He Has Risen - A Charismatic Pastor Brings A Sexual Jesus To Washington

Branford P Jackson DD, was a preacher from Roamer’s Creek, a small Midwest town like a thousand others – pigs, cows, soy, and churchgoing – and because of its natural rectitude, and fundamental moral sense, the Reverend Jackson had little to do except to remind his congregation of the grace of Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, Heavenly Father who would come again to take us to the Promised Land.

 

Reverend Jackson mixed his metaphors in lyrical passages every Sunday morning; and borrowed freely from the Old Testament and St. Augustine, embellishing, embroidering, and quilting to his heart’s content.  His congregants were simple people, devout, faithful, and believing fully in the Lord; so they never thought twice about the religious mishmash the pastor offered every week.  For all they knew, the words he spoke were the words of God.

Let us pray.  Oh, Lord Jesus, come to us from on high,  from the Temple Mount, from the cross high on the hill of Golgotha to us sinners here in Roamer’s Creek.  Come, oh Lord, come…

‘Amen’, said the congregation in unison, shaking their heads, closing their eyes, and imagining the Lord, God himself on the altar of the Ebenezer Baptist Church of the Redeemer embracing the Reverend Jackson.

Come ye, Almighty, and shine on us your beatific light, your saving grace, your all-encompassing love, your beauty, and your kindness…

‘Praise the Lord’, rose the anthem from the pews; and so it went until everyone was on the same page, a leaf from the Holy Book, verses from God himself, so was the appeal of the Reverend Jackson.  In his hands the church was a community, joined in faith and good will.  Each and every one who had participated in the services that day left with joy in his heart. 

To be honest however, Reverend Jackson, for all the fondness he had for his churchgoers, was a bit restive.  He was not home grown, and in fact came from Baltimore, was a descendant of Francis Scott Key, and from an old Anglican family who had helped build the Port of Baltimore into the shipping Mecca of the Mid-Atlantic, transporting textiles, slaves, and timber up and down the coast, to the Caribbean, and to Europe.

Somewhere in the 1850s, just before the Civil War and when Baltimore was unsettled and unsure of its support for the Confederacy, the Jackson family became converted Baptists.  There was something relevant and immediate about the holy rolling and ecstatic worship of the Lord that appealed to them.  The simplicity, order, and Old World recondite religious spirit of the Anglican Church was simply not American enough, and thanks to the evangelism of a North Carolina Baptist preacher who had found Jesus in the backwoods of the Smokies, followed him and his faith.

The Jackson family produced many preachers of whom Branford was the latest, and upon graduation from the seminary was encouraged to go west.  His nascent but promising eloquence and down home nature would be just the thing for the people of Indiana; and so it was that he left Baltimore for the Midwest.

Branford, despite his calling, was a very ambitious man, taken with the allure and seamless beauty of women, tempted by their seductive charm, and no stranger to courting them.  He was often seen with one of Baltimore’s high society beauties at one of the chic restaurants on the harbor.  He was an attractive young man thanks to his looks, his family legacy, his money, and his surprising profession.  Women never knew whether he was a bon vivant, roué, and boulevardier or a man of God.  He knew of his particular allure and took advantage of it

Sorry to leave the delights of Baltimore but excited about the opportunity of leading a congregation, he settled in quite nicely in Roamer’s Creek; and before long he was looked up to as a leading citizen and a prospective husband.

He, however, was not looking for a mate, but for a partner, a woman like those in Baltimore who fell so easily for his charm and unusual spiritual presence; and it was not long before he became known as the Brad Pitt Baptist.  Some of his congregants were suspicious of a man whose attentions were so persistently secular, but who was to judge when a man should wed, and surely the affections of such a lovely, complex person like the Reverend should not be discounted or dismissed.

Sexual ambitions and political ambitions often go hand in hand.  Henry Kissinger, former Nixon confidant and Secretary of State once famously noted that power was the supreme aphrodisiac – it both gave powerful men a vigor and virility par excellence, and drew women ineluctably to their flame. 

Every President in American history had lovers and paramours – it came with the territory – and the same vitality infused the Reverend Jackson.  Washington was to be his beat, and after much to do with the Southern Baptist Convention, he was given leave to move to Washington.

While sharpening his ecclesiastical spurs at Wesley Seminary (a Methodist institution, but ecumenical in spirit), he chanced to meet a woman well-connected with official Washington.  She was an aide to an influential senator from the Midwest a man whose profound religious belief and canny political aptitude won him landslide victories in every election.  He would be pleased to meet Branford.

It was a match made in heaven – the two men hit it off from the moment they met.  The Senator welcomed someone from his state particularly one who was not ashamed to profess his faith, but who also acknowledged the ways of the world.  Before taking on the responsibilities of congregation, would the new reverend consider an internship with him.  Jackson immediately accepted and before long he was seen as ‘that charming young man from Indiana’.  He made friends quickly, had an instinctive sense for understanding strengths and weaknesses and the interstices between them – that is, the very spaces where influence and sway could be had.

‘Let us pray’, said Branford, on his knees in the Senate office of one of the most influential legislators in Congress with that very senator, praying for guidance and divine support.  It was that particular, wonderful spiritual bonding which gave Branford license and free rein.  He had become trustworthy.

 

There have been many academic publications on the unusual but not uncommon nexus between sexual and spiritual attraction.  Sinclair Lewis immortalized Elmer Gantry, a country preacher with spiritual insight and sexual ambition; but the literature goes beyond fiction.  Women seem to be persuaded by a man of sexual purpose and confidence and a religious indomitability.  A relationship with him would be sexually and spiritually gratifying.

The literature cites the example of Friedrich Muller of Cologne, a man of unusual male beauty and prophetic religious insight.  He was never overbearing in his religiosity or insistent about his sexual desire.  He had that perfect blend of upper and lower world sensitivity. He was the pastor of a Lutheran Church which in 1883 was the center of religious and social affairs in the city largely because of its charismatic pastor.  Women who came to him for spiritual counseling inevitably became his lovers and all because of their willingness and desire.

It was by no means an affair of predatory sexuality so common today, but was akin to an almost Tantric community of shared sexual pleasure.  The women all felt blessed by his intimate attentions and had no jealousy towards one another.

It was this remarkable, unusual, but not unheard of character that the Reverend Branford Jackson shared; and so not long after his prayerful kneeling with the Senator, did Branford court and bed Melissa F., an aide to the Senator for economic affairs.  Just as in the case of Friedrich Muller, Melissa told her friends and colleagues about the newcomer and urged them to meet him.  Before long, the coterie – the devilish cabal some outsiders called it – had grown, a virtual harem for the young minister.

The Senator, as taken with Branford’s spiritual charisma as women were to his indelible virility, told his colleagues about him; and before long he was appointed as spiritual advisor to Congressmen on both sides of the aisle.  In a short time, he had become the Billy Graham of official Washington.

In Washington sex and power are nothing without money. The roles of Casanova and St. Francis were remunerative in only limited ways; and so it was that he through the influence of the senator and the wealthy family connections of his lovers, was able, through elegantly constructed NGO covers, pass millions to his private bank account.

‘Now, that’s success’, Branford said to no one in particular, smiling broadly, and waving to a bright young think in silk and chiffon waiting on the corner for the light to change.