Mike Cosper’s Counterfeit Forgiveness for Anthony Fauci

You may be familiar with Mike Cosper as the voice behind the podcast series, The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill, which was published in Russell Moore’s Christianity Today. But Cosper’s damage to the church is much more serious, and much older, than his podcast lambasting Mark Driscoll.

Cosper, a former “music pastor” at a Louisville, KY church who is now the “director of podcasting” at Christianity Today, is a functional Democrat (I don’t know what he’s registered as) and has been an avid promoter of leftist causes.

You may also be familiar with Cosper as the man who defended a public library holding a drag queen story hour for little kids while throwing out a Christian pastor who objected to it.

Mike Cosper, a prominent contributor to the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC) as well as The Gospel Coalition (TGC), also joined Preston Sprinkle and a gaggle of pro-homosexual advocates for a “queer Christian” conference.

And in his latest attempt to, well, basically be a leftist advocating for leftist causes while attacking conservatives, he publishes an article defending Anthony Fauci while scolding those who want to see him held accountable for his crimes against humanity.

He cloaks his entire argument in the language of “forgiveness.”

First, Cosper admits that not only were the policies Fauci supported dangerous and disastrous, but he also overstepped his authority. He acknowledges that Fauci gave false accounts of the origins of the COVID virus as well as false testimony on his knowledge of various treatments for it.

Yet, he portrays the pursuit of justice and accountability for Fauci’s crimes as conspiratorial, personal grievances, and political rage.

Cosper’s argument is biblically indefensible and essentially rests on a confusion between forgiveness and justice. He shames those who are in pursuit of truth—and of justice for a powerful government official—by invoking the biblical language of “mercy” despite the fact that he has never acknowledged his wrongdoings.

But the issue isn’t about forgiveness or mercy, it’s about whether a powerful official abused his authority, misled the public, caused enormous suffering, and then tried to escape accountability with a pre-emptive pardon by the former president and by refusing to answer questions by invoking the Fifth Amendment.

Cosper wants us to just accept that Fauci’s crimes were just honest mistakes even though he “sometimes overstated his certainties” or “overstepped his authority” or offered accounts that were “difficult to square with the record.”

According to Cosper, Fauci is merely a flawed man trying to make extraordinarily difficult decisions during an unparalleled crisis.

He also attempts to gaslight us. According to Cosper, it is normal and natural for people to alter their stories and recollections to protect their reputations. That’s just what human beings do.

And while that’s true, that doesn’t make it right—particularly for a public official with so much power.

Cosper completely dismisses all of that. The deception. The abuse of power and authority. His lies and false testimony before Congress. It’s all just normal human fallenness, and despite the fact that he’s never acknowleged it any of it, we need to just look past it.

Perhaps a man of his academic prestige just “misunderstood” a peer-reviewed study. Perhaps he just miscalculated his projections.

None of it makes sense.

But the actual questions that need to be answered are far more serious.

Questions like,