can we knock off the whole “gaffe hunting” thing? Barack Obama uses the words “my Muslim faith,” and some folks jump on it and claim he’s admitted that he’s really a Muslim. If you read the transcript or watch the video, it’s clear he didn’t do any such thing (though George Stephanopoulos didn’t help him any); rather, this was simply “a reference to those falsely imputing Islam to him,” if a clumsily-phrased one. And yet there are some trying to turn it into a gaffe, because that appears to be what we do in American politics these days: look for something we can misinterpret, and then pounce.Similarly, when Sarah Palin calls Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac “too big and too expensive to the taxpayers,” the cry goes up from the Left: “A gaffe! A gaffe!” Again, it wasn’t. Granted the technical truth of the statement that these institutions “aren’t taxpayer funded but operate as private companies,” Gov. Palin was just responding to the same concern Sen. Obama had raised, that they “should either should either operate as public entities without profit, or as private companies that won’t be rescued if they fall into trouble.” As it is, as entities created and sponsored by the federal government, they’ve effectively been private companies backstopped by national taxpayers, free to do whatever was profitable in the short term in the assurance that they’d be bailed out if it all went sour. As is indeed happening, which is why the McCain/Palin ticket has them firmly fixed in the crosshairs as “too big and too expensive to the taxpayers.”Finally, the one most annoying to me, the whole kerfuffle over “lipstick on a pig.” I’m all for defending Gov. Palin from people going after her children, or phony attacks on her record, but honestly, this is just ridiculous. Sen. Obama used a standard Americanism, one which Sen. McCain has used before, as many, many Americans have; granted, he delivered it awkwardly, and the audience does seem to have taken it as a shot at Gov. Palin, but still, it’s just a standard bit of American lingo. Conservatives howl when liberals do this to us—why on earth dignify this tactic by using it ourselves? If some who see the video take it that way and get mad at Sen. Obama, then so be it, but I agree with Roger Kimball: “Palin Rule #1: No whining! (Give the pig thing a rest)” Let Gov. Palin come up with a wisecrack for her next couple stump speeches, and let it go. (Sen. Obama would be well advised to drop it as well, before he makes things worse.)Now, some have pointed out that if he didn’t intend the “lipstick on a pig” line as a shot at Gov. Palin, Sen. Obama was unwise to use it, and I think that’s true; that, plus the “Muslim faith” line, are definite signs that the golden tongue has gone a bit clumsy just at the moment. As someone pointed out to Hugh Hewitt in an e-mail, “he hasn’t had a ‘good communicator’ day since his acceptance speech,” which is deadly for a campaign that has depended on his ability to communicate—when you combine Sen. Obama’s recent infelicities with the walking gaffe track that is Joe Biden, you get a very bad day or two indeed; but while that may well be cause for some thoughtful analysis as to why his campaign is missing its mark, I don’t think it justifies attack ads and charges of sexism. Not even close.
Joe Biden crosses Barack Obama’s line
“I hope I am as clear as I can be. So in case I am not, let me repeat, we don’t go after people’s families, we don’t get them involved in the politics, it is not appropriate and it is not relevant. Our people were not involved in any way in this and they will not be. And if I ever thought it was somebody in the campaign that was involved in something like that they would be fired.”—Barack Obama, 9/1/08“I hear all this talk about how the Republicans are going to work in dealing with parents who have both the joy, because there’s joy to it as well, the joy and the difficulty of raising a child who has a developmental disability, who were born with a birth defect. Well guess what folks? If you care about it, why don’t you support stem cell research?”—Joe Biden, 9/9/08OK, at the time that Sen. Obama made his statement, I wrote, “Based on the way Sen. Obama has run his campaign so far, there’s no plausible reason to doubt his statement.” Let’s see if I can still say that in a day or two. Sen. Biden’s comment is clearly directed toward Sarah Palin, with her son Trig who has Down Syndrome, and is clearly intended to score a partisan political point; that would be in violation of Sen. Obama’s edict that “we don’t go after people’s families, we don’t get them involved in the politics, it is not appropriate and it is not relevant.” Clearly, Sen. Biden disagrees, and I think we can safely call him “somebody in the campaign.” Now, he’s not just an ordinary Joe in the campaign, and I’m not sure Sen. Obama actually can fire him—sure, he picked the guy, but the convention nominated him, and I really don’t know what the rules would be on booting him off the ticket now, or even if there are any; but still, if Sen. Obama is to be true to the principles he articulated, some sort of discipline should be in order, and a sincere public apology (i.e., not “I’m sorry if anyone was offended, because I wasn’t being offensive”) should be shortly forthcoming from Sen. Biden. I look forward to hearing it.HT: Jennifer Rubin
When ideology trumps thought
