I decided…I was never going to put the services of the church on TV or the radio, because I didn’t want to be a celebrity. Always being in the spotlight blinds you.
I’m mostly sitting this election out. Really, I am. Neither main candidate thrills me; I’ve likened the choice as being between liver and lima beans.
I didn’t know until I saw something on Sharon’s blog the other day that Rick Warren had something major to do with some recent debate or something. How’s that for vague? I told you–I’m just not paying attention.
I do think it’s somewhat novel to see Big Church intersect with Big Politics in such a way. Rick Warren is a hero to a lot of Christians–my mother included. She’s told me before that I can’t say anything bad about him. Is it bad to say that I think he’s getting too big for his britches, that he’s becoming nothing more than a granola-flavoured Pat Robertson and that he’s becoming the latest in a long line of people who’ve take a lot of money from the hungry and thirsty laypeople of the country and parlayed that windfall into a highly-visible seat at the head of the political table? Cause if that’s bad, then I guess I can expect a call from her later today.
Some columnist at the LA Times has already gotten Warren nominated for a jokey government position called “Moderator General”. Yes, I know that’s a position which exists only in Dana Parson’s mind, but the mere fact that people are suggesting Warren for government work, even jokingly, bugs me. Not because I think all pastors should stay out of politics (I don’t) or because I think Warren is too liberal (I have no idea what “too liberal” is, but Warren probably isn’t it).
I’m just fed up with all these guys. Robertson. Warren. LaHaye. In fact, I may be more fed up with Warren at the moment than I am with LaHaye. (Keep reading, mom. I don’t want to have to repeat myself over the phone.) Warren* has acheived a place of prominance by repackaging the gospel in a glib and dumbed-down slick marketing book. He’s done all but put the gospel–something that is supposed to be FREE–on a lunchbox. Since it’s the gospel he’s repackaged, some folks think he’s as anointed as St. Paul, or even Jesus himself.
People elevate Warren. And he lets them. He lets them so that he can take part in high-profile things like interviewing presidents, signing statements about the environment and dictating public policy. It’s as though we said “take our money and we’ll make you our king”. Well, when I say “we” I don’t mean “me” because I’ve never given Rick Warren one thin dime. Nevertheless, he’s motoring to the top of the heap by exploiting the gospel.
*Boy I’m not used to using that name in this context. Usually when I type “warren” it has something to do with wry discontent. And music.
Just Another Pretty Farce 
I’m curious…the generation behind me was all MTV, all the time. Today, I think we could safely label this generation as the YouTube generation. News is parred down to easily digestable soundbites, and even the print media has given up reporting for entertainment gossip.
How does The Church compete? There is precious little time to read the Gospel, much less so for the quiet time necessary to reflect on what you have read. Churches opt for slick media-driven services to draw crowds, do they not?
Somebody will take advantage. There is, after all, an enormous profit potential in doing so. Don’t get me wrong, I’m with you on this, but I’m curious what you think might be done about it?
If you ever want to see this sham of a forum for yourself, I’ve saved it (no pun intended) on my DVR, and I will pop you some corn and bring you little frosty glasses of lemonade as you watch it. I’d LOVE to hear your take.
Clothing optional. 😉
[…] –Coble, I thought the same thing. To me, it goes against everything Protestantism stands for to have one or two or three identifiable Protestant leaders to whom politicians can go and pay tribute to and have that stand for a candidate paying attention to Evangelicals and it’s gross that politicians do it, but shame on ministers for participating. […]
Both the marketing of faith and the collusion of organized religion with political structures are nothing new.
Mack, I agree with your comment about easily digestible soundbytes, and I think that dynamic is very telling. I think the experiment formerly known as the U.S.A. is in a steep, steady decline. It is, in my humble opinion, a case of systemic failure due to piss-poor citizenship among the masses. Granted, the republic was founded with some glaring and potentially fatal flaws, so it is remarkable that it has lasted this long.
