Good luck with that: Bachmann's "pray away the gay" sidekick Janet Boynes urges church unity

While Senator Scott Newman (R-McLeod Cuckooland) and timid Democrats are warning against action on striking down Minnesota's law banning same-sex marriage, Bachmann's "pray away the gay" sidekick Janet Boynes writes in Charisma Magazine that it's already here.

In Should the Church Teach Against Homosexuality?, Boyne writes:

There is strength in numbers, but in the past election the numbers weren't on the side of those who care about Christian values. The lack of unity in the church has caused us to lose ground in the fight to keep the sanctity of marriage between a man and a woman.

This election saw residents of Minnesota, Maryland, Maine and Washington all vote their approval of same-sex marriage. Statistics suggest that even many self-identified Christians joined in this approval, while other believers either didn't vote or chose to remain silent on the issue in the run-up to the ballots. Where is the wisdom in all of this? If the Bible says that the “fear of The Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Ps. 111:10), then it is clear that as a nation we have lost the fear of God.

As the presence of Pastor Grant Stevensen, the Lutheran minister who headed Minnesotans United for All Families organizing in the faith communities, might suggest, maybe not.

But more importantly, we Minnesotans weren't voting to allow cute boys and strong women to marry; we were voting to stop folks like Boyne from hijacking our liberities by enshrining marriage inequality in the state constitution. Marriage freedom is next.

Minnesota-based Boyne's solution to the spectre of gay bridal registries? Outreach to suffering LGBTQ folk:

This issue is not about being black, white, Hispanic, Asian, or any other race or ethnicity. This is about winning souls and discipling those who come to Christ. Across the nation our churches are filled with tens of thousand of Christians who are afraid to reach out to those who are caught in the bondage of homosexuality, tell them there is hope and healing in Christ, and then walk that road to wholeness alongside them.

Uh-huh. Bluestem doesn't inquire into the romantic practices of our queer friends, so we simply can't speculate whether bondage is involved or not. While the fetish of observing such things (especially if the boys are ripped) holds a certain amount of intellectual charm, friends know we're not really into spectator sports.

And Boyne suggests that Christians get some unity:

Dear believer, how are we going to deal with this issue in our churches, in our communities and in our nation? Will history say we fought the good fight to push back the forces of darkness? Or will we ultimately be condemned as cowards?

It's time that a united church body across the land stand up for righteousness and align ourselves with God's truth. We are called to love all, and we must never compromise on that command. But in loving the lost we must also not compromise on the rest of Scripture, which makes it clear that while God is merciful, He is also just and will ultimately punish those who are living in sin.

Call it the Disciple and Punish movement, or salvation of docile bodies by the divine panopticon.

Given the massive investments of money, volunteer time and brand reputation that the Catholic Church and its allies in the faith community burned in their failed attempt to pass the amendment, we can only only wonder how Boynes missed the unity of the anti-gay church.

The panopticon: or, eye on Boynes

According to Dump Bachmann, which has been keeping an eye on Boyne for the last 10 million news cycles, the gay whisperer last surfaced during the national media's investigations into Marcus Bachmann's mental health clinic.

DB noted in News Media Feeding Frenzy Continues on the Bachmann Clinic that a report on Anderson Cooper brought up Boynes:

The report mentions Bachmann's ex-lesbian sidekick Janet Boynes. The clinic was apparentlly recommending Boynes as a "mentor".

In a 2009 post, Stop drinking. Get help for traumas. Heck, stop having gay sex. But stop linking these disconnected elements!, Good As You's Jeremy Hooper points out:

If there was even ONE self-declared "ex-gay" who didn't marry their supposed "change" out of homosexuality with their concurrent move away from things like drug abuse, past traumas, promiscuity, and clubbing, then that movement wouldn't come across quite as misguidedly. But that is NEVER the case. The standard "ex-gay" script always details their "conversion" as being not only a move away from simply their attractions to the same gender. Instead, their "godly intervention" is presented as a move away from a whole host of behaviors and traumas that they present as innately connected to homosexuality, full well knowing that such a presentation will much more fully stigmatize LGBT people (the primary goal of a movement that identifies themselves not as what they currently claim to be, but as a 'former' member of the community they are now politically opposing). . . .

. . .. "Ex-gay" is not just a program of "helping" the "poor, immoral, deviant" gay folk. This is a thoroughly political movement that is meant to tell every aspect of society that while heterosexuality is perfectly normal and in-born, homosexuality is a choice/mistake/aberration in need of "changing." Why do you think the anti-gay groups invest so much money in it? It's because they want it need it to be successful in order to justify how they can, in good evangelical conscience, discriminate against queer people. if it's a "choice" to be gay, then they can keep the "love the sinner, hate the sin" nonsense alive. And if they can marriage gay sex and its associated orientation with far more universally relatable concepts like drugs and partying, then they can keep the "gay lifestyle is evil" meme alive in many social conservatives' heads. These folks don't need to meet an actual living, breathing LGBT person: Focus on the Family has already told them all that they think they need to know.

Boyne's personal story fits this pattern--and one thing Bluestem has noticed is that Boyne's ministry deploys the discourse of an abuser.

There's a whole lot from Boyne and her kindred about punishment and control, while the notion of love--like the Catholic preferential option for the poor-- among these communities seems to have fled to shelter in the mysterious Lacunae of the Blessed.

Who would have guessed?

More human sexuality theory from Charisma Magazine

Charisma Magazine, source of Boyne's recent column, also shares some rather curious theories about the origins of affectional orientation. In a recent article, Can You Be Raped by the Devil?, readers learn:

As bizarre as it sounds, those who minister to people in occult bondage say it's more common than you think.

For nearly two decades, Contessa Adams felt as though she had no power against the demonic violators of her body. She felt trapped in secrecy and shame and knew that the demons tormenting her wanted things to stay that way.

But God had another agenda for Adams when she found Christ in 1979. The former stripper has a ministry through which she exposes one of Satan's darkest secrets—sexual demons

. . .The two most identifiable sexual demons are the incubus, which is a male sexual demon that traditionally assaults women, and the succubus, which is a female sexual demon that assaults men. Sometimes they also lure people into homosexual behavior. . . .

Adams says the succubus spirit that used to attack her confused her so much that she contemplated becoming a lesbian.

For ourselves, Bluestem will be sticking to the pleasures of zombie movies on Netflix, while keeping an eye out on the body of believers who read Charisma.

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Cartoon: Janet Boyne, by Ken Avidor.