Jesus was ‘effeminate’
Scholars identify the deity’s surprising sexual vibe
When you grow up Evangelical, Jesus is real masculine. As Billy Graham said: “I’m not believing in some effeminate character.”
Evangelicals didn’t like that girly deity. Or as Mark Driscoll put it, that “neutered and limp-wristed Sky Fairy.” So there I was, looking at early Christian sarcophagus art of…Jesus?
I’m listening to a lecture on early Christian art.
Dr. Ally Kateusz, a specialist in the subject, is doing her presentation, “Introduction to Early Christian Art and Its Gender Politics.” The sarcophagus art is particularly interesting because these are coffins. They were buried, and so survived waves of destruction, as the religion re-wrote itself.
In contrast to the men around him, she notes, Jesus was seen, typically, as beardless and with long hair that is similar to the hair of women. Throughout early Christianity, Jesus is identified by these gendered cues.
She muses over one sarcophatus, where Jesus is extra fabulous. “He looks very effem — He looks very feminine.”
