Klandamentalism: Bob Jones at the Intersection of Revivalism, Politics, and White Supremacy
An Interview with Camille Kaminski Lewis
by William Trollinger
Camille Kaminski Lewis is an Assistant Professor of Communication Studies at Furman University in Greenville, South Carolina. She holds a Ph.D. from Indiana University in Rhetorical Studies with a minor in American Studies. Her book, Romancing the Difference: Kenneth Burke, Bob Jones University, and the Rhetoric of Religious Fundamentalism, was a scholarly attempt to stretch the boundaries of both Kenneth Burke’s rhetorical theory on tragedy and comedy as well as stretch conservative evangelical’s separatist frames. (The story of that publication is available at The KB Journal.) In 2020 she published an edited volume, White Nationalism and Faith: Statements and Counter-Statements on American Identity (Peter Lang). In 2023 she published a remarkable piece here at rightingamerica: “The Unholy Trinity in Fundamentalist Parenting: A Rhetorical Analysis.” And in the past few weeks Clemson University Press has published her newest book, Klandamentalism, which is the focus of this interview.
1. In Klandamentalism you critique (rightly so, I have to say) the ways in which both Bob Jones University-trained historians and outside historians have told the story of Bob Jones in particular, and the KKK-fundamentalism connection in general. Could you talk a little about what you find problematic in these historical treatments?
There are three problems with the historical treatment of Bob Jones, Inc. First of all, gross inaccuracies get repeated. Secondly, scholars have no desire to interrogate those inaccuracies. Lastly, there is an inability to look across several sources at once.
Let me explain how these problems happen: Scholars presume that if you want to get the facts about anything, you need to go to “the source.” They presume that the information you get there will be comprehensive and accurate. I have noticed over the years that if I read an article or a book that mentions that they visited the BJU archives in their research, then their conclusions will pivot toward an overly glowing view of all things BJU.
I surmise that in the scholar’s process the BJU archivist insinuates himself (gendered pronoun is intended). I have several examples of this over the years – where a BJU alum pivots to BJU’s Aura of Goodness.™ I don’t mind including those, but it’s a little off-topic. Since I am banned from the BJU campus, I cannot go to the archives. So I had to start elsewhere or even everywhere else. Frustrating this presumption that “the source” is accurate and comprehensive is a simple failure to check the source’s story.
Maybe it’s a lack of curiosity. Maybe it’s a need to prove a different point and not wanting to get waylaid, to get too far into the weeds. I think there’s a naivete in all this. Since fundamentalists claim to be super-duper pious, they wouldn’t lie, would they? ::clutches pearls::
I know BJU, Inc. lies. So I started there. What actually happened with X? What does BJU, Inc. say happened? What do BJU’s neighbors say? Their allies? Their antagonists? And what shape does their lie take? Is it consistent?
Here are two mistakes that, I believe, can be eliminated when you look across several sources: One of the mistakes I found was from an exceptionally fine historian, Wayne Flynt. He repeated a mistake about the 1889 Dothan Farmer’s Alliance riot. In Poor But Proud, he said it occurred in 1899 (254). If you dig into his footnotes, his source is a single Alabama newspaper that cited the wrong date. It happens. And it’s not a big deal in the grand scheme of things. Because of the digitization of American newspapers, I can look across many, many locales, dates, and audiences. While Professor Flynt was likely looking at a microfilm version of a single-page of a single edition of a newspaper, digitization allows the scholar to go back and forth looking in every which way to get a fuller picture.
Another fine historian Sean Wilentz uses the “Stollenwerck Panorama” in the introduction of his Oxford UP book, Chants Democratic. It kind of cracked me up because he uses that invention to describe Pierre Martin Stollenwerck as a kind of “Yankee Yeoman,” a middle-class everyman. Nothing could be further from the truth. Just a few years prior his family was trafficking human beings in the Caribbean as part of the Code Noir. Is this important to Wilentz’ larger point about upward mobility in the early 19th-century? Heck yeah, it is! If the Stollenwercks were able to come to this country because of the wealth they accumulated from enslaved labor, that says a lot about the white supremacy cloaked in “upward mobility.”
2. At the heart of this book is the metaphor of a puzzle. How you make use of that metaphor in the book? And when it comes to Bob Jones, what is the final piece of the puzzle?
I struggled for a way to explain all this data I collected from fifty years of Bob Jones’ life. Kathleen Turner’s metaphor of the puzzle in her Rhetorical History seemed like a concrete and accessible explanation. Rhetorical theory is just a metaphor that has been cemented in some way after all. While I was thinking all that through, we were putting together that “magic puzzle” at my in-laws that Thanksgiving. And everything made sense to me too.
The final piece of the puzzle is this: Bob Jones, Sr., the founder of my alma mater Bob Jones University, was a member of the Ku Klux Klan. He repeatedly denied it. His biographers ignore it or deny it. Other historians don’t want to take it on (for whatever reason). But after all of all my work, the evidence is plain.
3. You make the argument that “throughout his entire career, at least from 1911 through the 1940s, women are his most consistent target.” And you back this up with innumerable examples, including his infamous “Modern Woman” sermon. What did Jones in particular and the KKK in general have against women?
This one was the hardest one for me to confront. It really, genuinely alarmed me. And frankly, I’m still processing this one. If I were to say it simply, it would be this: women do not conform to the middle-class masculine code of conduct (whatever that means), and, thus, they are nearly impossible to control.
Now others don’t conform to that code of conduct either. Anybody who is not-them (cis-het-white-Protestant men) cannot have power. There are some men that are not yet at the center of power, but they might grow up to be. And the Klandamentalist power players are fine with them. But everyone else must be kept on the sidelines. The Klandamentalist must receive all the attention.
Women can keep busy with their womanly things: childcare, housekeeping, cooking, praying. But those are all done outside of the masculine sphere. So, in sum, I think what they have against women is that they are potentially uncontrollable and distracting.
4. What sorts of responses to this work have you received/do you imagine receiving from folks within the Bob Jones University orbit? Put another way, given how thoroughly you have researched this story, what possible objections could they make?
Funny story: A few weeks ago in a BJU alumni “in good standing” Facebook group, an unwitting member posted a link to this book from Clemson University Press. I am not a member of this group, by the way, because I am a Persona Non Grata in fundyland. But countless people sent me the screenshots of this conversation. Within twenty-four hours, the post was deleted. So most BJU alumni will pretend this book doesn’t exist.
I sent a copy to Bob Jones III with a note saying that I hoped he would read it because when “we know better, we can do better.” I doubt he will read it. His second wife has a Ph.D. in Rhetoric, so she might, but I doubt it.
The hate hasn’t come yet, but I am bracing myself. When you live in Greenville, you are an easy target. I anticipate that someone will try to bring me up on charges for church discipline or threats. Both of those things have happened in the recent past, so it might happen again.
5. In your conclusion, in particular, you connect Bob Jones and his Klandamentalism with Donald Trump and contemporary Klandamentalism. Could you elaborate on this connection?
This startles me too. I can’t NOT see the parallels, to be honest. Donald Trump and Bob Jones, Sr. are both the centers of their universe, both demand complete loyalty (as they capriciously define it), and both have no credentials. Further, both demand a certain “appearance” for women around them, both have a cadre of young and compliant men to do their bidding. They both superficially use a vocabulary of religion, both draw stark divides between themselves and their cohort and everyone else, and they both violence on the “everyone else.” Donald Trump and Bob Jones, Sr. are both malignant narcissists, what we rhetoricians used to call demagogues.
If I were to continue this analysis, I would need to map out Trump’s rhetoric. I mean, is he the subject of all his sentences? If he is, then Donald Trump and Bob Jones, Sr. are the same.
6. Given the prodigious research involved in producing Klandamentalism, it makes all the sense that you take a break from research and writing. That said, do you have any projects in the work?