You may have seen Joe Biden’s statement today that the election of Sarah Palin as VP would be “obviously a backward step for women.” Beldar posted a response to Sen. Biden that is positively devastating:
It’s possible to become so thoroughly saturated with partisan politics that it turns one into a complete moron. Every question, every issue, must be answered in a fashion deemed “correct” and “acceptable” according to the entire spectrum of one’s party’s positions. When carried to extremes, this becomes so ridiculous that it’s actually quite funny, sort of like watching a drunk search for his missing keys only below the lamppost because that’s where the light’s better.I believe in equal opportunity regardless of race. Anyone who shares that belief can take satisfaction from the fact that a major party’s presidential nominee is black. Although I will campaign and vote against him, if he should be elected, I will nevertheless readily acknowledge that to be a historic symbolic event, and one that should provide further satisfaction to all who believe in equal opportunity regardless of race.Someone who denies the corollary of that historic symbolism for Gov. Palin’s potential achievement is not really a believer in equal opportunity regardless of sex. If accomplishment only “counts” when the accomplisher is a “right-thinking” (meaning here, “left-thinking”) woman, that’s just another variety of sexism—a particularly ugly one, because its premise is that a woman’s own decision about her beliefs on the entire remaining range of issues counts for less than a man’s.I say, then, with confidence, and as a committed believer in equal opportunity regardless of sex, and one who absolutely believes his two daughters ought to have the same opportunities as his two sons: If Joe Biden is elected to the vice presidency, that would obviously be a backward step for women.
I agree completely.
British Palin envy
It’s been interesting to see the reactions to Sarah Palin from England. Those on the Left over there don’t like her any more than the Left over here does, of course, but since she’s less of a direct threat to them, there’s definitely less of the hysteria that has driven efforts to club her to death like a baby seal. That’s provided more room for intelligent commentary—and also, interestingly, for voices asking, “WHY, why, why can’t WE have a Sarah Palin?” In Fergus Shanahan’s case, his lament seems primarily the result of a British political scene “as grey and dull as the leaden September skies. It’s dire”; but others are expressing the same wish for more substantive reasons. The title of Melanie Phillips’ column in the Daily Mail says it all, I think: “Contempt, apathy and lies—why Britain is crying out for our own ‘pitbull with lipstick.'”
There are millions who long for a conservative defence of Britain and its values by a leader they respect and admire. Sarah Palin may well turn out to be Middle America’s revenge on its elites. Middle Britain is watching—and hoping that it will now be hunting season against the moose of the British Left, too.
Perhaps the best British piece on Gov. Palin was James Bennett’s article in the Telegraph pointing out how different her small-town background is in Alaskan politics than it would be most places:
Having worked with Alaskans, I know something of the challenge she has faced, and why—contrary to what Democrats think—it could make her a powerful figure in the White House.The first myth to slay is that she is a political neophyte who has come from nowhere. In fact, she and her husband have, for decades, run a company in the highly politicised commercial fishing industry, where holding on to a licence requires considerable nous and networking skills.Her rise from parent-teacher association to city council gave her a natural political base in her home town of Wasilla. Going on to become mayor was a natural progression. Wasilla’s population of 9,000 would be a small town in Britain, and even in most American states. But Wasilla is the fifth-largest city in Alaska, which meant that Palin was an important player in state politics.Her husband’s status in the Yup’ik Eskimo tribe, of which he is a full, or “enrolled” member, connected her to another influential faction: the large and wealthy (because of their right to oil revenues) native tribes.
In other words, Sarah Palin was actually already well involved in statewide politics in Alaska even before she ran for lieutenant governor in 2002. As such,
Far from being a reprise of Mr Smith Goes to Washington, Palin was a clear-eyed politician who, from the day she took office, knew exactly what she had to do and whose toes she would step on to do it. The surprise is not that she has been in office for such a short time but that she has succeeded in each of her objectives. She has exposed corruption; given the state a bigger share in Alaska’s energy wealth; and negotiated a deal involving big corporate players, the US and Canadian governments, Canadian provincial governments, and native tribes—the result of which was a £13 billion deal to launch the pipeline and increase the amount of domestic energy available to consumers. This deal makes the charge of having “no international experience” particularly absurd.In short, far from being a small-town mayor concerned with little more than traffic signs, she has been a major player in state politics for a decade, one who formulated an ambitious agenda and deftly implemented it against great odds.
