Godbeat

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Anatomy of a scandal: What's next for journalists working on the Ravi Zacharias fallout?

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Anatomy of a scandal: What's next for journalists working on the Ravi Zacharias fallout?

File this memo under “be careful what you wish for.”

Those planning last May's funeral for evangelical star Ravi Zacharias were pleased to obtain live-streamed tributes from celebrities like Vice President Mike Pence and athlete Tim Tebow. Those outside the oft-disdained evangelical subculture may not comprehend the esteem Zacharias won by turning "apologetics" (defense of the Christian faith) from defensive bombast to intelligent and personable persuasion through books, countless personal appearances worldwide and the global team of some 100 speakers he built.

Presidential Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany teared up as she told CBN News that Zacharias equipped multitudes so "you didn’t have to check your brain at the door when you became a Christian." She concluded, "Rest assured, his legacy will always be here and he will continue to change lives."

That encapsulates the drama of this harder-they-fall saga.

All the posthumous praise for Zacharias shocked one onlooker, a massage therapist who says he groped her, masturbated in her presence and asked her for sexualized photos. She searched his name online, contacted Steve Baughman of the hyper-hostile RaviWatch.com and then spoke with Daniel Silliman, news editor of the evangelical magazine Christianity Today.

Silliman's resulting investigation found three victimized massage therapists and provoked fury among some staffers and beyond, eventually forcing Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM) to drop its kid-gloves response and commission a totally independent investigation by a major Atlanta law firm, Miller & Martin.

Media analysts should understand that it takes far more guts for an evangelical magazine that survives on donors and advertisers to expose such situations than a metropolitan newspaper. Upshot: Silliman and colleagues can take satisfaction in distinguished service to the Christian constituency — which echoes those utterly candid authors of the Bible. [Disclosure: The Guy was this magazine's news editor early in his career.]

As agreed, RZIM released the attorneys' full findings on Feb. 9 (click here for .pdf) and they were mind-numbing. Christianity Today's lede had this socko summation:


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Ravi Zacharias scandal shows why independent ministries are so difficult to investigate

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Ravi Zacharias scandal shows why independent ministries are so difficult to investigate

If you have followed the Ravi Zacharias story in recent years, you know that it’s a tragedy on multiple levels and a reminder of why repentance is a crucial element of orthodox Christianity.

I followed this story at a distance, because — unlike many religion-beat pros — I had next to zero contact with Zacharias. I interviewed him only once, by telephone, several decades ago. I thought that he was clever, especially when addressing Hollywood’s trendy take on Eastern religions (“Only in America would anyone argue that reincarnation is Good News).”

The stunning, sordid details of his abuse of women make it clear that he suffered from some kind of sexual addiction. And while his mind was razor-sharp when dissecting many questions about moral theology and ethics, he also used his intellectual gifts to justify his own behavior — to the point of saying that God was blessing his actions.

What can we learn from the news coverage of this scandal?

First of all, it’s a good example of what happens when editors allow religion-beat professionals to cover important stories on their beat. Second, the reporting — in Christianity Today and also in the mainstream press — is devastating because it is based on mountains of documentation and on-the-record sources, as well as the testimonies of victims who deserve privacy.

However, there is a third point that must be emphasized, echoing a point frequently made at GetReligion for nearly two decades. I repeat this as a way of stressing one of the biggest challenges facing journalists — even veteran religion-beat pros — covering stories of this kind.

The fall of Zacharias is a perfect example of why it is so difficult to cover independent, non-denominational parachurch ministries (and independent congregations, as well). Nine times out of 10, radically independent religious organizations are only as honest as their charismatic, gifted, rainmaker founders allow them to be. This is true whether we are talking yoga or the prosperity anti-gospel. It was true long ago when I worked with skilled investigative reporters trying to probe the hidden scandals of PTL’s Jim Bakker. Alas, this remains true today.

Hold that thought, because we will come back to it.

Readers who want to know the horrifying details of this case can start with Christianity Today or with The New York Times. Here is the summary material from CT:


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Supreme Court justices are not singing the same religious liberty tune during pandemic

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Supreme Court justices are not singing the same religious liberty tune during pandemic

Legal battles over pandemic-era worship gatherings rage on.

Last October’s confirmation of Justice Amy Coney Barrett flipped the U.S. Supreme Court’s script on such questions.

