“It is not to be excluded that I will enter history as the one who split the Catholic Church.”

– Attributed to Pope Francis

“A lesbian/gay theology is an example of authentic subversion.”

– Sister Jeannine Gramick

In an exquisite example of Providence’s comedic wit, Pope Francis announced the self-referentially named Synod on Synodality two years ago during the annus horribilis. Last year “the synodal process” began slouching its way toward Rome. This October, the world’s dioceses will begin the process of tabulating and synthesizing the results of their listening sessions. In October of next year, the world’s bishops will gather to be midwives at the birth of what has already been hailed as the newest “new Pentecost” (yes, really).3 What is the Synod on Synodality? What implications does it have for an already divided and ailing Church?

Let’s begin in the very best possible place: the beginning. The Encyclopedia Britannica describes a synod thusly:

[S]ynod, (from Greek synodos, “assembly”), in the Christian church, a local or provincial assembly of bishops and other church officials meeting to resolve questions of discipline or administration.
The earliest synods can be traced to meetings held by bishops from various regions in the middle of the 2nd century. Such synods have convened throughout the history of Christianity. A synod of bishops from the worldwide Roman Catholic Church meets in Rome at regular but infrequent intervals for the purpose of discussing matters of vital church interest, in an advisory capacity to the pope.4

Restated, synods are non-doctrinal advisory meetings of bishops convoked under the authority of the pope for the purpose of addressing pastoral needs in the Church. Synods must not be confused with Ecumenical Councils. Councils are irregularly held meetings of the worldwide episcopate under the authority of the pope for the purpose of resolving doctrinal and disciplinary disputes affecting the universal Church. (It should be noted here that as recently as 1909, the Catholic Encyclopedia could accurately state that “[t]he terms council and synod are synonymous.”5 More on this below.)

In their modern form, synods are a regularly occurring feature of the administrative life of the Church and have been since the 1960s. The Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops meets every three years and discusses global and/or regional pastoral (there’s that word again) endeavors. Previous General Synods have addressed matters such as “Preservation and strengthening of the Catholic faith, its integrity, its force, its development, its doctrinal and historical coherence” (1967)6 and “The Vocation and Mission of the Lay Faithful in the Church and in the World” (1987).7 The upcoming Synod on Synodality will be the 16th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops. (The Holy Father can also convene Extraordinary Synods, Special Synods, and Particular Synods at will to address specific situations if the need to do so arises.)

With the exception of Venerable John Paul I, each pope since Vatican II has made use of synods in order to hear concerns from his fellow bishops, creatively manage issues, and develop new approaches for evangelization. Until Francis’ reign, synods have been relatively harmless affairs. In the present papacy, synods have – like so much else of the ecclesiastical apparatus – been used to fulfill Francis’ injunction to “make a mess.”8 Unfortunately, all signs point to the upcoming synod being a convulsive, epoch-making event. Lest the reader think we are being uncharitable, we will now consider some of the ambiguities, indignities, and outrages of recent memory.

In 2014, the Third Extraordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops addressed itself to the topic of “Pastoral Challenges of the Family in the Context of Evangelization.”9 This event laid the groundwork for the now infamous Synod on the Family (properly, the Fourteenth Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops) in which the constant teaching of the Church on divorce, remarriage, and admission to the Sacraments was undermined on the basis of 1960s-style situation ethics and pastoral (hello!) accompaniment. The final report of the 2015 synod ultimately resulted in Amoris Laetitia, which made statements on the admission of the civilly divorced and remarried to Holy Communion apparently in contradiction to longstanding Church teaching and practice. Cardinals Caffarra, Brandmüller, Burke, and Meisner subsequently asked the Holy See for clarification of the contentious issues raised by the Holy Father’s apostolic exhortation; their dubia remain unanswered at the time of this writing. By way of contrast, the dubia submitted in response to Traditionis Custodes have already been answered with extreme prejudice.

