Don Wildmon

AFA/AFR founder

November-December 1999 – In the October issue of the AFA Journal, I wrote a column saying that the church needs to end its “adultery-phobia.” In the column I used all the arguments that the homosexual activists use in defending their agenda. Even the term “adultery-phobia” was a take-off on the homosexuals’ use of the word homophobia.

The column was satire and my intent was to show that if we accept the argument of the radical homosexuals, their argument could and would be used in the future to push acceptance of adultery – and any other perversion.

In the column itself I referred to the fact that the year was 2050, not the 1990s. It never, ever dawned on me or the AFA Journal staff that anyone would take the column literally.

Let me reassure you that for more than 22 years your AFA has fought for Biblical morality, and we will continue to do so. If you read the column and have any doubt about it, let me say again that the column was satire intended to show the fallacy of arguments from homosexual activists.

Many AFA Journal readers contacted us either by phone, letter or e-mail. Were they ever angry! Did their anger make me angry? Absolutely not! In fact, I thank God they were angry enough to contact me. Anger is an emotion given by God to be used for a constructive purpose. In fact, I get angry because many Christians don’t get angry at things which should make us angry.

I think that if I had taken the reference to the year being 2050 and placed it at the end of the column, readers would have understood my point. But God moves in mysterious ways His wonders to perform, as William Cowper wrote in his poem that we now sing as a hymn. Perhaps the column did more good in the manner in which it was written than it would have if I had done a better job in using satire.

Nevertheless, let me apologize for the confusion. And let me again thank those who became angry enough to write. And to those who became angry but didn’t contact me, I wish you had. I just don’t like apathy.

Should I ever write anything like that in the future, rest assured that I will leave no doubt that it is satire. But this time I made a mistake, one that makes me appreciate our readers so very much.

I was especially impressed that so many who contacted me were ministers. Thank God for these people! Their members should thank God for them. They care. They are involved. I thank God they cared enough to get involved and take a stand.

This is one time I got chewed out real good – and it made me very happy. Thanks!