21AR26-25

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AR 26:25 - Have "modern white evangelicals remade their faith"?

In this issue:

APOLOGETICS - "Is Christianity outdated, maybe even harmful?"

ARCHAEOLOGY - "Best Popular Book" on Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls

BUDDHISM - the flow of "goods and services" between clergy and laity

EVANGELICALISM - ministries that are failing in transparency and accountability

+ replacing Jesus with an "idol of rugged masculinity"?

Apologia Report 26:25 (1,530)
June 22, 2021

APOLOGETICS

Questioning Christianity: Is There More to the Story?, by Dan Paterson <www.bit.ly/3gC6VNa> and Rian Roux <www.bit.ly/2SDEnuM> [1] -- Moody Press asks: "Have you ever seriously questioned Christianity? If so, you're not alone. A lot of people have wondered if this faith is outdated ... irrelevant ... maybe even harmful. But what if everything is not as it seems? What if there's more to the story? Questioning Christianity explores the nature and relevance of the Christian story in an accessible and compelling way. No slogans. No politics. No simple solutions to complex problems. After many years of exploring issues of faith with skeptics, seekers, and new believers, Dan Paterson and Rian Roux serve as guides to help you navigate what can be a disorienting and confusing journey. Perhaps you're feeling lost, unable to find your bearings, and you need some help to map out the terrain around you. Or maybe you've encountered obstacles and have hard questions that need to be addressed before you can move ahead. Whatever it is that has made you curious about this faith, there are good answers waiting to be discovered. So go ahead. Question Christianity. Just give Christianity the chance to answer back."

It comes with noteworthy endorsements from Sam Allberry (The Gospel Coalition) and Amy Orr-Ewing (President, Oxford Centre for Christian Apologetics), among others.

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ARCHAEOLOGY

Eerdmans wants you to know that The Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls, by Jodi Magness <jodimagness.org> [2] is a "Choice Outstanding Academic Title and winner of the Biblical Archaeology Society's Publication Award for Best Popular Book [about] the most important archaeological discovery of the twentieth century."

Magness (Religious Studies, UNC Chapel Hill) "provides an overview of the archaeology of Qumran that incorporates information from the Dead Sea Scrolls and other contemporary sources. ... By carefully analyzing the published information on Qumran, she refines the site's chronology, reinterprets the purpose of some of its rooms, and reexamines archaeological evidence for the presence of women and children in the settlement. ... Considered a standard text in the field for nearly two decades, [it has been] revised and updated ... in light of the publication of all the Dead Sea Scrolls and additional data from Roland de Vaux's excavations, as well as Yitzhak Magen and Yuval Peleg's more recent excavations."

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BUDDHISM

Monks, Money, and Morality: The Balancing Act of Contemporary Buddhism, Saskia Abrahms-Kavunenko, Christoph Brumann, and Beata Switek, eds. [3] -- Bloomsbury Academic explains that the book "focuses on the material and financial relations of contemporary monks, temples, and laypeople. It shows that rather than being peripheral, economic exchanges are key to religious debate in Buddhist societies. Based on long-term ethnographic fieldwork in countries ranging from India to Japan, including all three major Buddhist traditions, the book addresses the flows of goods and services between clergy and laity, the management of resources, the treatment of money, and the role of the state in temple economies. Along with documenting ritual and economic practices, these accounts deal with the moral challenges that Buddhist adherents are facing today, thereby bringing lived experience to the study of an often-romanticized religion."

For more on Buddhist tradition from past issues of AR, see <www.bit.ly/3cMHNlD>

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EVANGELICALISM

MinistryWatch "profiles public charities, church and parachurch ministries" in order to help members of the public "learn about how to be a responsible giver." The organization provides the public with timely information on "organizations alleging to be charitable and [their] key leadership in order to identify materially misleading behavior, or wasteful spending practices." It also helps by identifying and highlighting "organizations that are above board and running efficiently.

Furthermore, MinistryWatch seeks to "limit consequences of scams and [prevent] fraudulent activity, promote better allocations of giving, encourage intelligent questions of organizational structure, financial health, and advance the idea of organizational transparency and best practices."

