Megachurches and Authoritarianism

So here's a completely non-controversial take:

Megachurches have primed Christian America for authoritarian rule, and have contributed to the collapse of republican virtues.

My church is very much not a megachurch.  We're a little community church, and thriving as a small church pastor requires letting go of the idea that you have more authority than your lay leadership.  Formal authority is meaningless in the little church.  What matters is care, relationship, and a willingness to be discipled by the Christians around you...and that includes pastors actually listening to and learning from the gifts and witnesses of their co-workers in Christ.

My church is also Presbyterian.  Being Presbyterian means a bunch of different things, but on a practical and functional level, it means that the beating heart of the church is lay leadership.  The Elders who are elected into leadership of a Presbyterian congregation make that church what it is.  My task, as a pastor and Presbyterian Teaching Elder, is to proclaim the Word, administer sacraments, and support my fellow Elders as they guide the church.  I am, to use the small "c" catholic ideal for the soul in the formal position of leadership, a servus servorum dei -- a servant of the servants of God.

I ain't the one in charge. That's not to say my role isn't important to the well-being of the congregation.  But I am not the "unitary executive" of my congregation.   

That has always been the Presbyterian vision.  It was so fiercely a part of Presbyterian identity that it was a potent source of radically antimonarchist sentiment.  Presbyterians, back when we were a significant force in American life, were always the foes of kings and tyrants, those who would deny power to the people and claim it all for themselves.

There's a reason the American Revolution was called "The Presbyterian Rebellion" by the supporters of King George.  For Presbyterian pastors who forget this truth, and imagine they can rule their churches like a king or a CEO, well, you're gonna get reminded of that real danged quick. 

But the Presbyterian age is waning.  

Our numbers are in decline, and not just in my withering branch of the tradition.  Taken as a whole, the Presbyterian tide has ebbed in America.  Taken all together, liberal and conservative flavors combined, we are less than half of the four million total souls who considered themselves Presbyterian at the midpoint of the last century.  

In our place have risen nondenominational corporate churches, ones where the pastor is conceptualized a a CEO.  Those leaders are explicitly entrepreneurial, and they quickly become the central focus of the life and the mission of their churches.  They are the face of the brand, so to speak, and the final authority on all things.

Many of these corporate-scale churches do the good work that their size enables, and many of those pastors work hard to maintain a humble servant heart.

But.

But many do not, and following the Face on the Jumbotron can become profoundly dangerous to the soul of the church.  Driven by the More is More ethic, Pastors devolve into celebrity influencers, chasing more and more followers and more and more influence.  They become the sole authority, the whole power, and the source of all truth.  Congregants in such gatherings can become pastor-focused, not Christ focused, trapped in a parasocial relationship with a single charismatic authority.

This cultic enthrallment is dangerous for personal discipleship, and is just as dangerous for the spiritual integrity of the Pastor in the High Pulpit.  As Karl Vaters put it in his excellent DESIZING THE CHURCH,

You cannot build your brand and develop your spiritual maturity at the same time.  They are heading in different directions.  That doesn't mean you can't promote your church, an event, or a ministry.  But promoting ministry for the betterment of others is very different from promoting your identity for the glorification of self.  (DESIZING, p. 84)

From that, it's not hard to see how this now dominant model of church life has impacted the political predilections of American Christians.  We have been trained to see authority as vested in a single figure, one who is centered as the source of all authority.   

And just as the power of bishops and cardinals once affirmed the divine right of kings, so now the power of the CEO pastor and the Christian celebrity influencer "blesses" a new breed of authoritarian. 

With that expectation reinforced from the heart of a politically compromised faith, the people cry for a king, and AmeriChrist, Inc. is all too happy to oblige.

The Great Houses

I am, without question, not a fan of Donald J. Trump.  But he's going to be president. 

I am also a lifelong Beltway Insider.  Born here, raised here, pretty much the entirety of my life.  It's where I own a home, purchased back in the late 1990s for what felt...at the time...like an exorbitant amount of money.  Two hundred and forty nine thousand dollars, for a 1,300 square foot brick rambler in Annandale, and even with family help, it was a bit of stretch.  