The latest ruling came last Friday night: A 6-3 order stopped California’s ban on indoor worship in most of the nation’s most populous state. But the justices allowed a 25 percent capacity limit to remain.

Perhaps most interestingly, the majority said California can keep prohibiting singing and chanting. For now.

On the singing issue, the justices sang several different tunes:

• Chief Justice John Roberts: “The State has concluded … that singing indoors poses a heightened risk of transmitting COVID–19. I see no basis in this record for overriding that aspect of the state public health framework.”

• Barrett, joined by Justice Brett Kavanaugh: “Of course, if a chorister can sing in a Hollywood studio but not in her church, California’s regulations cannot be viewed as neutral. But the record is uncertain. … (H)owever, the applicants remain free to show that the singing ban is not generally applicable and to advance their claim accordingly.”

• Justice Neil Gorsuch, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito: “California has sensibly expressed concern that singing may be a particularly potent way to transmit the disease. … But, on further inspection, the singing ban may not be what it first appears. It seems California’s powerful entertainment industry has won an exemption. So, once more, we appear to have a State playing favorites … expending considerable effort to protect lucrative industries (casinos in Nevada; movie studios in California) while denying similar largesse to its faithful.”


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In the age of COVID-19, it's impossible for clergy to avoid wrestling with the internet

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In the age of COVID-19, it's impossible for clergy to avoid wrestling with the internet

Even before the coronavirus crisis, this question haunted pastors: What in God's name are we supposed to do with the internet?

American clergy aren't the only ones wrestling with this puzzle. Consider this advice -- from Moscow -- about online personality cults.

"A priest, sometimes very young, begins to think that he is an experienced pastor -- so many subscribers! -- able to answer the many questions that come to him in virtual reality," noted Patriarch Kirill, leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, at a recent diocesan conference. "Such clerics often lose the ability to accept any criticism, and not only on the internet, or respond to objections with endless arguments."

Pastors eventually have to ask, he added, if their online work is leading people through parish doors and into face-to-face faith communities.

"That is the question of the hour, for sure," said Savannah Kimberlin, director of published research for the Barna Group. Recent surveys have convinced Barna researchers that "the future church will be a blend of digital and in-person work. But it's up to us to decide what that will look like. …

"But isn't that true of our society as a whole? There are digital solutions for so many issues in our lives, right now. … But we can also see people yearning for more than that -- for experiences of contact with others in a community."

In a recent survey, 81% of churchgoing adults affirmed that "experiencing God alongside others" was very important to them, she said. At the same time, a majority of those surveyed said they hoped their congregations would continue some forms of online ministry in the future.

Similar paradoxes emerge when researchers studied evangelistic efforts to reach people who are "unchurched" or completely disconnected from religious institutions.

Half of all unchurched adults (52%), along with 73% of non-Christians, said they are not interested in invitations to church activities. However, a new Barna survey -- cooperating with Alpha USA, a nondenominational outreach group -- found that 41% of non-Christians said they were open to "spiritual conversations about Christianity" if the setting felt friendly.

Online forums and streamed events -- experienced at home, with viewers in control -- may offer some newcomers the flexibility and "safety" that they want.


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Did the January 6th riot at the U.S. Capitol involve Christian 'heresy' or was it 'apostasy'?

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Did the January 6th riot at the U.S. Capitol involve Christian 'heresy' or was it 'apostasy'?

THE QUESTION:

Did the January 6th Capitol riot involve Christian “heresy” or “apostasy”?

THE RELIGION GUY’S ANSWER:

The U.S. Senate may have debated whether ex-President Donald Trump bears responsibility for the Jan. 6 riot at U.S. Capitol, but certain conservative Christians focused instead on his followers. They propose that the final day of Trump’s campaign to overturn President Biden’s December 14 Electoral College victory involved religious “heresy” or “apostasy.”

Those leveling this charge are not #NeverTrump politicians or pundits but devout and conservative Christians. That may seem surprising because in the media and the public mind the “religious right” fuses with devotion to Trump. But such thinkers take doctrine and biblical teaching seriously (unlike religious liberals who define political sins while ignoring theological errors).

A survey by the conservative American Enterprise Institute shows 63% of white evangelicals think Biden’s win was illegitimate, despite the numerous federal and state court rulings that found no evidence for Trump’s claim of a “sacred landslide.” But to what extent were Christians implicated in the Capitol mayhem?

As weeks roll on, we’re learning how a radical fringe planned the Capitol attack in advance and energized the crowd that Trump assembled and addressed.

