Bud Light theology: New order of ever-evolving humanity
The furor over Bud Light’s ad campaign is at its core a battle over the theology of the trans cult. The fight is about what it means to be a human being and what it means to be redeemed.
Bud Light advertising executives apparently believe they have seen the future of humanity. People are seen as evolving toward the image of Dylan Mulvaney, whose biological identity is malleable. He is representative of a great societal reset in which there is neither male nor female. A self-generated and self-salvific personage of neither sex has transcended the natural order and become godlike.
Powers that be appear to have embraced the idea that people like Mulvaney, who has millions of followers on social media, indicate Americans have moved beyond the current and socially conditioned idea of maleness. He transcends what the advertising executives see as a “frat boy” mentality. He is a being surpassing all former ideations of masculinity.
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In brief, Bud Light execs discern the current natural order is being reprogrammed. They recognize and promote the brave new world in which what was formerly real is no longer real. Bud Light customers should be drinking a toast to the new order of ever-evolving humanity.
In what universe does Bud Light’s advertising campaign play well?
It plays well for the trans cult. But not so much for the rest of humanity.
Apparently, trans folks have divined the shape of a new world order. They are people to whom transformation and societal power are granted by self-generation. Divine rights are conferred, along with a new liturgical language and new ways of eating and drinking to be characteristic of the coming utopia. The new ways of addressing the devotees (such as “they; them”) are the equivalent of the old royal “we,” which was also indicative of an elevated and superior class. The new class has discerned the essence of a world spirit in which there is neither male nor female. Their new society will reset the standards of the former world order. Despite the fact most do not discern the new revelation is at hand, all will someday drink a Bud Light toast to the new world.
There is nothing new about the trans cult.
The movement is a resurrected variant of Gnosticism, the core theological tenets of which remain constant. For ancient and modern Gnostics, the human spirit is purely good, but the soul is imprisoned in a body that is either intrinsically evil or simply an illusion. The goal of the human being, then, is to release the good spirit from its corrupt embodiment. Freedom is achieved by the mysterious secret gnosis the spirit possesses. Even children can discern whether they are trapped in a male or female body.
For the trans initiate and devotee, one’s biology given at birth has nothing to do with the essential identity of the human being. Mystical discernment and transformation involving the ritualization of the body via sacred rites which are a combination of self-flagellation and mutilation will transform the material body into a divine other. Self-redemption elevates the human being into a new order of superior being no longer dependent on biology or societal expectations. Renewed human beings released from the definition of male or female will create a utopia in which perfect equality is achieved. Like Dylan Mulvaney, any human being will be able to create a completely new person.
Such a secular docetic view of humanity is diametrically opposed to the orthodox Christian view of the body, which is regarded as created by God, not by one’s self. The body given by the Creator is seen as living eternally, either out of fellowship with God or eating and drinking in fellowship with God forever; eating and drinking is foreshadowed by the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.
For the trans movement, self-imposed suffering is redemptive and transformative. The sufferings of Christ are irrelevant, as they were only apparent and not real. The gnosis of the trans cult rejects the material reality of Jesus Christ, the Son of Man and Son of God.
For orthodox Christianity throughout all centuries, the person of Christ is irrevocably that of a man, conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of Mary. He is the Redeemer who undoes the sin of Adam, the first man, and who saves the human race, male and female. Christ as man is essential to the entire Christian narrative: “As in Adam all died even so in Christ shall all be made alive.”
To abolish Christ as a man and to eliminate humanity created as male and female is a denial of both God and creation. Ultimately, the denial of the reality of Christ in the flesh as the Son of Man completely guts the Gospel and thus the entirety of Christianity.
The core gnostic beliefs of the trans cult seek to destroy Christianity, as have gnostic cults in all their manifold forms throughout history.
But as Erik Voegelin points out in his work Science, Politics and Gnosticism, creating a gnostic world is impossible, for the creation of that world involves destroying the being itself, including the human being:
“All gnostic movements are involved in the project of abolishing the constitution of being, with its origin in divine, transcendent being; and replacing it with a world-immanent order of being, the perfection of which lies in the realm of human action … the attempt to create a new world is common to all … This endeavor can be meaningfully undertaken only if the constitution of being can be altered by man. The world, however, remains as it is given to us, and it is not within man’s power to change its structure.”
The trans movement, then, is profoundly spiritually abnormal in that it wishes to fundamentally alter the natural order, including the human being as well as Christ, Son of Man and Savior of the world.
Christians must recognize and resist the doctrines of trans theology, which is entirely incompatible with the faith in every respect. They must reaffirm the Gospel of Christ, which proclaims the Son of Man came to seek and save all who claim his name, male and female, both body and soul.
We can drink to that, now and forever.
Fay Voshell holds a M.Div. from Princeton Theological Seminary, which awarded her the prize for excellence in systematic theology. Her thoughts have appeared in many online magazines, including the Christian Post.