In my 2023 self-evaluation at Furman, I summed up the year be calling it a “year of rejection.” I had so many rejections that year. It was demoralizing. I have a book chapter coming out this year in from University of Pennsylvania Press, Bodies and Beliefs: Purity Culture and the Rhetoric of Religious Trauma. My chapter is called, “A Working Brain, Womb, and Mouth: The Female Body in Bob Jones University’s Purity Culture.” It’s an autoethnography, so that was a different kind of interrogation of the same thing.
I’m also in the middle of producing an edited volume with several fine scholars, called William Jennings Bryan: Haunting American Populism for 100 Years through University of Tennessee Press. Bryan died 100 years ago this summer, so we are looking back at his legacy as a way to understand our current political climate.
But the thing I’m most excited about is this: a volume called She Sang, He Sang: What Dolly and Bruce can Teach America. I’m working on this with my ethnomusicologist friend, Joanna Smolko. She and I both see hope in how Dolly Parton and Bruce Springsteen respond to public conflict. That’s what I’m working on this summer.
When America Goes Nativist, America Becomes Less Christian
by Rodney Kennedy
Rodney Kennedy has his M.Div from New Orleans Theological Seminary and his Ph.D. in Rhetoric from Louisiana State University. He pastored the First Baptist Church of Dayton (OH) – which is an American Baptist Church – for 13 years, after which he served as interim pastor of ABC USA churches in Illinois, Kansas, New York, and Pennsylvania. He is now a full-time writer, and lives in Louisiana. His eighth book, Dancing with Metaphors in the Pulpit, is the focus of this interview. And there are more books to come!
Thanks to Donald Trump and his MAGA cult, nativism is having one of its extended moments in our nation’s history. Nativism is the political policy of promoting or protecting the interests of native-born over those of immigrants, and it often includes the support of extreme anti-immigration laws.
Nativism as a movement opposes immigration on the basis of fear. Immigrants are “poisoning the blood,” “distorting or spoiling” American values. Of course, and as seen in social media memes, the irony of white people claiming to be natives isn’t lost on Native Americans.
- “You have to walk to school fifteen miles in the snow, uphill both ways? Try walking to Oklahoma.”
- “Immigrants threatening your way of life? That must be tough.”
- “Feed a man corn, he eats for a day. Teach a man to plant corn, he steals your land and kills you.”
Of course, nativism has a long history in the USA.
- In the 1830s President Andrew Jackson’s nationalism, populism, and commitment to democracy was deeply charged with racial hatred and the defense of white supremacy.
- In the 1850’s white evangelical fear of Catholic influence led many evangelicals to find a home in the American, or “Know Nothing,” Party. The Know-Nothing Party was built on the belief that American was a Protestant nation. The Know-Nothing Party, like MAGA, had a flag banner with the words: “Native Americans: Beware of Foreign Influence.”
- WWI saw a deep fear of German immigrants, to the point that speaking in German was banned in some states.
- In the 1920s the Ku Klux Klan – which had 4-5 million members across the nation – was virulently anti-immigrant, and (with the help of Klansmen in Congress) pushed through the Immigration Act of 1924, which eliminated immigration from Asia and drastically limited immigration from southern and eastern (i.e., Catholic and Jewish) Europe.
- WWII stoked both anti-German and anti-Japanese fears, and resulted in internment camps.
All movements share the ebb and flow of popularity and slump. When it comes to politics, there are flashes of populism and nativism. Something disturbs the usual hospitality of Americans and turns it into something quite ugly. A frightened, aggrieved and angry people are woven into a collective.
The current mixture of populism and nativism, a real devil’s brew, is enjoying a longer shelf life than usual. The natives are restless. Even in towns and villages with no immigrants, Americans have been aroused by images of immigrants as rapists and murderers. The whole movement takes on an religious apocalyptic tone. The protections of the “people” from hordes of immigrants pouring across our borders have broken down. The illegal immigrants are taking “our jobs,” killing our children, and destroying America. In biblical terminology, they are like a plague of locusts.
The current outburst of nativism feeds off a MAGA evangelical faith “grounded in a highly problematic interpretation of the relationship between Christianity and the American founding,” according to historian John Fea. “It is a playbook that too often gravitates toward nativism, xenophobia, racism, intolerance, and an unbiblical view of American exceptionalism. It is a playbook that divides rather than unites.”
A major nativist theme has been saving America from destruction. This fits the evangelical fear of losing the country to immorality. And this evangelical fear is old.
For example, see fundamentalist Baptist preacher, J. Frank Norris. In the 1920s and 1930s Norris worked overtime to stoke nativist fears. In keeping with the Second Ku Klux Klan, Catholics were his focus: “They would behead every Protestant preacher and disembowel every Protestant mother. They would burn to ashes every Protestant Church and dynamite every Protestant school. They would destroy the public schools and annihilate every one of our institutions.” But in places like El Paso and Birmingham, “the American people, the real white folks, the Protestant population rose up and put the Catholic machine out of business, and a Roman Catholic is not even allowed to clean spittoons in the Court House of City Hall in Birmingham.”
According to Norris, Catholics could not be real Americans. He called the Catholic faith “anti-American and unconstitutional.” Anti-Catholicism, American nativism, and white supremacy mixed together as one. Norris saw Russian Jews, Mexicans, and others as “low-browed foreigners.” “Let other do as they may,” he said. “As far as we are concerned …. we stand for 100 per cent Americanism; for the Bible, for the home, and against every evil and against every foreign influence that seeks to corrupt and undermine our cherished and Christian institutions.”
Norris and his nativism faded from the public eye. With the election of John F. Kennedy in 1960, Catholicism became more acceptable in mainstream America. This positive development is now undermined by MAGA’s anti-immigrant outrage.
At stake here is the public rise of nativism in tandem with the rise of Trump authoritarianism. Kenneth Burke named this experience consubstantiality. The magic of consubstantiality is its ability to merge people together in language that is also material. Burke says it is about being “both joined and separate, at once a distinct substance and consubstantial with another.” The various entities “stick” to one another.
For example, at Trump rallies, red Trump hats bob alongside American flags and Hitlerian emblems. Patriotism, nationalism, white nationalism, and antisemitism meld. The #MAGA hashtag of Trump’s campaign sloganeering accompanied Sieg Heil salutes in person and Twitter celebrations of the violence by “Proud Boys” identifying as “western chauvinists who refuse to apologize for creating the modern world.”
All the fears and hatred of various interest groups have merged into MAGA. Journalist Natasha Lennard noted, “This is not to say that each, or even the majority, of the hundreds of pro-Trump attendees sympathize with the Venn Diagram of white supremacist, alt-right, antisemitic, and neo-Nazi groups which intersect with the president’s broader support base.” Rather, “the point is that the constellation of hate gets interwoven at all levels irrespective of varying individual attitudes.”
Racism, xenophobia, homophobia, Islamophobia, misogyny, nativism, Christian nationalism, anti-science and anti-history ideologies, Nazism, white supremacy – all the demons of American political hell are now consubstantial, of one substance, with the Evil One.
We now face a legion of J. Frank Norris disciples, as fear gives rise to demons.
(Editor’s note: For an excellent biography of J. Frank Norris, see Barry Hankins, God’s Rascal: J. Frank Norris and the Beginnings of Southern Fundamentalism.)
“Compromising Biblical Authority”: Ken Ham, Answers in Genesis, and the Christian Right
by William Trollinger
Last Friday Ken Ham — sadly and emotionally — tweeted his concern about evangelical leaders whose inconsistent approach to the Bible is leading folks to abandon the faith:
It’s our contention that compromising Christians (as I call them) have an inconsistent approach to Scripture that unlocks a door to undermine biblical authority in Genesis – and puts people on a slippery slope toward unbelief through the rest of Scripture. And I’m passionate about not compromising biblical authority. In fact, because we are so burdened by the rampant compromise in the church regarding Genesis, we work hard in contending for the faith by exposing and challenging this compromise. This is particularly true when it comes to Christian leaders and Bible college/seminary professors. . . . That’s why, as much as I hate it, it’s so important for us at AiG to do all we can to passionately reach out to these leaders. We plead with Christian leaders to apply a consistent hermeneutic to Scripture and reject compromise that undermines the authority of the Word, which has such a negative impact on the people they influence.
