In the past few weeks, I’ve had a lot of time to think about this entire Shawn Bolz hypocrisy and harassment scandal. For years, I’ve known that dysfunctional authoritarian religious groups sprout way more hypocrisy than more functional groups can manage. I’ve also known that they tend to be way Read more
On January 17, Mike Winger released a nearly six-hour-long video about the Shawn Bolz scandal erupting in Bethel Church right now. Winger thinks that the Bolz scandal indicates huge problems within Charismatic evangelical culture. But he’s wrong. The rot goes completely to the core of hardline, right-wing conservative Christianity itself—including Read more
Somehow, evangelical pastors have figured out how to make their end of Christianity even worse—by implementing the ‘Moses Model’ of church leadership. It really is remarkable how they’ve turned an essentially dysfunctionally-authoritarian flavor of religion into such an extreme worst-case-possible scenario. But the Moses Model lets them make that transition Read more
Halloween is that magical time of year when Christians can dial up to 11 their Happy Pretendy Fun Time Games. It is their everything.