Category: Uncategorized (Page 3 of 6)

When I asked evangelical leaders about why they supported Donald Trump, nearly all mentioned the 200 judges he appointed to the federal bench, including three justices to the U.S. Supreme Court. Republicans have long made it a priority to stack the federal courts with lifetime appointees who will hand down conservative decisions for decades. Even if Republicans lose control of Congress or the White House, they know that the courts will thwart liberal policies.

On June 24, the court’s solid conservative majority overturned Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that established the constitutional right to abortion. Evangelicals in particular celebrated the decision as the culmination of years of activism. But they were not always so invested in the issue. After the Roe decision, the National Association of Evangelicals pointed out the “necessity for therapeutic abortions to safeguard the health or the life of the mother.” W.A. Criswell, the longtime pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas that I wrote about last time, said a child became an individual person only after being born, thus it was up to the mother to decide what was best. Abortion was seen as a “Catholic issue” by most evangelicals.

It took years for evangelicals like Jerry Falwell to become engaged in the fight over abortion rights. Singer-turned-activist Anita Bryant asked for Falwell’s help in her successful campaign in 1977 to repeal a Dade County ordinance in Florida that banned discrimination against gay people in housing and employment. Soon after, Falwell launched a national advertising blitz that highlighted three issues: gay people teaching in public schools, “abortion on demand,” and the spread of pornography. Falwell held rallies at state capitols to promote these issues, a movement that led to the creation of the Moral Majority in 1979. It aligned with the right-turn of the Republican Party and helped propel Ronald Reagan to the White House in 1980.

Conservatives have a record of being disappointed at Republican presidents’ Supreme Court nominations. Reagan’s nomination of Sandra Day O’Connor in 1981 upset Falwell because she was seen as insufficiently conservative on abortion. George H.W. Bush nominated David Souter in 1990, who turned out to be well left of center on most issues. Even John Roberts, nominated as chief justice by George W. Bush in 2005, has proven to be too incremental for some activists. But Trump’s three justices were all carefully vetted by the conservative legal establishment to avoid any surprises. Evangelicals have reaped the benefits of the court’s rulings on abortion as well as “religious freedom” issues.

One of the most intriguing people I interviewed on the record for the book was Robert Jeffress, senior pastor of First Baptist Dallas since 2007. The church, which some have called the Vatican of the Baptist world, has been around for about 150 years, has about 15,000 members and sprawls across multiple blocks of downtown Dallas. Jeffress runs a popular broadcast ministry and is a frequent commentator on Fox News.

Jeffress was one of the first prominent evangelicals to support Donald Trump and even campaigned with him before the Iowa caucuses in 2016. When I asked why he favored Trump over fellow Texan Ted Cruz and the many other candidates running, Jeffress answered simply, “It was real easy: It was a political calculation. I felt like he was the only one of that field running that had the power to beat Hillary Clinton.”

I appreciated his honesty and asked him about his reaction to the “Access Hollywood” tape released late in the campaign that depicted Trump profanely bragging about his sexual conquests. Jeffress said then-Fox News host Bill O’Reilly asked him to discuss it on his program along with Trump. Jeffress and Trump met at hotel in Dallas for the taping. Trump went first and answered O’Reilly’s questions. Then Jeffress took Trump’s place in the chair while Trump stood by. Jeffress said what Trump had said on the tape was indefensible, but it wasn’t enough to make him vote for Hillary Clinton. That seemed to be the evangelical consensus — Ralph Reed told me the same thing — and Trump went on to upset Clinton.

As president, Trump carefully tended to his evangelical supporters who were crucial in propelling him to the presidency. Jeffress attended many White House functions and received the honor of delivering the opening prayer at the dedication of the U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem. Still, Jeffress understood that he was involved in a “transactional relationship.” In return for evangelical support, Trump nominated “three Supreme Court justices who are rock-solid conservatives,” Jeffress noted.

I asked him if evangelicals had been damaged by their strong backing of Trump. “I think there may have been some cost to it,” he replied. “Unfortunately, I think today most people view evangelicals as a voting bloc rather than as people who are distinguished by what they believe about Jesus Christ.”

