I am stuck on how exactly to respond to the post by
Frank Schaeffer about Christianity Today's Mark Galli and his review of
the new film Hellbound. I was determined that I would simply let a comment by
me at his post stand as my reply, but having seen Frank's response to my reply
I think a bit more needs to be said. Before sharing my comment and his, a bit
of background. I have written serious and sustained critiques of Christianity
Today on the subject of Samuel Rodriguez and Heidi Baker. Anyone who reads my work knows
that I believe serious, thoughtful analysis and criticism of Christian media is
important and necessary. I have been very frustrated with their coverage of
many issues and I believe that they deserve to be challenged on things, but I
firmly believe that there is a difference between thoughtful criticism and demagoguery.
Here is one definition of a demagogue: "A leader who obtains power by
means of impassioned appeals to the emotions and prejudices of the
populace." I think Frank would admit that for many years his work fit that
defintion. The question, and I think it is a serious one for Progressive
Christians at Patheos to consider, is whether or not Frank is not still a
demogague though this time with a different "populace" with different "prejudices" to appeal to. His Patheos column from
last week entitled "Everything You Always Hated About Christianity
Today (But Were Afraid to Say)" is perhaps the clearest example of how the progressive Schaeffer still employs the same rhetorical knife he used in the past (see
also his Huffington Post column on the film entitled "Pro-Hell Evangelical Bastion Smears New Movie Because it
is Anti-Hell"). I will leave it to you the reader to take in
his full column and decide for yourself, but here are key quotes from it that I
think point to a man still in the style of a demagogue.
1. Christianity Today workers are "keepers
of the flame of second-rate Christianity" and CT is "a little obscure rag
on the Christian right that wouldn’t know a nuance if one bit them."
2. On CT's Mark Galli: "how odd and yet
somehow typical that Christianity Today would assign this
review to Mark Galli, senior managing editor of Christianity Today and
author of God Wins, a book that simultaneously tried to cash in on
the best-selling title Love Wins while at the same time “answering”
the book in order to defend the evangelical establishment view of a literal
hell, say the kind of hell all those Jews gassed in WWII went to seconds after
they died because they never 'accepted Jesus.'...I guess that’s the best
you can expect when CT assigns a professional theologian with a personal
commercial ax to grind rather than a professional film reviewer to the
case...Overall I would say Mark Galli is really upset he wasn’t interviewed.
This review sounds a lot like a “What about me?” protest."
3. In his Huffington Post version of his article Frank
says "you have to wonder what's wrong with a
'Christian' publication so attached to hell that they have to smear a
great new movie -- even lie about it -- to make a pro-hell point. Christianity Today magazine
is the send-all-the-sinners-to-hell gatekeeper of the evangelical
establishment. And they are trying to stop their evangelical readers from even
considering the anti-hell, anti-damnation, anti-retribution version of our
collective human destiny"
In response to his article I posted this comment at his blog: "I have criticized
different columns/articles from Christianity Today before and I have definitely
had and still have at times great frustration with things there, but this
response is so vicious and so wide-ranging as to cry out for a deeper
explanation from you for you and your father’s disdain for the magazine. I also
have to say that the Mark Galli you describe here is not the Mark Galli I know.
Even when I disagree with him or his editing, I never sense in him the kind of
craven, egotistical man you paint here before us. Instead, what I see in this piece
is more of the same painfully raw wounds in Frank’s soul. I pray for you,
brother. It feels sometimes that you have just replaced one group of people
that you hate with another group of people that you hate, but the hate is still
there. Please try to disagree agreeably. This is not modeling a deeper
spirituality or a vision of journalism any better in anyway than what CT, warts
and all, provides."
This is Frank's reply: "I think it is time for
evangelicals who want to play critic to grow up. I think you should read the
posts by me and others on Huffington Post where I live most of the time pro or
con and use that perspective when reading my post, not Sunday school etiquette.
If CT wants to play critic of movies being released into the larger culture then
they should bring knives and forks to the food fight. Where have you been
living? All the sobbing over tone is odd. This was an answer to a movie review
by a crumby little mag. Why should I have been nicer? CT is a multi-million
operation, not the old lady down the street."
I have to say that Frank's response baffles me. Of course context matters and of course harsh criticism is in order at times. But perhaps I don't want to believe that Christians should ever want to resort to a "food fight" or use of "knives" that reflect the larger culture, but rather I want to imagine a world in which we as Christians don't view questions about how we say things as "sobbing over tone" but rather as honest attempts to be sure that we "speak the truth in love." Am I missing the boat on this? Am I going too far
the other way in calling Schaeffer’s work an example of demagoguery? I freely
admit that I am biased in my view of Schaeffer because I was so hurt by the work
he did for many years on the religious right and later as a kind of “Orthodox
fundamentalist” against Catholicism. Am I allowing that bitterness to taint my
view of him now? Or am I just able to see that having been hurt by him in the
past I can now see that even if his politics aligns with mine I can’t ignore
his similar use of inflammatory, simplistic rhetoric?
UPDATE: This is how Frank responded to another person who commented with concerns about his tone. "Again stop with the “tone” nonsense. I was answering a MOVIE review by a multi-million dollar organisation of bullies picking on one brave film maker. This ain’t Sunday school Lee. It doesn’t even have anything to do with religion. It has to do with a vast establishment protecting its corporate ass. Sticking up for CT in this context is like sticking up for Bain Capital or the Koch brothers in the context of politics. Get real and quit hand wringing."
Dear Mr. Metzger,
ReplyDeleteI wrote something in this space the other night only to withdraw it at the last moment. I may still post it, but for now I simply want to let you know that I've paid attention.
Over the past week or so I've been reading some of Mr. Schaeffer's online essays and several words come to mind: anger, bitterness, envy, resentment (and ressentiment), jealousy, petulance, yearning, craving, need. All these, and more, come to the fore while reading him. (Permit me to add irrational, judgmental, and crude to the list.)
It shouldn't puzzle you, if it does, that Mr. Schaeffer will not engage with you further on this matter. He is right and all others are wrong. It's fairly simple arithmetic. You do not agree with him. Therefore you have to be wrong. Or something like that.
Does this mean he's a demagogue? I have no idea. But he is not going to fight a fair fight. He's not going to reason with you; and he's not likely to consider any slights against him as having merit -- unless the slights come from the evangelical "bastion" he damns as a worthless rag. He dismissed your suggestion that civility might be commendable by denigrating that suggestion as "Sunday school etiiquette". His dismissal, if not irrational, is at least a hoot.
All in all I think you are left to yourself to figure out Mr. Schaeffer's reply to you. I can only say to you what I've said, and that his silence and avoidance can only mean that you will never get the answer you seek.
Peace to you.
BG
Thanks, Bill, for the reflection on Frank from your reading of him and his interactions with others. I don't expect a reply from him and I continue to try and do what I said I would do in my comment at his post--pray for him. He has been through much in his life that I don't understand. It has left him in a place that seems to leave little room for non-cartoonish readings of people and institutions.
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