Stella Immanuel is a licensed, practicing physician in Houston, Texas specializing in pediatric medicine. Her practice out of the Rehoboth Medical Center which she owns is adjacent to the evangelical church she pastors, Fire Power Ministries.
Dr. Immanuel, a self-appointed prophet of God, makes such claims as “gynecological problems like cysts and endometriosis are in fact caused by people having sex in their dreams with aliens and witches.” It is 2024, right?
She is a regular presenter at large evangelical gatherings and during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic was quoted as a medical source by then President Trump supporting his denial of the need for facial coverings, social distancing, and his false claim that hydroxychloroquine would cure the virus.
Greg Locke is the pastor of Global Vision Church in Mt. Juliet, Tennessee. Each Sunday thousands of people identifying as Christian evangelicals gather to hear pastor Locke preach such things in his sermons as “autistic children are subjected by demons” and that “you cannot be a Christian and vote democratic in this nation”.
Locke, a Christian Nationalist, also encourages his congregants to arm themselves with guns and bring them to church as a way of witnessing for American Nationalism and Second Amendment Rights. Because of, or in spite of it all, Locke is hailed as a “rising star” among evangelicals.
Robert Jeffress is a prominent evangelical Christian voice on Fox News. He is also the pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas, Texas, the largest church in the Southern Baptist Convention.
Jeffress became a prominent evangelical leader when he was pastoring in Wichita Falls and there became aware of two books in the public library entitled, “Daddy’s Roommate” and “Heather Has Two Mommies.” Waving the books before his Wichita congregation he started a culture war in that community seeking to ban books from the library or any public place which advocated for LGBTQ people.
Jeffress, experiencing great “success” condemning gay people, went further calling them and any public official who would advocate for their rights, “infidels who would deny God and His word.”
Today Jeffress advocates for a Christian Theocracy in America and would concur with Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, an evangelical Christian who believes he was ordained by God for his elected post. They share a vision for a Christian Theocracy in America.
Those I have named are not evangelical anomalies. They are just some stand-out examples of persons infected by and spreading in America what I think is a lethal spiritual virus. They are examples of evangelical grifters like Benny Hinn, Paula White, and evangelical mega church pastors, along with their many, many congregants and supporters who are evidence of what renowned theologian and head of Yale University’s Center for Faith and Culture, Miroslav Volf, describes as “the predominant form of evangelical Christianity in the United States.”
I call this lethal spiritual virus now in pandemic form in autocratic movements all across the world, Self-Sanctified Self-Righteousness. It is an ancient virus. But ancient or modern, Self-Sanctified Self-Righteousness always manifests itself in the same old horrors.
The horrors are pogroms, crusades, holy wars, culture wars, inquisitions, and the killing – along with all manner of torturing – of those labeled heretics, infidels, and apostates, by the fear-mongering, well-positioned, well-funded, infected folks who have slithered their way to power and influence.
Self-Sanctified Self-Righteousness results in weaponized religion and totalitarian political movements. Those infected with this spiritual virus seek to promote self-serving founding myths, the denial of science, enact restricted medical care, regulated education by those who would restrict learning, burn offending books, and accuse – as well as demean – opposing voices without evidence, all the while claiming that God is on THEIR side.
We deal with this spiritual virus by naming it for what it is, calling out those that are infected by it, refusing to sing out of their hymnals, and most of all, refusing to vote for those who claim to be representative or supportive of such an extremist evangelical Christian point of view.