Julie Lyons' "Holy Roller" -- CC interview
Tuesday June 2, 2009
Categories: Protestantism/Evangelicalism, Religion (general)
Hey y'all, I'm in Cambridge today, but I'm posting this to the site on last Friday -- through the magic of Movable Type software, I can paste this in and schedule it to post in days to come. Woo. Today...
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About Crunchy Con
Rod Dreher is an editorial columnist for the Dallas Morning News, and author of "Crunchy Cons" (Crown Forum), a nonfiction book about conservatives, most of them religious, whose faith and political convictions sometimes put them at odds with mainstream conservatives. The views expressed in this blog are his own.
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Is this article online too soon?
I was once told by a Catholic priest, a former missionary to Africa, that if you don't believe in the existence of the demonic, Africa will cure you of your naivete.
I spent two years living in Malawi, a small nation in Southern Africa.
I didn't see any evidence of demons.
Great interview, thanks Rod, and great to hear from you Julie.
Complete and utterly primitive crap.
This is a vivid testimony to the power of the Holy Spirit to change lives and there to be evidence to such by action. Too many churches have fallen for the "once saved, always saved" doctrine that tends to excuse one from a dutiful response to God's saving grace. As John Wesley, founder of Methodism, once said, "Faith without holiness and righteousness isn't worth much." The changed person cannot rest without becoming more holy, or if you will and according to C.S. Lewis, "more lovable." Jesus said "If you obey these commandments (The Two Greatest) you shoe your love for me...and also the Father." And he went on to say that if you do I will prepare a place for you, but if you do not, well, we all know the ending. Many folks, namely atheists, have the misconceptions that us Christians follow Christ out of the need for the afterlife because of our fear of death. Nothing could be further from the truth, because our goal is to pull down some of what is promised to this earth in this time to expericne some of what we beleive it must be like. From a personal viewpoint, it was strikingly evident to me as related to my views on controversial social issues of our time. Once you put on the lens of Jesus, the entire portrait changes-new new canvas is needed.
R.Baldwin, MD, MA
Author, Life and Death Matters: Seeking the Truth about Capital Punishment (New South Books, Jan 2009)www.newsouthbooks.com
www.lifeanddeathmatters.blogspont.com
www.twitter.com/LifeDeathMatter
Voodoo and Pentecostalism have some similarities. They both incorporate deliberate demon possession and snakes into worship. In fact in New Orleans, the so-called "spiritual churches" blend Voodoo, spiritualism, and Pentecostalism.
In Voodoo, "same sex attraction" is a sign of being favored by Erzulie. In Pentecostalism, it's apparently a sign of possession by an evil demon.
In my opinion avoiding both is a sign of possessing sense.
"You won't want to miss this"
Sorry but I read the entire thing and found it a waste of my time.
Apart from Ms Lyons' apparent self-loathing, I'm even angrier at you for your arrogance in asking her,
"Where did your attraction to women come from?"
Would you ask that question to a known (or admitted, or self-confessed) heterosexual man? Why is it acceptable to question the 'origins' of homosexuality and not heterosexuality? Tell us, Rod, where did your attraction to women come from? Truly curious minds wanna know.
"How did you conquer it?"
Can you "conquer" your attraction to women, Rod? I'm sure you'd reply, 'Why should I?' Well, gay people should reply likewise.
"I had a deep wound of rejection, as do many other people who experience same-sex attraction."
Too bad Ms Lyons doesn't bother to question the source of that rejection - namely rabid, right-wing 'religious' nutjobs who daily scream at gay people that they're an "abomination unto the Lord", or "Satan's minion", etc. I wonder where that 'rejection' could possibly have originated, eh?
"What challenges to the church does the greater acceptance of homosexuality pose -- and how should the church respond?"
To which she replies,
"There is a dividing line today between those sectors of Christianity that accept the Word of God as the final authority for all matters of life and doctrine, and those that don't."
This scares the bejeezus out of me. Considering that the "Word of God" (TM) says that God's gay children should "surely be put to death", if she believes this is the "final authority", gay Americans should be as scared as abortion providers.
I'm with Frank. I, too, found this to be complete and utterly primitive crap. Voodoo indeed.
When I was young I sojourned for a time among Pentecostals and while my life took a radically different turn they will always have a warm place in my heart.
But the demon thing...well they get way too heavily into that. When Pentecostals get going they can see demons in everything, from women wearing too little clothing in the summer to, I kid you not, sneezing in church. I remember one night after a particularly enthusiastic pile of exorcisms driving my then girlfriend home singing, "I've got demons, you've got demons, all God's chillun got demons..."
The probably with this strain of Christianity is that it takes root in religion withOUT room for the discovery of modern psychiatry/psychology or science. Demons were a way of explaining things that had no names 2000 years ago. Many parts of under-developed Africa are still immersed in this pre-science age and demons and good/evil spirit wars are a folksy way of explaining things. We need to be a bit more wise about how we read our bible -- namely remembering when/where/to whom it was written for. Of course, remembering that something can have truth without being literally true.
the "problem" is what I meant to type.
I had a deep wound of rejection, as do many other people who experience [heterosexual] attraction. This wound can come from sexual abuse, being abandoned by a parent, being ridiculed, or feeling like you were totally different from everyone around you. In my case, I had a terrible, crippling fear of not being loved. It shaped my life in profound ways. For whatever reason, I craved affection from a woman.