Bennett also raises a very interesting point about the reaction of Gov. Palin’s enemies in Alaska to her nomination (one which makes a great deal of sense out of some of the stories we’ve seen):
Her sudden elevation to the vice-presidential slot on the Republican ticket shocked no one more than her enemies in Alaska, who have broken out into a cold sweat at the thought of Palin in Washington, guiding the Justice Department’s anti-corruption teams through the labyrinths of Alaska’s old-boy network.It is no surprise that many of the charges laid against her have come from Alaska, as her enemies become more and more desperate to bring her down. John McCain was familiar with this track record and it is no doubt the principal reason that he chose her.
Who would ever have thought that Alaskan politics would become a subject for international analysis?Surely not Ted Stevens.
The Jesus heresy, take 2
I wrote, back in January, about what I called “a sort of Jesus-only Unitarianism” that characterizes much of our popular evangelical piety in this country, as reflected in the songs the American church sings, and the dangers of that. Now, along comes Collin Hansen, in a web-only review for Christianity Today of Stephen J. Nichols’ book Jesus Made in America: A Cultural History from the Puritans to the Passion of the Christ, to point out, inter alia, some of the reason why:
Jesus is easier to conform to our culturally-comfortable faith than either his Father or his Spirit.[Nichols] admires the evident devotion to Jesus in much contemporary Christian music. But he shows how lyrics “safe for the whole family” begin with sub-Christian notions of romantic love and neglect the biblical record, not to mention the rich descriptions in the Nicene and Chalcedonian Creeds.”Like a good boyfriend, Jesus shows up at the right moment, says the right thing and knows how to hug,” Nichols writes after surveying popular Christian radio hits. . . .”How ironic it would be if American evangelicalism reduces its message to such a saccharin-sweet package, not to keep up with religious pluralism or because of some philosophical or theological shift but merely because it falls victim to its own commercial success,” Nichols muses.Focused for so long on the enemy outside, evangelicals may now face a far more dangerous foe: themselves.
Candle Room
On a completely different note, this is a short documentary about a young Orthodox candlemaker, Peter Kavanaugh, and his work; it was directed by his younger brother David, currently a film student in Santa Fe. (In the interests of full disclosure: their father, Dr. Patrick Kavanaugh, is the music minister and worship leader at our church, and I think very highly of both Peter and David.)
Setting the record straight
There have been a lot of folks on the Left beating up on evangelicals for, well, not beating up on Sarah Palin. “She’s a working mom, her oldest daughter is pregnant before marriage, she . . . she . . . what do you mean, you don’t want to tar and feather her?! You hypocrites!” Such folks would do well to read the thoughtful reflections of Dr. Alan Jacobs and the Anchoress on this issue. (And if that doesn’t work, they can try Thomas Lifson.)And speaking of Alan Jacobs, I could wish more people on both sides of the political fence understood this:
It’s actually possible to have some sympathy for a political candidate—to think that a candidate is being treated unfairly—whom you have no plan to vote for. It is not the case that all compassion is partisan.
Community organizing and the vision of Barack Obama
Byron York has a good article up on the National Review website on Barack Obama’s time as a community organizer, his accomplishments, and the way in which that shaped his political vision and approach. (See also Stephen Malanga in City Journal for an account of his transition to politics.)
Snapshot of the presidential race
As of this evening, in the RealClearPolitics national polling average, John McCain has a 2.9 point lead over Barack Obama. That’s within the margin of error, of course, but still, it’s a pretty good bounce.