I could go on forever with this off-the-cuff analysis, but the point crossing my mind right now is that popularity of the Robertsons and the Warrens (with their soundbyte Gospel and political involvements) is a product of the aforementioned piss-poor citizenship. Too many people don’t want to invest themselves in understanding what it means to be a citizen of the republic, and that refusal to invest includes maintaining a sort of aggressive ignorance about what’s happening and why. So in times of crisis (real or manufactured), they aren’t prone to rolling up their sleeves and fighting for solutions. They are prone to lining up behind the snake-oil salesmen who offer easy answers, because doing that is always easier in the short term.
Seeing McCain and Obama playing the God game with Rick Warren is just a case of snake-oil salesmen of different disciplines pooling their efforts. A good citizen should not give a rat’s ass who or how a political candidate worships. They should be paying attention to how that candidate proposes to do his or her job. In my lifetime I’ve already seen a few too many church-going, mass murdering thieves occupying the Oval Office. I’d gladly take a Satan worshipper as president if said dark minion would abstain from bombing innocent people, supporting murderous dictators, and stealing other people’s national resources.
What I have continually asked myself through this entire week is why only Rick Warren got to moderate. Why didn’t they invite moderators from other faiths?
Who died and made him King?
a few years back, when there was all that hullabaloo over The Purpose Driven Life, I kept seeing Warren on TV in his Hawaiian shirt and “aw shucks, just folks” demeanor. I remember finding something unsettling.
I don’t have cable, and rarely turn on the TV other than to watch a DVD, but seems like my “hmmm” moment about him might have been more insightful than I thought.
Ginger, I think the answer to that is that it’s clearly a religious test, not a test of the moral fiber of either man, even though Warren tried to frame it as about morality.
The thing I keep coming back to though is not the political side (though I think Mack and CS do a great job of covering that). I keep thinking of Warren–a minister–telling people during Obama’s time that McCain was in a ‘cone of silence.’ On the one hand, clearly that was a joke. McCain was not sealed away like some gameshow contestant. But the joke was in service to… for lack of a better word… a lie.
Warren was giving the audience the impression that McCain was someplace, anyplace, where he could not hear the questions or Obama’s answers, so that the questions would be as fresh to McCain as they were to Obama and the responses as un-practiced. That clearly was not true. And Warren had to know that wasn’t true. McCain was on his way to the forum. Warren had no way of knowing if McCain was listening in the car or if his aids were and were prepping him for the questions to come (as it seems obvious from his “Let’s get back to talking about the Supreme Court” statement before they were talking about the Supreme Court).
And that really bothers me. It’s the kind of icky thing I would expect from a news pundit hosting one of the things and I wouldn’t expect any better.
But from a minister? He’s not just standing up there as a person. He’s standing up there as a Christian leader. And he’s modeling to other Christians that it’s okay to fudge just a little bit.
I don’t know. I’d rather a good minister screw up enormously than to model that kind of “eh, well, let’s be honest only as much as it suits us” behavior. Anyone can come back from a big mistake. It’s a lot harder to change habits.
why only Rick Warren got to moderate
Some possible answers–among the many:
a) Rick Warren is becoming more well-connected, thanks to the power he wields due to TPDL.
b) “Outsiders” see him as appealing to both sides of the Evangelical movement. Conservatives like him because he’s a Southern Baptist preacher, while Liberals like him because of his more left-friendly stances on world AIDS outreach and the environment.
c) Warren is trying VERY HARD to become a world leader by implementing his P.E.A.C.E. plan. The details of that plan are worthy of another post altogether. We won’t go into how he’s already changed what the “P” means because the first “P” definition was too uncomfortable for a lot of folks. The new P (Promote Reconciliation) is more touchy-feely. I can’t remember what the old “P” was. I think it was “Preach the gospel”. Not sure though. I have to go thru some old CTs to find the answer.
