“The Defense Calls to the Stand…” Defining and Meeting the Upcoming LGBTQ Challenges

Author:

Joe Dallas

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Article ID:

JAF44612

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Updated: 

Mar 13, 2025

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Published:

Mar 10, 2025

This article first appeared in the Christian Research Journal, volume 46, number 1/2  (2023).

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​Anyone who’s seen the 1997 blockbuster film Titanic remembers Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet’s scramble across the sinking deck, clawing their way toward the ship’s highest point. After hitting an iceberg, the Titanic had split in half, the section above water jutting skyward, forcing passengers to crawl as high as they could to survive. It was temporal survival, of course, since the whole thing was obviously going down. Still, they held on, doing their best for as long they could. Now in 2023, plenty of American believers feel the same, facing a nation hopelessly divided, split open like that great vessel on a relentless downward plunge.

Case in point: the divisive, multifarious LGBTQ issue. We ended 2022 fighting over whether elementary school children should be taught the finer points of transgender ideology,1 and whether teens should be given drugs and surgery to “transition” into whatever gender they identify as.2 Plenty of Americans lamented “Drag Queen Story Hour,”3 while others cheered it on.4 And after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade (1973) in June 2022,5 some dreaded (while some quietly hoped) that would be a precursor to overturning gay marriage, as well.6

As of 2023, lines are being drawn with no letup in sight. Look for three LGBTQ-related trends in particular to escalate, sooner than later, in the coming years: an increase in the scope and strength of “conversion therapy” bans; increased government intrusion when parents object to children “transitioning”; and revocation of tax exemption or grant benefits to churches and Christian universities that are “non-affirming.”

Conversion Therapy Bans Limiting Speech and Ministry

“Conversion therapy” is the label applied to any Christian counsel or ministry to people who reject, and want to overcome, their own homosexual desires and behavior.7 It’s become a rallying cry of the gay rights movement — a fraudulent cry, in that it pretends to call for a ban on dangerous practices such as coercing or shaming homosexuals into therapy or abusing them with shock treatment. Yet the fine print of the bans goes further than advocates admit, forbidding a therapist or minister even to counsel a gay person to change his behavior.8

Saying a ban does one thing when it accomplishes another seemed acceptable to proponents like California Assemblymember Evan Low, who in 2018 authored a bill making it an act of consumer fraud to offer counsel to repentant homosexuals and charge a fee. It also prohibited the sale of any literature telling homosexuals they could change, which would necessitate banning sales of the Bible, since the apostle Paul specifically makes that claim in his first letter to the church at Corinth (1 Cor. 6:9–11).9

Nationwide bans on conversion therapy already exist in a number of countries, including Canada, France, and Germany.10 Local bans are in place throughout the U.S.,11 and California has passed a non-binding resolution encouraging pastors to avoid exhorting gay counselees that God calls them to repentance.12 Look for this trend to implement its goal of monitoring sermon content and private pastoral counsel, making it impossible to claim homosexuality is a sin without becoming a lawbreaker. As ban advocate Brandan Robertson asserts, “If we’re going to end conversion therapy, we must end the prevalence of non-affirming theology. One gives birth to the other. We must do this through exposing the lies, educating the masses, and holding religious leaders accountable for the harm that they perpetuate. Boldly. Publicly. Uncompromisingly.”13

Move Over, Dad. Big Brother Knows Best

The logical outcome of the belief that non-affirming positions damage LGBTQ people is the next step: protecting lesbian, gay, and trans kids from parents who abuse them by holding the traditional biblical view. Hence, Texas father Jeff Younger found himself investigated by the state for child abuse after interfering with his ex-wife’s encouragement of their seven-year-old son to “transition” from male to female.14 Though the mother is a pediatrician, it was Younger who was alarmed at the prospect of puberty-blocking drugs being administered to his boy. For this, he had to fight for custody and to restrain the mother from submitting her son to transitioning medical procedures.15

