As if it were not enough to have Anne Graham Lotz and Marjorie Taylor Greene warning of God’s judgment on America through a solar eclipse, some in the Religious Right lost their minds over the weekend in two other social media threads.
Baylor University English professor Greg Garrett (a BNG columnist) tweeted a comment about his Harry Potter class that as of April 7 had garnered 2.6 million views and nearly twice as many comments. Garrett’s tweet was a double boogeyman for the Religious Right because in it he affirmed that the Harry Potter series is literature worthy of a college English class and that he has concerns about author J.K. Rowling’s views on transgender people.
Remember that ever since publication of the first book in the mega-best-selling series, Christian fundamentalists have warned the books are teaching children real witchcraft. Now the same people who want Rowling’s books banned from libraries are coming to her defense for her statements about transgender people.
Strange bedfellows indeed. There must a solar eclipse coming. Oh, wait! There is.
Eclipse exaggerations
For weeks now, some from the fringiest parts of the evangelical Christian right have been warning of signs and portents in the heavens that must be read as the sure judgment of God on America.
Never mind that total solar eclipses happen somewhere on the earth about every 18 months, so they are not rare. It’s just that this time, the eclipse will cover a large swath of America. And, you know, if you consider America God’s chosen people and you ignore the rest of the world, well, this must be a warning from God to America.
Self-appointed prophets and prosperity gospel preachers have led the way on this fearmongering. Driving from Austin, Texas, to Waco, Texas, last week and scanning the radio dial, I heard part of an awful sermon about why we must read the book of Revelation literally and therefore pay attention to God’s warning in the eclipse.
And then people like Marjorie Taylor Greene got involved.
U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene
On April 5, the controversial Republican representative from Georgia tweeted: “God is sending America strong signs to tell us to repent. Earthquakes and eclipses and many more things to come. I pray that our country listens.”
That tweet was not well received by the general public, who pointed out the scientific and spiritual errors of Greene’s view. But she was not deterred and instead doubled down on her views with another tweet April 7: “Many have mocked and scoffed at this post and even put community notes. Jesus talked about that in Luke 12:54-56. Yes eclipses are predictable and earthquakes happen and we know when comets are passing by, however God created all of these things and uses them to be signs for those of us who believe.”
That was mild compared to what came out April 6 from Anne Graham Lotz, daughter of Billy Graham and an evangelist with 74,000 followers on the social media platform X.
The April 8 eclipse, she explained, will be the third total eclipse visible within the United States in a seven-year period. Then this: “This is the first time in over 1,000 years that any nation has seen something like this. The paths of the three eclipses over our beloved nation form the Hebrew letters that represent the first and last letters of the alphabet … the beginning and the end … the Alpha and the Omega … which is also one of the names the Lord God gives for Himself (Revelation 1:8).”
She continued: “Could God be giving us a sign from the sky? Is He giving us a heads-up warning that time is running out for our nation? In a significant way, God is the Alpha of the United States of America. He is our beginning. We were founded as ‘one nation under God.’ Is He now putting us on notice that He is also our Omega? Is He warning us that the end is near for America as we have known her? While I don’t know the answer to those questions, I do know everything means something.”
Then she issued a call to repentance to “get right with God as a nation.”
Donovan Domingue
Donovan Domingue, professor of physics and astronomy at Georgia College and State University, doesn’t see the spiritual or political signs feared by Greene and Lotz, however. In an eclipse-related post on the university’s website, he said: “All (eclipses) are mathematically predictable. Nature would be indifferent to choosing any existing cities that happen to lie in any paths.”
That comment was in response to those who are trafficking in “wild conspiracy theories” about the 2024 eclipse.
The university article confirmed that the 2017 and 2024 “eclipse pathways overlap to create a giant X across America — a sign of heavenly disapproval to some. But others will travel long distances to the X’s center point near Carbondale, Ill., thinking it the luckiest place on Earth that day.
“Certain people fear the eclipse corridor passes too close to the New Madrid Seismic Zone. They point to a series of earthquakes in the Mississippi Valley that occurred just months after the September 1811 solar eclipse — though Newsweek found no scientific evidence to connect the two.”
Also, this year’s eclipse path will cross through Jonah, Texas, and at least two towns called Nineveh in Indiana and Ohio — “calling to mind the Old Testament story of repentance,” the university noted. And also on April 8, “a horned celestial object nicknamed the ‘Devil’s Comet’ becomes visible.”
Harry Potter
That’s a good segue back to Baylor University in Waco, Texas — which, you guessed it, lies directly in the path of totality for Monday’s eclipse. Coincidence? Only Professor Dumbledore knows.
“It’s like every single thing about culture and academia that has gone wrong in the past 50 years condensed into a single tweet.”
At this ginormous Baptist school on the Brazos, my friend Greg Garrett teaches an extremely popular class on Harry Potter as literature. This class is so popular that students write him personal letters begging to be admitted to the class after it is full.
On April 2, Garrett tweeted: “Today in my Harry Potter class @Baylor, we had a hard and necessary conversation about JK Rowling and her hatred of trans-people. We decided novelist Rowling, who wrote with compassion about diversity, equity, and inclusion, is worth our attention. Twitter Rowling? Shame on her.”
Rowling has drawn international attention for a series of comments about transgender people that began in 2020 and continue to be controversial to this day. She has been denounced by several of the stars of the movie versions of her bestselling books, among others.
Garrett’s tweet elicited an unending string of snarky comments from people who either (a) hate Baylor; (b) hate Harry Potter; (c) hate trans people or (d) all the above.
Some of these were the usual suspects who live on social media to bash liberals.