Terry Mattingly of GetReligion.org distinguishes among four groups: The horde that Trump assembled to hear his demand that Congress and Vice President Mike Pence somehow overthrow Biden’s election; those who obeyed Trump’s plea to march on the Capitol; the militant marchers who broke into the security zone, but only protested outside the Capitol; and the smaller, violent, and foul-mouthed mob that desecrated this potent symbol of democracy across the globe.

Regarding that fourth group, Tony Carnes, editor of the A Journey Through NYC Religions website observed that, “no pastors, priests, or other organized religious leaders have been identified so far as part of the riot.” Mattingly wondered where’s the evidence that links a legal protest that evolved into insurrection with “evangelical networks and institutions.” And yet, videos do capture some incongruous Christian symbols and prayers that mingled with the homicide, threats to kill national leaders, injuries to 138 police, vandalism and theft.


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New podcast: 'Screen' culture tied to loneliness; can clergy build bridges with same tech?

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New podcast: 'Screen' culture tied to loneliness; can clergy build bridges with same tech?

The coronavirus pandemic has created a wide variety of religion-beat stories — from empty local pews to the U.S. Supreme Court debating how many people can occupy local pews. And sometimes it feels like all roads during this crisis, for better or worse, lead to the internet.

Yes, we had lots of ground to cover in this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (click here to tune that in).

Empty local pews have, in some cases, led to near-empty offering plates. Leaders in religious groups that were struggling before COVID-19 — look for closing congregations, seminaries, colleges and even cathedrals — are now hearing the demographics clock tick, tick, tick even louder.

We’re talking about huge stories, but they are also stories that are hard for journalists to cover, simply because they require information at the local, regional and national levels.

It was easy to cover local clergypersons as they learned to mount smartphones atop camera tripods and stream worship services to their locked-down flocks (as opposed to megachurches that already had cameras and massive websites). It was also easier to cover black-sheep clergy that rebelled against social-distancing guidelines than it was to report on the remarkable efforts of leaders in entire denominations and religious traditions seek ways for their people to worship as best they could within constantly evolving (and often hostile) government guidelines.

Journalists, of course, were also being affected by lockdowns and, in some cases, budget cuts. This was an equal-opportunity crisis.

Let me give you an example of an important story that everyone knows is unfolding right now. Consider this Baptist Press headline: “Pandemic division causing pastors to leave ministry, pastoral mentor says.” Here is the overture:

Brian Croft jokes that masks are the new “color of the carpet argument” in churches, with similarly poor outcomes. Pastors are resigning from the stress “kind of in a way I’ve never really seen.”

The founder of Practical Shepherding transitioned from fulltime pastoring to lead the shepherding outreach fulltime in January, pulled by a need for coaching and counseling that has steadily increased among pastors over the past decade.

Then came COVID-19.


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Protestants in pulpits say that the QAnon era is creating tension in many pews

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Protestants in pulpits say that the QAnon era is creating tension in many pews

Having reached the vice president's chair in the U.S. Senate, the self-proclaimed QAnon shaman, UFO expert and metaphysical healer removed his coyote-skin and buffalo horns headdress and announced, with a megaphone, that it was time to pray.

"Thank you, Heavenly Father … for this opportunity to stand up for our God-given inalienable rights," proclaimed Jake "Yellowstone Wolf" Angeli (born Jacob Chansley), his face painted red, white and blue and his torso tattooed with Norse symbols that his critics link to the extreme right.

“Thank you, divine, omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent Creator God for filling this chamber with your white light and love," he added, in a prayer captured on video by correspondent working for The New Yorker. "Thank you for filling this chamber with patriots that love you and that love Christ. …

"Thank you, divine Creator God for surrounding and filling us with the divine, omnipresent white light of love and protection, of peace and harmony. Thank you for allowing the United States of America to be reborn. Thank you for allowing us to get rid of the communists, the globalists and the traitors within our government."

Many phrases in this rambling prayer would sound familiar to worshippers in ordinary churches across America, said Joe Carter, an editor with The Gospel Coalition and a pastor with McLean Bible Church near Washington, D.C. But the prayer also included strange twists and turns that betrayed some extreme influences and agendas.

"This is a man who has described himself as pagan, as an ordained minister, in fact," said Carter, reached by telephone. "The alt-right has always included some pagan influences. But now it's obvious that leaders with QAnon and other conspiracy theorists have learned that if they toss in some Christian imagery, then they'll really expand their base and their potential reach 100-fold."

