He leads a weekly Bible study that’s attended by Cabinet Secretaries Mike Pompeo (State), Ben Carson (Housing & Urban Development), Betsy Devos (Education) and Alex Azar (Health & Human Services). Twice weekly, he meets with members of both the House and Senate at a congressional prayer service. His ministries lists Vice President Mike Pence as one of its sponsors. In fact, his ties to the current White House are so strong that the New York Times recently referred to him as a “shadow diplomat” within this administration.
His name is Ralph Drollinger. He’s a current preacher. He’s a former NBA basketball player. Oh, and he also believes that the current coronavirus is because of God’s wrath–something he believes is at least in part due to homosexuality.
Yes, you read that correctly. In a series of verbose blog posts and an additional study guide, this man who leads a weekly Cabinet bible meeting (one that former Energy Secretary Rick Perry has said best demonstrates the Trump administration’s “biblical values“) admits that he believes the current pandemic is a “consequential” or “sowing and reaping” form of wrath–one that directly stems from tolerance of certain things. Things like, he believes, “a proclivity toward lesbianism and homosexuality,” which he delineates as one of only a couple of reasons for why God might be ticked off enough to deliver a virus:
Pretty specific, huh? And it’s not like Mr. Drollinger lists all kinds of things in his writing. If you check out his full writing, you’ll see that a hot button like abortion doesn’t even get a mention. Corporate greed is left unaddressed. The nation’s gun scourge is also off the table. But homosexuality? It (along with environmentalism) gets a whole section as a possible reason for why God’s wrath might be coming to our world.
To be “fair,” Mr. Droillinger doesn’t believe God has completely forsaken our too-accepting world . He does share in his writing a belief that coronavirus will be cured, and that we will be given a chance to course correct. But “not being totally destroyed” is hardly the point. The point here is that a man who is in weekly meetings with some of the GOP’s leading stars in all levels of our government believes that we need to course correct our world, and that acceptance of homosexuality is a primary reason why. He truly believes that a “sensation toward homosexuality” is in and of itself a reason to tick off a vengeful God, and the Trump administration is just like, “cool views; tell me more!”
It’s one thing when we hear about a rando pastor blaming a natural disaster on a Pride parade. This, however, is someone who actually has the friendly shoulder and the captive ears of people who set policy–people, like Pence and Carson, who are actively serving on the current COVID-19 task force! It may be not the most concerning thing happening in our world right now, but it’s not nothing.