The Ugly, the Bad, and the Good
Continued lies, a challenged democracy, and a beautiful film...and a surprise!
Welcome to the midweek Cottage! This week, I’m sharing up a sampler to keep you informed and inspired during these tough times.
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THE UGLY: Continued, Purposeful Lying and Disinformation
One of the most common things I consistently hear from readers — and have been hearing for years — is that they can’t talk with their friends and relatives who are FOX News viewers. This isn’t just an anecdote. Researchers have found a link (see Figure 9 in the linked report) between support for Trump, MAGA, and being pro-Christian nationalist.
I’m sharing this news story today because it underscores the importance of my recent post, Standing Up for Truth.
Some cynical, “both-sides-ism” readers attacked me for that piece with predictably trite comments: “both sides do it” and “politicians always lie” sorts of things (despite the fact that I specifically mentioned these illogical critiques in my own piece).
This post isn’t about politicians shading the truth, lying, or creating alternate realities.
This is about media lying.
I suppose the same people will come back with the same sophomoric critique. Yes, it is true that all media have biases. And those biases can be pretty extreme. But bias is different from credibility and accuracy. A publication with a particular bias can also be credible and accurately report facts. Thoughtful people check for and understand biases and adjudicate sources on the basis of credibility and fact. (For example, I do listen to MSNBC. But I also watch local news and CNN, read the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post, listen to NPR, watch the BBC and PBS, and regularly read a wide range of print publications with high levels of credibility).
But, if you look at the media landscape since the founding of FOX News, as many scholars have — you see something almost unique in American history. FOX isn’t just any media. It is a major network that has changed the nature of truth and reality regarding both politics and culture. And that change hasn’t been good. Through it (or because of it), Americans have come to equate bias with credibility — something is factual in so far as it presents a view of the world I believe.
That’s why yesterday’s Bret Baier FOX interview with Kamala Harris goes into my “Ugly” file today. It wasn’t that Baier is biased for Trump and against Harris (hey, good for her to go on FOX News and submit to a hostile interviewer). It was that Baier deceived his audience by presenting a partial clip of Trump’s comments in order to make Harris look like a liar.
In short, Bret Baier lied to viewers — and created an alternate reality — to confirm their existing opinions. He didn’t let them see something that the rest of the media is reporting on: Trump’s turn toward attacking “the enemies within.”
That’s not a bias problem. That’s a credibility problem. That’s a fact problem.
Here’s Baier’s question, the clip he showed to “prove” his point, and Harris’s answer.
https://x.com/atrupar/status/1846679371832013114
For the entire FOX interview, watch HERE. This above clip begins around 18:30.
This is what Donald Trump actually said on FOX in the Faulkner interview just a few hours before Baier sat down with Harris:
This is the clip BEFORE it was deceptively edited by Brett Baier. The video shows what Trump actually said a few hours earlier on FOX when Elizabeth Faulkner asked him about the “enemies within” comment (and she showed him a clip from FOX News on Sunday that has been widely shared by media other than FOX News). You might notice that Trump doesn’t want to answer for his own words.
https://cdn.jwplayer.com/previews/Rd79Bg6c
You can see the difference. It is damningly obvious. And lies like this are creating the problems we are facing.
The BAD? A New PRRI Survey About the Challenges to Democracy and the 2024 Election
Yesterday morning, I attended the launch of the annual American Values Survey from Public Religion Research at the Brookings Institution. This year’s report is titled Challenges to Democracy. You can read the online version at that link or download it HERE. (Same report, two different formats.)
I highly recommend that you read it. It is immensely valuable to anyone concerned with the health and future of democracy — and clarifies issues of faith and politics that will be particularly important to religious and faith leaders (yes, clergy, that’s you!).
Robert P. Jones did an outstanding job presenting the findings and those responding to the data — including A.B. Stoddard and Joy Reid — were both pointed and powerful.
The upshot? Even when this election is over, the United States has a long road of democratic repair ahead. It was, in a word, more than a little depressing. You can get most of it in the top-line executive summary, but I recommend looking at the entire report.
There’s a lot of good longer-track data. Like the chart below on nostalgia. Smart church folks will immediately see how the attitudes presented on the chart are having an impact on both their congregations and larger denominational issues:
And, in case you are curious — White, non-evangelical (i.e., mainline) Protestants have depressingly high support of Donald Trump. Christian nationalism is not only a white evangelical problem:
I’m grateful for my long, collegial friendship with PRRI. But, honestly, I came away from yesterday’s launch understanding that the work for democracy is going to be long and hard — especially in churches.