In 2018, the Fifteenth General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops met to discuss “Young People, the Faith and Vocational Discernment.”10 Sexuality was one area of special interest to the synod, which explored subtopics ranging from precocious sexuality, promiscuity, digital pornography, digital exhibitionism, and sexual tourism. As one would expect, the topic of homosexuality was unavoidable: the issue of gay youth “who […] above all, would like to be close to the Church”11 was raised. In survey responses, “[s]ome LGBT youth” expressed a desire to “’benefit from a greater closeness’ and experience greater care by the Church.”12 As is by now de rigueur, there were calls for greater openness and dialogue between Mother Church and her allegedly faithful opposition on homosexuality, transgenderism, and cognate topics such as abortion, contraception, and cohabitation.13

In 2019, the Special Assembly for the Amazon of the Synod of Bishops explored “Amazonia: New Paths for the Church and for an Integral Ecology.”14 Without a doubt, the Amazon Synod will go down in history as one of the most egregious indulgences in novelty, error, and idolatry in the post-Vatican II Church. While the Assisi-eclipsing outrage of the Pachamama idol being brought into Saint Peter’s Basilica and then set before the main altar justifiably received the most attention at the time, other rupture points deserve mention here. In stark contrast to the longstanding discipline of the Latin rite, ordination to the priesthood of married permanent deacons was recommended in order to meet pastoral (!) needs in the Amazon. Further study of the question of ordination of women to the diaconate – something only a misogynist could regard as a Trojan horse for undermining the infallible teaching on women’s ordination reiterated in Ordinatio Sacerdotalis – was also recommended.

Substantiation of Protestant caricatures of Catholic idol worship, the further erosion of the ideal of priestly celibacy, and the prospect of Catholic priestesses are all bad enough, but one of the dangers to the Faith introduced offhandedly via the Amazon Synod has gone largely unnoticed. At the time of the synod, Sister Nathalie Becquart, XMCJ was a consultor to the General Secretariat of the Synod of Bishops. (Subsequently, Francis made her an undersecretary of the Synod of Bishops, meaning that she is now the first woman in the history of the Church with the ability to vote in a synod.) During an interview with Crux, Sister Becquart was asked about the ordination of women to the diaconate and in response she made the following comments:

When you speak about inculturation, you speak about decentralization and that’s the main thing also for the reform of the Church nowadays[.] It’s one way, and it could be a good way[.] But as the challenge is de-clericalization, maybe there could also be another way[.] Maybe the other way is to imagine the Church with another ministerial system, less focused on ordination. Now with this synod, it’s truly clear, for the whole Church, we have to work for this conversion toward integral ecology[.] And my strong conviction is that young people are the ones who will help the Church to do that, because they are very committed to that topic[.]15

Here, Sister Becquart gives voice to the true intentions of those subversives who are abusing the synodal process to enact their vision of reform: the destruction of hierarchy (“clericalism”), the democratization of the Church, and deemphasis on or even eventual elimination of ordination. As one of the authors sarcastically said to the other during a planning session for this article: “You know what would be great? Catholicism without the priesthood or the sacraments.” Sister Becquart also makes it clear that all of this is to be done on behalf of and by “young people.” One is left with the impression that Sister Becquart conceives of the Church as the de Gaulle government in France the year before she was born and of herself and the members of the youth movement she foresees (but which has yet to materialize) as the May revolutionaries. Perhaps Father James Martin, SJ will take to the streets of Rome to hand out copies of Wilhelm Reich to the insurgents.

—

“Pope Francis breaks Catholic traditions whenever he wants because he is ‘free from disordered attachments.’ Our Church has indeed entered a new phase: with the advent of this first Jesuit pope, it is openly ruled by an individual rather than by the authority of Scripture alone or even its own dictates of tradition plus Scripture.” – Father Thomas Rosica 16

The preceding discussion has provided us with the keys to understanding and interpreting the purpose of the Synod on Synodality. As Francis’ reign has progressed, less and less concern has been shown for the maintenance of Pope Benedict XVI’s uneasy truce between the warring camps that have arisen in the Church since the Second Vatican Council, “the hermeneutic of continuity.” In its scope, the synod is like no other event in the preceding two millennia of Church history. The planning of the synod specifically requires the involvement of all the faithful, not just the episcopate. As we will show below, the synod is emblematic of a familiar pattern in the post-conciliar Church, namely the emptying out of familiar concepts, phrases, and institutions and their mobilization in the service of novelties.

