Book Review: The Family by Jeff Sharlet
It reads in part like a Cold War spy novel, but unfortunately The Family by Jeff Sharlet is not fiction. Rather, The Family, subtitled The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power, tells the story of how one quasi-evangelical organization clandestinely infiltrated the halls of power in Washington, D.C. and beyond. It is the story of raw politics wrapped in a blanket of evangelical piety that is at times both fascinating and disturbing.
The author, Jeff Sharlet, knows the Family better than most outside the elite Washington set — Sharlet spent a month in 2002 living in one of the Family’s many residences, Ivanwald. While there, Sharlet was privy to confidential Family documents and met with the head of the Family, Doug Coe. In 2005, Coe was named one of the 25 most influential evangelicals by Time magazine, joining the ranks of more widely-recognized figures like Chuck Colson (a Family member and product); James Dobson; and others.
The Family, Sharlet says, “is a story about two great spheres of belief, religion and politics, and the ways in which they are bound together by the mythologies of America.” And quite a story it is, too. Sharlet remembers his days living at Ivanwald where he heard Adolf Hitler often referred to as an example of effective leadership. When Sharlet questioned members of the Family about this fascination with Hitler, he was told Hitler and other dictators were a “model of intimate relationships.” Sharlet wondered, as I do, if the Family couldn’t find someone more worthy of comparison with Jesus as a leader.
Founded in the 1930s by Abraham Vereide and a group of Seattle businessmen, the first meeting of the group which would later become the Family was for prayer, and to break a dockworker labor strike. Vereide, or Abram as he was called, saw the American way of life and the Christian message as virtually interchangeable. Recounting a revelation, Abram would tell how God spoke to him with “The Idea” of working with men of power — business leaders, politicians, and powerbrokers in society. Abram believed, based on Romans 13:1, that God established men of authority. In other words, if a man was in a position of authority, God had put him there, and Abram was to work with him regardless of his character, morals, or actions. If he befriended these powerful men, the benefit would be a trickle-down of blessings on the common people. After all, working with poor people hadn’t really changed the world much. The rich and powerful were the place to start, according to Vereide.
Vereide began prayer meetings with these powerful leaders, and quickly found himself the welcomed guest of businessmen and politicians on the national, as well as local level. These prayer cells were patterned on the cells of communist organizations, whose politics Abram despised, but whose organization and commitment he admired.
But, Sharlet doesn’t just focus on the founding work of Abraham Vereide. He flashes back to the 1700s to Jonathan Edwards, and later, Charles G. Finney, both of whom fostered the antecedents of modern evangelicalism. Edwards did so with his soft-spoken but terrifying sermons, and his fascination with the extreme religious experiences of his followers. Finney’s revivalism produced the “anxious bench,” where penitent sinners would weep for forgiveness and salvation in response to his preaching. Those precursors of modern evangelical life shifted the American gospel, according to Sharlet, paving the way for men like Abraham Vereide and his successor, Doug Coe, and the organization known as the Family.
Under Coe’s leadership, the Family submerges, goes underground, to increase its influence and avoid scrutiny as it curries favor with politicians both American and international. That some of those politicians were ruthless dictators like Indonesia’s Suharto, or Somalia’s Siad Barre, or Nicaragua’s Somosa seemed to be of little concern to the Family or to Coe. Coe once said, when explaining why the Family did not object to the inhumanity of some of its friends, “I don’t want to embarass anyone.” Presumably, Coe didn’t want to use his influence to save the hundreds of thousands slaughtered by Suharto, or Barre, or Somosa either.
Sharlet writes with a captivating clarity, weaving the story of the organization from the Family’s own records housed at the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College. Once accessible to anyone, more recent documents are now off-limits to researchers because of Sharlet’s articles and the inquiries of several international reporters, according to Sharlet. Secrecy creates the impression the Family has something to hide, which Sharlet’s critics say they don’t.
Sharlet is careful not to sound shrill as he reports on the connections the Family has made. He notes particularly ministers of defense from developing countries who attend the National Prayer Breakfast for the purpose of meeting influential members of Congress. Sharlet cites several instances of increased foreign and military aid after connections are made by the Family. Sharlet provides copious endnotes to support his reporting on the Family and their affairs. A comprehensive index allows quick access to subjects and individuals of interest to the reader. It is evident Sharlet has done his homework over the five years he spent researching and writing the book, and it shows in the book’s meticulous detail.
Does Sharlet get it all right? I’m not sure about all the details, but at times the book seems to gather up the whole of evangelicalism under the suspicion of one part of it, the Family. But perhaps this is Sharlet’s way of pointing out that evangelicalism’s unquestioning embrace of all who bathe their work in the name of Jesus ought to be re-examined. For the most part, Sharlet’s book is a stunning expose’ of the blurring of power politics and a reinvented gospel fostering an Americanized-version of Jesus.
