Richard Land, The Christian Post, and Celebrity Theology

https://www.christianpost.com/news/pub-fri-morn-pls-jo-kathie-lee-gifford-says-church-has-failed-nonbelievers-feels-called-to-share-faith-through-film.html

Led by Richard Land a lobbyist, political activist and Dominionist the Christian Post wants to reach the broadest possible spectrum to make Christianity something that's not merely detected (having a place at the table) but a force that's influencing all aspects of culture.

The Christian Post attempts to provide a broad spectrum of Christian media and news coverage but instead it has degenerated into parody.

Land who led the Southern Baptist (ERLC) Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (its lobbying arm) has now become an agent of ethical compromise.

Discernment has been turned into fog and news has been turned into sensationalism.

My work takes me into people's homes and more times than I can count I have been subjected to their televisions blaring in the background. Since I more or less dispensed with television during the 1990's my perspective is a bit different than most. People who watch television on a regular basis are desensitized to its content. When you're not familiar with it, let's just say it can prove to be quite shocking.

Two shows have really impressed me over the years – impressed in the sense of grasping the cultural degradation. Now mind you I'm only encountering morning programmes. I know the prime time shows are absolute filth. But in terms of the morning (often women oriented) shows I've been struck by 'The View' and the Today show supplement with Kathie Lee Gifford and some other woman I'm unfamiliar with. I remember Kathie Lee Gifford from the 1980's when she had a show with Regis Philbin and was known for her singing commercials and her marriage to an ex-football player. I never gave her  much thought until in recent years I encountered her on the Today Show. I was shocked at just how vile, feminist, worldly, sensual and crass she was. She was really disgusting and then to my shock I discovered that apparently she's passing herself off as some kind of Christian – and even a Christian leader!

Evangelicals it would seem are desperate for celebrity endorsement and so they'll turn to anyone no matter how compromised they are or how bogus their confession might be. I'm sorry but Kathie Lee Gifford should not be held up as a voice for Christians to hear. She needs to be rebuked and commanded to repent.  Her public life and conduct are not commensurate with a Christian profession.

But for Richard Land's 'Christian Post', Gifford is good enough. She'll grab attention even if it's at best a kind of tabloid style Christianity.

The same is true of figures like the FOX channel tart Elizabeth Hasselbeck and Candace Cameron Bure. It continues to amaze me that Candace and Kirk Cameron are granted status in Christian circles because of their celebrity fame associated with television sit-coms in the 1980's and 1990's – shows that were deemed stupid and filthy by Christians at the time. I tried to watch an old episode of 'Growing Pains' several years ago to see if it was as bad as I remembered. It was worse. I didn't even make it halfway through the show. Why have they not repented of their participation in these shows? Instead they ride the wave (and fortune) and because they're famous and have 'converted' – they suddenly are worthy of a voice, of leadership?

This trend started back in the 1970's. Martyn Lloyd-Jones was appalled that Billy Graham was so keen to get recent convert Malcolm Muggeridge up on the stage. His understanding of Christianity was weak and coming from a wicked womanising background he was in a place that he needed to shut his mouth, be humbled and be discipled. Instead he was held up as a leader, a trophy for the Evangelical community. Lloyd-Jones wasn't surprised when a few years later Muggeridge lost his way and wandered into Roman Catholicism.

Cameron Bure recently caught some flak because apparently she didn't understand that posting improper pictures of she and her husband online was out of bounds. It's commendable that she and her husband have an affectionate relationship but an earlier generation understood that some things need to remain behind closed doors. A generation that's about self-promotion and feeds on exhibitionism cannot grasp this. So be it, but these are not people that should be granted authoritative voices in the Church or people that should be elevated as some kind of example. She's not – in any way.

Does Richard Land know this or care about this? Or is site traffic, numbers and revenue all that motivate him?

Are we supposed to believe that 'Dog' the bounty hunter has something to say to the Church? He has some kind of wisdom or insight into the Christian life? I was once shown a few minutes of his show and was left shaking my head and laughing out of embarrassment for both 'Dog' and anyone who would waste their time watching his show. It would have never even entered my mind that he was some kind of Christian. A Christian Bounty Hunter? At one time that would have been quite a stretch.

Apparently the greatest thing a Christian can do is get a reality television show. After the Duggars fell from favour and were exposed as something of a sham (which I'm sorry to say that I've known more than one family cut from their type of cloth and I wasn't surprised), the Duck Dynasty crew seemed to take over the celebrity role. Why Christians are excited about their faith being communicated in less than clear terms by means of a manufactured entertainment pseudo-reality programme is odd to say the least. Again, why these people who are clearly in it for the money are allowed a platform, let alone venerated as culture warriors and leaders is a case of bad theology governing the Church.

But Richard Land thrives on this sort of thing and has made it his mission. I suppose in one regard, at least he's not encouraging wars as he did in 2003, but I'm not sure this path is spiritually speaking any better.

And we must ask why would we care about what Mike Pence's daughter has to say? Are you telling me that on her own merits she would warrant a place on a national platform as a Christian leader and teacher? I am of course ignoring the feminism implicit in this model and the fact that it reigns on the Christian Post website. I suppose it's just in keeping with the worldly and compromised nature of Evangelicalism. But as far as the Pence girl – she's not granted an audience simply because she's the daughter of Mike Pence, right?

Why this should give her any standing I'm not sure. Mike Pence strikes me as deeply compromised and as one who lacks all ethics and judgment. I have little interest in anything he has to say, let alone his daughter.

Likewise when CCM singer Lauren Daigle participates on American Idol or sings on the lesbian Ellen DeGeneres show, these things are lauded and lionised.

My wife often comments on how things have changed. Amy Grant was excoriated in the 1980's for 'crossing over' and performing secular music – even with Peter Cetera no less! And yet today these things are celebrated. One wonders if Grant isn't a little bitter – or perhaps she feels vindicated?

And yet this celebrity coverage only goes so far. When Sarah Palin appeared on 'The Masked Singer' performing a filthy rap song – that didn't seem to warrant attention. Apparently her fall was not worthy of instruction. Is Land a member of the political circle that would see her revitalised and thus he's providing cover in ignoring her folly or perhaps since he was part of the movement that championed her – he'd like to flush her legacy down the memory hole?

The Christian Post is a sham, a disgusting exercise in fake news, bad theology and poor Christian leadership. And I haven't even touched on the outlet's political reporting and commentary. In some respects I'm surprised Land would lower himself to something like this but in other respects it reveals that in the end he's just a salesman and if he's turned into an Evangelical PT Barnum then we shouldn't be all that surprised. It a parable really, the tale of Evangelicalism over the past thirty years. Land has lived it, that's for sure.

I cannot even imagine where it will be thirty years from now. By then Land will be gone. He will have stood before the Throne and given an account for what he did with his time and energies and with the faith he professes. He believes he has laboured to build up the Evangelical movement and expand its reach. Instead he has been one of the architects of its compromise and fall. He has generated money and fame but sold his soul in the process and laid the groundwork for the movement's utter collapse. He was a lobbyist for ethics (itself a comedic notion) but instead he has outdone himself in destroying Christian ethics and making them into a laughingstock. This is the legacy of Richard Land.