I wrote the first series on the Separation Syndrome approximately a decade ago after something happened that brought the SS out of the shadows and into the world’s living rooms via television. The tragedy took place in Orlando, Florida in a gay nightclub where a number of queer men were killed. The riot that took place at that time was a harbinger of things to come, which did come. What we are seeing on the social scene today is a direct result of that tragedy. Millions of people world-wide have taken their cues from the homosexual situation and are filling the streets, churches, businesses, etc. with their voices, writings and actions concerning their favorite causes. Relative to the Bible and its depiction of sin as a personal choice, millions of people have worked hard to prove that God is wrong, that sin is not a personal choice. They have worked to separate the sin from the sinner and to remove the sinner as the causative agent in the acts which God plainly characterizes as sins

When the “Orlando Massacre” unfolded, the word “homophobia” (fear of homosexuals) became an overnight household word. One could not turn on a t.v. without seeing and hearing queers and their supporters accuse everyone else of being “homophobic.” Suddenly, queers (and later other types of sex deviants), who had been hiding their deviance in the “closet,” came rushing out of the shadows as public sympathy and support for the closet dwellers spread throughout the society at large. Sensing that their moment had arrived, sex deviants of all stripes came “out of the closet” and began demanding that their life-styles become, recognized as legitimate, accepted by the society, labeled as “normal” and given the same social status as heterosexual relationships.

Students of religious and secular history recognized that church would not be immune to the public pressure that was building up around the sex deviance situation. I told my students at the time that the church as a whole, and their specific churches individually, would eventually fold under the rapidly-building pressure to embrace such sinners as fellow churchites. Soon rainbow flags were waving in front of cross-festooned buildings throughout the nation as the institution that supposedly represented the One Nation Under God readily embraced one of the cardinal sins identified by the God of the Bible. This was the same Bible which 75% of the nation owned and took to church with them each Sunday morning. Because God’s Word cannot be changed; because what He calls a sin is a sin and because man must not be held responsible for his anti-Bible actions, the next step was obvious: THE SINNER COULD NO LONGER BE ASSOCIATED WITH THE SIN. Queers had to be separated from their Biblically-defined sin.

Almost over night sex deviants were being recruited to join the church of their choice, to “come in from the cold” of social and religious rejection and into “God’s house” where they would be warmly received as equal partners with others in the “body of Christ.” They just had to take Jesus as their Savior and the fix was in. It was at that point that the “Come as you are; stay as you are, because Jesus loves you just the way you are” mantra began to be heard throughout professing Christendom and directed toward the masses of deviants who had suddenly come out of the shadows and into the warm embrace of God’s light. That light reportedly blinded Him to the sins of the sinners the church was welcoming into her midst. At that time I wrote the following on this website: “We are about to see this (change in attitude toward the sexually deviant) mind-set explode onto the world scene where it will totally dominate and totally change professing Christendom. Prepare to see the so-called Christian Community open its arms to sexual deviants of all stripes en masse. Along with this will occur a surge of people coming out of the closet. Sexual deviance will not merely be tolerated by the church, but will become equal in “rightness” to the Biblical standard.” History has shown that sexual deviance did not merely become accepted, but became celebrated as America went all-out in her acceptance and exaltation of Biblically-defined sin. Queers, transes, byes, drags, etc. soon became the rage and still are. A recent poll revealed that 40% of the student body of a famous university has come out as either queer or trans.

in the first Separation Syndrome series I warned that the coming exaltation of sexual deviancy would give the church’s “Come as you are; stay as you are; Jesus loves you just the way you are” mantra a powerful push. I predicted that it would provide an added impetus to Satan’s “love” and “inclusion” message that would cause the whole of professing Christendom to view sex deviants and their lifestyles as nothing more than “alternate lifestyles” which God approved of and smiled upon. I predicted that the church would bow to public pressure to accept deviants as they are in order to avoid the condemnation of those who have “heard the voice of the Lord” Who told them to embrace sinners of every type just as they are and with no expectation for a change in the activities of the deviates. There would be no need for a change in behavior as long as they loved Jesus, repented regularly and tithed. I predicted that no church system would stand up for the Biblical standard for fear of being called false Christians because they refuse to welcome sex perverts as co-equal “children of God.”

Throughout the previous generations there had lurked just beneath the surface of professing Christendom’s religious facade a hidden “secret” in which sinners continued their sins as long as they looked to the cross for carte blanche sin absolution. For example, many years after I had left the denomination of my religious youth, I learned that my childhood Sunday School teacher had carried on an affair year with a local woman. It seems that everyone knew about it. But all was well because he took the time to teach us kids all about the ways of God. Regardless of his sins, all was well with his soul for he was also a deacon. The church took pride in the fact that she welcomed and harbored sinners who had no intention to give up their sins. Her only caveat was that the sinners repent periodically and tithe regularly. There was no mention of conversion, of getting sin out of one’s life and keeping it out, of obeying God by “walking as Jesus walked” (1 Jn. 2:6) and overcoming Satan’s temptations to sin as did the Lord Jesus (Rev. 3:21). Nothing has changed. And why should sinners change after joining the church? After all, the first known queer Presbyterian explained on national television: “God has changed.” The message put forth by sinning saints is clear: It is God, not man, who must change.

Until recently, church sins were covered up, shielded by the blood of Jesus that blinded God to the saved sinner’s naughtiness. After all, “God can’t see through the blood.” But now that “saved sinners” are “coming out” relative to their sins, another step must be taken in order to legitimize the church’s attitude toward Biblically-defined sin. That step involves separating the sinner from his/her sin, a phenomenon I call the Separation Syndrome. This spiritual act is much like the legal act of separating the criminal from his/her crime. A good example of this phenomenon involves the killer and the gun he uses in the killing. Now it is the gun, not the shooter, that is to blame. Guns must be outlawed, we are told as we send the shooter home with a wave of a legal hand. After all, it is the gun that is to blame, not the one pulling its trigger. A similar situation took place a couple of years ago in which a man deliberately drove his car into a group of people, killing several of them. A newspaper report stated that “a car ran over several people, killing six of them.” Nothing was said about the driver who, evidently, was also a victim. The obviously self-controlled car started itself, traveled to where a parade was taking place, picked up speed and deliberately killed the people. In another episode a drunken 16 year old boy killed two people with his truck. His defense was that he was from a rich family that had spoiled him by letting him do what he wanted to do without consequences. Therefore, he was not responsible for his actions. He was found not guilty.

The church was the first to become involved in the “not my fault” theology in order to absolve herself of guilt. As a result the church blames, not the sinner, but the sin itself for the behavior of her members. The sinner is in reality the victim. The ultimate fault, we have been told, lies not in the doer of the deed, but in the deed itself which does itself on the innocent not-doer.

I stated in the previous posting that Adam, having performed the miracle of the ages, received the blame for the sins of church members. A few generations later church sin came to laid at the feet of Satan. Over time Adam again as the cause of choice for churchman’s repeated sins. Now another entity is being named as the culprit when churchman inevitably sins–sin itself. It is the act, not the actor who is to blame for the act. The act apparently chooses the one whom it will use to express itself. The unfortunate victim has no choice but to participate. L.J.