Fixed that for you. This paragraph now describes most of the men I've known. Dysfunctional? Pretty much. Unique to gays and lesbians? Not at all. Explanatory of the sources of sexual desire, whether hetero- or homo- ? Possibly, but I doubt it. I think people feel sexual desire whether or not they're emotionally wounded.
On the topic of homosexuality, this admission was interesting:
I had enough of a desire to please God that I fought those same-sex erotic thoughts. I didn't act on them. I was actually more attracted to men in terms of the sex act itself. But that deep desire for affection from a woman remained, and if I'd given it free rein, I'm sure it would have led to a sexual relationship at some point.
Very interesting, and quite unlike the experience of the gay men I know. But perhaps some lesbians are different. Or perhaps not, and perhaps Lyons experienced some form of bisexuality. It sounds as if she wasn't really interested in a sexual relationship with other women, but thought that would be needed to get the sort of emotional relationship she really wanted. Something interesting is going on there, and I'm not at all sure that it has too much to do with homosexuality.
***
On the topic of demons in in Africa and in Pentecostalism, it's very interesting to note how history repeats itself. As Christianity spread through Europe during the Early Middle Ages, we see how local pagan cults, deities and sacred places were very consciously adopted into Christian worship (reread your Bede for some crystal clear examples). It would appear that the same thing is happening in Africa. Traditional practices, including spiritualism and exorcism, are drawn into Christianity as much as possible in order to ease the transition.
What's curious is the degree to which pagan beliefs and practices are subsequently absorbed by supposedly orthodox Christians from quite different cultures and traditions. Witness Rod's fascination with exorcism, for instance. But that shouldn't really surprise us—when different cultures meet, the transmission of practices is a two-way street (if often unequal).
Interesting read.
And with African Christianity growing so fast, what does the Western world have to learn from Africa's Christians?
A world view in where everything is good or evil, white or black, in which there are no uncertainties or shades of gray. In this world, it's perfectly reasonable to call a strange old lady a witch, to threaten her life, and to chase her out of town. It's reasonable to make homosexuality a status crime.
In short, nothing new.
I don't condone book burning. But I do recycle. So maybe Random House can do something useful with all of the leftover unsold copies, and turn them into toilet paper.
This woman supports the torture and abuse of children in corrupt African churches.
You should checkout the Nightline report by Dan Harris about the proliferation of corrupt Christian preachers in the parts of Africa that have a strong belief if witchcraft.
These preachers exploit poor families by charging them large sums of money to have demons cast out of their children.
The images are disgusting. The children are physically tortured in the name of Jesus Christ.
Julie Lyons is a simple minded woman who can believe in witchcraft and demons all she wants to. But when she goes to Africa and aids and abets "preachers" who torture children, she becomes an accessory to a crime.
She is doing the work of the devil.
http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/story?id=7613395&page=1
Seb's link is heartbreaking. The look in the eyes of those children as they are abused in the name of God is terrible to see. Belief in demons may look like harmless eccentricity, but this is where it takes you. My own Mr. Sig spent his childhood with a stepmother who considered him evil. I can only imagine what his life would have been like if she could have sicced the local pastor on him to cast the demons out of him.
For the commenters who are writing off Pentecostals and issues of the demonic: don't forget that some very educated, urbane, theologically moderate folks took these issues very seriously. Consider M. Scott Peck, respected psychiatrist and mainline Protestant, who wrote an entire book (People of the Lie) about such things and recounted in great detail his involvement in exorcisms. And there's also C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien, whose writings clearly indicate that they recognized the demonic in our world.
I am not a big fan of the Pentecostal church, but I don't think we can write off the Pentecostals or the demonic as "primitive" or "voodoo." Some of the tinfoil-hat crowd do go overboard on these things. But a legitimate concern with the demonic is well within the mainstream of Christian thought.
Bill, I read that Tolkien thought that C.S. Lewis should never have written "The Screwtape Letters" because he believed it was dangerous to delve into "the demonic" to that extent. Tolkien even created a character in LOTR who was corrupted by studying to closely the ways of "the enemy."
I allow the possibility that demons exist, but think 99.99% of cases of so-called encounters with demons are a form of projection or mass hysteria by the people involved. And I think the "speaking in tongues" of Pentecostals is not only a misreading of the Pentecost story but an actual reversal of it. Pentecostals who "speak in tongues" are recreating Babel not recreating Pentecost, IMO.
The impression I get from Rod's postings about Julie Lyons is that she is a lot (except for the politics) like Ann Lamott.
Alicia, thanks for the anecdote about Tolkien and Lewis. I am intrigued by it.
I can't believe that no one has asked Seb if he actually read Holy Rollers. Why in the world would he say that she aids those who torture? Are those who "abuse" children that he condemns the same ones she worked with? It seems like he is making a huge (and unjustifiable) jump from a general concern based on one expose, and her own efforts. Lyons and her team in Africa (as she wrote about in the book) showed serious cross-cultural sensitivities even as they rebuked those who abused power, pastoral or spiritual--- bold and forthright confrontation with leaders who they felt needed to be challanged. Yes, she believes in excorcism, but she and her team also spent much time resisting the abuse of church leaders, esp male pastors. One can disagree about the role of the demonic, or whether Lyons too easily accepts it, but to make these huge accusations is unfair and unacceptable. She accepts abuse of children? That is just slander, unless he can document her complicity in harm.
WOW! Amazing and authentic - I can't wait to read it!!!
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