Much depends, of course, on whether the bounce is transitory or hangs around for a while, but there are reasons to think it might stick. One is that the huge edge in voter identification that Democrats enjoyed—it was 6% in November 2006 and had climbed over 10% this past May—has been steadily eroding; by last month it was down to 5.7%. Now, according to the Gallup/USA Today poll, that edge has dropped to just 1%, which is less even than the Democratic Party had in 2004. Another is that according to the Rasmussen tracking poll a higher percentage of McCain voters than Obama voters are certain about their vote (41%-38%); not only is Sen. Obama behind in the polls, more of those who say they plan to vote for him are open to changing their mind. It’s also worth noting that the ABC poll reports a 20-point swing in Sen. McCain’s favor among white women; Gallup finds a smaller shift among all women, but a huge shift in support among independents (now 52%-37% in his favor). As well, after all the talk about Sen. Obama reaching beyond the Democratic base, pursuing a 50-state strategy and drawing votes from Republican evangelicals, the focus is back on swing states and he’s doing no better with evangelicals than Kerry did.That said, if you take RCP’s electoral map with every state projected one way or the other, they do still give Obama/Biden the win in electoral votes, 273-265:
That’s somewhat misleading, however, because most of the state poll numbers they’re using are pretty old. Thus, for instance, New Hampshire:
As you can see, their average gives Sen. Obama a paper-thin lead—but the newest poll there was finished on the 18th of August, and the others are one and three and a half months older. Given that Sen. McCain has gained a fair bit on Sen. Obama in that time, it would seem likely that New Hampshire is now leaning the other way; and if you flip them and leave everyone else the same, you get a 269-269 tie.Other interesting cases to consider include Michigan, Pennsylvania and Colorado:
In Michigan and Pennsylvania, Sen. Obama’s decent lead in the poll average is based largely on old polls; in the one up-to-date poll in each state, his lead is razor-thin—one point in Michigan, two points in Pennsylvania; when the other polls catch up, they will likely show the effects of the McCain bounce. At this point, while you’d have to say both are leaning toward him, the tilt would seem to be very slight; both states are very much in play. As for Colorado, there we see no such pattern, but there is a poll not included in this average, commissioned by the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which shows Sen. McCain up by two. Given that Rasmussen in Colorado shows no signs of a bounce for the McCain campaign, there doesn’t seem reason to expect the other polls to move significantly in his direction, leaving Colorado also leaning slightly against him.Others might ask, what about states that could flip the other way? What about Ohio? Well, take a look:
At this point, the numbers on Ohio don’t look promising for the Obama campaign; yes, the average is quite close, but the only recent poll, Rasmussen, gives Sen. McCain a seven-point lead, whereas even after the Democratic convention, Sen. Obama was only up two. Virginia‘s more interesting, though:
There, we have two polls which are up to date, and both show a two-point lead for Sen. McCain. He ought to be able to carry the state, but he’s not going to be able to take it for granted—it appears that the Old Dominion could readily go either way.So what does this all mean? Well, on my read, the truest picture of the race is this:
Looking at that, I tend to think there’s more opportunity for the GOP to pull states out of the Democratic column than vice versa; the momentum is going their way, and Sarah Palin looks like someone who will have particular effectiveness appealing to blue-collar Democrats in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Minnesota. Sen. Obama doesn’t have a similar advantage to help him go after states like Ohio, Virginia, Missouri and Florida.That, of course, is as of now; we need only look back at the serpentine course this presidential election has already taken to be reminded how quickly—and strangely—things can change. Certainly there’s no room for overconfidence on the part of the GOP; they’re in a dogfight, and at best have an even shot at coming out on top. But when you consider that most pundits expected them to be all but writing the concession speech at this point of the campaign, an even shot looks pretty good.
The attractional church: a paradigm for abusive ministry?
(Note: this was originally posted on August 28—and then had the misfortune to be swamped by political commentary. I’ve bumped it up in hopes that folks who might be interested who might have missed it before will catch it.)
I want, if I can, to start a conversation here. Over the past year or so, I’ve gotten acquainted to one degree or another, starting through Hap, with a lot of people who’ve left the church, either temporarily or for good, after being hurt by churches with a bad approach to ministry—people like Erin, Barry, Tyler Dawn, Barb, and Katherine Gunn—along with others like Kathy Escobar and Heather who had reason to leave but didn’t. (This is not by any means an exhaustive list.) I’ve also continued to chew on what it means for the church to be missional; along those lines, I’ve appreciated Jared Wilson‘s ongoing work contrasting the missional paradigm with what he calls the attractional-church paradigm. For those of you who haven’t followed that, you can find his overview here, and his ongoing overview at SearchWarp in Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8.
Now, up until recently, I thought of these as just two separate phenomena. On the one hand, you have bad churches. On the other, you have a bad ministry paradigm. I’m starting to wonder, though, if there might be a connection.
What got me thinking about that was Jared’s post “Mega(church)lomania”, in which he linked to and quoted a post by a Dr. Jim West called “Speaking Of The Outrage That Is The Mega-Church…” that I found very interesting. First, let me note one of Jared’s comments on Dr. West’s post:
When I agree with folks who are harshing on the megachurch vibe, it is typically because what I see them criticizing is the attractional model of church, and while I’ve gone on record several times acknowledging that there are certainly aspects of our ecclesiology and methodology that can be attractional, I think the attractional mode of “doing church” is counterproductive to discipleship. (Because it doesn’t work.)
