Loud, Arrogant Christians

Freedom to Worship Very Loudly

We just got back from a lovely road trip to the Denver area to visit with some friends and family. As I have never been a long haul driver, we broke the drive up into two stages, stopping each way at the very nice Inn of the Governors in Santa Fe. On the return trip we arrived in Santa Fe mid-afternoon with plenty of time to take a nice stroll before dinner. My idea was to check out the handy map of the area and find a place of interest or two before we picked a direction to point our feet. I mentioned this plan to my wife and she nodded and said, "I hear music. Let's see where it's coming from."

    Naturally, her plan was much better than mine.

    Following the music turned out to be a bit more a challenge than we anticipated, as the heavy beat and as yet unintelligible vocals seemed to bounce off the buildings in the area of the state capitol complex in a bewilderingly deceptive manner, making it seem like it was coming from first one direction and then, when you turned another corner, from yet another point of the compass. But finally we figured it out and as the lyrics became clearer and the beat became more window rattling we made our way to the source. About half a block away we could make out these words...

Our god is an awesome god!

    ...repeated over and over again. There may have been some other lyrics sprinkled in here and there, periodically spacing out the declaration of awesomeness, but for the most part it was that one line, pounding away at the unoffending Santa Fe air, sounding for all the world more like an angry challenge than a joyous celebration. As we came around the final corner we saw a gathering of perhaps a couple hundred people (I'm not adept at crowd count estimates, but I think I'm being generous) facing a temporary stage on which a band consisting of an electric guitar player, bass player, drummer, young woman singer, and the fellow pictured above, was producing this very loud, musically simplistic brou-ha-ha.

    My beloved decided not to draw too near, but I had to see if I could get a better look at those responsible. First thing that caught my eye was a big truck parked to the side of the stage.

    Ah! So it was America's Revival we had happened upon. Lovely. And they travel under the name of "Let Us Worship." This, of course, made me wonder just who or what was keeping them from that activity. All the evidence indicated they were not only worshiping but doing a pretty good job of disturbing the peace within a six or seven block radius in the bargain.

    And then the fellow pictured above, who whose parents gave him the name John Christopher Feucht but whose stage name is Sean Feucht*, began to tell a story of when he was out elk hunting with a couple of Native American friends. According to Sean, after they had bagged a majestic creature of the forest, as his friends were performing their ancient ritual to celebrate a successful hunt, he turned them away from what he called "misguided worship" by saying,

    

    "Hey, how about we don't lay hands on the dead animal and talk to the dead animal and all that stuff. That's weird. How 'bout we do this? How 'bout we gather together and hold hands? And how about we invite God's presence? And I kid you not, I started to do this. And the presence of God felt so strong both of these big, manly elk guys (yes, that's what he called them) started weeping."

    He continued with, "This is a state (referring to New Mexico as far as I could tell) created for worship. The problem is so much of it is misguided."

    And so here was this combination Elmer Gantry**/Ted Nugent*** fellow, telling a story in which two grown up Native Americans are brought to tears and converted to his version of Christianity in a matter a seconds by his suggestion "How about we invite God's presence?" Sure, just like random people with tears in their eyes stroll up to Trump and declare they've never known a more decent, compassionate, unjustly persecuted fellow in their whole entire lives. This is just a little less plausible than the burning but vocal bushes that are not consumed or large bodies of water splitting in two we've been studying in our prior installments here at Book by Book. Also, the arrogance in his anecdote is astonishing although it's very much of a pattern with what con artists throughout the ages have done.

    According to this revival huckster, the only folks with a right to worship are the ones who worship like he does, the ones who toss money his way so he can go around the country making noise and insulting people. This, my Dear Reader, is a darned big reason why religion has such a deservedly tarnished reputation.

*If you are of a mind to, do a quick search for this Sean Feucht fellow. I think you'll find that he is an opportunist of the sort America likes produce on a regular basis.

**The movie with Burt Lancaster is excellent, but if you can, read the book by Sinclair Lewis. It is an exposé of hypocrisy that has lost none of its relevance since it was first published in 1927.

***Both of the Dear Readers who have read "devil Went Down to Phoenix" know just how I feel about Ted Nugent. And how our hero Ted Hogwood feels about him too.