I kept seeing Warren on TV in his Hawaiian shirt and “aw shucks, just folks” demeanor.
He’s perfected that demeanor, and he’s got some good teachings. But I’m leery at how he’s so much at the forefront of all of it. Not Jesus. Rick Warren. Again, I think these may require some more blog posts.
I don’t know. I’d rather a good minister screw up enormously than to model that kind of “eh, well, let’s be honest only as much as it suits us” behavior.
If you ask me–and I know you didn’t–I think the whole “Cone of Silence” deal illustrates the larger problem with Warren and this politics business. He used that line because it’s from the Get Smart franchise. He deliberately not only fudged the truth but did so to make himself seem more palatable to the secular world. He valued marketing over the message. That’s a real problem for any pastor–but it happens more and more frequently the more they try to sell the gospel using worldly tactics. Jesus was subversive and revolutionary. He was also simple. And free. You didn’t have to pay to hear him speak, but hearing him teach was uncomfortable. You had to either stand or sit in the hot desert sun for hours on end, sweating and hungry. There were no catchy phrases and laminated bookmarks to take home. It was just Jesus.
And in case anyone forgot…he didn’t get involved in politics–other than to accept without question the death sentence passed upon him by the state.
How does The Church compete? There is precious little time to read the Gospel, much less so for the quiet time necessary to reflect on what you have read. Churches opt for slick media-driven services to draw crowds, do they not?
Somebody will take advantage. There is, after all, an enormous profit potential in doing so. Don’t get me wrong, I’m with you on this, but I’m curious what you think might be done about it?
I write about this topic alot because it is close to my heart. I’m very torn about what we can do about it. At this point my personal calling is to be the curmudgeonly lady with a blog who tries to write what she feels called to write about to the Church and to participate in the way God calls her to participate. And pray. Because it’s a bigger issue than can be tackled by even on generation.
Great piece… I wrote about him here and said a lot of the same things… Great minds think alike! 🙂
I honestly believe that many of the Evangelicals are thinking that Catholics just got the whole Church/State combination wrong, but with their superior theology and unique approach, they’ll get it right, at long last. (NOTE: I am Catholic.) They seem totally unapologetic about their injection of faith into politics.
It’s interesting. We’ve learned from our mistakes, but apparently, the Protestants didn’t. And they were the people who first pointed them out!!
Again, great post and comments.
“valued marketing over the message”
I will go one step further by saying that he is marketing himself as the brand name via the message as the vehicle.
The name “Rick Warren” is much more recognizable than the name of the church, his denomination or faith. How about all of the nameless supporters and background staff that work to support that brand with their 10%.
Does he live in an average house? drive an average car? eschew fame, fortune and financial rewards in lieu of promoting the message and being a personal example?
I look to the example set by the Dalai Lama.
I do know that many people are very surprised when they find out Warren is a Southern Baptist.
Does he live in an average house? drive an average car? eschew fame, fortune and financial rewards in lieu of promoting the message and being a personal example?
Warren does something called “reverse tithing” where he lives on 10% of what he makes and gives the other 90% away. Of course, the mere fact that he talks about it makes me a little bit skeeved, because we aren’t supposed to talk about that kind of stuff, but I do cut him some slack…especially since he’s so in the public eye.
Of course, if Rick Warren would listen to the words of an Evangelical pastor, it might convince him to step out of the public eye.
That pastor was Rick Warren just a few years ago.
The current Dalai Lama has certainly made a virtue of necessity. In exile, he has pared his existence down. But before the Chinese drove them out of Tibet, the Dalai Lamas lived here: http://www.sacredsites.com/asia/tibet/potala_palace.html
Which is just to say that people follow leaders and are a little to willing to want their leaders to have a little fancy something something now and then, and the leaders are all too unwilling to say no to that. No religion and no political system is immune from this.
Sorry, the Potala Palace was just for the winters. In the summers, the Dalai Lamas lived here:
http://www.tibettours.com/norbulingka.html
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