Focus on the Fundies: Baptist suggests no right to life for 'gay' fetuses

An influential pastor of the arch-conservative Southern Baptist persuasion has wondered aloud whether if homosexuality is indeed found to be biological in origin, should his followers eliminate "gay" fetuses, perhaps by wearing some sort of patch that prevented their birth?

Here is where the line blurs between someone has the ability to be a real visionary, and someone whose shriveled, scorched-earth version of religion has instead caused him to be a raving paranoid. In fact, it's quite a leap in the first place for one of these foamers to even admit to the possibility that homosexuality could have a biological component, because that would imply -- to someone with a somewhat more expansive soul -- that God created some people gay and thus it might not be as bad as they've always thought it is. No, instead this thought leads him to wonder what "you could do about it" (emphasis mine) in order to keep the putative queer from sin.

In an interview on Friday, Mohler said that Christian couples "should be open" to the prospect of changing the course of nature -- if a biological marker for homosexuality were to be found. He would not support gene therapy but might back other treatments, such as a hormonal patch.

"I think any Christian couple would want their child to be whole and healthy," he said. "Knowing that that child is going to be a sinner, we would not want to make their personal challenges more difficult if they could be less difficult."

Actually, there is some foundation in Christian teaching for what I think this fellow is proposing. Jesus himself is quoted as saying "if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: it is better for thee to enter into life with one eye, rather than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire." (Matt. 18:9). I think this is what Mohler is getting at: what's the difference between a roving eye and a putatively sinful fetus? Why not keep the fetus from existing in the first place?

So the amazing thing about this cluck is not merely that he is suggesting the possibility of a biological basis for homosexuality, but that he is envisioning something that could actually justify abortion. You know, I always wondered who the foamers hated worse, women or gays. Now we know. They'd rather see women have a right to abortion if it meant the elimination of homosexuality.

Then, low down in the article is the real reason the guy's upset:

Homosexuality is a "huge challenge" to Christianity, said Mohler, referring, in part, to the Rev. Ted Haggard, former president of the National Association of Evangelicals, who was forced to step down last November because of a gay sex scandal. And the Rev. Lonnie Latham, a member of the executive committee of the Southern Baptist Convention, was embroiled in a gay sex scandal but was found not guilty of having solicited sex from another man.

"In our churches and in our families there are people struggling with homosexuality and for a long time this was kind of hidden," Mohler said in the interview. "It is no longer hidden, and the fact is we've got to be coming up with genuinely Christian responses to Christians who are in this struggle."

Yes, even Brother Mohler understands that Ted Haggard is lying when he says he emerged from his rehab "one hundred percent heterosexual." And it scares the crap out of him. If fine upstanding preachers like Ted and Lonnie can be queer, how can he risk closing his eyes during the next men's prayer meeting? Some cocksucker might be sneaking up on him.

technorati: fundies, Baptists, abortion, homosexuality, homophobia, crypto-fascists