Evil Whites or Bad Families?
L.A. Justice,by Robert Vernon (Focus on the Family, 254 pp.; $17.99, hardcover);The Coming Race Wars? A Cry for Reconciliation,by William Pannell (Zondervan, 143 pp.; $9.99, paper). Reviewed by John Wilson, a writer in Pasadena, California.
In An Experiment in Criticism, C. S. Lewis argued that we read literature to experience “an enlargement of being.… Each of us by nature sees the whole world from one point of view with a perspective and a selectiveness peculiar to himself.… We want to see with other eyes, to imagine with other imaginations, to feel with other hearts, as well as with our own.”
Although Lewis’s subject was what he termed “strictly literary reading,” his conclusions apply to other reading as well. Consider the outpouring of books and articles occasioned by the 1992 Los Angeles riots. With few exceptions, to read these responses is to be stunned by their narrowness of vision. Still, however partial and inadequate their testimony, these voices deserve to be heard, for they challenge us to enlarge our own limited vision.
Two Christian responses to the riots provide a case in point: Robert Vernon’s L.A. Justice and William Pannell’s The Coming Race Wars? Both see what happened in L.A. as symptomatic of deep, widespread problems in American society. Both invoke Christian principles. They differ radically, however, in their diagnosis of the riots—and in just about everything else.
Vernon, the son of a career L.A. police officer, was a 37-year veteran when he retired from the LAPD in 1992, having reached the rank of assistant chief. Part one of his book (more than two-thirds of the whole) focuses on two subjects: the riots and the witchhunt conducted against him following unsubstantiated allegations that his religious beliefs were improperly influencing his job performance. (Vernon’s account of this latter affair is the most important section of his book; where were the civil libertarians when the target was a real, live “Christian fundamentalist”?)
In part two, Vernon attempts to identify the “true root causes” of the riots. “Poverty, racism, poor education, lack of job opportunities, and crime are very real concerns,” Vernon writes. “But there are deeper problems that cause these symptoms to appear.” Vernon contends that all of these “symptoms” ultimately derive from the breakdown of the family.
Thus, his proposal for a “federal family czar” who would support the ideal of the traditional family, “condemn behavior destructive to the family,” and ensure that government policies are “family friendly.” Indeed, Vernon concludes, “None of the other issues faced by our government will matter if our families continue to deteriorate. All else pales in importance.”
Why, then, not a federal sin czar, to address the most fundamental cause of our problems: our self-willed estrangement from God? Vernon’s proposal—its utter implausibility aside—suggests the narrow limits of his vision. Traditional family values desperately need to be encouraged—“Dan Quayle Was Right,” as a recent Atlantic cover story proclaimed—but in conjunction with policies that will address those “symptoms” that Vernon disposes of far too easily.
America’s “police state”
From a white police officer we turn to a black seminary professor. William Pannell, professor of preaching and practical theology at Fuller Theological Seminary, disagrees that the breakdown of “family values” is the best handle for understanding the riots.
While many Americans are oppressed by the constant threat of violent crime, with carjacking lately added to the menu, it is the police who most worry Pannell: “We are on the very brink of a police state wherein law and order will mean something far more aggressive than it did when Richard Nixon inhabited the White House.” Indeed, “This is really the generation that will fulfill Saul Alinsky’s dark prophecy of an America that moves into either a radical social change or an indigenous American fascism.”
Rarely has a book been so misleadingly subtitled: instead of “a cry for reconciliation,” Pannell’s book offers an indictment of white society, the white evangelical establishment, and white males, period. It is loaded with outrageous stereotypes and taunting sarcasm. For instance, here is Pannell on the effects of downward mobility on the American middle class: “The antidote for this growing sense of powerlessness among whites is more helpings of the same thing that caused the malady—more doses of the rightness of whiteness. What a burden that must be to have to be strong, nearly perfect, wise, adequate, brave, clean and reverent, exceptional—all those wonderful Boy Scout traits!”