California father Ted Hudacko didn’t fare as well when he objected to his ex-wife allowing their 15-year-old son to begin transitioning, including the use of puberty blockers.16 His objections became more forceful when he learned such drugs could leave his son infertile, with impaired cognition and bone density loss. In the bitter custody battle that followed, California Superior Court Judge Joni Hiramoto eventually stripped Younger of all parental rights, prohibiting him from even seeing or speaking to his son and from stopping the medical procedure scheduled for his boy at the UCSF Benioff Child and Adolescent Gender Clinic.17

Footnoting the tragedy was the fact that Judge Hiramoto never disclosed that she herself was the mother of a transgender child, a detail screaming for a conflict-of-interest recusal.18

Look for the inevitable wave of embattled Christian parents facing child custody disputes and defenses against charges of child abuse, all because they will not affirm their child’s desire to live and be recognized as the gender they were not born as and can never truly become.

Memo to Christian Institutions: “Go Woke or Go Broke”

The feelers have already gone out. In the 2020 U.S. Presidential Primaries, Democratic presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke plainly declared that churches who do not affirm same-sex marriage should be stripped of their tax-exempt status.19 His colleagues disagreed, for now. But it should be remembered that in 2007, only two Democratic presidential candidates supported gay marriage, a position today’s Democratic leadership assumes all its members hold.20 The fact that a presidential candidate holds O’Rourke’s views does not bode well for religious freedom in the U.S.

Nor is that concern limited to churches. As long ago as 2016, California was considering a proposal to prevent Christian universities from receiving state funding if they enforced, through housing and conduct policies, their belief that marriage is a heterosexual union.21 Also notable is the grassroots student movement to force Christian universities to change their policies on LGBTQ matters or face class action lawsuits.22 Challenged with a choice between adopting gay-affirming policies or losing government support for grants, Christian institutes of learning should gear up for hard choices and extended battles.

Here we are, then, scrambling upward on the Titanic like DiCaprio and Winslet. Even though it looks like the whole thing’s going down, we hold on, doing our best for as long as we can. Two questions for 2023 are presented to us: where’s the church in all this? And what does it have to say? Responding in a Christ-like manner will prove to be one of our greatest upcoming challenges.

Present but Unaccounted for

In response, one might say we’re here, but too often unacceptably silent. Christianity without clear and precise communication is neither biblical nor workable. Yet much of the church seems reluctant to communicate an intelligible position on a subject everyone else feels free to comment on.

When popular Christian artist Lauren Daigle refused to give an interviewer a clear answer about her position on homosexuality,23 she was more representative of Christian leadership than many realized. A recent Barna survey found half of its pastoral respondents admitting they were afraid to speak on social issues, and LGBTQ matters were at the top of their fear list.24 To be relevant in 2023, we’ll have to first admit, then turn from, this reticence.

In fairness, intimidation isn’t always born of cowardice. Some ministers, for example, are so repulsed by the way some earlier leaders addressed homosexuality in the 80s and 90s (the notorious “AIDS is God’s judgment!” remark comes to mind) that they vowed to shun culture wars altogether. At other times their silence may spring from misguided ideas about their role — are Christian leaders peacemakers who facilitate peace between God and man, or peacekeepers who seek peace between Christians and non-Christians at the expense of truth? That question reveals the futility of a “user friendly” approach that hopes to keep the church on good terms with a world increasingly hostile to Christianity, rather than accepting Christ’s promise to His followers that being hated by the world they hoped to win was inevitable rather than avoidable (John 15:18).

Indeed, the world He (and we) loves cannot be won to a truth that is not plainly presented. Declaring sin to be sin will turn some away, while turning others toward. Jesus is described as loving a rich young ruler who asked how he might follow Him (Mark 10:17–27). Knowing full well that He would “lose” that man, He nonetheless gave him clear truth rather than vague comforts. Conversely, when Jesus presented plain truth to an adulteress (John 8:1–11) and a woman living with a man she wasn’t married to (John 4:1–42), they turned from sin to Him.