The synod is to take place in three phases. In the first or local phase, now drawing to a close, “listening sessions” are held in parishes throughout the world in order to ensure that the voices and concerns of the faithful are heard (or, at least, that the faithful are left with the impression that they’re being heard). In the second or regional phase, the findings of each diocese will be summarized and synthesized on a continental basis and then submitted to the Vatican. In the third or global phase, the Vatican is to evaluate the purported will of the laity and, under papal commission and with papal authority, implement the heartfelt desires of the people of God. Francis’ biographer (and synod participant) Austin Ivereigh has described the synod as “the biggest consultation exercise in human history.”17

At the beginning of this article, we emphasized that in the modern senses of these terms, synods and councils are not to be confused and then, seemingly paradoxically, cited the Catholic Encyclopedia to show that in the recent past these terms were considered synonymous. We thank the readers for their patience and will now reveal the method to our madness: the evidence shows that the Synod on Synodality is intended as a sort of super-council-that-is-not-a-council, an irreformable reinforcement of the centrifugal tendencies unleashed in the Church in the 1960s. In the words of the Synod 2023 Preparatory Document:

How does this “journeying together,” which takes place today on different levels (from the local level to the universal one), allow the Church to proclaim the Gospel in accordance with the mission entrusted to Her; and what steps does the Spirit invite us to take in order to grow as a synodal Church? Addressing this question together requires listening to the Holy Spirit, who like the wind “blows where it wills; you can hear the sound it makes, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes” (Jn 3:8), remaining open to the surprises that the Spirit will certainly prepare for us along the way. […] [S]ynodality represents the main road for the Church, called to renew herself under the action of the Spirit and by listening to the Word. The ability to imagine a different future for the Church and her institutions, in keeping with the mission she has received, depends largely on the decision to initiate processes of listening, dialogue, and community discernment, in which each and every person can participate and contribute. […] “It is precisely this path of synodality which God expects of the Church of the third millennium. What the Lord is asking of us is already in some sense present in the very word ‘synod’,” which is “an ancient and venerable word in the tradition of the Church, whose meaning draws on the deepest themes of Revelation.”18

We see here the effusive ambiguity and contradiction which have been characteristic of the Holy See for the past decade. Schizophrenically, the Church seems to be saying: “This is a new path, but it’s really the same path; in fact, it’s actually the old path which we’re now recovering but have never really lost. This is at the binding dogmatic core of the Church’s understanding of herself, but it’s also whatever you want it to be; the Church is a Rorschach ink blot, just don’t deny the objective truth that everyone has their own truth.” There are any number of resources which could be cited here to show the absurdity of this endeavor (one thinks of the Syllabus of Errors19 and Pascendi Dominici Gregis20), but as one of us is a blue-collar cradle Catholic and the other a redneck convert from Oklahoma, we’ll try to keep things country simple. In the spirit of the Little Flower, here goes.

The planning of the synod evinces a complete absence of even a rudimentary understanding of grace, virtue, and office, three necessary attributes of the Church one of the authors learned in his 4th grade CCD class. Baptism is the sole formal requirement for Christians (not just Catholics) to participate in the synodal process, but baptism is seemingly understood as little more than a magic trick which invokes the Holy Spirit and invests even the apostate baptized with intimate knowledge of the Divine Will. The opinion of a baptized individual in a state of mortal sin and formal heresy is as much desired by the synod planners as the opinion of a baptized individual in a state of grace and faithful adherence to dogma. Were Aleister Crowley, Martin Luther, and Michel Foucault still alive, the Synod on Synodality would presumably welcome their thoughts on the future direction of the Church. By design, the synod seems intended to create and amplify a cacophony rather than a symphony of voices.

The emphasis on the inner promptings of the Holy Spirit is reminiscent of the charismatic movement; intense emotional experiences are substituted for rigorous thought and the ultimate criterion of truth becomes, not objective reality, but rather whether something feels true. We do not deny the power or importance of the Holy Spirit, nor do we denigrate the cultivation of a relationship of attentive listening and faithful responsiveness to His promptings, but the danger we perceive is that people will be misled into equating their personal desires with the Will of God. Were the Holy Spirit truly leading all the faithful in articulating God’s Will for the future of the Church, it would be impossible for any of us to contradict the other. The inappropriate elevation of private judgment was a key element of the Protestant revolt, and the safeguarding of the Church from the dissension that private judgment can provoke is one of the precise reasons Our Lord gave us the gift of the Magisterium.

