Authority to Heal

Author: Andrew Comiskey
January 28, 2019
A disgruntled ‘gay’ activist, Mathew Shurka, testifies in legislatures around the country that conversion therapy did not work for him; he did not change and he doesn’t want to change. And he doesn’t want anyone else to change either.

Me thinks he protests too much. A recent NY Times articles quotes him: ‘It’s still the same question—“Can someone change?” This is the source of all LGBT rights.’ In other words, Shurka and like-minded ones hang all their LGBT aspirations on the fragile hope that no-one can overcome the domination of lust and actually begin to experience what God designed his or her body for–fruitful engaging with the opposite gender.

Mathew’s grousing may help win some legal battles. But he has already lost the war. Justifying one’s right to exist on the grounds that no-one with same-sex attraction can successfully choose a path different than one’s own is a losing proposition. Two choices remain: close your eyes to others’ transformation or claim that they are lying.

Mathew lives under a low ceiling, which he seeks to extend over everyone, including the faithful. Make no mistake—the issue here is not only ‘conversion therapy’—it is about halting any person with same-sex attraction or gender dysphoria who seeks new sexual direction. And Shurka is not alone. Evan Low in California who last year initiated #2943 is ramping up for a ‘better’ bill in 2019 that he hopes will eradicate choice of change for any Californian.

Now we can see why ‘change’ is such a threat to the LGBT+ set. It exposes the quaking ground of ‘selves’ built on the fault-line of sexual fatalism. From that tight controlling place emerges a selfish, non-generous spirit. How else can you describe legally forbidding persons to aspire to authentic sexual creativity?

Thank God for the authority to heal—to become the fruitful man or woman of His design. The Church of Jesus Christ understands this. Not because she cites the LGBT+ set as those most in need of healing. She simply knows that all persons who seek freedom in Jesus’ name will find it because He is the healer!

Last week the Denver Archdiocese sponsored our Gender Matters Conference. Archbishop Aquila opened the time with two interwoven truths: the magnificence of the human person made in God’s image as male and female, and the authority of Jesus Christ to restore persons to that original dignity. We adore the God who heals.

Jesus brought a ‘new teaching, and with power’ (MK 1:27). Most of His time was spent delivering persons from oppressive spirits then restoring men and women to their original dignity. Of course He only did this for persons who wanted it. He was known to gently ask: ‘What do you want?’ or ‘Do you want to be whole?’ Even so, He contended constantly with naysayers who were so threatened by His Almighty Mercy that they put Him to death.

He lives to resurrect that power in us. In spite of diabolical efforts to stamp out ‘change’, no power on earth has authority to void His power to heal. It is His prerogative and now ours. We—faithful members of Jesus– have authority to heal.

‘Faith in the Lord’s real Presence and in His transforming power decides everything. If this faith is firm, the Church’s doctrine about human sexuality will be comprehensible and equally firm. If it evaporates, then repentance, conversion, grace, and sanctification evaporate with it.’ Dr. Stephen Oster
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