If Ham is really so determined to challenge and correct compromising Christian leaders, it would make sense that he start with the fellow he sees in the mirror.
In doing our research for Righting America at the Creation Museum, Susan Trollinger and I were surprised by the fact that, for all the supposed emphasis on the Bible, what was presented to visitors was a multitude of placards with tiny (sometimes just a few words) snippets of biblical text. More stunning was the museum’s strikingly loose approach to the Bible, As we note in the book, we discovered at the museum an “inconsistent use of translations; . . . the creative editing [of biblical text]; the lack of ellipses indicating where text has been removed from a passage; [and] the failure to provide relevant context for the passages that are displayed” (pp. 136-137)
How does all this fit with Ham’s commitment to biblical inerrancy?
Then there are the Jesus Rooms, which were added to the Museum ten years after its 2007 opening. There one finds the “Teachings of Jesus” placard, which includes a section entitled “Rebukes” (which would better titled “Condemnations”). Here’s one of the condemnations included on this placard: “Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels” (Matthew 25:41). Given the emphasis on culture war at Answers in Genesis (AiG)– training evangelicals to become culture warriors is a (if not “the”) central aim of AiG – it seems obvious that the museum expects visitors to understand the “cursed” as those individuals who are LGBTQ/LGBTQ-affirming, those women who have had abortions and/or are not submissive to their husbands, those folks who are secular humanists and hold evolution to be true, those individuals who believe in the separation of church and state, and so on.
These culture war commitments help explain why the Creation Museum excised the verses that follow Matthew 25:41. Here’s the full passage:
“Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.” Then they also will answer, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?” Then he will answer them, “Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.” And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life (Matthew 25: 41-46).
Is it possible to imagine a more blatant example of “compromising biblical authority” than the removal of these verses?
Well, ok, perhaps it is matched by the 46 (!) point AiG “Statement of Faith” that all employees must sign. Each of these 46 propositions is accompanied by Bible verses that allegedly provide a divine imprimatur for that particular statement. Here, for example, is proposition #29 (a proposition which fits neatly with the biblical excision noted above): “The concepts of social justice, intersectionality, and critical race theory as defined in modern terminology are anti-biblical and destructive to human flourishing” (Ezekiel 18:1-20; James 2: 8-9).” But when one looks at these verses, one finds nothing to confirm that social justice, intersectionality and critical race theory are anti-biblical.
How is blatantly using the Bible as a mere prop for right-wing culture war arguments NOT the quintessential example of “compromising biblical authority”?
For all their bluster about Christians who “compromise” the Bible, the folks at AiG and elsewhere in the Christian Right elide the fact that it is their own compromises, their own turning from the Gospel, that have driven people away from the faith. As I pointed out in my 2021 essay, “Religious Non-Affiliation: Expelled by the Right,” the “quantitative and qualitative evidence strongly support the argument that the Christian Right has been a primary reason for the remarkable rise of the religious nones in the United States since the 1990s” (186).
I ended this essay on a personal note:
With the Christian Right’s enthusiastic support of Donald Trump . . . their cover is blown. We can now see (some of us had already seen) that the Christian Right is not about personal morality and Christian/religious values, but is instead about a particular right-wing politics – a politics in keeping with the history of fundamentalism – involving white nationalism, hostility to immigrants, unfettered capitalism (which includes a disinterest, at the least, in global warming), and intense homophobia . . . [And] if I thought the Christian Right = Christianity, or Christian Right = religion, I would want nothing to do with it, either. But as a person of faith, I understand Christianity to be something else. I understand it to be centered in the Gospels, in the message (stated quite clearly in Matthew 25) that in the end, we are to be judged on how we treat our brothers and sisters, on how we treat “the other.” So while I appreciate the clarity with which we can now see (much of) white evangelicalism, I am also saddened by the fact that the secularizing of America occurs in part because the Christian Right has been so successful in articulating what it means to be Christian (189-190).
Call for Articles
Foundations
American Baptist Historical Society
Atlanta, Georgia
“Evolution, Creationism, and Faith/Science”
It has been a century since the Scopes Trial, and Christians continue to debate the scientific merits of creationism and evolution, a debate that raises all sorts of questions pertaining to the relationship of faith and science. Foundations invites articles that reflect on some aspect of this century-long debate among Christians, that take into account the challenges this debate poses for public education, and that help us think more clearly about the faith/science relationship.
Send an abstract to wtrollinger1@udayton.edu and ABQeditor@ABHSarchives.org.
Abstract deadline: 1 August 2025
Final paper deadline: 1 February 2026
Forget the “Sweet By and By”: For MAGA Evangelicals, Apocalypse is Now
by Rodney Kennedy
Rodney Kennedy has his M.Div from New Orleans Theological Seminary and his Ph.D. in Rhetoric from Louisiana State University. He pastored the First Baptist Church of Dayton (OH) – which is an American Baptist Church – for 13 years, after which he served as interim pastor of ABC USA churches in Illinois, Kansas, New York, and Pennsylvania. He is now a full-time writer, and lives in Louisiana. His eighth book, Dancing with Metaphors in the Pulpit, is the focus of this interview. And there are more books to come!
As a child in a North Louisiana Baptist Church, I wondered why we were grinning while singing, “Are You Ready for the Judgment Day?”
But now I realize we were grinning because we were sure we were the sheep, the chosen people of God.
Nothing has previously thrilled MAGA evangelical hearts like preachers describing the end of the world. Evangelical dreams of apocalypse have always been a dark secret of wanting revenge on the wicked even though they couch their message as one of love and salvation. Rev. Robert Jeffress has written several books on what he thinks will happen. All the scenes he depicts contain chaos, destruction, annihilation, and the wrath of God loosed upon the wickedness of humanity.
But now, these resentful and angry MAGA evangelicals — tired of waiting on Jesus to return, frustrated that Jesus isn’t doing anything to help them – have decided to release the wrath of God now. Jesus is an afterthought. His name is invoked, but the power behind this movement is Trump. “It’s judgment day in America. Bring it on!”
Don’t be fooled by Trump’s fake offer of “Make America Great Again.” This is a salvation by demolition and destruction. As Lance Wallnau once said of Trump, “He’s the chaos candidate.” And now he is unleashing the terrible swift sword of God’s eternal wrath on liberals.
The rhetoric of dismantlement and destruction now lays waste the foundation of our government – the civil service. As Trump rules by executive order, he seeks to destroy all in his sight. His imperial militancy knows no bounds.
Rhetorical scholar Robert L. Ivie says, “Trump personifies chaos. Demolition is his rhetorical hammer. Cataclysm is the political entailment of demolition.” MAGA evangelicals are on board with the unfolding scenes of destruction.
MAGA has manufactured a national narrative of a chosen people in a Christian nation with an apocalyptic mission, an innocent righteous people opposed by the forces of evil. Trump has always offered a message of salvation, but it is clothed in lies. Ivie labels it “a true revelation of crisis but a false diagnosis of what is wrong and how best to respond.” And “Trump’s deception hinges on a facile promise of national salvation. It is a puerile discourse of redemption by demolition and deal making.”
For example, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s purge of tens of thousands of federal workers has halted efforts to collect data on everything from cancer rates in firefighters to mother-to-baby transmission of HIV and syphilis to outbreaks of drug-resistant gonorrhea to cases of carbon monoxide poisoning. If a nation doesn’t have safeguards in place for the appearance of epidemics and plagues, the door swings open for a real apocalypse.