If there is any comfort to be taken from the saga presented in The Family, it might be that they don’t appear to be succeeding. Two of their members, Senator John Ensign of Arizona, and Governor Mark Sanford of South Carolina recently made the news because of their marital infidelity. Ensign’s unfaithfulness occurred with one of his staff members, the wife of his chief of staff. Senator Tom Coburn, another Family member, is said to have tried to help Ensign by suggesting that his chief of staff and his wife be “made whole” financially. Coburn has denied suggesting any such thing, but the Senate Ethics Committee may investigate the whole sorry mess.
Governor Mark Sanford, of course, kept the nation riveted with his disappearance to walk the Appalalchian Trail, which apparently extends all the way to Argentina, where he went to see his “soul mate.” On his return, and with endless discussions of his affair, Sanford likened himself to King David in the same terms that Sharlet had heard the Family use during his stay at Ivanwald. If the Family is no more successful at international intrigue than they are at raising the moral bar in Washington, we need not fear a far-right theocracy anytime soon. Of course, that’s the cynical view, and I acknowledge it as such. The Family is far from being a bunch of clowns, even if there are a few in their midst.
Jeff Sharlet has done evangelicals a favor by showing us that in the case of the Family, the emperor really is naked. The argument which forms the basis for the Family — that men of authority are there because God placed them there — is a poor exegetical attempt to justify amoral power politics. If Jesus were to have adopted the philosophy of the Family, he would have worked with Herod, and he would have taken Pontius Pilate to lunch. And, when Satan tempted Christ by offering him raw political power, Jesus would have jumped at the chance because, as Doug Coe says, “we work with power where we can [and] build new power where we can’t.”
(I purchased my own copy of The Family, and have received no inducement to read or review the book. I requested an interview with Jeff Sharlet, which he provided, and you can read my questions and his responses at my other blog, Confessions of a Small-Church Pastor. )
Must-reading: ‘Saving Paradise’
Normally, I read an entire book before posting about it. But, I am reading a fascinating new book, Saving Paradise — subtitled, How Christianity Traded Love of This World for Crucifixion and Empire, by Rita Nakashima Brock and Rebecca Ann Parker. You need to read this book. Brock and Parker offer some of the freshest, most exciting insights into the transformation of the Christian church over the past 2,000 years.
Paradise, the authors contend, was the focus of the early church. Paradise was where humanity was created in the image of God. Paradise was the destiny of the people of God — the land flowing with milk and honey. The psalmists wrote of paradise; and the prophets described the renewed land as paradise restored. The church was the “portal to paradise” and baptism the rite that ushered new converts back into the paradise that sin had lost.
The book is also filled with first-through-fourth century historical vignettes depicting how the early church spoke of and anticipated paradise here and in eternity. One of the most fascinating chapters titled, “So Great a Cloud” describes how the early church held sacred dinners at the entrance to the burial places of Christians who had died. They placed a single lit candle in an empty chair, signifying the presence of the deceased in their midst. Based on the Hebrews 12 image of “a great cloud of witnesses” the early church believed that the dead were present with and helped those Christians still in this life. They believed that the resurrection defeated death immediately, not just in the future, and that the veil between this world and the world to come was much thinner than we believe now.
The tone of the book is positive, hopeful, and points us back to a time when the church took seriously and practically the life-giving power of the resurrection. Paradise was the narrative that gave coherence to creation, even in all its sin and short-coming. Paradise, the garden of God, is not only the goal, but the present reality of followers of Christ.
I read a lot of books, as I am sure many of you do. Most books are rehashes of old ideas, maybe with some good stories, or clever twists. But, Saving Paradise presents a unique perspective, a fresh encounter with the early church. If the second half of this thick volume (over 500 pages) is as good as the first, then I’m in for a treat for the next couple of days. I’ll let you know. – Amicus Dei
Collapse of the world as we know it
Now that we’re accustomed to serial crises — bank failures, oil prices, food contamination, and so on — I thought I’d roll all this together into one post about the collapse of society as we know it. Which actually makes for some thought-provoking reading. If you’re interested in how this might play out in the 21st century, read Joseph Tainter’s The Collapse of Complex Societies.
Tainter is head of the Department of Environment and Society at Utah State University, and writes for an archaeological crowd. The Collapse of Complex Societies is not a pop culture book, but a textbook (which explains both the price and Cambridge Press as publisher). Be forewarned that this is not easy slogging, but Tainter meticulously outlines the reasons for the study of societal collapse (we’re all interested in why other societies failed so we can avoid the same fate), and debunks the common easy explanations of societal collapse, such as resource depletion, catastrophes, insufficient response to circumstances, intruders, social dysfunction, and so forth.