In a later chapter, Pannell celebrates the efforts of practitioners of liberation theology to “rescue theology from the palsied grip of Euro-American scholars and churchmen.” Never mind the fact that the popular appeal of liberation theology in Latin America has been dwarfed by the impact of Protestant evangelicalism, or that “Euro-American scholars and churchmen” were among liberation theology’s most enthusiastic supporters.
In his introduction, it should be noted, Pannell himself acknowledges that his “argument is one-sided in the extreme.… But I believe it is important for me … that I say what I have to say, even if at times it smacks of bitterness and sounds unreasonable. If my words are unguarded, they are at least sincere.” For that very reason, it would be a mistake to ignore Pannell’s message.
Does he speak for all African Americans? No, and he does not claim to, but the reception of his book among black leaders suggests that he speaks for many. The explosive anger, the bitterness at promises unfulfilled—these are widespread in the black community.
Reading Coming Race Wars? we begin to see the world (and ourselves) through Pannell’s eyes. We may protest that the picture is grossly distorted, but such differences in perception can provide a starting point for dialogue and change.
“The primary impulse of each of us,” Lewis wrote, “is to maintain and aggrandise himself. The secondary impulse is to go out of the self, to correct its provincialism and heal its loneliness.” We need to listen to the policeman, to the seminary professor who doesn’t like “cops,” and to many other voices. And we need books that—unlike these two—are themselves the product of such listening.
A History Of Church Shopping
The Churching of America, 1776–1990: Winners and Losers in our Religious Economy,by Roger Finke and Rodney Stark (Rutgers University Press, xiv + 328 pp.; $22.95, hardcover). Reviewed by James A. Mathisen, associate professor of sociology, Wheaton College, Wheaton, Illinois.
For Easter Sunday 1990, a “Sunday supplement” to our newspaper carried a lead article on contemporary megachurches and the appeal they have for their congregants. “Happy customers from California to Maryland are eating up ‘fast-food religion’ this Easter.” Both intrigued and appalled, I read further that these Sunday services are designed as “a baited hook for the shoppers.”
This Madison Avenue approach to church life has now been elevated to an academic level. Sociologist Roger Finke and his mentor, Rodney Stark, argue in The Churching of America that it is not only appropriate but necessary to understand the church from a marketing perspective. They contend that “economic concepts such as markets, firms, market penetrations, and segmented markets” provide insights for understanding why some religious bodies fail and others succeed.
The result is a fascinating and provocative book—actually, books, since it is really two books wrapped into one. The first is a historical work. Finke and Stark have uncovered a variety of hitherto-unknown demographic sources that enable them to reconstruct likely rates of “religious adherence” since 1776 and thereby provide the basis for their market model. For example, between the Revolution and the Civil War, the rate of adherence more than doubled from 17 percent to 37 percent of the population. The problem is that for groups such as Congregationalists and Episcopalians, their “market shares” were declining from 20 percent to 4 percent, and from 16 percent to 3.5 percent, respectively, over the same period. By 1906, over half of the U.S. population was churched, and that rate inched upward to 62 percent by 1980.
The great rude awakening
Finke and Stark’s historical conclusions will alternately tickle the fancy and arouse the ire of serious scholars of American religion. They don the costume of “dragon slayers” to do battle with two of the most treasured explanations scholars employ for understanding the history of religion in America—secularization and awakenings.
The conventional secularization wisdom, as set forth by Peter Berger et al., says that the future of religion in the U.S. is precarious because of the culture’s pluralism, which inherently weakens the truth claims of any single religious tradition, including orthodox Christianity. Nonsense, say Finke and Stark. Faith in the power of monopoly religion is both bad history and bad economics. Instead, American religious pluralism and the “endless cycle of sect formation, transformation, schism, and rebirth” are positive indexes of active religious markets continuously responding to the changing demands of their consumers. With the “disestablishment” of mainline religion after the Revolution, an “unregulated, free market, religious economy” resulted, and adherence rates boomed for the next three generations.