The evangelicals have long warned of the four horsemen of the apocalypse as pestilence, war, famine, and death. Now, the four horsemen of apocalypse are a ream of executive orders, a group of compliant billionaires, and a compromised Congress. Instead of bombs dropping from the sky, we have a chaotic tariff policy, the destruction of entire departments of the federal government, and revenge on Trump’s personal enemies.
The point is revenge.
Apocalypse now makes MAGA evangelicals giddy with excitement. Dropping all pretense of salvation, they now unashamedly promote Trump’s horrible campaign of revenge. This is the evangelical war to end all wars. MAGA has taken on the task of forcing the nation into line. Eric Metaxas, after the election of Trump, exclaimed, “Let the AWESOMENESS begin! God bless America!” Our ambassador to Israel, former Gov. Mike Huckabee says President-elect Trump might as well be called “President Lazarus” after his sweeping victory.
Owen Strachan couldn’t contain his glee: “We have been granted a reprieve, a temporary stalling of evil as driven by the modern political left. God has shown up. God has answered our prayers. Let us use this truth to keep praying, and keep hoping, and keep loving …. It’s morning in America.”
Evangelicals are not talking about the devastation to nations cut off from needed food and medicine by the severe cutbacks at USAID. They ignore the tragedies of government workers fired without cause. They don’t care about Trump trampling on the Constitution and eroding the First Amendment. Legal immigrants kidnapped by ICE agents in plainclothes and disappeared are cheered. Evangelicals are a happy bunch. This is like a Trump rally where Trump and his followers enjoy one another’s cruelty; but now it’s better because real people are being punished.
MAGA evangelicals would be dancing if they danced. Given the absolute absurdities of MAGA evangelical theology in its capitulation to Trumpism, I’m wondering, “How many evangelicals can dance on the head of a pin?”
The gleeful, giddy evangelicals are heedless of the innocent casualties of the culture wars they started. War always destroys more than soldiers in combat. Civilians died from genocides, massacres, bombings, disease, and starvation. According to statistics from The National WWII Museum, 45 million civilians were killed in WWII.
Trump’s apocalypse has disrupted thousands of innocent bystanders. Civil service workers have been fired without explanations. Elon Musk, with no apparent plan, has rampaged through the government in a helter skelter way to close departments, reduce departmental efficiency, and fire workers. The image of Musk with a chain saw is suggestive of his approach. When any reformation of the federal government should require precise surgical tools, Musk and his crew are loose with chainsaws. This apocalypse has become a “chainsaw massacre.”
To MAGA evangelical eyes, the demolition is long overdue. They righteously believe this is the true judgment of God. President Trump has the full backing of an evangelical crowd convinced beyond any semblance of doubt that he is doing what must be done.
We are not witnessing a reformation of our government; we are witnessing a feckless mob of people who have gathered to witness the mayhem.
MAGA have presumed the right to be at God’s right hand as judges of the nation. They parade and preach as if they have just returned from the top of Mount Sinai with stone tablets of instruction from God entitled, “The Destruction of the Deep State.”
Their fondest dreams are coming true before their eyes. Paul Dans, the former director of Project 2025, the apocalyptic blueprint, says he is delighted with Trump’s policies. “It’s actually way beyond my wildest dreams,” Dans said.
Even as Project 2025 and Trump’s executive orders look like exact copies, Dans insists any correlation is merely the result of great minds swimming in the same sea. Still, Dans claims, “Trump is seizing every minute of every hour. I’m not sure that you’d be able to implement Project 2025 without Donald Trump’s ability to bring people together and Elon Musk’s ability to focus the direction of the work.”
As for MAGA evangelicals, they are acting as if the Rapture has occurred in the second coming of Trump. They are busy selecting targets for the president. Wallnau wants Trump to really go after the universities because he believes they are “the hotbed of resistance. Time to make them a priority of reformation. For real!” As Trump attacks history and science, he embraces the two greatest enemies of the evangelical tribe.
MAGA evangelicals like Jeffress, Wallnau, and David Barton are doing flips over Trump’s executive order targeting history and the Smithsonian. Now, at last they see an opening for their fake, revisionist history claiming America was created according to God’s will and as a Christian nation.
Ken Ham must be deliriously happy as he watches Trump destroy the department of Education and attack science on multiple fronts. What more could a man who believes the earth is only 6,000 years old want more than the undoing of real science?
A political power determined to demolish and destroy can’t be allowed to dominate American politics. The MAGA evangelicals are no longer harmless Bible-thumpers; they are giving President Trump all the support he needs to create Apocalypse Now. And as Trump would put it, “It’s happening. It’s happening. It’s happening.”
And MAGA is not prepared for the horrific outcomes.
A(nother) Frontal Attack on Democracy: The Trump Administration Eviscerates the National Endowment for the Humanities
by William Trollinger
On April 03 the Department of Governmental Efficiency (DOGE) sent an email – from a nongovernmental email address (which meant that many of these emails ended up in SPAM folders – this is efficiency?) – informing hundreds of recipients that their National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) grants had been terminated. These grantees include museums, teachers, and state humanities councils. As the American Historical Association (AHA) has rightly pointed out, “this frontal attack on the nation’s public culture is unpatriotic, anti-American, and unjustified” and “imperil[s] both the education of the American public and the preservation of our history.” These grant terminations are in keeping with other Trump executive orders that “prioritize narrow political ideology over historical research, historical accuracy, and the actual historical experiences of Americans.”
This attack was then amplified by an email sent the evening of April 03 – again from a nongovernmental email address – informing 75-80% of NEH staff that they were being placed on “administrative leave.”
One of the casualties of this anti-American assault is the Ohio Humanities Council (OHC). The OHC has funded a variety of projects that “tell stories that are essential to our cultural infrastructure,” including the remarkable documentary film, “The Lincoln School Story,” which tells the story of African American mothers in Hillsboro, Ohio and their heroic effort to desegregate the local school. More than this, it is OHC policy to “serve everyday Ohioans statewide, from school children to veterans, living everywhere from one-stoplight communities to big cities.”
The OHC is an invaluable resource for the state. And besides everything else it does, it maintains a Speakers Bureau which includes 27 scholars in the humanities. Libraries, museums, and the like apply for (modest) OHC support to bring in one of these scholars to speak at an event that is free and open to the public.
Sue and I are both Ohio Humanities speakers. Sue gives presentations on “Moving Off the Farm and Trying to Stay Amish” and “Rebels in Corsets: The Embodied Rhetoric of the Women’s Suffrage Movement”; I speak on “Statues, Flags, and the Ongoing Battle over the Meaning of the Civil War” as well as “Terrorizing Immigrants and Catholics: The Ohio Ku Klux Klan of the 1920s.” And in keeping with OHC’s stated goal to serve Ohioans “living everywhere from one-stoplight communities to big cities,” in the past decade we have given talks in the following locations (sometimes we have each spoken in the same locale, and sometimes we have given both of our presentations at the same venue):
- Athens
- Barberton
- Bellville
- Celina
- Cincinnati
- Columbus
- Coshocton
- Dayton
- Granville
- Greenville
- Lima
- Loudonville
- Marietta
- Milan
- Niles
- Northmont
- Peninsula
- Sandusky
- Shawnee
- Springboro
- Versailles
- Wapakoneta
- Warren
- Zanesville
- Zoar
We have thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to see towns we would never have visited otherwise. Even better, we have thoroughly enjoyed the people we have met at these events. In particular, we have been repeatedly struck by how eagerly folks want to learn the history we have to share – which is contrary to the bad rap that the humanities often receive in contemporary American culture (sometimes even in institutions of higher education). More than this, attendees are quite eager to interact, with questions that are often terrific and smart (“how is that there are now Catholics in white Christian nationalist organizations, given that they used to be the enemy?”), and with comments that expand our knowledge (“if a Swartzentruber Amish person shows up at the hospital, you have to give them your immediate attention, as it has to be very serious since they never seek medical treatment.”)
