Evangelicals Want Power, and They Have it (Jeff Sharlet)
Friday October 19, 2007
Categories: Evangelicals in Power: A Beliefnet Roundtable
I can't help but admire David's determination to make "evangelical" something other than a political term. David wants to be part of a real movement, one for which politics is no more than one front among many. The good news...
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"Modern evangelicalism is a cultural politics. "
Oh, I hope not, Jeff. Maybe the very term 'evangelical' has been so bastardized that it should be discarded. Believers' should long to be Christ-like, not political.
"There's no better illustration of that than Jerry's novels. This is literature, of course, but it's also very political. It shapes the way readers think about what society is and what their role in it is, and ought to be. Sometimes in unexpected ways -- I don't imagine that Jerry or his co-author thought that when they wrote about the tongues of unbelievers exploding in "Glorious Awakening" that that passage would end up serving as a sort of reverse rallying call for leftists who'd perceive it as, um, violent and hateful. (Sorry, Jerry, but I think they have a point.)
But, with respect to both David and Jerry, that kind of thing isn't any closer to what David wants evangelicalism to be (I write this based on his book, "Tempting Faith," and a long conversation with him a little while ago) than are the bullies at the Family Research Council. Jerry and David both speak of servanthood, but I have to draw a distinction between their definitions of that term, as understood out here by one of the poor unbelievers presumably in need of service. Jerry's fiction presents "service" as a my-way-or-the-highway (to Hell) kinda deal. In his personal life, I gather, he's more interested in simple helping, soup kitchens and the like. Great. But that only goes so far. "
Oops, sorry, hit the post button way too soon.
Rather than paste your portions here again, Jeff, I hope those interested can refer back to them. Thanks for using the term 'literature' and 'Jerry's novels' in the same paragrpah. Don't believe I've ever seen that before, even among my fans. :)
In truth we weren't terribly surprised at the response to the scenes you cited, but did you think that was part of the fiction? That's straight out of prophecy, which becomes a loving Christian's crucible. How do we represent what we believe is a loving, merciful God who would cause such a thing to happen? Dr. LaHaye has an entire non-fiction book entitled The Merciful God of Prophecy, in which he tries to handle this dilemma. The bottom line is that it seems God has tried everything to get our attention -- from paradise (Eden), the the Old Testament laws, to the grace of the church age (the death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus) -- and then in the future the rapture, the tribulation, and the Glorious Appearing. And then when we have thumbed our nose at Him long enough, His patience runs out and Armageddon is the result.
People like the loving God and the meek Jesus as they pick and choose what they want from the smorgasbord of Scripture. But when the just and righteous and holy God finally responds with power, they call it hate or -- as I mentioned -- assume some novelist has made it up.
Jerry, I couldn't agree with you more.
Didn't expect that, did you? The part that I agree with is your disdain for the cherry picking that results only in a nice-guy Jesus, so clearly at odds with the character depicted in Scripture. Whatever else he was, Jesus was no sweetie-pie, and he makes it clear in the Gospels that there will indeed be hell to pay sometime soon.
That said, you're disingenous about your assertion that such prophecies are plainly stated. You know as well as I do that "Dr." LaHaye's (sorry about the scare quotes; I can't extend the respect I really do have for you to that bully) interpretations are just that. Unless you're going to claim that "Dr." LaHaye has been granted super-extra Bible reading powers that make his discernment greater than that of 2000 years of history. In which case, I refer you to the late Rebbe Menacham Schneerson, still seeing supplicants at his grave in Queens.
Now that I've been mean, I'll be nice, because, unlike Jesus, I AM a sweetie pie: Your novels are literature, Jerry, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. You're a genre writer, and genre writers are wrongly looked down upon. What the literary establishment dismisses as excessive simplicity, or cliched language, is actually the medium in which you're working. So I think it's literature, and since I'm not familiar enough with the genre, I'm not even sure if it's good literature. I can't "read" it the way I can a more conventional novel.
Lastly, and most important -- above I write, "free market" economics sure as hell are going to help."
Sure as hell, that's a typo.
Jesus was no sweetie pie? I would say that the woman he saved from stoning would disagree. I would say the sinners he dined with would disagree.
Those to whom Jesus spoke most harshly were those who claimed to know and enforce the will of God, but were really just acting in the interests of their own power. Those were the same people who were ready to stone a woman to death and condemn Jesus for dining with sinners. They even said his healing power was the work of the devil. From my observation, modern evangelicals are the Pharisees of today, seeking power in the name of God and dismissing contemporary acts of love as namby-pambyism.
Those to whom Jesus spoke most harshly were those who claimed to know and enforce the will of God. . . . From my observation, modern evangelicals are the Pharisees of today
But you're not judgmental, right?
If Evangelicals had political power, 11-year old children would not be given birth control pills. They would have both better parents to guide them and better role models to follow. They would desire to have sex later in life. Far, far later in life like, say, as adults.
It is clear that Liberals and Progressives (anti-Christians) are in complete power and in total control of our country. One just needs to look at our shattered and destroyed youth, the products of shattered and broken homes to see that.
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