Besides slaying the dragon of secularization, Finke and Stark tackle “awakenings,” the idea popularized by William McLoughlin and others favoring a cyclical theory of religious expression. Nonsense, say Finke and Stark. Instead, historians Timothy Smith and Jon Butler are closer to depicting the reality that awakenings never occurred or at least were never huge outbursts.
Thus the “Great Awakening” was “actually nothing more (or less) than George Whitefield’s well-planned, well-publicized, and well-financed revival campaign.” What really occurred is that under the influence of Whitefield, Cartwright, Finney, and others, a variety of upstart groups most successfully responded to changing market conditions. Older mainline groups failed to adapt, and the upstarts won the day, often by default.
Church by the numbers
So it is that Finke and Stark’s “second book”—that of consistently and persistently applying the market model now in vogue among “rational choice” theorists in economics and sociology—consists of their interpretation of the “why?” of winning and losing in the American religious economy.
For instance, they point out that if religious monopolies are bound to fail and upstart groups have been the consistent winner, then the worst possible advice Peter Berger could have provided in 1963 was that denominations merge to form cartels, thus “reducing the number of competing units.” Instead, merger is a sign of weakness; Finke and Stark identify “a strong positive correlation” historically between increasing market share and retaining denominational identity.
Theoretically, “rational choice” predicts that religious consumers evaluate the costs and benefits of their options and then consume the religious goods that “maximize net benefits.” Because mainline churches are plagued by “free riders” who contribute little and thereby weaken the shared benefits for all, it turns out that the stricter, sectlike groups are more able to maximize benefits for their adherents, even though the cost of individual membership is high. This is true because each member “benefits from the higher average level of participation thereby generated by the group,” in part because possible activities outside the group would be even more costly.
So, is religion a market, or is it like a market? In one sense, Finke and Stark raise nearly as many unresolved issues as they provide answers. Their rational-choice explanation of Catholicism’s historical success, for example, does not seem to fit their model as well as does their historical contrast of Baptist success versus Methodist failing. And their reductionistic tendencies (i.e., “rational choice” explains all) are certain to trouble both those who prefer more theological and more historical explanations of winning and losing, although for varying reasons. Furthermore, must winning be measured only in numerical terms if “only a few” find the small gate and the narrow way?
The book still succeeds, however, even if one disagrees with its theoretical interpretation, because it supplies such a wealth of historical and sociological analysis in a fashion that is stimulating and thought provoking. For those of us who care about the futures of our congregations and denominations, it is loaded with encouragement alongside warning: To succeed we must understand the choices available in our dynamically pluralistic religious culture.
Return To Hell
Gehenna,by Paul Thigpen (Creation House, 276 pp.; $9.99, paper). Reviewed by Robert Bittner, an editor and freelance writer living in the Chicago area.
Dante Alighieri’s 600-year-old classic, The Inferno, gets updated in this joke-filled retelling of one man’s soul-searching trek to hell and back. The novel begins when Thomas Travis, a professor of historical theology, escapes a gang of thugs on a dark Atlanta street, only to find himself passing through the gate of hell. Well, actually, the man-hole cover of hell. As one character notes, hell has been redecorated since Dante was there.
Trapped in the underworld, Travis learns he is destined to descend through the rings of hell, witnessing the punishments of damned souls—punishments that increase with intensity as he travels farther down. From feeling the hollow longing of souls in Sheol to watching the suffering of souls boiled in molten plastic or drowning in oceans of blood, Travis learns firsthand the difficult fact that life’s sins carry eternal consequences. The story of how he finds God’s grace, even in the lowest level of hell, makes for lively—if sometimes gruesome—reading.
Still, given Dante’s lasting achievment, I can’t help wishing that Thigpen had aimed for more than banter. The satire, which could have challenged readers, simply confirms what many evangelicals already accept. Gehenna will entertain, but the subject matter calls for more than a smile.