Sorry. I wish I could be more cheerful on this score. Maybe it isn’t bad news, though. Maybe it is clarifying and truthful news.
I plan to write a longer and more detailed piece on the report — and the event — next week.
The GOOD: Leap of Faith, A New Documentary
I was recently able to view a brand new documentary, Leap of Faith, from Nicholas Ma. Ma also produced Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, the award-winning film about Fred Rogers.
His new project follows a year-long project that involved twelve pastors who wanted to find a way beyond their differences from Grand Rapids, Michigan.
It made me cry. There were moments that just gutted me.
But it also reveals the GOOD among us — and that neighborly love can make a real difference in our lives and communities.
Leap of Faith is only in theaters at the moment. But if you live in a city where it is showing, I recommend it with all my heart. It is both hard to watch and holy. You’ll be hearing more about it soon here at The Cottage. I’m trying to get Nicholas Ma to join me for an online Cottage Conversation. 🙏
You can find out the cities where it is currently playing at the film’s website. You can also sign-up for film updates there.
AND THE SURPRISING….
As it happened, the Convocation’s Faith & Democracy event in North Carolina happened on the exact same day on which Sean Feucht, a pro-Trump evangelical worship leader and well-known musician, led a Christian nationalist rally in Raleigh.
Baptist News Global sent a reporter to cover both events. He had a head-spinning day. Read about it here:
A tale of two rallies on the same day in North Carolina by Rick Pidcock.
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INSPIRATION
REDUCE DEFENSIVENESS AND BREAK THE DEFENSIVENESS CHAIN:
I could hear the light beings as they entered every cell. Every cell is a house of the god of light, they said. I could hear the spirits who love us stomp dancing. They were dancing as if they were here, and then another level of here, and then another, until the whole earth and sky was dancing.
We are here dancing, they said. There was no there.
There was no "I" or "you."
There was us; there was "we."
There we were as if we were the music.
— Joy Harjo, from “Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings” (please read the ENTIRE poem HERE)
Tripp Fuller shared this Karl Barth quote with me a few days ago. I’m not sure of its source — and I forget to ask Tripp! But I’ve been ruminating on it:
The Church knows that all totalities of the world and society and also of the state are actually false gods and therefore lies. In the end you don't have to be afraid of lies.
Lies don't have any legs to stand on.
And in the Church one can know that. Whenever the Church takes these lies seriously, then it is lost. With all calmness and in all peace, it must treat them as lies. And the more that the Church lives in all humility and knows that we too are only human, and there are also many lies in us, then it will also know all the more surely that God sits in governance over and against the lies that are in us and over and against the lies in the world and in the state. And in that case, the Church, regardless of the circumstances and no matter how entangled and difficult the situation, remains at its task and knows itself to be forbidden to fear for its future. Its future is the Lord. He, not the totalitarian state, is coming to the Church.
— Karl Barth
ARIZONA!
The Convocation Unscripted Goes on the Road!
We’re heading out to swing states with a Faith & Democracy Tour.
Sunday, October 20: Tempe, AZ at Dayspring UMC, 5PM
📣 ⭐️ With a SPECIAL added Sunday morning at The Fountains UMC in Fountain Hills. I’ll be preaching and Robert Jones will lead a discussion on PRRI’s new research.
Come and hear me, Robert P. Jones, Jemar Tisby, and Kristin Du Mez on Christian nationalism (we’re not for it!) and why people of faith must be engaged in politics in this LIVE in-person Convocation Unscripted — plus great music! GREAT MUSIC. (I promise!)
It is free — bring your friends.
DETAILS and REGISTRATION INFO HERE!
I believe that the word poet is synonymous with the word truth teller.
— Joy Harjo
I keep you all in my daily prayers. Thank you for being out there doing the hard work.
Stay strong. I wish you peace.
In my opinion, Trump and Covid proved that most people in the US who claim to be Christians are actually what I call "tribal Christians". They're not "Christians" because they actually believe or follow anything Jesus taught, they are "Christians" because that's their self-congratulary social club where they can tell themselves how they are "in" and everyone else is "out", with glee at the idea of the suffering of those they consider "out". And boy do they tell EVERYONE, how "Christian" they are, despite displaying literally zero resemblance to Christ. As Jesus taught, you can tell a tree by it's fruit, and the fruit (Love, joy peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control) of "Christian" Nationalism is non existent. It's an obviously dead tree worshipping an Anti-Christ. The perfect anti-witness. Driving people away from God on a daily basis.