We bought in because it was where my wife and I both planned on working, and because it was near family.  More broadly, it's our cultural expectation that buying in will give you equity in a home, which is better than just dumping money into rent.  When home prices go up over four...or eight...or twelve...years, selling off means you profit handily from the purchase.

Our rambler, for instance, is worth 200% more now than it was two decades ago.  The house my parents bought, and in which my mom still lives?  That's worth about 1,100% more than it was in 1975.

Again, I'm a Beltway Insider born and bred, which means I've seen what happens when administrations change.  Folks hoping to work with the new regime come bopping into DC, seeking housing to buy.  For most of the fifty five years I've lived here, that's been a good bet.  

Out there, I don't doubt there are Trumpy politicos thinking they'll get a piece of DC Real Estate.  In that knowledge, I'm reminded of my Lord and Savior's insistence that one love one's enemies, that one go the extra mile, that one offereth up one's cloak also and whatnot.

So to them, a warning about buying a house here:  Don't.

Knowing the sensitivities of Trumpy folk, let me note that even if you are the great Cornholio, I am not threatening you by saying this.  You'll be fine here.  Folks are generally neighborly in these parts, if a little prone to being overly work focused.  Some eye rolling and muttering may be encountered, but that's as far as it'll go.

No, the reason not to buy in to the housing market in the DC area is, if you voted for Trump, precisely because he may well do what he promised.  If the Department Of Government Efficiency has even a fraction of the impact Elon and Vivek insist it'll have, it'll tear an iceberg sized gash in the Titanic of the DC housing market.  

Many thousands of workers, gone.  Departments eliminated.  Agency budgets cut to the bone.  The broader economy here will be significantly impacted.  No matter what your opinion on governmental size may be, the impact of that would be gobsmackingly obvious: a sudden explosive decompression of the local economy.  I know what that looks like here.  Things got noticeably leaner here a bit during Al Gore's reinvention of government.  Then back in the subprime crisis of '06 and '07, home prices collapsed, leaving folks with mortgages they couldn't afford and houses that were worth half of what they paid for them.

In my own neighborhood, houses were just abandoned.  Meaning, the owners closed and locked the doors and disappeared.  The two little ramblers at the top of our street, both identical to our own?  They sat empty for years, the grass growing high, the only signs of life being the county violation stickers and foreclosure notices on the front doors.

Ever take a long walk through Flint, Michigan?  I have.  Following the closing of the Buick factory there in the nineties, entire neighborhoods were abandoned.  Home prices went to functionally nothing.  That's what it looks like when the primary industry of a region shutters or significantly retracts.

So, in the interests of being honest to even those who are my political enemies: don't buy a house here.  

You don't want to tie youself to this market right before your own choices destroy it.

Just a friendly warning.

I've also got something you might want to be aware of regarding continuing to live on this planet, but hey.  One thing at a time.

Romney, Government, and the Very Poor

Last week, Mitt Romney continued to roll inescapably towards the Republican nomination, much to no-one's surprise and the consternation of social conservatives everywhere.  Romney's a well oiled machine, capable as a speaker, smart and difficult to ruffle in a debate.  He presents the competent, distant benevolence of an early 1960s sitcom dad, arriving at 5:15 sharp from The Place Where Grownups Live, ready to sit down with Wally and the Beav to offer the final and definitive word on whatever sepia-toned hijinks have ensued.

It's unusual for him to slip, allowing that identity...not a facade, I'm convinced it goes deeper than that with Mitt...to be dinged.   Last week's wanderings into whether a president should be concerned about the very poor were such a slip.   Romney's statement in its entirety can be found here, and read in completeness, it is more nuanced than blood-in-the-water punditry would have you believe.   It is also utterly comprehensible in the calculus of politics in a democracy.  The key to winning an election in a democratic society is the same key you use to win a game of chess.  If you take the center of the board, you are likely to win.

Romney is money and a patrician.  What is he is not is stupid.  He understands that dynamic.  And so when he says that his concern is not with the very rich (who can take care of themselves) or the very poor (who have a "safety net"), but with everyday folks like you and me, he's speaking from the strategic heart of consumer politics.