The public humanities work supported by the NEH and state humanities councils really does matter. And the Trump Administration’s attack on the public humanities is, indeed, thoroughly unpatriotic.
A Century After Scopes: Much Has Not Changed, and Much Has Changed
by Susan Trollinger and William Trollinger
Here we are, at the centenary of the Scopes Trial. And last week was very much a Scopes week. On Tuesday afternoon the Society of Biblical Literature devoted a session in its Global Virtual Meeting to “Scopes 100 Years Later,” which was expertly presided over by the University of Chicago’s Shailer Matthews Distinguished Service Professor, Margaret Mitchell. (Given how the first generation of fundamentalists absolutely despised Matthews, Mitchell’s presence was extra-sweet.) Then, on Friday, at Vassar College’s wonderful “Science and the Culture Wars” conference, there was a session devoted to “Science and Religion in Culture and the Courts.” Pepperdine’s Ed Larson spoke on the populism of William Jennings Bryan; Stephen Weldon from the University of Oklahoma discussed how the culture wars have moved from creationism to other issues; Pepperdine’s Christina Littlefield talked about the power of the right-wing media, with particular attention to Charlie Kirk; and Glenn Branch from the National Center for Science Education discussed the recent effort in North Dakota to mandate that Intelligent Design be included in the state’s science standards.
William spoke at the “Scopes 100 Years Later” session (Sue was in class, and could not participate), and we presented together at the session devoted to “Science and Religion in Culture and the Courts.” It was a distinct honor to present at both conferences, and at both conferences we gave a variation of the following talk.
100 years after the Scopes Trial. And there is no question that there is much that remains unchanged, including the conviction of many fundamentalists and evangelicals that: mainstream science is at odds with a faithful reading of the Bible; there should be equal time for biblical creationism alongside mainstream science in public school classrooms; and, this conflict between faith and science involves not only the nature of public education but, in fact, the very soul of America.
So it was in 1925, and so it is in 2025. But much has changed in the past 100 years, and it is these changes – we will focus on three — that we want to highlight here, as we think it is crucial for biblical scholars, scientists, and interested Americans to have a clear-eyed sense of how – when it comes to creationism in the US (and beyond) — 2025 is not 1925.
The first involves the very nature of biblical creationism. At the time of the Scopes Trial most fundamentalists were “old Earth” creationists. They adamantly and passionately rejected mainstream biology, understanding evolution to be both profoundly antibiblical and – in its emphasis on humans as highly developed animals – morally and socially corrosive. But they simultaneously accepted mainstream geology, holding either to the “gap theory” – there was an indeterminate gap of time between Genesis 1:1 and Genesis 1:2, during which time God used six days to order his creation – or the “day age theory,” in which each “day” of Genesis 1:1 represented an indeterminate period of time.
William grew up with old Earth creationism in a very tangible way. His father was a fundamentalist in theology if not in behavior – he made prodigious use of very colorful expletives, and won a great deal of money playing poker — and he passionately opposed evolution. But as a geologist who used aerial photographs to create maps that could predict where oil would be found, he also passionately held to the idea of an “old Earth,” particularly, the day-age theory.
So he was horrified by the 1961 publication of John C. Whitcomb’s and Henry Morris’ The Genesis Flood: The Biblical Record and its Scientific Implications. Borrowing heavily (without attribution) from the Seventh-day Adventist geologist, George McCready Price, Whitcomb (a fundamentalist theologian) and Morris (a civil engineering professor) argued that Noah’s Flood was a yearlong global event that produced the geological strata that provided the appearance of an old Earth. More than this, they argued that not just the Earth but the entire universe was created in six twenty-four hour days less than 10,000 years ago.
Replete with footnotes, photographs, and the occasional mathematical equation, The Genesis Flood gave conservative Protestants what seemed to be a serious alternative to mainstream science. More than this, their young Earth creationism fits much better with taking the Bible literally than does old Earth creationism. As a result, young Earth creationism took conservative Protestantism (and beyond) by storm; much to my father’s dismay and anger, within a few decades it supplanted old Earth creationism as the dominant form of biblical creationism. And one very important consequence of this shift — from holding to the idea that the Earth is billions of years old to the idea that the Earth is but a few thousand years old – is that it dramatically widened the gap between biblical creationism and mainstream science. And this is significant..
A second and related change is that the role of the Bible in the arguments for a young Earth creationism seems, at least in some very influential quarters, to have become increasingly unserious, even irrelevant. Why do we say this? As we began research for our book, Righting America at the Creation Museum, we assumed that we would find lots of Bible at the museum. And in one sense, there is indeed some Bible, or better, there are many little snippets of Bible. But as we looked closely at the museum’s ubiquitous placards – and here we had the assistance of a very bright doctoral student – we discovered an inconsistent use of translations, extraordinarily creative editing of biblical passages, a lack of ellipses to indicate where text (sometimes whole verses) had been removed from a passage, and the failure to provide relevant context for the passages that are displayed. To give one example of the latter (and keep in mind that the threat of Hell is very important to Answers in Genesis (AiG)), in the Museum’s “Jesus Rooms” there is a placard with Matthew 25:41: “Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” That’s it. No mention of the verses before and after, which make clear that those condemned to the everlasting fire are those who did not give the hungry food, the thirsty drink, the naked clothing, and so forth. Proof-texting on steroids.
Of course, it is no accident that these verses are omitted. The emphasis on caring for “the other” as the condition for salvation does not fit with AiG’s ideological agenda. And when one looks at the AiG’s 46 point statement of faith, which all employees must sign, one finds this ideological agenda combined with a proof-texting that is carried even further, on occasion beyond any text at all. Each of the 46 propositions includes references to Bible verses. So here’s proposition #29: “the concepts of social justice, intersectionality, and critical race theory are anti-biblical and destructive to human flourishing (Ezekiel 18:1-20; James 2:8-9). We looked up these passages and found nothing to indicate that social justice, intersectionality, and critical race theory are anti-biblical. But as we are not biblical scholars, we turned to Abingdon’s New Interpreters Bible Commentary, where we discovered nothing to corroborate AiG’s assertions.
All this to say that for AiG and its museums, the Bible is often little more than a prop used in behalf of young Earth creationism and its right-wing culture war arguments. Let us be clearer. Young Earth creationism is not simply an argument that biblical creationism is true, nor is it simply an argument that biblical creationist science is the true, factual way we should understand the universe. As we discovered in our research, what matters most at the Creation Museum, Ark Encounter, and the virtual Answers in Genesis is preparing conservative evangelicals to serve as right-wing culture warriors who attack (among others) feminists, the LGBTQ+ community, DEI initiatives, and “woke” thinking, and who argue in behalf of Christian nationalism and patriarchy.
More than this, the young Earth creationist juggernaut that is AiG is very busy attacking what they see as the scientific and academic conspiracy that works to brainwash us into believing that evolution is true, that global warming is real (“the climate cult”), and that COVID vaccines are efficacious.
Of course, to hold such conspiratorial views is made much easier when one resides within a bubble that protects adherents from what many of us would see as facts. In this regard, over the past few decades the right-wing media industry – Fox News and much, much more – has exploded, providing a wonderful landing spot for the most outrageous conspiracy theories.
But there’s also education. In the Scopes Trial the controversy was about what would be taught in the public schools, schools that were, with few exceptions (in some places, Catholic schools) the only game in town. But this is radically changing. Today we have a plethora of Christian schools and homeschools, schools which are often equipped with fundamentalist textbooks from publishers such as Bob Jones University Press, Abeka Books, and Accelerated Christian Education. These schools suffuse their students with a heavy dose of young Earth creationism, white Christian nationalism, and more. And then many of these students head off to “Creation Colleges” – you can see a list of them on the Answers in Genesis website – where they are inculcated with a very similar messages.
Folks like AiG’s Ken Ham have been quite aggressive about promoting this alternative educational system, And now there are states that are funding or seeking to fund private schools. So the fight now is not just about getting creationism, the Bible, and white Christian nationalism into the public schools. It is also about funding private schools, including fundamentalist schools. It is about expanding the right-wing subculture. It is about taking dominion over the culture.
