Here we go again. This week’s “Crossroads” podcast (click here to tune that in) offers yet another journey into the world of QAnon and its impact in American pews.
All the evidence is that this subject is not going away, even as it gets more complex. See this week’s post entitled, “The New York Times looks at QAnon leader who is, wait, a Manhattan mystic from Harvard?” Some interesting court trials loom ahead, no doubt, after the January 6th riot at the U.S. Capitol.
Still, if you were looking for a thesis statement that captures how elite American newsrooms view QAnon, and the red-hot topic of conspiracy theories in general, it would be a bite of revealed truth drawn from the must-read “Shadowlands” package published last June by The Atlantic. In “The Prophecies of Q,” author Adrienne LaFrance claimed that QAnon is an emerging sect that is defined by its evangelical hopes and dreams, since the “language of evangelical Christianity has come to define the Q movement.”
In a GetReligion post at the time (“The Atlantic probes QAnon sect and finds (#shocking) another evangelical-ish conspiracy“) I offered my own opinion on that:
There are times, when reading the sprawling “Shadowland” package … when one is tempted to think that the goal was to weave a massive liberal conspiracy theory about the role that conservative conspiracy theories play in Donald Trump’s America.
At the center of this drama — of course — is evangelical Christianity. After all, evangelical Christians are to blame for Trump’s victory, even if they didn’t swing all those crucial states in the Catholic-labor Rust Belt.
It’s almost as if evangelicals are playing, for some strategic minds on the left, the same sick, oversized role in American life that some evangelicals assign to Hillary Clinton, George Soros, Bill Gates and all those liberal Southern Baptist intellectuals who love Johnny Cash and Jane Austen.
That’s still half of what I think on this topic.
It is certainly true that (a) leaders of the “political cult” called QAnon — to use a term from a must-read Joe Carter FAQ on this topic — speak fluent evangelical and that (b) the gospel according to Q and similar conspiracy heresies have influenced many people in pews (including some who traveled to the National Mall for Trump’s March to Save America rally).
That’s an important, ongoing story that must be covered. However, I am still waiting to see evidence supporting this amazing New York Times statement about the Christians who were numbered among the rioters who shouted “Hang Mike Pence!” as they crashed into the U.S. Capitol (as opposed to those who attended the legal Trump rally):
The blend of cultural references, and the people who brought them, made clear a phenomenon that has been brewing for years now: that the most extreme corners of support for Mr. Trump have become inextricable from some parts of white evangelical power in America. Rather than completely separate strands of support, these groups have become increasingly blended together.
The word “some” is important, in the phrase “some parts of white evangelical power in America.” However, I still haven’t seen on-the-record evidence linking those who planned the Capitol attack — or even voices found in QAnon chatter — to actual structures of evangelical power, such as denominations, parachurch groups, megachurch pulpits and academic institutions.
Some of that factual material may emerge in court testimony in the next year or so. That is certainly a news topic worth investigating.
Meanwhile, it’s clear that conspiracy-theory culture has creeped into many pews and complicated life for clergy in pulpits.
Check out this chunk of a new Lifeway Research press release:
A new study from Nashville-based Lifeway Research finds 49% of U.S. Protestant pastors say they frequently hear members of their congregation repeating conspiracy theories they have heard about why something is happening in our country. Around 1 in 8 (13%) strongly agree their congregants are sharing conspiracy theories, defined by Merriam-Webster as “a theory that explains an event or set of circumstances as the result of a secret plot by usually powerful conspirators.”
Another 47% disagree, including 26% who strongly disagree, saying they do not often hear church members sharing such ideas. One in 20 (5%) are not sure.
Here’s a question that reporters could ask: What are the leaders of evangelical institutions going to do in response to this trend?
I would argue that this poll offers more evidence of a divide between some — repeat “some” — people in pews and the leaders of their churches and denominations. However, it is also a sign that few, if any, religious leaders are paying much attention to the impact of mass media, digital technology and popular culture on the lives of their people (a topic at the heart of the main Denver Seminary course that I taught back in the early 1990s). That isn’t just an evangelical problem, of course.
I was struck by this passage in a recent essay at The Atlantic (“QAnon Is Destroying the GOP From Within”) by U.S. Sen. Ben Sasse of Nebraska, under the subtitle, “America’s junk-food media diet.” As you read this, think about religious believers instead of generic Republicans (and others):
The way Americans are consuming and producing news — or what passes for it these days — is driving us mad. This has been said many times, but the problem has worsened in the past five years. On the supply side, media outlets have discovered that dialing up the rhetoric increases clicks, eyeballs, and revenue. On the demand side, readers and viewers like to see their opinions affirmed, rather than challenged. When everybody’s outraged, everybody wins — at least in the short term.
This is not a problem only on the right or only on obscure blogs. The underlying economics that drive Fox News and upstarts such as One America News to cultivate and serve ideologically distinct audiences also drive MSNBC, CNN, and The New York Times. More and more fiercely, media outlets rally their audience behind the latest cause du jour, whether it’s battling supposed election fraud or abolishing local police departments.
The conservative swaths of this media landscape were primed for Trump’s “Stop the steal” lie, which lit the fuse for the January 6 riot.
All that, and more, in this week’s podcast. Please give it a listen and pass it along to others. Your GetReligionistas appreciate your support.
FIRST IMAGE: Screenshot from YouTube video, “The Real Reason Conspiracy Theories Work.”