Weekend Plug-in 🔌

Editor’s note: Every Friday, “Weekend Plug-in” features analysis, fact checking and top headlines from the world of faith. Subscribe now to get this newsletter delivered straight to your inbox. Got feedback or ideas? Email Bobby Ross Jr. at therossnews@gmail.com.

(ANALYSIS) Nearly 20 years ago, I wrote a column for The Oklahoman headlined “Internet deception runs wild.”

In that July 2001 piece, I highlighted the claim that an atheist group formed by the late “Madeline Murray O’Hare” had collected 287,000 signatures and was pushing to remove all Sunday morning worship service broadcasts.

“The good news is, the prayers have been answered — many times over,” I wrote. “Since the false petition related to the late Madalyn Murray O’Hair (that’s the correct spelling) began circulating in the late 1970s, the Federal Communications Commission has received more than 35 million signatures asking it to block her efforts.”

Two decades after that column ran, well-meaning religious people’s susceptibility to conspiracy theories has not waned.

If anything, the rise of social media has made it worse. Much, much worse.

“This last year has just been one giant conspiracy theory about everything — the pandemic, the civil unrest, the election — and it all sort of culminated with this terrifying scene we saw on Jan. 6. That was an army of conspiracy theorists, pretty much,” Tea Krulos told Religion News Service’s Emily McFarlan Miller this week.

Krulos is the author of the book “American Madness: The Story of the Phantom Patriot and How Conspiracy Theories Hijacked American Consciousness.”

Last week, I referred to President Donald Trump — who has repeatedly claimed he won an election he lost by 74 Electoral College votes and 7 million popular votes — as the nation’s conspiracy-theorist-in-chief.

In the wake of the deadly Jan. 6 siege at the U.S. Capitol — egged on by Trump — a leading evangelical theologian told NPR this week that it’s time for a Christian reckoning.

“Part of this reckoning is: How did we get here? How were we so easily fooled by conspiracy theories?” said Ed Stetzer, executive director of the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College in Illinois. “We need to make clear who we are. And our allegiance is to King Jesus, not to what boasting political leader might come next.”

In a May 2020 essay titled “Christians Are Not Immune to Conspiracy Theories,” The Gospel Coalition’s Joe Carter traced the problem all the way back to Satan spreading lies in the Garden of Eden. Carter’s take remains a must read.

Finally, in his “On Religion” column last week for the Universal Syndicate, Terry Mattingly interviewed Daniel Darling, author of the book “A Way with Words: Using Our Online Conversations for Good.”

“Today's mobs are not found on the streets with sticks and stones; they're dressed nicely in office cubicles, sitting quietly in church pews and sipping coffee in the comfort of air-conditioned homes. The mobs are — us,” said Darling, the National Religious Broadcasters’ senior vice president of communications.

“It is intoxicating. So intoxicating that we are tempted to immediately post something without stopping to consider if what we are communicating is true. And we often fail, in these split-second decisions, to consider the humanity of the person or organizations we are joining a mob to crush.”

Power Up: The Week’s Best Reads

1. For insurrectionists, a violent faith brewed from nationalism, conspiracies and Jesus: “As insurrectionists began the attack on the Capitol, a banner waved above the throng,” writes Religion News Service’s Jack Jenkins. “It read: 'Proud American Christian.’”

At The Tennessean, religion writer Holly Meyer reports that symbols brought to the Capitol raise questions about the role of Christian belief in the riot.

For more on “Flags, faith and fury,” check out my Christian Chronicle story.

2. Charismatics are at war with each other over failed prophecies of Trump victory: In mid-November, Julia Duin profiled the Pentecostal and charismatic leaders still prophesying a Trump election victory — two weeks after his defeat to Joe Biden — and refusing to back down.

Her latest viral report for Religion Unplugged details “prophets and their thousands of followers (who) are slugging it out in an orgy of self-blame, recriminations and fantastical hopes that somehow before Jan. 20, God will bring about a victory for Trump.”

3. Biden plans to be sworn in as president with a massive family heirloom Bible dating back to 1893: Exactly how big is the Bible that President-elect Joe Biden will use to take the oath of office?