This is where we are. 100 years after Scopes.
Dancing with Metaphors in the Pulpit: An Interview with Rodney Kennedy
by William Trollinger
Rodney Kennedy has his M.Div from New Orleans Theological Seminary and his Ph.D. in Rhetoric from Louisiana State University. He pastored the First Baptist Church of Dayton (OH) – which is an American Baptist Church – for 13 years, after which he served as interim pastor of ABC USA churches in Illinois, Kansas, New York, and Pennsylvania. He is now a full-time writer, and lives in Louisiana. His eighth book, Dancing with Metaphors in the Pulpit, is the focus of this interview. And there are more books to come!
1. One of the things I most love about this book is its passion – it permeates very chapter. I am particularly struck by this quote from your introduction: “I am interested in the work of preparation – the long hours that take place every week in the life of the preacher. We have so much to learn from novelists, poets, philosophers, and rhetoricians. Let the dance begin!” (16). Could you say a little bit about where your passion comes from, and could you say something about why some preachers may not be doing “the hard work” you describe here?
First, thanks for mentioning the passion of my book which is an extension of my passion for preaching. I have always felt uneasy about the church calling half of the church year, “Ordinary Time.” I understand the meaning, but “ordinary” doesn’t quite fit the power of the faith. My fear is that preachers can treat every Sunday as “ordinary.” I believe passion must come to the pulpit every Sunday. So I remind myself, that every Sunday, even during Lent, is a “mini-Easter.” And there is nothing ordinary about resurrection.
In my introduction to homiletics class, my first lecture is always about reading – the reading life of the preacher. I encourage my students to have a file for new words they “discover.” And to find ways to use those words in sermons. A preacher is a reader. I give my students a reading list of 200 books from multiple disciplines. As impossible as it is, I want my students to be Renaissance persons. For example, I’m currently reading David Blight’s Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom.
Since preachers have to face the nonsense of biblical creationism, I always give them books to read by scientists. Kenneth R. Miller, Only a Theory: Evolution and the Battle for America’s Soul, Francis S. Collins, The Language of God, and Lewis Thomas, Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler’s Ninth Symphony. In the memorable words of physicist Freeman Dyson, ours is a “universe that knew we were coming.”
My passion for the preparation phase of the sermon comes from the more than 20 years I spent playing baseball. My father, frequently my coach, taught me that what happened on game day came down to how well I practiced. I believe the sermon comes down to how well the preacher has practiced the gathering of the very best materials. This has always been my passion.
Every book, article, or essay I read always has one question for the material: “Will it preach?” I have spent a lifetime gathering materials for sermons. I’m sure you would laugh at the sight of me scribbling a quote from a movie on the side of a bag of popcorn at Cinema 11.
While I know there is a tremendous amount of great preaching every Sunday in America, I sense preachers are being squeezed into a giant cauldron of busyness – most of it good work, but it takes away precious hours needed for sermon preparation.
One of my favorite Flannery O’Connor pearls of wisdom is when she is talking about writing: “I go to the typewriter every day for three hours so that if anything comes, I am prepared to receive it.”
2. In your chapter, “What the Poets Teach Us About Preaching,” you make the claim that “to speak of, about, or for God, poetry is required. No other language suffices” (82). Why do you say this?
I don’t quote a lot of poetry in my sermons, but I am always imitating the way the poets use language. For me, poetry is life and life is poetry. Writing and life for the preacher becomes the search for an imaginative space to find ways of expressing truth even though everything appears to have been said before. The poets lead the preachers into the rich world of metaphor. Here we discover metaphors are not mere stylistic flourishes, but rather a strategy used to speak old truth in new ways and create new realities.
The poets allow us a linguistic freedom as we attempt to develop our own unique voices over against our precursors. Harold Bloom argues that meaning occurs as part of an agon or struggle with previous meaning.
Metaphors produce a new kind of knowledge, a new vision as a defense against literal meaning. Literal meaning feels like a prison, a life-sentence handed down by stern-faced masters insisting on binding all creativity and imagination.
Nothing helps preachers to be poets like the 150 poems in the book of Psalms. Andre Chouraqui says, “We are born with this book in the depths of our being. A little book: a hundred and fifty poems: a hundred and fifty steps set between life and death.” And the psalms are an unending reservoir of metaphors.
And I am grateful for the poetry of the King James Version and the Book of Common Prayer. Both are products of the 17th century and both are still filled with joy and deep pathos.
Walter Brueggemann’s Finally Comes the Poet still rings with truth. Flat prose is not the language of preaching. Flat prose is what gives preachers the sobriquet – “Boring.” Poetry is our language. Approach it as a throne of grace and mercy even if you never publish a book of poems.
In the book, I use Mary Oliver’s A Poetry Handbook almost as a preaching textbook. She’s a worthy guide for preachers.
I find a deep connection to preaching in Jane Kenyon’s poem “Otherwise.” She reflects on her daily life after she was diagnosed with leukemia.
I slept in a bed
in a room with paintings
on the walls, and
planned another day
just like this day.
But one day, I know,
it will be otherwise.
And I must say, “Letters from a Father,” by Mona Van Duyn, is a powerful sermon. A father, convinced of his approaching death, receives the gift of a birdfeeder from his daughter. He grumbles: “I don’t see why you want to spend good money on grain for birds and you say you have a hundred sparrows, I’d buy poison and get rid of their diseases and turds.”
In the conclusion, the father has come to life and joy again:
I am going to keep
feeding all spring, maybe summer, you can see
they expect it. Will need thistle seed for Goldfinch and Pine
Siskin next winter. Some folks are going to come see us
from Church, some bird watchers, pretty soon.
They have birds in town but nothing to equal this.
So the world woos its children back for an evening kiss.
3. Please expand upon this quote from your chapter, “What the Philosophers Teach Us About Preaching”: “I refuse the binary choice between a populist, evangelical ministry and a progressive ministry. I believe both evangelicals and progressives have much to learn from the secular disciplines, as the early preachers in the church so amply demonstrated” (99).
In our postmodern, post-truth age where opinions dress for the ball as if they were the truth, the preacher has never so needed the company of the philosophers. Aristotle, Plato, Augustine, Aquinas, Wittgenstein – the list is endless. From the philosophers we learn how to think.
Dualism is the enemy of the preacher. We keep thinking binary choices are our only choices. For example, I have found a way to take Walter Rauschenbusch’s social gospel and combine it with the awful criticisms of evangelicals to create a third way: an evangelical social gospel. “Either/or” bores me.
Preaching was born in the house of philosophy and rhetoric. From St. Paul to St. Chrysostom to St. Augustine, the early church filled her pulpits with men trained in philosophy and rhetoric. Any move the churches make against this intellectual grounding is detrimental to the cause.
My preaching students were reluctant to read Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age, for example. Most of this revulsion came from the book being almost a thousand pages long. But beyond my students being too busy to read philosophy, they didn’t enjoy the struggle to grasp the complexities of what it means to be faithful witnesses in a secular age.
I’m not suggesting sermons be filled with philosophical diatribes, but I am saying preachers increase their intellectual firepower by spending time with philosophers. Paul spending time with the Greek philosophers in Acts 17 always fills me with a sense of adventure. Here’s how Paul’s sermon to the philosophers ended: “When they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some scoffed; but others said, ‘We will hear you again about this.’ At that point Paul left them. But some of them joined him and became believers.”
4. In your conclusion, so wonderfully entitled “For God’s Sake Feel the Sermon,” you assert that “the perfect word” for a preacher’s attitude is “parrhesia.” Could you explain what this means, and could you talk about (as you do in the conclusion) the danger that comes from this in the year 2025?