For all of his bluntness about a “transactional relationship,” Jeffress tries to walk an impossibly thin line. He says he rarely mentioned Trump in the pulpit, but defended him in widely seen TV appearances. He says he disagrees with Republican Party on some issues and that Democrats are also welcome at his church, but the politicians who speak at First Baptist always seem to be Republicans. (When I asked why he let Vice President Mike Pence give a partisan speech from the pulpit in June 2020, Jeffress give the tissue-thin justification that he wasn’t a candidate because there was talk of Trump dumping Pence from the ticket at the convention.) White evangelicals are the most important voting bloc for the Republican Party, and politically active pastors like Jeffress have solidified that relationship.

In my last post, I wrote about my experiences visiting nine different evangelical churches (plus a Franklin Graham rally). I wanted to talk to people who attended those services to understand what drew them to the church and what kept them coming back. The paradox of megachurches is that it is their small groups that keep people engaged. Once you decide to become a member, you join a group of 10 or so people who meet weekly at someone’s house for dinner and Bible study. It is there that people find their deepest connections to the church, not through the large-scale, showy Sunday service, which is intended to attract the masses of “unchurched” people. It is difficult for adults to make friends, and smart church leaders know that people will not forge friendships if left to their own devices. Evangelical churches are intentionally designed to foster these relationships through their small groups, classes, and volunteer requirements.

A main reason why I wanted to write about evangelicals is that they are a deeply committed, cohesive group with an outsize influence in our country. White evangelicals are the most important (and reliable) voting bloc for the Republican Party. At the services I attended, I did not hear many overt political messages. Most pastors referenced Bible passages projected on large screens and offered practical guidance about being better Christians, parents, and spouses. But there was one service that left me quite shaken.

The service was attended by a few thousand people — the crowd was overwhelmingly white — and I got there early to find a good seat. I spoke with two friendly couples seated next to me who said they enjoyed the “Bible-based” aspect of the church in contrast to others. After a variety of high-energy songs, the longtime pastor stepped up to deliver his remarks, which startled me so much I recorded them on my phone. He mentioned that his wife had looked out at the vast crowd and said it made her “so angry that they’re trying to steal this from us.” The line received big applause.

Let’s pause here because the feeling of embattlement runs deep in evangelicalism. They have historically felt under siege from secular culture (and even from mainline Protestants, with some justification) and thus must fight to protect their freedoms. There always has to be an enemy, in this case, progressives who teach “critical race theory” in schools and want to “tear down our monuments,” in the words of the pastor. (I overheard a group of people complaining about “CRT” before the service. They had seen coverage about it on Fox News.) “They tell us not to teach American history any longer in school because if they wipe out all the good things about this nation, then they can supplant it with their evil,” he said.

Christian education, like his church’s school, was the last line of defense. This was another classic evangelical response to cultural change: create a closed system and characterize any criticism of it as an attack on religious freedom. Much like Jerry Falwell and Ralph Reed did years earlier, the pastor told people to run for office — not just federal or state offices, but local school boards and city councils. “Your church is important in the fight against everything that’s coming at us from the evil side of the fence,” he concluded.

After the service, I turned to the people I had spoken to earlier and said I felt the pastor’s statements were inappropriate. Characterizing entire classes of people and their ideas as “evil” and insinuating that the people at the church were the true patriots were off-putting to me, I said. They responded that the pastor was right to say that their freedoms could be taken away, even though no one hindered us from coming there to worship at what seemed to be a thriving, prosperous church campus. I brought up the riot at the Capitol in which far-right groups tried to overturn an election, and the man sitting next to me equated it to the burning of cities in the summer of 2020 as part of the Black Lives Matter movement. He also pointed out that Donald Trump asked people to protest peacefully at his “Stop the Steal” rally on the morning of Jan. 6, 2021.

We parted with an “agree to disagree” amicability, and one man even asked for my phone number to invite me to join their small group session later in the week for “hamburgers and Bible study.” I was left with an unsettling feeling that these were everyday, nice folks who truly believe they are patriots defending America against perceived evils. The pastor who tapped into this idea declined my request for an interview, which is one of the reasons I’m not naming him or his church here. However, I did talk to other evangelical leaders who spoke frankly on the record about the commingling of religion and partisan politics. More on that next time.

Thorough research is the foundation of a book. There is no shortcut, and writers must show their work. Bibliographies and endnotes indicate whether the author has read widely and has solid grounding for his or her assertions. But there are limits to what you can learn through library/archival research. There is a danger of seeing people and groups as abstractions. I felt it was essential to attend church services in person and talk to people about their experiences. So once I was fully vaccinated in May 2020, I was ready to see some of these churches for myself.