Silence brings no one to life, nor does ambiguity when clarity is called for, a point Paul rhetorically makes when asking, “For if the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to the battle?” (1 Cor. 14:8).25 It shouldn’t be hard to find the food when you enter a restaurant, and it shouldn’t be hard to find the truth when you enter a church. Clarity is charity.

The Defense calls us as a witness, subpoenaing our apologia (defense) in the public square to answer what the hostile religious leaders asked John the Baptist, “What sayest thou of thyself?” (John 1:22). In 2023 and beyond, let our answers be clear, our posture bold, and our actions and expressions informed by the love of Christ constraining us. Only then, regardless of the outcome, can we say with peaceful integrity, “The defense rests.”

Joe Dallas is the program director of Genesis Counseling in Tustin, California, a Christian counseling service for men dealing with sexual addiction, homosexuality, and other sexual/relational problems. He is a member of the American Association of Christian Counselors and is the author of several books on human sexuality and Christianity, including Christians in a Cancel Culture: Speaking with Truth and Grace in a Hostile World (Harvest House, 2021).

 

NOTES

  1. “DeSantis Defends ‘Don’t Say Gay’ Bill, Warns of Transgender Issues ‘Injected’ into Classroom Instruction,” CBS News Miami, March 4, 2022, https://www.cbsnews.com/miami/news/desantis-defends-dont-say-gay-bill-warns-of-transgender-issues-injected-into-classroom-instruction/. See also Douglas Groothuis, “Defining the Meaning of Woman (Review of Matt Walsh’s Documentary Film and Book, What Is a Woman?),” Christian Research Journal 45, no. 02/03 (2022): 36–41.
  2. Commentary on “What Is a Woman?,” LFR Family podcast, June 10, 2022, https://youtu.be/lgyWDXNslmg.
  3. Fox 5 NY Staff, “Councilwoman Calls Drag Story Hour ‘Degeneracy,’ Sparking War of Words with Colleagues,” Fox 5 New York News, June 17, 2022, https://www.fox5ny.com/news/councilwoman-objects-to-drag-queen-story-hour.
  4. Monica Hess, “Drag Queens Are Not the Ones Sexualizing Drag Story Hour, ”Washington Post, June 23, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2022/06/23/drag-queen-story-hour/.
  5. See Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, 597 U.S. ____ (2022), Majority Opinion Justice Samuel Alito, https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/19-1392_6j37.pdf.
  6. Louis Jacobson, “Same-Sex Marriage Would Be Illegal in 25 to 32 States If the Supreme Court Overturned Obergefell,” Poynter, July 21, 2022, https://www.poynter.org/fact-checking/2022/what-happens-supreme-court-overturn-obergefell/.
  7. See Joe Dallas, “What’s the Problem with Conversion Therapy?” Christian Research Journal 42, no. 01 (2019), https://www.equip.org/articles/whats-the-problem-with-conversion-therapy/.
  8. See Joe Dallas, “Conversion Therapy: Answering the Arguments, Part 5,” Christians in a Cancel Culture podcast, March 4, 2022, https://youtu.be/VOkka52M4WU.
  9. See “LGBT Conversion Therapy: A Fraudulent Business Practice,” Assemblymember Evan Low, archived August 22, 2018, https://web.archive.org/web/20180822175352/https:/a28.asmdc.org/article/lgbt-conversion-therapy-fraudulent-business-practice. See also “AB-2943 Unlawful Business Practices: Sexual Orientation Change Efforts,” California Legislative Information, May 30, 2018, https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201720180AB2943. Despite Assemblymember Low’s denial that bill AB 2943 applied to the sale of books, including the Bible, the legal analysis of the Alliance Defending Freedom concluded otherwise, showing that AB 2943 “outlaws speech, whether offered by a licensed counselor, a best-selling author, or even a