General Assembly preacher likes book suggesting Jesus was 'gay' By John H. Adams The Layman Online Thursday, April 29, 2004 The winter issue of More Light Update, the quarterly journal of More Light Presbyterians, includes a review by its editor, Chris Glaser, of a book titled The Man Jesus Loved: Homoerotic Narratives from the New Testament. One of the premises of the book, which was written by Theodore W. Jennings Jr., is that Jesus had an unnamed male lover, who was described in John's Gospel as the "beloved discipline." Glaser, a homosexual activist who will be one of the preachers at the 216th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA), does not push the point of Jesus' sexuality, but he does praise Jennings' book and says the writer's conjecture is just as plausible as heterosexual accounts that speculated that Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married: "… if heterosexuals can read into scripture a marriage between Jesus and Mary Magdalene (a la The Da Vinci Code), then others have the right, as many throughout the Christian tradition have, to see romance between Jesus and the man he loved. If nothing more, the same-gender intimacy reveals Jesus wasn't afraid to be thought queer." Traditional scholars in the Reformed tradition would be flabbergasted by Glaser's speculations and attempt to wrest from the Gospel of John an endorsement for homosexual behavior. Most believe the "beloved disciple" depicted by John is the Apostle John, who, by not using his own name, is both displaying modesty and an amazement that he can be loved by the Word, who was from the beginning with God, who was God and who became incarnate in Jesus. In his review, Glaser cites Jennings'detailed description of John's physical closeness to Jesus at the last supper. "Jennings claims the disciple's sole distinction is Jesus' love, that no characteristic otherwise sets him apart from the other disciples," Glaser says. "I disagree. His proximity to Jesus is his unique attribute, and suggests a disciple who welcomes intimacy with the divine perhaps more than others – in other words, a mystic. Personally, I prefer the ambiguity, both of the Beloved Disciple and Jesus' sexuality." Jennings is a United Methodist minister who serves on the faculty of Chicago Theological Seminary. He acknowledged in an interview with The Associated Press that many would find his book "blasphemous." Robert A.J. Gagnon, a professor at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary and the author of The Bible and Homosexual Practice, says that "the idea that Jesus was a homosexual or engaged in homosexual acts is complete nonsense" and no "serious Biblical scholar" has ever proposed this. Bob Knight of the Culture and Family Institute says Jennings is another in a long line of "gay theologians" who are rewriting the Bible. He stresses that they are "driving a wedge right through the Bible, asking the question: 'Has God really said?' – and of course, we know ... that question came out of Genesis from Satan himself." Knight says that liberal "gay theology" is dangerous because "some people actually take this stuff seriously, and they begin to question [the Bible]." He believes "pastors need to know that the homosexual movement presents the greatest challenge to Scriptural authority." Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., quotes a statement Jennings made about how he interprets Scripture: "'The task of a gay reading thus entails a multiple strategy of interconnected readings of texts. By attending to the distinction between and relations among these strategies, we become better acquainted with the biblical text itself as well as with the varied aspects of liberationists readings generally.'" Then Mohler adds, "If that sentence makes clear sense to you, you probably need counseling." He calls Jennings' work "a radical re-reading of the New Testament material." Glaser himself has demonstrated what traditionalists would call a "radical re-reading" of Scripture in some of his own works, including a book titled Coming Out as Sacrament. Denied ordination in the Presbyterian Church (USA) because of his acknowledged homosexual behavior, Glaser still lobbies for gay causes in the PCUSA. But he serves as spiritual director of a non-Christian, New Age-like religious group in Atlanta. Susan R. Andrews, the moderator of the 215th General Assembly and a long-time proponent of ordaining homosexuals and blessing same-gender unions, selected Glaser as one of the preachers for the General Assembly. Richard O. Ostling of The Associated Press, formerly the religion writer for Time magazine, included The Man Jesus Loved in a December 2003 column about books. The column had two categories of books – "notable titles" and "lumps of coal are better." Jennings' book was listed under lumps of coal.

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