Business Insider’s Ashley Collman notes:

In 2013, Obama's inaugural committee said that Biden's family Bible is five inches thick and has a Celtic cross on its cover, according to USA Today. 

During that second swearing-in, the size of Biden's bible became a focal point on Twitter. 

"Inside the Biden family Bible are all his Amtrak tickets," Twitter user Helder Gil joked at the time, referring to Biden's well-known love of train travel.

More Top Reads

• Josh Dickson: The evangelical behind Joe Biden’s outreach to religious voters (by Sarah Pulliam Bailey, Washington Post)

• Anti-Semitism seen in Capitol insurrection raises alarms (by Elana Schor, Associated Press)

• Most evangelical Trump voters didn’t turn on Mike Pence (by Kate Shellnutt, Christianity Today)

• Why one man’s Supreme Court case is uniting the ACLU with the Catholic Church (by Kelsey Dallas, Deseret News) Update

• Pastor Kirbyjon Caldwell gets six years in prison for fraud scheme involving worthless Chinese bonds (by Robert Downen, Houston Chronicle)

• How The Epoch Times became a pro-Trump propaganda machine in an age of plague and insurrection (by Simon van Zuylen-Wood, The Atlantic)

• What four strangers of different faiths learned while living together during a pandemic (by Alejandra Molina, Religion News Service)

• How House chaplain calmed tense hours in besieged Capitol with prayers for ‘God’s covering’ (by Jack Jenkins, RNS)

• Pixar adviser and theologian Suzan Johnson Cook on how they came to define ‘soul’ in the film (by Adelle M. Banks, RNS)

• The one missing fact: How EWTN misreported the Viganò letter (by Paul Moses, Commonwealth)

Inside The Godbeat: Behind The Bylines

After eight years, Daniel Burke is moving on from his role as religion editor for CNN.

In a Twitter post, Burke said he plans to write a book about Buddhism.

Charging Station: In Case You Missed It

Here is where you can catch up on recent news and opinions from Religion Unplugged.

• Religious freedom is central to the epiphany (and condemns the Capitol violence) (by Chelsea Langston Bombino)

• One in eight Christians worldwide live in countries where they may face persecution (by Ewelina U. Ochab)

• A mansion built by Jerusalem’s most notorious mufti slated to become a synagogue (by Gil Zohar)

• Televangelist Bob Rodgers ‘curses’ those who voted on the ‘wrong side’ in ‘stolen election’ (by Mattie Townson)

• 'We must all repent': Pastors address their flocks after Capitol siege (by Hamil R. Harris)

• Pope Francis changes canon law: What it means for the Catholic Mass (by Clemente Lisi)

• Catholic Church releases rules for pandemic Ash Wednesday (by Timothy Nerozzi)

• The solution to Christian nationalism? Better theology (by Thomas K. Johnson)

• Q&A with Rev. Paul Abernathy, an Orthodox priest combatting vaccine skepticism (by Mladen Aleksic)

• Nigerian archdiocese still doesn't know why their bishop was kidnapped (by Timothy Nerozzi)

• 'A republic, if you can keep it': How Benjamin Franklin's response Is still applicable post 'Capitol coup' (by Michael Metzger)

• Capitol violence calls us to recommit to redeeming institutions, not tearing them down (by Rev. Khary Bridgewater and Chelsea Langston Bombino)

The Final Plug

How consumed are we by politics?

So much so, it seems, that a really big interview this week went mostly unnoticed.

“Wow,” my friend David Duncan said after seeing that tweet. “Who would have thought the Second Coming would happen in Boston?”

Bobby Ross Jr. is a columnist for Religion Unplugged and editor-in-chief of The Christian Chronicle. A former religion writer for The Associated Press and The Oklahoman, Ross has reported from all 50 states and 15 nations. He has covered religion since 1999.

January 6th

Back   ●   ●   ●   ●   ●   ●   ●   ⦿   ◦   ◦   ◦   ◦   ◦   ◦   ◦   ◦   ◦    Next

Earlier in this Collection

Up Next in this Collection