CrossPolitic is one of the many influential ministries to come out of Moscow, Idaho and is part of the Fight Laugh Feast Network. On August 17, they did a podcast titled, “From Slavery to Abortion to Transgenderism – The Church Led us to the Trans Movement” in which a guest, Jason Farley, argued that credobaptism leads to transgenderism, and this argument was affirmed by CrossPolitic. This argument was expanded upon in a “backstage” episode and further tripled down in a Friday evening livestream. Chocolate Knox appears to be the only dissenter. Jared Longshore, a former founder of Founders Ministry, strawmanned his previously held belief in credobaptism.
The argument that Jason Farley makes is about an anthropological assumption in which Baptist theology has popularized a “radical individualism” metaphysic that is the same metaphysic that caused a person to self discovery of becoming a transvestite. Farley views credobaptism as a person choosing to profess Jesus, as though reformed Baptist do not exist. And this same choice is the same logic that leads to transgenderism. This view was doubled and tripled down upon.
There are many flaws in this argument, and like a Baptist, I have three primary reasons why CrossPolitic is in gross error.
The Bible is not as explicit on credo vs pedo baptism as it is with other theologies.
This is me being charitable. I believe that the Bible teaches credobaptism, and that this is a demonstrable pattern in the New Testament.
31 They said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.” 32 And they spoke the word of the Lord to him together with all who were in his house. 33 And he took them that very hour of the night and washed their wounds, and immediately he was baptized, he and all his household.
Acts 16:31-33 NASB1995
Even in this text where a household is baptized, there is no indication that infants were baptized, and all those who were baptized were baptized after they heard the gospel.
But if the Bible is not exceedingly clear on when to baptize, I would argue that it is more pressingly clear on immersion, as that was how Jesus was baptized. This method lends itself more to credobaptism than pedobaptism.
Additionally, Presbyterians, like those of CrossPolitic, would baptize new converts, I would think, meaning that to some extent they believe in credobaptism. Baptists and Presbyterians disagree on how the passing of the covenant onto your children works, not the concept itself. This distinction is uncharitably overlooked by CrossPolitic.
If Jason Farley and the others are wrong in their theology, they have insulted that which God ordains which is a major issue.
History Disagrees
What makes this argument look fundamentally retarded is when you look around at the pedobaptist denominations out there. It was the ECLA that had to fire a transvestite bishop. It was the Christian Reformed Church who invented side b theology. A Baptist educated Nate Collins went to the Presbyterian Church in America to find support to launch Revoice. We haven’t begun to dive into the homosexual priests in the Catholic Church yet.
Meanwhile in credobaptist world, there are plenty of issues, yet only a fool would argue that transgenderism is gaining more traction in credobaptist circles than pedobaptist circles.
Muh Anthropology
Anthropology is one of the squishiest of the pseudosciences. It and sociology are where we get gender studies from. CrossPolitic can dress up anthropology as philosophy all they want, but that would require shedding all of the logical fallacies they’ve used to construct this argument. Anthropology does not supersede the well documented history of pedobaptist denominations embracing sexual immorality.
Conclusion
Jason Farley and Jared Longshore are shock jocks spending time in an ivory tower navel gazing at the root cause of transgenderism when the obvious cause we see in Scripture is Romans 1 :22-23, “Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures.”
Was not academia where gender identity theory began? Yet Baptists, who were instrumental in pushing back against evolution all while Tim Keller is pushing theistic evolution, are to blame?
The refusal by CrossPolitic to acknowledge the most prevalent criticisms against their position, as demonstrated in their Friday livestream shows a lack of seriousness in their thought process. The shock jock ivory tower navel gazing has stirred unnecessary strife between Baptists and Presbyterians who are not only cobelligerents but allies in spiritual warfare. I urge CrossPolitic to come to their senses.
3 Responses
There argument is silly, I’ll concede that. But your counter argument is equally 😬. I disagree with your views on baptism. Further, the clear implication that there’s more of a proclivity for transgenderism as a result of the mode of baptism is stupid and has no merit or objective (not something biased and commissioned by the SBC) kind of statistical findings to back that up. That’s like saying people who eat ice cream have a greater proclivity for spousal abuse, or for homosexuality.
As a credobaptist, if that’s not the first objection that I have to their arguments, that says more about me than it does them. I don’t expect to convince a pedobaptist in a brief couple of paragraphs but it’s necessary for the record.
Typo “their” not “there”.