Their May 3rd "Ministries With an 'F' Transparency Grade" report <www.bit.ly/3xlxuNk> has far too many familiar organizations leading the pack. No wonder Christianity gets smeared in so many public forums. Among the top offenders:

* - Benny Hinn Ministries

* - Breakthrough Ministries / Rod Parsley

* - Creflo Dollar Ministries

* - Fred Price/ Crenshaw Christian Center

* - John Hagee Ministries

* - Kenneth Hagin Ministries

* - TD Jakes Ministries / Potters House

* - Joel Osteen / Lakewood Church

* - Revival Ministries International/Rodney Howard-Browne

* - Wisdom Center/Mike Murdock

The latest book by MinistryWatch president Warren Cole Smith (formerly of World Magazine) is Faith-Based Fraud: Learning from the Great Religious Scandals of Our Time [4].

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Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation, by Kristin Kobes Du Mez [5] -- publisher Liveright proudly calls this a "revisionist history of the last seventy-five years of white evangelicalism, revealing how evangelicals have worked to replace the Jesus of the Gospels with an idol of rugged masculinity and Christian nationalism - or in the words of one modern chaplain, with 'a spiritual badass.'"

As Kristin Du Mez <kristindumez.com> helpfully explains, "the key to understanding this transformation is to recognize the centrality of popular culture in contemporary American evangelicalism. Many of today's evangelicals might not be theologically astute, but they know their VeggieTales, they've read John Eldredge's Wild at Heart, and they learned about purity before they learned about sex - and they have a silver ring to prove it. Evangelical books, films, music, clothing, and merchandise shape the beliefs of millions. And evangelical culture is teeming with muscular heroes - mythical warriors and rugged soldiers, men like Oliver North, Ronald Reagan, Mel Gibson, and the Duck Dynasty clan, who assert white masculine power in defense of 'Christian America.' Chief among these evangelical legends is John Wayne, an icon of a lost time when men were uncowed by political correctness, unafraid to tell it like it was, and did what needed to be done."

Boldly breaking new ground, Du Mez challenges "the commonly held assumption that the 'moral majority' backed Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020 for purely pragmatic reasons, [and] reveals that Trump in fact represented the fulfillment, rather than the betrayal, of white evangelicals' most deeply held values: patriarchy, authoritarian rule, aggressive foreign policy, fear of Islam, ambivalence toward #MeToo, and opposition to Black Lives Matter and the LGBTQ community. A much-needed reexamination of perhaps the most influential subculture in this country, Jesus and John Wayne shows that, far from adhering to biblical principles, modern white evangelicals have remade their faith, with enduring consequences for all Americans."

For more skeptical appraisals, see (for example) two reviews on Mere Orthodoxy: "Missing the Subtler Yet Greater Problem: Replying to 'Jesus and John Wayne,'" by Kirsten Sanders <www.bit.ly/3wKhKnc> (Jan 27, '21); and "Accusations Aren't Evidence: Responding to 'Jesus and John Wayne'" by Jamie Carlson <www.bit.ly/3d1cOCs> (Jan 27, '21). You'll find an even less charitable view <www.bit.ly/3xBYUi6> in Anne Kennedy, "Jesus and John Wayne: A Fair Portrait of Evangelicalism?." ("By taking sincerely held theological and ethical beliefs off the table as possible motives for voting habits and replacing them with supposedly toxic masculine consumerism, Du Mez doesn't have to deal with what many Christians in America actually believe.")

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SOURCES: Monographs

1 - Questioning Christianity: Is There More to the Story? by Dan Paterson and Rian Roux (Moody, 2021, paperback, 176 pages) <www.bit.ly/3q8poFC>

2 - The Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls, by Jodi Magness (Eerdmans, 2021, paperback, 340 pages) <www.bit.ly/3wsj2mJ>

3 - Monks, Money, and Morality: The Balancing Act of Contemporary Buddhism, Saskia Abrahms-Kavunenko, Christoph Brumann, and Beata Switek, eds. (Bloomsbury, 2021, paperback, 264 pages) <www.bit.ly/3gBrdqd>

4 - Faith-Based Fraud: Learning from the Great Religious Scandals of Our Time, by Warren Cole Smith (WildBlue Press, 2021, paperback, 302 pages) <www.bit.ly/3gW7lxX>

5 - Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation, by Kristin Kobes Du Mez (Liveright, 2021, paperback, 358 pages) <www.bit.ly/3wCtLuU>

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