minister or religious leader”; and that under this law, “a bookstore (including online bookstores like Amazon) could not sell many recently published books challenging gender identity ideology and advocating that these beliefs should be rejected by society.” “Legal Memorandum,” Alliance Defending Freedom, March 8, 2019, https://web.archive.org/web/20190619035614/https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9njBaZTrCfSMFJfRGMzX2ZQeFh0R0U3bFVMS2ZYWUl1M2VF/view. For Low’s denial, see “Assembly Bill 2943: Declare Conversion Therapy a Fraudulent Practice: Fact Sheet,” Office of Assemblymember Evan Low, April 26, 2018, https://web.archive.org/web/20180822193132/https://a28.asmdc.org/sites/a28.asmdc.org/files/pdf/AB2943_FactSheet_2.pdf.
  10. “Which Countries Have Already Banned Conversion Therapy?,” Stonewall, April 2022, https://www.stonewall.org.uk/about-us/news/which-countries-have-already-banned-conversion-therapy.
  11. “Conversion Therapy Laws,” MAP, March 2, 2023, https://www.lgbtmap.org/equality-maps/conversion_therapy.
  12. Karen Ocamb, “‘Conversion Therapy’ Resolution Passes California Assemblywith Evangelical Support,” Los Angeles Blade, June 25, 2019, https://www.losangelesblade.com/2019/06/25/conversion-therapy-resolution-passes-california-assembly-with-evangelical-support/; “ACR-99 Civil Rights: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, or Queer People,” California Legislative Information, September 26, 2019, https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200ACR99.
  13. Brandan Robertson, “Burning Bridges,” August 3, 2021, https://web.archive.org/web/20210804021936/https://www.brandanrobertson.com/blog/burning-bridges.
  14. Karen Brooks Harper, “His Public Custody Battle Helped Ignite a Movement against Transgender Health Care for Kids. Will It Carry Him to the Texas House?,” The Texas Tribune, March 14, 2022, https://www.texastribune.org/2022/03/14/jeff-younger-transgender-care-house/.
  15. Harper, “His Public Custody Battle Helped Ignite a Movement.”
  16. Abigail Shrier, “How a Dad Lost Custody of Son after Questioning His Transgender Identity,” New York Post, February 26, 2022, https://nypost.com/2022/02/26/dad-lost-custody-after-questioning-sons-transgender-identity/.
  17. Shrier, “How a Dad Lost Custody.”
  18. Shrier, “How a Dad Lost Custody.”
  19. Walter Olson, “O’Rourke: Churches That Don’t Support Rights Should Lose Exemption,” CATO Institute, October 11, 2019, https://www.cato.org/blog/orourke-churches-dont-support-rights-should-lose-exemption.
  20. “Democratic Hopefuls Pressed on Gay Issues at Forum,” CNN, August 10, 2007, https://web.archive.org/web/20160818131955/https://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/08/10/gay.forum/.
  21. Sarah Eekhoff Zylstra, “California Lawmaker Drops Controversial Proposal to Regulate Religious Colleges,” Christianity Today, August 10, 2016, https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2016/august/california-drops-controversial-bill-to-regulate-religious.html.
  22. Emily Cousins, “Class Action Lawsuit on LGBTQ Discrimination at Faith-Based Schools Continues to Gain Momentum,” Baptist News Global, June 14, 2022, https://baptistnews.com/article/class-action-lawsuit-on-lgbtq-discrimination-at-faith-based-schools-continues-to-gain-momentum/#.Y4l9xezMKLo.
  23. Jonathan Merritt, “Lauren Daigle and the Lost Art of Discernment,” The Atlantic, December 8, 2018, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/12/let-lauren-daigle-be-unsure-about-lgbt-relationships/577651/.
  24. “Pastors Face Communication Challenges in a Divided Culture,” Barna Group, January 29, 2019, https://www.barna.com/research/pastors-speaking-out/.
  25. Scripture quotations are from the KJV.
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