Theologian Michael Bird (Ridley College) appeared on Australian national television last night, talking about Jesus’ erections.

Here’s the rush transcript of Michael Bird discussing the rigidity of Our Lord’s penis with ABC interviewer, Tom Ballard:

Michael Bird: I’ll tell you a real funny story. I taught religious education to some students … and I asked them a very provocative question. I said to them, ‘Did Jesus ever have an erection?’ Tom Ballard: ‘Did Jesus ever have an erection?’? Michael Bird: I believe he did. Tom Ballard: Multiple erections? Michael Bird: Throughout the course of his life. Tom Ballard: Would he have had an orgasm? Michael Bird: I don’t know. He may have had, he probably had a nocturnal emission as a teenager. Tom Ballard: OK. Michael Bird: We all have… Tom Ballard: Would he have… helped that along, if he was a red-blooded, normal man? Michael Bird: What do you mean by ‘helped it along’? You mean like… Tom Ballard: Would he have… Michael Bird: … choked the chicken? Tom Ballard: Yeah. Michael Bird: Ah. I don’t know about that. Tom Ballard: Just to be clear, you brought up Jesus and erections. I wanna make that very clear. I know I’m from the godless ABC, but that was your call, Sir.

So Michael Bird has made the daring theological proposition that Jesus Christ had erections, even orgasms, while refraining from commenting on whether the Son of God ever had a wank.

On national television.

If you watch the video above, you will see that Michael Bird goes on to sing a few songs from Jesus Christ Superstar with Tom Ballard. But let’s try to put that to the side, to concentrate on the weightier theological ramifications of the alleged tumescence of Jesus’ penis.

As it so happens, one of my varied fields of expertise is the erections of Jesus, as the New Adam. I can confirm that it is theological Orthodoxy that a Perfect Man, as was Adam before the Fall, and as was Our Lord throughout his earthly life, would only have had an erection if he had willed it with his mind. Yes, the prelapsarian Adam and Jesus had perfect control over the stiffness of their penises. They could control their penises with their minds! The penis, in this respect was just like any other part of the body, say the hand.

As I documented in my recent article,

“The Perfect Penis of Eden“,

St. Augustine considered that penises today are mere shadows of the perfect penis of Eden, ‘neither arising nor subsiding at the bidding of the mind’ (De pec. mer. 1.57). Jesus came to Earth for the purpose, among other things, to restore a perfect penis to man.

So for Michael Bird to suggest that Jesus himself would have unwanted erections and unwanted nocturnal emissions is blatant Heresy. It may be classified as neo-phallo-Ebionitism, a variation on what was a dangerous early Heresy. Christian Orthodoxy, with St. Augustine, rightly holds that Jesus exercised perfect control over his penis, having the mind of the prelapsarian Adam. Michael Bird makes the gravest theological error in thinking that it is ‘fully human’ for Christ to have unwanted erections and wet dreams. For Jesus was made incarnate in the body of the unfallen Adam, not the fallen Adam whose mind no longer had perfect control over his penis. And as Our Lord had no use for an erect phallus, he willed it not.

With the utmost sincerity, I call upon Michael Bird to recant his heretical neo-phallo-Ebionitism, and affirm Jesus’ perfect control over his penis.