I decided to go the services at least 30 minutes before they started to allow me time to look around and talk to people. I thought a lot about how I should present myself. I dressed casually and carried a Bible and a notebook. I went as interested first-timer rather than as an author. I wanted to hear people tell their stories rather than tell my own and risk them freezing up. I did not quote or name anyone I talked to or directly reference any of their stories in the book.

There are many evangelical churches in San Diego County, so the challenge was narrowing down the list. I attended a church that was a former bar/billiards hall, a Southern Baptist megachurch, a congregation that met in a hotel ballroom, an independent megachurch, a Pentecostal church, and a prosperity gospel-flavored church. I also went to services at two churches I studied in-depth for a chapter in the book: Saddleback in Lake Forest and Willow Creek in suburban Chicago. In all, I attended services at nine churches plus a Franklin Graham rally in San Bernardino.

I’ll write in greater detail about some of my specific experiences in future posts, but for now I’ll reflect on my general feelings. I talked with dozens of people and had brief encounters with dozens more, and nearly all of my interactions were positive. Every church has a welcome desk staffed with friendly, knowledgeable people. They gave away books, T-shirts, water bottles, pens, and stickers. They were proud to show off their campuses — the sanctuary’s video screens and sound system, the Starbucks-style coffee bars, the gymnasiums, the playgrounds. When I asked why they go to the church, nearly everyone said “because of the sense of community.” People yearn for connections in an often-isolated world, and these churches are seven-day-a-week kinds of places where everyone is expected to play a role, whether it’s as a parking lot attendant, greeter, or teacher. It made me understand better why many evangelical churches were so resistant to COVID-19 lockdowns.

The churches reflected the diversity of evangelicalism, but there were some similarities in worship styles. Most services began with high-energy bands that belted out contemporary songs with lyrics and imagery projected on large screens. The higher-end churches had plush seating and lighting and sound systems that were as good as any major concert venue. Then a casually dressed pastor strolled on the stage and related a practical message. They referenced Bible verses as fluently as pop culture and sports references. Some showed funny videos about being a dad, another had a band play songs from a summer road trip playlist. They all made an effort to be entertaining and relevant. And yes, there were references to tithing — the expectation that people donate 10 percent of their income to the church — and how easily they could contribute by downloading an app.

Visiting the churches added nuance to my thinking and writing. Journalists are taught to check your biases and challenge your assumptions, and I tried hard to do that. I have thought, though, that I had a much easier path moving through those spaces because I’m a Christian white man in my 40s. If I was agnostic, or gay, or black, or a woman, I would have likely been perceived differently and certainly would have received the messages in a different way. A few of the services were racially diverse, but mostly they were white. All of the teaching pastors were men. And even from my perspective, some of what I heard was troubling. More on that later.

When I visited Wheaton College’s Billy Graham Center Archives last summer, I came across a slim manila folder labeled, “File closed until after Billy Graham’s death.” Graham had died a few years earlier, so the file was unsealed. My heart fluttered: What was in there? Why the secrecy over it? I didn’t expect anything scandalous — we’re talking about Billy Graham, after all — but my curiosity was piqued.

The file contained letters from Graham to Herbert J. Taylor, a powerful business executive and a major donor to evangelical causes for decades. Taylor was leading the effort to organize a Graham crusade in Chicago in 1962, a vast undertaking that required two years of planning and fundraising.

The letters were surprisingly blunt. Graham was unhappy that Taylor was not busy lining up the support of Chicago-area churches and pastors — one of Graham’s top priorities. He worried about using Soldier Field as a site because of the possibility of bad weather and empty seats, which would be embarrassing to the preacher.

In the letter shown here, Graham reveals his frustration with Taylor when he told the press he expected 1 million people to attend and 50,000 conversions. “In thinking it over — I think your press conference put the crusade back and did a great deal of harm!” Graham wrote in his own hand to emphasize his displeasure. In a later letter labeled “personal and confidential,” Graham detailed Taylor’s shortcomings and said he should consider stepping aside as chairman. Taylor took on a face-saving role and the crusade went on to be a success.

The letters offered a fascinating glimpse into the real Billy Graham — a hard-nosed organizer who zealously protected his image as one of the most well-known and admired people in America. So a great find, right? Yes, but the only problem was that I couldn’t figure out how to incorporate it in my book. I had already written about several of Graham’s earlier crusades, and adding another one seemed excessive. The Chicago crusade also didn’t fit well with my timeline. So the best I could do was to add a little texture here and there about Graham’s tough-minded approach to running his enterprises.