Law-enforcement officials will soon present evidence attempting to prove who planned key elements of the illegal riot that crashed into the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, after the legal "March to Save America" backing former President Donald Trump's claim that fraud cost him the White House.

This is just the latest example of how conspiracy theories, on the left and right, have soaked into public discourse about COVID-19 vaccines, Big Tech monopolies, sinister human-trafficking networks and, of course, alleged illegal activities in the 2016 and 2020 elections.

There is no way to deny that this digital tornado has shaken many Protestant churches, according to a new Lifeway Research survey that asked clergy to respond to this statement: "I frequently hear members of my congregation repeating conspiracy theories they have heard about why something is happening in our country."


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Spot the link between Trump ally Sen. Josh Hawley and hot 5th Century Christian dispute?

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Spot the link between Trump ally Sen. Josh Hawley and hot 5th Century Christian dispute?

THE QUESTION:

How is Trump ally Sen. Josh Hawley linked with 5th Century Christianity’s hottest dispute?

THE RELIGION GUY’S ANSWER:

New York Times contributor Katherine Stewart doesn’t care much for conservative Christians.

Consider the subtitle of her 2012 book “The Good News Club: The Christian Right’s Stealth Assault on America’s Children.” (Actually, these non-political after-school clubs operate openly, and participation is voluntary.) Last year, she wrote the timely “The Power Worshippers: Inside the Dangerous Rise of Religious Nationalism.”

Stewart’s latest Times op-ed article (“The Roots of Josh Hawley’s Rage”) decries U.S. Senator Josh Hawley’s clenched-fist backing for President Trump’s attempt to have Congress overturn the 2020 election that culminated in the U.S. Capitol riot, Trump’s second impeachment and multitudes of criminal investigations.

The controversial 42-year-old is a Stanford and Yale Law alumnus whose rapid rise included clerking for Chief Justice Roberts and just two years as Missouri’s attorney general before winning his U.S. Senate seat. Pundits assume he’ll seek the presidency in 2024 if Trump does not or cannot run.

Hawley tells World magazine he is part of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, he was formerly a staff attorney with the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty and some count him among Capitol Hill’s most devout figures.

Stewart makes the surprising assertion that to understand the senator’s role in the unprecedented furies of recent weeks we must look back 16 centuries to one of the hottest theological disputes in Christian history.


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New podcast: Are tensions between Speaker Pelosi and her archbishop a valid news story?

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New podcast: Are tensions between Speaker Pelosi and her archbishop a valid news story?

The following is not a hypothetical case or a parable. This is the heart of the news story that was the hook for this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (click here to tune that in).

Step one: Speaker Nancy Pelosi was a guest on Hillary Clinton’s “You and Me Both” podcast. As you would expect, since this was recorded a week after the stunning January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol, they spent some time discussing their views on the Donald Trump years.

This led to a discussion about the choices made by pro-life voters in the 2016 election. Here is some crucial material from a Catholic News Agency story about the exchange.

… House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said that support of pro-life voters for former President Donald Trump was an issue that “gives me great grief as a Catholic.”

“I think that Donald Trump is president because of the issue of a woman’s right to choose,” she said of abortion, implying that pro-life voters boosted Trump to victory in 2016. She added that these voters “were willing to sell the whole democracy down the river for that one issue.”

Other than the “sellout” implication, the key phrase there is “as a Catholic.”

Step two: The archbishop who — canonically speaking — is charged with overseeing Pelosi’s life as a Catholic believer was not amused by this assertion. Here is another chunk of that CNA report.

“No Catholic in good conscience can favor abortion,” said Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco, Pelosi’s home diocese. … “Our land is soaked with the blood of the innocent, and it must stop.”

Pelosi has long supported abortion despite her Catholic faith. In 2008, she said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” regarding when life begins, “over the centuries, the doctors of the church have not been able to make that definition.” She said that her Catholic faith “shouldn’t have an impact on a woman’s right to choose.” …

Archbishop Cordileone clarified that "Nancy Pelosi does not speak for the Catholic Church. … And on the question of the equal dignity of human life in the womb, she [Pelosi] also speaks in direct contradiction to a fundamental human right that Catholic teaching has consistently championed for 2,000 years.” …

Step three: Write a mainstream news story?


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