Homosexuality and the Charismatic Church
To lie with a man is deceitful ... actually, all lying is deceitful.
IF two men, or two women, wish to live together, and to bear and raise children, and also to live a Holy Life, you must welcome them into your Churches and your Communities.
In early 21st century America, this statement is not terribly controversial. The only surprise would be a Charismatic1 religious leader preaching this.
Yet I predict that by the end of 2023, there will be at least one high-profile pro-Trump evangelist who actively endorses and performs gay marriages.
The Theological Angle
Doesn’t the Old Testament condemn homosexuality? We note this is specifically a reference to Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13. There are many interpretations. One interpretation is that, in context, the condemnation is only of incestuous homosexual relationships. The previous verse to 20:13 states that a man should not sleep with his son’s wife, the next verse that he should not sleep with his wife’s mother.
Our interpretation does not rely on a close analysis of the text, and in fact is willing to reject a close reading if necessary. Our interpretation is simply that two men or two women cannot make a baby. The Five Books of Moses often explain things that the modern reader would consider obvious.
Doesn’t the New Testament condemn homosexuality? We note first that these condemnations come from the letters of Paul, not from the teachings of Jesus. There are several of them.
Our interpretation is that this is largely a marketing tool; a way of distinguishing the new Christian community from the claimed immorality of the Roman pagans.
Don’t all religious traditions condemn homosexuality? To a certain extent, all successful religions must promote child-bearing. And, before the Twentieth Century, to do that was to discourage homosexuality.
While I am certainly not an expert on Islam, a Wikipedia article states that the Koran never forbids homosexuality.
The Kama Sutra includes several passages on same-sex sexual actions.
There is an entire program of research on various ways other folk religions or indigenous religious are friendly to homosexuality. I am unfamiliar and have no comment.
Are you really one to speak? It is well established that I am no fan of biblical literalism or certain interpretations of historical figures. Yet I think “a high-profile pro-Trump evangelist reads this post and rejects it because of its author” to be vanishingly low in probability.
Who Will It Be?
I don’t know. It could be someone like Joel Osteen or Kenneth Copeland. It could be somebody with no current public profile who rides the wave of controversy to public prominence.
It could potentially be a “TikTok ministry”. These may or may not have been invented yet, but Christianity Today talks about them For our prediction, a minimum of 1 million views per post at the end of 2023 (and ideally 5 million views per post) is required to meet the “high-profile” clause.
Regardless, the epistle is simple: Paul of Tarsus was wrong. Gay marriage is fine, it is gay promiscuity that is the enemy of the church. Live your life in love, bear and raise children, and dedicate your soul to the glory of השם.
On Predictions
What does it mean to predict, here?
Certainly I have not used a timemachine to tap2 out this secret knowledge of the future. And I have no particular way to get Charismatic thought leaders to even acknowledge my writings, much less agree with them.
Yet the arrow of history is not as hard to predict as some would claim. Whether it is blind ambition or divine revelation that leads them to that place, the fruits will be impossible to deny.
And yet to predict is an action that moves the wheels of history3. In the beginning was the word, and with levers and pulleys the word may move mountains. My word is backed by my word; where shall it lead?
Charismatic and Pentecostal are similar in meaning. We avoid the term “Pentecostal” largely because the term “Pentecost” is archaic and largely unknown in American English. The term Pentecost normally refers to a day known as “Shavuot” in Hebrew and “Whitsunday” in British English.
to tap, as one taps out Morse code.
“Blood alone moves the wheels of history!” - Dwight Schrute, paraphrasing Mussolini