Recruiting Young Love: How Christians Talk About Homosexuality

Jordan (The Invention of Sodomy in Christian Theology), professor at Harvard Divinity School, tracks the rhetoric evangelical Christians have used to oppose (or, in fewer cases, support) homosexuality. He argues that this rhetoric has an underlying concern about adolescent vulnerability. Over the span of nearly a hundred years, from the early 20th century coining of the terms both homosexual and adolescent to mid-1990s youth ministries, he unpacks and traces the intellectual genealogy of well-known figures, such as Anita Bryant, Jerry Falwell and Paul Cameron, as well as lesser-known and committee-produced works. His recounting, however, is less about individuals than patterns, which explains in part the limited selection of writings he considers, among them psychological treatises, polemical works, pulp novels, and pamphlets. At several points, the connections between the rhetoric and adolescents themselves seem absent or tenuous, a fact Jordan explains partly by noting the historical silencing of actual young people. Also, his analysis ends before the contemporary debates about same-sex marriage begin in earnest. These minor issues aside, this work provides excellent insights into the development of Christian arguments about homosexuality. (Apr. 15)