Michel Foucault has a small volume on parrhesia – the word translated as “boldness – that is so powerful. Foucault says parrhesia involves risk, truth, danger, and a willingness to speak truth to power. Parrhesia may be the most needed virtue for preachers. Some preachers belong to the status quo and they preach the gospel of “the king’s temple.” Others are Amos and they preach the truth that clashes with the status quo.
None of this is easy. And no preacher should put on the mantle of the prophet every Sunday in every sermon. She or he will become to be more of a scold than a faithful preacher. But in our time, in our dangerous political environment, I believe the preacher simply must bring to bear the truth of Scripture. I believe the Word has plenty to say to our current political malaise. The anger, the mistrust, the outrage, the lack of civility, and etc. cries out for homiletical application.
5. Related to this, you ask in the introduction, “Why are progressive preachers often such wimps”? Why do you say this, and how do you answer your own question?
George Lakoff, in The Political Mind, asks, “Why are Democrats such wimps?” The question hit me hard and I applied it to preaching. Lakoff says progressives are stuck in the Age of the Enlightenment and don’t understand the importance of emotion in today’s culture. We are not so good when it comes to pathos. We still think if we can just tell people the facts, they will see the truth. This is no longer the case. This, of course, also relates to parrhesia. Speaking truth to power is never an easy task. As Otis Moss, Jr. reminds us, “We don’t like prophets.”
I think the reaction of the Nazarene synagogue crowd to the preaching of Jesus scarred preaching. I think the pain of that moment went deep into the sinews and bones of every preaching. The crowd, after all, was “outraged” and tried to kill him.
6. Besides your passion for preaching, you also have a deep passion for writing, Could you tell us a little about your latest writing project?
Most of my writing over the last several years has focused on the threat I believe we face as a nation and as a democracy. The irony for me is MAGA evangelicals are driving this movement and my mind seizes at the idea. I have a book of essays on President Donald Trump that will be published later in 2025. I have compiled 30 of my essays about Trump that were originally written for Baptist News Global, added an introduction, and a concluding analysis. I believe democracy is in danger. I cannot sit on the sideline and not respond. We live in dangerous times. I am glad I am alive for such a time as this, because “dissent” lives in my Anabaptist DNA.
As usual I am working on a new book about preaching. I am especially interested in how evangelical and progressive preaching seems to miss the mark with what I deem an excessive attention to anthropologically centered sermons instead of theocentric sermons. The title, Preaching in Doxology, is intended as my most definitional understanding of the preacher’s task. Doxology is not just chanting the psalms; it is whole different language.
I have one basic regret for Dancing with Metaphors. The book was already too long and I had to cut two chapters, “What the historians teach us about preaching” and “What the scientists teach us about preaching.” Since evangelicals are engaged in a cultural war against American history and science, I saved those chapters and I am now writing a tribute to historians and scientists.
In the meantime I pray a congregation somewhere will take a chance on this allegedly radical preacher and allow me the privilege of preaching for them one Sunday. The art of preaching, after all, only comes alive in a pulpit.
State Police Proselytized during K9 Training at Ark Park; No Word on How Dogs Reacted
by Dan Phelps
Note: This article originally appeared at Panda’s Thumb. We are pleased to republish it here with the author’s and editor’s approval.
Back in 2020, the Kentucky State Police (KSP) were embroiled in a controversy after it was discovered that a training PowerPoint presentation quoted Adolf Hitler and advocated ruthless violence. In spite of this horrendous exception, the Kentucky State Police is well-respected and noted for their professionalism and devotion to duty. Imagine my surprise when I learned that the KSP paid Answers in Genesis (AIG) to send an officer on a K9 training class on February 1 to 4, 2025, at the Ark Encounter. Besides K9 training, the class included Fundamentalist Christian and Christian Nationalist propaganda. With the government agencies and politicians increasingly becoming entangled Christian Nationalism, this incident is particularly disturbing.
On February 7, 2025, Ken Ham bragged in his daily blog that the AIG Department of Public Safety had hosted numerous law enforcement organizations in K9 training at the Ark. Photos indicated a Kentucky State Police officer was there with his vehicle, as were several other regional law enforcement agencies. Moreover, an organization known as TACTICA Ministries (Teaching Authorities Christian Truth in Central America) was also present. My curiosity was immediately piqued by the presence of the KSP trooper. The questions I immediately had were, “Why is a major law enforcement organization being trained by AIG?” and “Why isn’t AIG going to a major organization like the KSP for training instead?”
I then wrote a Kentucky Open Records Act (KORA) request. Surprisingly, perhaps as a delaying tactic, my initial request was rejected. The rejection claimed I was not a Kentucky resident, even though I specifically said I was a resident in the KORA request. (I was born here and have owned a house which I have lived in in Lexington for more than 20 years. Many of my ancestors came to the state with Daniel Boone in the late 18th Century.) I resubmitted the request and received a small number of documents. Some of the requested information was not available; no mileage records were kept, and the KSP trooper did not save all of his training materials. Additional withheld information included the redaction of the identities of all third-party instructors “…due to sensitivity of their respective jobs and the need for anonymity.” Were these third-party instructors members of government law enforcement? We may never know.
The open records information showed that Kentucky taxpayers paid approximately $225 for the training of one officer. This doesn’t include money spent by other Kentucky law enforcement agencies. Kentucky law enforcement from Villa Hills Police Department and the Boone County Sheriff’s Office participated. Some out-of-state regional law enforcement that participated included the Genesee County Ohio, Twinsburg (Ohio) Police Department, and the Collier County (Florida) Sheriff’s Department.
The event included several breakfasts and lunches, as well as one diner that was sponsored by Nutramax Laboratories (a company that produces supplements for pets and does a lot of evangelism on the side). Interestingly, the event Welcome Package showed that each lunch included “testimony.”
The Welcome Package for the event also included a message from AIG’s Department of Public Safety’s Sgt. Adam Witherspoon:
Also, AIG Dept of Public Safety makes no effort to hide who we are. We care deeply about your working relationship with your dog and want to do everything we can to help you improve as a K9 team. More importantly though we care about you as an individual. God created all of us in His image. Due to our sin, and we are all sinners, Romans 3:23-24. 23.
…for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24. being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; we are condemned to spend eternity separated from God. Jesus Christ however took our punishment on the Cross. Our most sincere prayer is that if you don’t know Jesus Christ as your savior, come and talk to us. We would love to share with you the Good News of the Gospel, which grants us eternity with God in heaven.
So, let’s get to some great training, enjoy some great food, fellowship, and learning, and I look forward to meeting and getting to know each one of you.
In His Service,
– Sgt Adam Witherspoon
A presentation at the K9 training (and a major vendor/sponsor) was by a Michigan-based TACTICA Ministries. This ministry apparently gives police/paramilitary training plus substantial religious instruction to police forces in Central and South American countries. Disturbingly, there are numerous YouTube videos available of TACTICA paramilitary training set to high energy Christian music (see: examples here, here, and here). Figure 2 is a hat that TACTICA Ministries sells. Apparently, part of the TACTICA “training” at the event included memorization of Bible verses on a “Memorization Card.” What do any of these verses have to do with K9 training?
TACTICA Ministries is run by Ryan Rought. At least one presentation was done by Mr. Rought. The training documents give this biography and description of Rought’s work:
Ryan is a man fervently committed to his Christian faith, his family, and serving others. His energy is contagious as he is unashamedly committed to investing in the public safety community through high quality training, relationship building, and Gospel centered teaching.
Several other participants’ biographies mention going on mission trips and long term training in with TACTICA Ministries, including Marty Buffenbarger (2.5 years with TACTICA in Costa Rica), Chris Carpenter of Livingston Security Solutions (several training mission trips), and Bill and Cindy Gruppen (also of Association of Baptists for World Evangelism). The Gruppens’ bios indicate that their “mission is to share God’s good news through creative and impactful avenues.”
