle led to a "significantly shorter life".

He was responding to comments by the Australian Christian Lobby chief, Jim Wallace, that a homosexual lifestyle was as unhealthy as smoking.

One of several studies by Paul Cameron and his son, Kirk, of the Family Research Institute in Colorado in the United States - which claims its ''overriding mission is to generate empirical research on issues that threaten the traditional family, particularly homosexuality, AIDS, sexual social policy and drug abuse'' - concluded heterosexual men outlived gay men by 20 years.