Research is a joy and a pitfall for authors. The discoveries and connections are thrilling, but sometimes you have to leave them out despite the time it took to find them. Resources like archives and newspapers.com are wondrous but incredibly distracting and time-consuming if you aren’t careful. It’s tempting to include every interesting scrap of research and every pointed quote from an interview. You need to have the discipline to think about how the material will serve the reader. In the case of Graham’s letters … well, at least I got a blog post out of it!

It’s the question that hangs out there for every author. It’s the literary equivalent of “What was going through your mind?” that athletes are inevitably asked after a contest. The question is important but sometimes difficult to answer. So I’ll try.

I have always been fascinated by why people believe what they do, and the consequences of private beliefs in the public arena. You cannot understand contemporary America without understanding the influence of evangelicals. They have helped shape American traits such as individualism, mistrust of government, hyper-patriotism, and faith in capitalism.

Many recent books have examined evangelicals through the prisms of race, gender, politics, white nationalism, and geography. They are all profitable ways to study a complicated subject. I chose to look at evangelicals as entrepreneurs, which was a road much less traveled. How do they develop their message and market it? How do they pay for their ministries? How closely do they work with business leaders and corporations? How does this shape their worldview? It took a few years of research to find satisfactory answers to these questions.

I’m far from a tech wizard, but with the help of Animoto, I had fun putting together this trailer for “Soul Winners.” (Make sure to turn up the audio!) Enjoy!

(Blows three years worth of digital dust off the blog…)

I’m excited to say that my new book, “Soul Winners: The Ascent of America’s Evangelical Entrepreneurs,” has officially been transmitted to the printer! It’s the culmination of four years of research, reporting, rethinking and rewriting. Fortunately, I had a large of amount of research in hand before the pandemic shut everything down in March 2020. I think we all needed to find a way to bring some kind of shape to our lives. For me, it was writing this book. It was a creative outlet and the one thing I could control. It helped keep me sane during a time of anxiety and fear. Once I became fully vaccinated in May 2021, I was thrilled to be able to attend in-person evangelical services and talk to people face to face. Streaming church services online is no substitute for being there. I’ll have much more to say about all of that in the months leading up to my Aug. 15 publication date, but for now, please take a tour of my updated website!

The U-T frequently invites guest speakers into the newsroom to discuss writing and journalism, and this week we hosted literary agent Sandra Dijkstra. Her Del Mar-based agency is marking 40 years in business this year, and she’s among the most prominent agents on the West Coast, representing authors such as Amy Tan.

Dijkstra gave a brief overview of the changing book industry: 41 percent of all books are sold via Amazon with Barnes & Noble at 23 percent, which was higher than I expected given all the bad news we’ve been hearing about the chain. (Independent bookstores sell only 6 percent.) Also surprising: Print book sales are increasing, e-book sales are down.

One of her main reasons for talking with a bunch of journalists was to tell us that nonfiction books are selling better than fiction, especially current events/politics. Journalists have built-in credentials and have an innate sense of what makes a good story, she said. Agents spent lots of time scouring newspapers and magazines in search of stories that could be turned into a book. The trick is find something that can be elevated beyond regional interest.

Dijkstra says the role of agents is to determine if an idea can sell, help refine it, and decide if the author is the right person to write it. Staffers were invited to send her a pitch for a book and have her evaluate it. It was instructive to hear a top literary agent deftly take apart the ideas and suggest improvements. Listening to her was a timely refresher course for me because I’m deep in the process of developing my next book. As I do so, I will keep her advice for authors at the forefront of my mind: “Come up with a good idea that suits you that you can present persuasively.”

Saturday’s San Diego Festival of Books was bigger and better than last year’s inaugural celebration at Liberty Station. I showed up about 40 minutes before the official opening, and the bookstore and merchant tables were already busy. All of the panels were sell-outs or near sell-outs, and there really was something for everyone. I had never participated in an author panel before, so it was a great experience for me to talk about “The Dark Side of Business” with two other authors and a moderator. The Book Catapult hosted us for a book signing event after the panel, and I’m pleased to say that I didn’t know any of the people who bought my book or took my business card!

With panel moderator Diana McCabe, Union-Tribune business editor; Orly Lobel, author and law professor at University of San Diego; and Seth Hettena, journalist and author of a book about Donald Trump’s ties to Russia.