Collapse of a society, according to Tainter, is the result of diminishing returns of social complexity. This is seen primarily in the amount of energy required to maintain a society at its current level of complexity. Collapse occurs when a society simplifies its complexity, which can be dramatic or mundane.
Tainter spends a lot of time focused on ancient Rome because we have extant records in great detail. A spiral of rising taxes, territorial expansion, governmental crackdown, and imperial capriciousness continues until of its own weight (inability to maintain its complexity) the Western Roman Empire collapses for good. Of course, with a little help from the barbarian hoards, but Tainter contends collapse would have occurred anyway.
Follow up Tainter with Strauss and Howe’s book, The Fourth Turning. Strauss and Howe contend that the Millennial generation will face “the fourth turning” as a natural part of a cultural cycle here in the United States. This fourth turning is a crisis of great proportion and will challenge the Millennials to become a new version of “the greatest generation.” Makes for fascinating reading in light of Tainter’s argument about the diminishing returns of maintaining increasing complexity in a society.
Throw Kuntsler’s book, The Long Emergency, and Zakaria’s book, The Post American World, into the mix and a case can be made for an impending societal “adjustment” here in the US that will transform the future of this nation. What implications will these converging theories have for communities of faith in the future? That’s another interesting question that I don’t see anyone addressing? - Amicus Dei
The Disney-fication of War
I was listening to NPR on the way back from a meeting this afternoon. The guest on Fresh Air was Marc Garlasco, military analyst for Human Rights Watch, and former Pentagon targeting expert. Garlasco explained his work at the Pentagon in identifying “high value” — human — targets, and devising a bombing plan to take out those targets. While it was strange to hear a former Pentagon employee describe his work for Human Rights Watch, more disturbing was the jargon he used to describe his days at the DOD.
Garlasco was one of the chief “targeteers” for the Pentagon, joined by other “targeteers” from CIA and NSA. He spoke of the “targeteers” gathering to sort high profile targets in priority order, and then turning those lists over for “weaponeering” to the ordinance experts.
I was struck by the Disneyesque quality of those words — targeteers, weaponeering — which sounded jauntily like “mouseketeers” and “imagineering.” But the clincher was this — Garlasco said they watched their bombs fall from the comfort of their Pentagon offices via military satellite imagery — the ultimate video game experience, where real bombs kill real people in real places.
Garlasco now serves a military adviser to Human Rights Watch. His responsibilities include seeing first-hand the effects of bombs, particularly on civilians. And, in a “professional” manner he discusses with military commanders how they might reduce the collateral damage (read: stop killing innocent people) by changing their bombing techniques and ordinance selection.
This all smacks of trying to clean up war, which of course, is an impossibility. War is war, but if we can have a cleaned up version, much like a sanitized fantasyland, then war becomes an acceptable past-time for nations of our world. This is a world which has lost its way and confuses inhumane strategy for ethics. I suppose fewer civilian deaths are better than more civilian deaths, but trying to clean up war seems to me like trying to live in a graveyard. While everything might look neat and tidy, death permeates it all. — Amicus Dei
In memoriam: 4,000 who gave their lives in Iraq
Each cross represents one US soldier killed in Iraq. Each line contains 50-crosses, and there are 80 lines. Please post this on your blog, and send to others. Pray for peace.
This didn’t work like I planned
The transition from Typepad to WordPress did not go quite as swimmingly as I planned. All the tags disappeared, and so did the images. So, I’ve got lots of repairing, updating, and relinking to do. Plus, I just noticed yesterday that somebody has already parked a false blog at my old Typepad address trying to capture traffic, I suppose. Anyway, AmicusDei.com is my domain, so you can always find me by going directly there. So, I’ll be back with more at Amicus Dei, and maybe a new look (this is temporary) and a new focus. See you in a few days with more new stuff! — Amicus Dei
We are not afraid
Those who would divide and 
conquer the electorate in this primary season will find their 20th century strategy inappropriate and ill-received, for this time, we are not afraid. We are not afraid of each other, but affirm in one another those differences that make us each unique. We are not afraid of ideas or beliefs that differ from our own because a plurality of ideas and beliefs enriches our society.
Why I Believe God Exists
A couple of posts ago, I reviewed John Allen Paulos book, Irreligion. Paulos answered his own question — Are there any logical reasons to believe in God? — with an unequivocal, No. In his book, Paulos comes to that negative conclusion by dismantling to his own satisfaction 12 of the logical arguments for the existence of God.