According to the itinerary, a good deal of the first day of training (14:00 to 19:00) involved signing in and “roaming” the Ark. This visitation combined with the speakers’ bios and other activities, such as lunchtime “testimonials” show that religious instruction and evangelism of law enforcement officers was a substantial portion of the K9 training.
There is some evidence that the KSP and other Kentucky law enforcement has participated in similar past events. On July 9, 2024, conservative Republican Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman posted pictures of “K9 Officer Charity” in front of the Ark Encounter. Officer Charity is a K9 with the Attorney General’s Office’s Department of Criminal Investigations. This sweet doggie has her own Instagram page. (The Attorney General’s post mentions that the KSP and the Boone County Sheriff’s Office participated in K9 training at the Ark in early July 2024. The instruction in February 2025 is probably one of several similar events that have used taxpayer money for an odd combination of training and evangelism.)
More disturbing than the use of taxpayer funding to evangelize law enforcement is the likelihood of the officers being indoctrinated in Christian Nationalism. Answers in Genesis is becoming more and more an advocate for far-right politics. On February 25, 2025, Founder CEO of Answers in Genesis, Ken Ham, posted an essay on his blog titled “What Happens When Your God Dies.” In this political essay he attacks “wokeness,” “racist” DEI hiring, pronoun use, and transgender ideology while praising the new administration and attacking Democrats. This theme is common throughout AIG’s online publications.
On July 15, 2023, Bodie Hodge (Ken Ham’s son-in-law) had an essay on AIG’s page called “The Religion of Sexual Humanism” (you may now find it on the Wayback Machine here). In this post, Hodge claims what he and AIG represent is “God’s Religion” while most other people belong to “Not God’s Religion.” Note that “Not God’s Religion” has a sub-section “Counterfeits of Biblical Christianity” that includes Roman Catholics, Seventh Day Adventists, Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Unitarians, “Moonies,” and even more bizarrely (if possible) Jews, Muslims, Freemasons, and Satanists (isn’t that special?) among many others. Eastern religions and secularism are given separate categories in this incredible (in the literal sense of the word) chart. I almost find this chart comical, but considering the very real possibility of Christian Nationalism becoming an arm of the government, the graphic is simply horrifying. AIG is very well-connected in state politics and apparently is looking to expand their reach. At one point Ken Ham was scheduled to speak at an event on April 24 along with Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Franklin Graham. Recently, Hegseth backed out, presumably because of other duties, but a list of the originally scheduled speakers is available on the Internet Wayback Machine as recently as January 17, 2025.
Every July the Tri-State Freethinkers have a protest near the entrance to Ark Encounter to protest the fake science plus the sales-tax rebate incentives and other handouts that the Ark has received from state, county, and Williamstown governments. I have avoided participating in this event in the past because of concerns about the event’s effectiveness and the possibility of a creationist provocateur causing a disruption. I was recently asked to speak at this event. I am frankly very hesitant. I have to wonder whether law enforcement will look the other way if the protest is attacked, actively disrupt the protest, or find another way of punishing or harassing the participants. In any case the government should not be paying to give their employees religious instruction especially when the employees are in a position where fairness and equanimity should be standard.
Originall published at Panda’s Thumb. Provided under Creative Commons BY-NC-ND License 4.0.
The Los Angeles Fires, or, Hollywood Had It Coming
by William Trollinger
It is striking – but not surprising – how often fundamentalist leaders and preachers proclaim that this or that natural disaster or this or that act of violence is divine judgment on a community for sin. In response to Hurricane Katrina Franklin Graham observed that New Orleans is well known as home to “Mardi Gras,” “Satan worship,” “sex perversion,” and “every type of drugs and alcohol” as well as “orgies.” As a result “there’s been a black spiritual cloud over New Orleans for years,” but now it seems that “God is going to use that storm to bring revival” to this “wicked city.”
Then there’s Jerry Falwell’s explanation of 9/11, in which he mashed together a potpourri of sins and sinners:
I really believe that the pagans and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America – I point the finger in their face and say, “you helped this happen.”
And no discussion of this topic would be complete without reference to Pat Robertson, who not only invoked God’s judgment to explain Katrina and 9/11, but also to explain the 2010 earthquake in Haiti which killed over 100,000 people. More than two centuries before the earthquake the Haitians
got together and swore a pact to the Devil. They said, “We will serve you if you get us free from the French.” True story. And so, the Devil said, Ok, it’s a deal. And they kicked the French out. . . . But ever since they have been cursed by one thing after another . . . That island of Hispaniola is one island. It’s cut down the middle. On the one side is Haiti [and] on the other is the Dominican Republic. The Dominican Republic is prosperous, healthy, full of resorts, etc. Haiti is in desperate poverty. Same island. They need to have, and we need to pray for them, a great turning to God.
As one commentator noted, the implication of this claim is that “if only they had stayed virtual slaves under French rule, God would have been pleased and they would have been earthquake free.”
Sex perversion and orgies. Abortion, feminism, LGBTQ, and the ACLU. All of this has brought God’s wrath down upon America (not to mention Haiti and its Satanic pact). Not greed and unfettered capitalism, or sex abuse in families and churches, or racial inequities in arrests and imprisonment.
And now there’s a new sin that may have provoked God’s violent anger. Taking God’s name in vain. Combined with wokeness, this may have, in the words of Answers in Genesis founding CEO Ken Ham, brought “a judgment from God on Hollywood, on woke California” in the form of the devastating January 2025 fires. For elaboration on this point, he encouraged readers to watch the video, “Hollywood Mocks God. Then This Happens,” produced by Ray Comfort of Living Waters.
Yes. That Ray Comfort, of the infamous banana video. The same Ray Comfort who has declared Halloween as National Evangelism Day, and who came up with the plan to pass out three million tracts at the 2023 coronation of King Charles in London. One side of the tracts appeared as if they were 1,000,000 pound notes (with a picture of King Charles), and on the other side there was an evangelistic message.
And now there’s “Hollywood Mocks God. Then This Happens.” In this video, Comfort, referencing the January 05 2025 Golden Globes awards ceremony, piously observed that “mocking God and using his name as a cuss word is nothing new for Hollywood.” But
less than 48 hours after the Golden Globes blasphemy, Hollywood was on fire. Are these fires some sort of judgment of God? No one really knows. But one thing we do know is that a good solid rain would immediately fix this terrifying nightmare. And the Bible tells us that God is the one who sends rain, the one Hollywood so joyfully mocks. The concept of God withholding rain is a form of judgment found throughout Scripture. And there to remind humanity that He’s the one who’s in charge.
Despite the classic distancing phrase – “no one really knows” – it is obvious that we are supposed to understand the L.A. fires as a judgment on Hollywood’s blasphemy and wokeness. Bringing this point home, Comfort then heads to the beach, where he asks folks, “What would fix the fire problem really quick? . . . What about rain? . . . Who’s in charge of the rain? . . . Why do you think He’s withholding rain from Hollywood? . . . Do you think God is judging Hollywood?”
The video ends with Comfort in evangelizing mode, asking beachgoers if they are good people, if they think they are going to heaven, and if they have ever lied, downloaded music off the internet that’s not theirs, and/or taken God’s name in vain. Having established that they are sinners, he makes clear that hell awaits if they don’t repent and put their trust in Jesus. As he told one person at seaside:
Steve, sin is so serious to a holy God that He’s given you a death sentence. You are on death row, you are in a holding cell that has a nice blue roof, good air conditioning, good lighting. But this life is a holding cell, and your death will be evidence to you that God is deadly serious about sin.
In quizzing these beachgoers about their sinfulness and suggesting their possible condemnation, Comfort could have quoted from the one place in the Gospels where Jesus speaks about the Last Judgment:
‘You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit.’ They will answer, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or naked or in prison, and did not take care of you?’ Then he will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it for me.’ And these will go away into eternal punishment. (Matthew 25: 41-46)
But of course Comfort was not going there. Cursing and wokeness. These are the sins that brought God’s wrath onto Hollywood.