Every Sacrament bestows on the receiving individual particular graces to assist him in fulfilling his duties in his state in life, but this is especially true of Matrimony and Holy Orders. A mother has jurisdiction over her children, a father has jurisdiction over the whole family, a priest has jurisdiction over a particular parish or set of parishes, a bishop has jurisdiction over his diocese, and the pope has jurisdiction over the universal Church. Dogma instructs us that not only did Christ give His Church a hierarchical constitution, but also that by virtue of Divine Right bishops possess an ordinary power of government over their dioceses. It is the clear intention of the synod planners to elevate the laity, and particularly women, to roles which they have never before held. In practical terms, this represents the completion of the autodemolition bemoaned by Pope Saint Paul VI five decades ago.21

Since the only requirement for full participation in the synod is that one be baptized, not a baptized Catholic, the Vatican is inviting all 2,400,000,000 or so Christians in the world to give their thoughts on the future of the Church. The nature of the listening sessions makes such an idea impractical to the point of impossibility, and the recent announcement that written correspondence (the Church’s equivalent of mail-in ballots) will be attentively reviewed does not improve matters. The most reasonable hypothesis is that the gargantuan, byzantine nature of the undertaking is an exercise in disguising despotism as radically participatory democracy. The “listening sessions,” reminiscent of the encounter groups of the 1960s and 1970s, offer those faithful who participate an emotional catharsis and a feeling of inclusion while effectively ensuring that their voices are not heard unless they are in conformity with the desires of those members of the hierarchy who wish to chart a new course for the Church. In our view, the conclusion of the synodal process is preordained; the motions we are going through now are designed to make it appear that the voice of Francis and his advisors is the voice of the people, and that the voice of the people is the voice of God. Anathema sit.

When Pontius Pilate acceded to the demands of the crowd in Jerusalem and ordered the crucifixion of Our Lord, he did not do so spontaneously. In kind, when the crowd demanded that Pontius Pilate order the execution of Our Lord, they did not do so spontaneously. The chief priests moved about the crowd, planting suggestions, whipping up emotions, until the people cried out as one for the blood of the innocent Man who also happened to be their long-awaited Deliverer. Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose. The spiritual and biological descendants of those who lobbied Pontius Pilate for Christ’s murder are now lobbying His Bride’s earthly guardian to gaslight Her into committing suicide. Yes, folks, the Jews are at it again.

While the Jews do not completely disdain direct, tangible involvement, it is generally their preference to have their work done for them by intermediaries. In the case of the Church, the Jesuits – most notably Francis, but many, many others as well – are the puppet to international Jewry’s puppeteer. The errors, machinations, and scandals of the Jesuits are too numerous (and well-known) to discuss in detail here, but in summary the Society of Jesus long ago became the leading exponent of Americanism. This heresy, condemned by Pope Leo XIII in Testem Beneveolentiae Nostrae22, advances numerous errors characteristic of the modern world, and, most unfortunately, the modern Church. These errors include religious liberty, separation of Church and State, lay interpretation of doctrine, liberalism, applying American politics to the doctrinal and disciplinary life of the Church, and the unshakable conviction that in the many areas in which the Church and America diverge on questions of faith and morals, it is America that knows best.

With the Jesuits as their proxy warriors, the same oligarchs who control the American empire have taken control of the Church. These oligarchs are disproportionately Jewish (for a wealth of supporting evidence, refer to part two of this article), and those goys who have been able to join the club have done so largely by internalizing the values (such as they are) of the parasitic American ruling class. Since the planning stages of the Synod, the Jesuits have been working closely with various highly questionable organizations to promote oligarchic interests. What are the interests of the oligarchs? Sodomy, contraception, depopulation, divorce and remarriage, the de facto erasure of international borders (except those of the Ukraine) with attendant unlimited immigration, and the rest of the secular anti-virtues incessantly promoted in the mainstream media and the consensus-manufacturing echo chambers of social media.

New Ways Ministry Founder Sr. Jeannine Gramick, SL

Particularly noteworthy is the close coordination between Father James Martin, the aforementioned Sister Nathalie Becquart, the notorious (and now ascendant) Sister Jeannine Gramick, SL (formerly SSND), and the homosexual advocacy group she co-founded, New Ways Ministry. New Ways Ministry was founded in 1977 by Sister Gramick and the now deceased Father Robert Nugent, SDS, in Mount Rainier, Maryland (coincidentally, the location of the exorcism that inspired The Exorcist). The primary goal of New Ways Ministry is to promote acceptance of modern social and psychological “scientific” innovations regarding sodomy and so alter immutable Church teaching on the subject in the name of sensitivity and tolerance. The USCCB and the Vatican have condemned New Ways on multiple occasions, most notably and forcefully in 1999 when the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith under the direction of then-Cardinal Ratzinger condemned the organization and reprimanded its founders by directing them to cease their public ministry.23