For example, William Wolfe, former aide to both Al Mohler and Donald Trump — to some, that’s scarier than an eclipse — tweeted: “Shame on @jk_rowling? I don’t think so. Shame on you, @Greg1Garrett, for being a grown man teaching a Harry Potter class and for siding with the disgusting ‘transgender’ movement that preys on and destroys young children’s bodies and souls. And shame on @Baylor for hiring you.”
And Megan Basham, conservative commentator who is ever-present and ever-outraged on X, chimed in: “1) Why does @Baylor have a Harry Potter class? 2) Why does a Christian school like Baylor retain faculty like this? Does it have no statement of faith requirement? Is it now completely corrupt, completely a white washed tomb of an institution?”
Basham later returned with a post where she claimed Garrett is in violation of the university’s Statement on Sexuality.
And there were hundreds of common people jumping into the fray with Twitter-style mockery, often receiving individual replies from the professor himself.
One tweeter named “The Oldest Member” said: “’Trans people’ have made themselves hateworthy. We all know it.”
To which Garrett replied: “Congratulations for most accurately representing why I felt JK Rowling’s posts were worthy of discussion at a Christian university.”
John Podhoretz, editor of Commentary, a conservative Jewish publication, summed up the wonder of the weekend’s social media bonfire: “I just can’t get enough of the Harry Potter teacher at Baylor. It’s like every single thing about culture and academia that has gone wrong in the past 50 years condensed into a single tweet.”
Richard Hays reversal
Among all this weekend furor, the world of religion academia turned its attention away from Baylor to Duke University and Fuller Seminary. That’s where New Testament professor Richard B. Hays and his son, Old Testament professor Christopher Hays, taught or teach.
“Hays and Hays have written a new book that’s not coming out until September but has divided religious scholars five months before any of them have read it.”
Hays and Hays have written a new book that’s not coming out until September but has divided religious scholars five months before any of them have read it. All it took to set that five-alarm fire was a simple book announcement from the publisher, Yale University Press: “A fresh, deeply biblical account of God’s expanding grace and mercy, developing a theological framework for the full inclusion of LGBTQ people in Christian communities.”
The notice continues: “In this learned and beautifully written book, Richard and Christopher Hays explore a more expansive way of listening to the overarching story that Scripture tells. They remind us of a dynamic and gracious God who is willing to change his mind, consistently broadening his grace to include more and more people. … The authors — a father and son — point out ongoing conversations within the Bible in which traditional rules, customs and theologies are rethought. They argue that God has already gone on ahead of our debates and expanded his grace to people of different sexualities. If the Bible shows us a God who changes his mind, they say, perhaps today’s Christians should do the same.”
Richard B. Hays and Chris Hays
As you might imagine, “a God who changes his mind” is a phrase Christian conservatives don’t want to hear. That’s fighting language.
BNG columnist Anna Sieges wrote a piece over the weekend explaining why this is such a big deal. The short version is this: Richard Hays in 1996 wrote a chapter in a big academic book that has been the chief defense of many conservative and moderate Christians for not accepting same-sex relations as biblically allowable, and now their favorite author has changed his mind.
In one editorial review, BNG columnist David Gushee, ethics professor at Mercer University, wrote: “This book is an event of historic significance. Senior New Testament scholar Richard Hays here renounces his very widely quoted (and exploited) non-inclusive treatment of human sexuality from 30 years ago. His son, Old Testament scholar Christopher Hays, of Fuller Theological Seminary (!), here clearly and boldly embraces LGBT+ inclusion, surely at the risk of his employment. Their case is made based on biblical materials, notably a trajectory-type vision emphasizing the ever-widening range of God’s mercy across the canon. Traditionalists will not be convinced by the exegesis. Those who have been wounded by the church’s rejection, and their allies, will see this book as occasion for celebration.
“This book is an event of historic significance.”
Sorry for the pun, but the reaction to this forthcoming book will eclipse the momentary hullaballoo over Monday’s darkness and the furor over Harry Potter at Baylor.
Robert Gagnon, professor of theology at Houston Christian University, tweeted extensively about the Hays and Hays book, defending his own view that “Jesus himself” opposed same-sex relations.
In one tweet, Gagnon wrote: “Sadly, Richard Hays (professor emeritus of Duke Divinity School) has backslidden into heresy, reneging on his decades-old published rejection of homosexual practice as immoral. … This will likely lead to an acceleration of evangelical capitulation on the Scripture’s (and Jesus’) male-female foundation for sexual ethics. It will also likely signal Fuller Seminary’s capitulation on sexual ethics.”
Denny Burk, head of the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, also tweeted his grievance: “Richard Hays had penned one of the most important New Testament ethics books ever written and had held the line on what the Bible teaches concerning sexuality. Apparently, that is over.”
While others who are LGBTQ-affirming celebrated the news of Hays changing his mind, many lamented that he’s too late.
For now, only a few people who have read advance copies of the manuscript know exactly the spirit of the case father and son make for inclusion. Everyone else will have to wait five months to read it.
Until then, there’s an eclipse and Harry Potter to occupy those with enquiring minds.
Mark Wingfield
Mark Wingfield serves as executive director and publisher of Baptist News Global. He is the author of Honestly: Telling the Truth About the Bible and Ourselves and Why Churches Need to Talk About Sexuality.
Related articles:
An oft-quoted biblical scholar changes his mind on LGBTQ inclusion in the church | Opinion by Anna Sieges
My quest to find the word ‘homosexual’ in the Bible | Opinion by Ed Oxford
Can’t a solar eclipse just be a solar eclipse? | Analysis by Rick Pidcock