Analyzing Christianity

Gospelbound: Authoritarians Think More Control Means Less Churn

The tagline TGC created for Gospelbound claims it offers listeners “firm faith in an anxious age.” Of course, it does nothing of the sort. Instead, it offers the usual authoritarian blahblah from the most toxic elements in their entire end of Christianity. I’ve saved the most alarming of that blahblah for last: their oh-so-very Calvinist plan for churn reduction. They think more control over congregants means less churn from their churches. Today, I’ll show you what that means — and why it’s such a laughable contradiction of the supernatural claims of authoritarians.

By Captain Cassidy, ago

An Ex-Christian Evaluates a Gospelbound Podcast

Gospelbound’s own marketing claims that it will give listeners ‘firm faith in an anxious age.’ We checked out their most recent episode, about a TGC-produced book called Before You Lose Your Faith, and we weren’t impressed. But hey, maybe they just forgot about their target audience because they were talking about their own book. So I wanted to check out what else they were telling potential doubters. Today, let’s evaluate another of their episodes — from the point of view of a Christian who desperately needs a jolt of ‘firm faith in an anxious age.’

By Captain Cassidy, ago

Bespoke spirituality: Another try at ‘Last Ideology Standing’

This past week, we had a really good time examining Brett McCracken’s post on The Gospel Coalition (TGC) (archive link). In it, he accidentally demonstrated how very little he understands of deconversion. He also offered up what might be the three most ridiculous reasons ever concocted to stick with Christianity. We covered the first and second of those already. Today, we’ll tackle his third reason: ‘bespoke spirituality’s loneliness.’ Gosh, ya’ll, the suspense is killing me! Will a TRUE CHRISTIAN™ finally manage to win his tribe’s beloved game of Last Ideology Standing? We’ll find out today. 

By Captain Cassidy, ago

Matt Gaetz: The principles of power in broken systems

One thing I noticed quickly was that nobody on Capitol Hill really seemed all that surprised that his time in the sun finally got here. Nobody should be surprised at all about this whole thing. After all, Matt Gaetz is an evangelical in a deeply dysfunctional religio-political tribe. Thus, he speaks the language of power in broken systems. Today, let me decode that language to show you how absolutely unsurprising his behavior really is.

By Captain Cassidy, ago