Unsurprisingly, both Sister Gramick and Father Nugent disobeyed this order and continued to provide their services to the LGBT community, the latter in secret and the former openly. Nugent retired in 2013 and passed away in 2014. We sincerely hope that he made a good confession prior to his death. Gramick has stuck to her guns long enough to see a remarkable reversal of her fortunes. Under the direction of its first Jesuit pope, the Vatican’s position on Sister Gramick’s ministry has made a 180 degree turn and she is now lauded as a visionary and reformer. New Ways Ministry now regularly hosts and works with Father Martin, a Jesuit known for his outreach to the LGTBQ community and his maddening evasiveness on the question of his acceptance of Church doctrine regarding sodomy.

During the Francis pontificate, Martin has been steadily accumulating honors and prestige. In 2016, he was appointed by the Pope as a consultor to the Vatican’s Dicastery for Communication. In 2019, Francis personally invited Martin into his library for what was by all appearances and from all accounts a supportive heart to heart about Martin’s homosexual outreach. In 2021, Martin received a handwritten note from the Holy Father which read “Thinking about your pastoral work, I see that you are continually seeking to imitate this style of God. You are a priest for all, just as God is a Father for all.”24 “God’s style” is a tripartite formula Francis has invented ex nihilo to describe how God relates to the world in general and human beings in particular. God’s style is marked by “closeness,” “compassion,” and “tenderness.”25

This idiosyncratic new understanding of God is, of course, an inane distortion of Saint John’s declaration that God is love, the same inane distortion that has been uttered at least a billion times by at least a million hippies. God is love, I love you, you love me, I am love, you are love, we are God together when we love each other. It might as well be a song by Marty Haugen. This understanding of love is a trivial one. As is known by any father who has ever had to discipline a wayward child, there are times when providing closeness, compassion, and tenderness to one’s offspring is the least loving thing one can possibly do for them.

The idea that Father Martin is embodying “God’s Style” in his tacit acceptance and promotion of a sin that cries to Heaven for vengeance is a curious one, and the increasingly rare apologists for Francis might be tempted to argue that there’s been some sort of misunderstanding. Unfortunately for them and for the Church, Francis has also used this formula to describe the ministry of Sister Gramick. Per America magazine, on December 10, 2021, Francis sent a handwritten letter to Gramick in which he “congratulated her in Spanish ‘on 50 years of closeness, of compassion and of tenderness’ in a ministry that he described as being in ‘”the style” of God.’”26 Past controversies did not even merit a mention and this gesture has been widely interpreted as a rehabilitation of Sister Gramick, Father Nugent, and New Ways Ministry, as well as a signal of a significant shift in attitude toward LGBT individuals on the part of the Church.

This letter is all the more significant in the context of a controversy that had erupted around New Ways Ministry and the Synod on Synodality in early December of last year. On the Vatican’s official website for the synod (synod.va), a webinar on “LGBTQ Catholics and Synodality” by New Ways Ministry was featured in the “Resources” section of the site. After Father Martin tweeted about this “small but historic step forward for #LTGBQ Catholics” (his words) on December 6, 2021,27 someone in the Vatican correctly and courageously removed the webinar from the site. On December 12, this decision was reversed, and the Synod’s communication director, Thierry Bonaventura, apologized, stating that the removal had “brought pain to the entire LGTBQ community, who once again felt left out.”28 The Executive Director for New Ways Ministry, Francis DeBernado, thanked the Vatican and gloated:

We appreciate that apologies are never easy to make. New Ways Ministry had not requested one, making this gesture all the more authentic. Vatican officials rarely apologize, and they almost certainly have never apologized to LGBTQ people or an LGBTQ Catholic ministry. This action signals that Vatican officials are becoming aware of how their decisions impact LGBTQ lives. It also reveals a desire to repair damages they may have caused. In these respects, this is an historic moment.29

The most troubling part of this entire episode is the content of the webinar in question. The video shows DeBernado talking with Doctor Robert Choiniere, a theologian, minister, playwright, and professor of theology at (Jesuit) Fordham University NYC. Additionally, Dr. Choiniere is also Chair and Managing Director of Stages on the Sound, a non-profit Catholic theater company for elementary school-age children in New York and is an avid promoter of homosexuality. According to the National Catholic Register:

Choiniere’s webinar offers a brief discourse on the development of Catholic doctrine, contrasting what he describes as the “imperial” hierarchical model that once defined the magisterium with the new, more inclusive model of synodality adopted by Pope Francis. The presentation also provides an “action plan” to make sure “LGBTQ” voices are heard during the synodal process. Those who have been traumatized by their pastors are encouraged to find a listening session at a different parish or to deputize a friend to speak on their behalf.30

Dressing up LGBTQ activism in Christian moral imperatives is a peculiarly modern form of drag, and the focus on the leveling of hierarchy in the name of inclusion is noteworthy, but the most telling aspect of Doctor Choiniere’s involvement in the synod is his collaboration with New Ways Ministry in the launch of the website synodmeetings.com (said website prominently displays the words “In partnership[ with the Jesuits of Canada and the United States” on its landing page).31 The official synod site provides resources for the synod, but does not provide locations, dates, and times of sessions in individual dioceses. Synodmeetings fills this gap; once at the site, individuals can enter their zip code and receive relevant results for the listening sessions in the United States. The coordinated involvement of Dr. Choiniere, New Ways, the Jesuits, and the Holy See in setting the tone for and directing interested parties to the synod is an important clue to the synod’s purpose.

Sister Becquart’s involvement further thickens the plot. New Ways Ministry selected Sister Becquart to give “The Father Robert Nugent Memorial Lecture” in honor of its cofounder.32 As previously mentioned, she is playing an historic role in the synod, and has been described by multiple news outlets as the number two ranking official in the synod office.33 Sister Becquart’s lecture, titled “Synodality: A Path of Reconciliation” was replete with clichés such as “diversity of the People of God” and “welcome, collaboration, family, diversity, acceptance, justice.”34 The studied ambiguity of modernists is in full force throughout her lecture; a change in the Church’s approach to sodomy is never explicitly stated but is rather heavily implied throughout.

—

“While emceeing the 1996 Lambda Literary Awards Ceremony, lesbian comic Suzanne Westenhoffer called for a new term to replace the lengthy and cumbersome yet politically correct tag used by and for our community: ‘Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgendered, and Friends.’
“She suggested ‘Sodomites.’”
– Carol Queen and Lawrence Schimel35

“There is no such thing as a homosexual or a heterosexual person. There are only homo or heterosexual acts. Most people are a mixture of impulses if not practices.”
– Gore Vidal36

At first glance, the emphasis on changing the Church’s attitude toward sodomy may seem peculiar. Why are homosexuals being used as a battering ram against the Church? At this juncture, it will be helpful if we first clarify exactly what it is we’re talking about. A saying often attributed to Socrates holds that “the beginning of wisdom is the definition of terms.” It seems that this is a misremembered misattribution, as it was Confucius who said that “the beginning of wisdom is to call things by their proper name.” Regardless of the quote’s provenance, the principle it enunciates is sound: in order to be able to think (and ultimately converse) productively, we must carefully check and re-check the correspondence between our ideas, our images, and the actualities they aim to represent. While some may object that this is “arguing semantics,” that is hardly an objection at all. We are indeed concerned here precisely with words and their meanings.

In this context, it is worth pointing out that the word for and concept of homosexuality is less than two centuries old. Confoundingly, the word for and concept of heterosexuality is even younger than that. These observations often have a scandalizing effect for modern ears. After all, we have it on good authority that any number of historical figures were “gay.” For decades, propagandists for perversion have subjected us to interminable discussions of the insanity, inanity, and inhumanity of the Christian moral code in light of the alleged sexual proclivities of the Romans and Greeks.

While it may seem obvious that “sexual orientation” is a fundamental component of human psychology, this manner of thinking would have been alien to the vast majority of human beings who ever lived. The spectrum of modern sexual behavior and misbehavior is indeed reflected in the ancient world, but the idea that how one used or misused one’s genitalia constituted an essential element of personal identity never occurred to anyone until the 19th century anno Domini. We are aware that…

[…] This is just an excerpt from the July/August 2022 Issue of Culture Wars magazine. To read the full article, please purchase a digital download of the magazine, or become a subscriber!

(Endnotes Available by Request)