Evangelical shite Books

If I have never plugged Sojourners on this site, let me do so now, especially for those liberal/progressive Christians who find Jerry Falwell vomit-inducing. Here you will find people who are less concerned with their gay neighbors and much more concerned about global poverty and justice. This month's issue is a books issue and is especially good. So go read it, dammit. Or subscribe.

Over at the Parish, Greg is taking on Hank Hanegraaff (self-proclaimed Bible Answer man) and I wish him well. After reading this review in Sojourners last night, I realized that one of the things that leaves me most disheartened by contemporary evangelical "thought" is the crap that is sold by the bales at Bible "book" stores.

The author takes on the big sellers, like Bruce Wilkinson's Prayer of Jabez: "It may seem selfish, even un-Christian, to ask blessings for oneself. But Wilkinson thinks we’re just being priggish and unbiblical; God actually has blessings stacked up for us in heaven that tragically go ungiven if we fail to ask for them."

Or Laurie Beth Jones's book on Jesus as Life Coach: "My favorite example from this collection of campy, patronizing readings of scripture: "Even from the cross he was delegating: ‘Mary, this is your new son, John.’"

Gawd. WWJD? Powerpoint?

As Byassee put it: "I wish such uses of scripture were self-evidently ridiculous, but Jones’ sales success suggests they are not. Suffice it to say that an American business person whose "Individualized Education Plan" for himself included such "positive confrontation" with authorities that he and his "staff" wound up summarily excluded by their co-religionists and tortured to death by the state for high treason would not likely unearth the desire to go and do likewise from many "customers." Never mind how Jesus and his disciples wound up; Jones is doing swimmingly."

My personal favorite in this John Eldredge's Wild at Heart, which I have actually read. Well, parts of it anyway. It not so much sucked, as it totally sucked. The thing that annoyed me the most was Eldredge's ignorance of how many Americans have argued this same stuff. The Boy Scouts comes out of this fear that urban America was sucking the masculinity right out of men. More recently, as Susan Faludi articulates quite well in Stiffed, we have multiple examples of this masculine anxiety--from militia types, to guys beating on drums, to Promise Keepers practicing their latent homosexuality in stadiums, to people like Eldredge. I can deal with that. What bugs me is the blatant sexism implied in his work. Here is an example:

"That strength is so essential to men is also what makes them heroes," Eldredge writes. "If a neighborhood is safe, it’s because of the strength of men. Slavery was stopped by the strength of men, at a terrible price to them and their families. The Nazis were stopped by men. Apartheid wasn’t defeated by women.... And have we forgotten - it was a Man who let himself be nailed to Calvary’s cross."

Byassee notes how dangerous it is to see this masculinity as something to be worshiped. What bugs me is the blatant historical ignorance of it all. Slavery stopped by men? Maybe. What about the Grimke sisters and hundreds of other women who either actively campaigned against slavery and often framed the moral debate? As a man, I find Eldredge's arguments offensive and stupid. Really stupid. I understand that one of his books is ok, but this one sucks.