I don't think Frances FitzGerald, who wrote this week's New Yorker story about Ken Blackwell and his Republican/theocrat run for Ohio governor, quite gets this charming line from Blackwell's preacher pal Rod Parsley:

Conservative Pentecostal pastors often use military metaphors, but Parsley's sermons are notable for their graphic detail. At the service that I attended, he spoke of the moment when "God broke into the world through the bloody flanks of a fourteen-year-old virgin." This puzzled me, until I understood that he was picturing Mary as a teen-ager who chose not to have an abortion.

Er, Frances? I don't think he's focusing on abortion here -- I think he's fixating on the virgin part.

And he seems to be really, really digging that image.

Ladies, I wouldn't go on a date with this guy without a police escort.

(Yes, I know -- he's married, though not, perhaps to her regret, to his good pal Ann Coulter.)

FitzGerald heard the sermon and I didn't, but I don't quite see how this constitutes a "military metaphor." And I'm not sure I want to know.

(Cross-posted at No More Mister Nice Blog.)