Now, with that in mind, here are some of Dr. West’s comments on the megachurch, which as Jared says apply not to the size of the church but to its approach, and are really a critique of the attractional model in all sizes of congregation:
Mega churches exist for one simple reason—the accumulation of wealth. Churches, you see, once upon a time would grow, flourish, and in order to extend their ministry establish mission churches in areas where no church work existed. Their goal in the establishment of such churches was to realize the goal of local churches sprouting up everywhere. Neighborhood churches, though, over time, became too small and offered too little to the consumeristic American who wanted more and more.
So, in order to quench the unending thirst of American Christians, Churches ended their missionary outreach and instead of planting small churches in local neighborhoods they began drawing people from miles and miles away. This allowed them to offer more glitzy programs for the thirsting public (a public which thirsts not for righteousness but for entertainment). It also allowed them to collect larger offerings and once that pandora’s box was opened, it became a free for all for as many members as possible concentrated in the fewest churches possible.
Churches turned inward rather than outward . . .
Born then was the mega church and at her helm, the millionaire (or close to it) mega church pastor. Said pastor now had a vested interest not in missions and church planting but in making sure that 1) no one left (so that money wouldn’t seep out) and 2) no one found out how much they actually earned as chairman of the board of the local church corporation (in the most demonic sense of the word).
The mega church is, in other words, the church turned in on itself. It is the logical conclusion of a christianity that has lost its way and which instead of doing the work of the ministry now becomes itself the sole recipient of any and all ministerial efforts.
Now, I know full well that everyone’s story is different. If you go to Barb’s blog and read her posts on why she and her husband left their church, you’ll find elements of charismatic/Pentecostal thinking that figure strongly in the story. For Erin, there was the”Better Christian Woman” box into which her church tried to squeeze her. No one’s experience exactly conforms to the experimental model. That said, I do think there’s a common theme that runs through a lot of them, anyway, and it’s the attractional church paradigm. It’s the church that has turned in on itself and exists for the accumulation of resources (not just wealth, but also people, prestige, and influence) and the building up of the glory of its leaders—because in that mindset, the people of the church are there for the sake of those leaders, to serve their purposes, and over time, tend to come to be treated accordingly.
Along with that, since the numerical success of such churches depends on quick attraction, there’s a need to preach a sort of quick-fix instant-oatmeal version of Christianity; my wife today called it a form of spiritual crash dieting, the sort of thing that in the short term helps you look good for the people you want to impress but in the end just screws up your metabolism. Not only is this kind of thing not the gospel preaching of Jesus that gives real life, but it sets up unreasonable expectations—see how easy this is? Follow these 27 simple steps and you too can have your best life now!—and if you can’t live up to those expectations and look just as good as everyone else, well, there must be something wrong with you and you must not be much of a Christian.
The result of this? Burnout. Jared captures it well:
[Christine] Wicker surveys attractional church burnout, which I’ve witnessed numerous times personally. Committed Christians are used up and spit out in service to the Program, and if they ever so much as suggest something isn’t right, they are accused of being immature and told to go self-feed or whatever. Church isn’t “for them,” they are sometimes told, which is doubly hurtful when the volunteer is a believer who was a seeker or baby Christian when they first entered the church. The church itself makes it clear the volunteer has outgrown the church, and then it will act surprised or indignant when the volunteer realizes he has outgrown it and takes his service elsewhere. . . .
Conversion to disillusionment averages about 8 years. That’s not a very good track record and does not bode well for the attractional future.
As I say, I could be off base; but what folks like Kathy Escobar and Tyler Dawn are talking about, from one side, and what others like Dr. Jim West and Jared Wilson are talking about, from the other, sounds like pretty much the same lump of coal to me. And why shouldn’t it be? When you have congregations that have come to exist for the accumulation of resources, driven by the consumerist mindset, should we be surprised if they turn out to be organizations that burn out those who want to serve, and chew up and spit out those who dare to ask questions or challenge the leadership?
What I want to invite you to do, then, is to think about this, talk about it, and tell me if you think this makes sense. I’ll try to contact all the folks I’ve actually named in this post to see what each of you have to say, but I certainly want broader input as well—if you have a thought, pro or con, or if you have a question because I’ve been “clear like mud,” please fire away regardless. Leave a comment here or post about it on your own blog, whichever you prefer (though if you do the latter, please leave a link in the comments here so that I don’t miss what you have to say); I just want to get the conversation started.