There is a difference, though, between what is politically advantageous and what constitutes good governance.  The validity of a state rests on the ability of that state to protect the interests of its constituent citizens.  The provision of infrastructure, both physical and regulatory, is a significant part of that validity.

But when you get down to the bone and gristle of the thing, states provide protection.  It's what they do.

States protect against attack from "outside."  If rapacious hordes of flannel-clad Quebecois came pouring across the border to menace us with their strange twangy French, it would be the responsibility of our state to defend us.

But states also stand as protection against uncertainty from within.  The measure of a good state is that within its borders, you will not go cold or starve or die abandoned in the dirt by the side of the road.  If the harvest fails, the good state has reserves.  If you are disabled or abandoned or orphaned or widowed, the good state will insure you are cared for.  If a powerful man decides he wants your home, the state will prevent it.  If the storm rises or the earth shakes and all is lost, the state will be there to rebuild.   It's an essential part of the social contract.

That isn't just true for our Constitutional Republic, which in its ideal provides for the common defense, promotes the general welfare, and secures the blessings of liberty.  It has always been true.  The protection of the rights of the "very poor" rests at the foundation of even our most ancient systems of governance.

Within the legal codes of the Torah, care for the last and the least is absolutely fundamental.  If you fall into debt and bondslavery, it promises eventual release.  If you are a stranger in the land, you are promised hospitality and protection.  If you lose parents or find yourself unable to provide for your own care, it promises the protection of the community.   Torah is not alone on this front.  The Code of Hammurabi, equally ancient, makes a similar point of asserting care for the widow and the orphan...the "very poor"...as the mark of a good king.

It would be tempting to here note that the Book of Mormon contains no such legal code.  It's a book of narratives and visions, with scant and tangential reference to the concept of justice as presented in Torah.  But for all of my many struggles with the LDS conceptually, I know that concern for the "very poor" is a potent and vital part of what that community does.  One look at the church-produced food in the larders of a struggling Mormon family will disabuse you of any notion that Mormons aren't aware of that need.

Where Romney slipped is in not recognizing that to seek the interests of the "center," you have to assure them that should ill befall them, that safety net will be strong.  He did attempt to do this, in all fairness.  But as the "center" is often just one job-loss and one major illness away from being "very poor," his efforts aren't adequate.

For a Republican running in a time of lingering economic trauma, when all of us have seen friends and family struggling, this is a particular concern.  If you're the candidate of the party that sees the "safety net" as the problem, telling people to trust the safety net may not be the wisest course.

It cuts at the heart of our most fundamental expectations of good government.  And that is not good politics.

Mercenaries, Prostitutes, and Politicians

We all hate politics. And politicians. It's a peculiar thing.

Here we are in a democracy, a constitutional republic that assumes leadership of the people, by the people, and for the people. Yet Americans as a whole seem to view the process of our democratic governance with a deeper and more aggressive disdain than even our most aggressive enemies. Honestly. The rhetoric of Hugo Chavez and the rhetoric of the Tea Party populist mosh pit aren't all that far apart.

Yet there's a reason for this, one that whupped me upside the head this morning as I tossed back my coffee. The tides of corporate political action committee giving have begun to roll in for the 2010 election season, and it's a tide that is strongly favoring the G.O.P. This is, given the anti-incumbent mood, perhaps something to be expected. Republicans have always been the party that self-identifies as friendly to business. It's politics as usual.

What got me was that there's an official plan amongst the Republican leadership to court the giving of corporations. Again, not a surprise. Money, particularly in this era of unfettered corporate giving, pays for the oppo research and fabricated, media-driven controversies that win elections. To win, you need folks with deep, deep pockets. What the GOP is doing is, again, just the way the game is played.

But did they have to give their marketing strategy a name? I know, I know, every major military operation gets a name. It helps define the goal, and motivate people. But to name your strategy "Selling the Fight?" Somehow, marketing language here seems...well...more than a little telling. Yeah, we know you're for sale. But do you really need to don that tube top and short shorts and parade around in front of us?

Sigh.

Must our democracy be such a freakin' floozy?