Living on the Dark Side

Years ago, when TheMeetingHouse was first launched (as a radio program), I interviewed Rev. Dr. Albert Mohler. He was rather new to his post at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Since then, his seminary has flourished while his denomination has foundered; the precipitous decline of the Southern Baptist Convention has been one of the lead religion stories of the last decade.

Last week, Dr. Mohler went head-to-head with the most influential Southern Baptist pastor in the country—yea, in the world: Rev. Rick Warren of Saddleback Church of Orange County, California. Mohler spoke a strong NO to women pastors (and the Saddleback Church has several), while Warren defended the practice as within the freedom granted to local congregations. The NOs won that tussle, by a 9-1 majority. It must have felt good following, as it did, the embarrassment to Mohler two years ago when he failed to make even the runoff in the SBC presidential election.

That vote was not mentioned in the 18+ minute interview I stumbled upon while scrolling through YouTube. It was conducted under the auspices of the Christian Broadcasting Network (and you can find it there, as more than 180,000 people already have).

When asked “What is the most pressing issue facing the church today?” Dr. Mohler launched into “the new forms of sin,” of which he listed first LGBTQ, “particularly the T.”  Without a whiff of empathy for parents and other distressed people, he pressed his condemnation without mercy. “The English language,” he said, “is destroyed, pronoun by pronoun.”

Nowhere was gender dysphoria mentioned, but “ideology” was invoked time and again, as was “second wave feminism,” “moral revision,” and more than once, “comrade”.

Finally, the conversation settled onto the “regime.” By which Mohler meant the government—not local or regional, but the federal government. He mentioned the Biden administration by name.

“The time is going to come when Christians will not be able to make the argument that we should leave our children in public schools. That time has already come in many places…. It is unfaithful for parents to leave their children in public schools. They are delivering their children over to Caesar.”

Here, as elsewhere, Mohler mimicked the Republican legacy of Ronald Reagan, who famously said, “Government is not the solution. Government is the problem.” Mohler also patterned his entire conversation after the talking points of talk show hosts and presidential candidates, all cultivating a crusade against the federal authorities (Presidents, Supreme Courts, Senators, and Representatives) who have expanded opportunities for immigrants, women, gays, minors, blacks, native Americans, and minority religions.

Toward the end, Artificial Intelligence came in for a warning as did women serving as pastor. “It all comes down to the inerrancy of Scripture,” Mohler said about the latter, invoking the shibboleth of the last century.

“We need to be kind and respectful,” he confessed. “But they are going to consider us as enemies of the regime….”

I wanted the young inquisitor to ask the question, “Where do you see signs of hope … in the Christian community or even in the wider human community?”

But he did not, and I am not sure if the doctor of theology would have the sensibility or substance to respond.

Is there any hope, I asked myself as the interview wound down. Or is it all doom and gloom? Is it all sin and sadness? Are the world and the church so immersed in wickedness that all we can talk about is “new forms of sin”?

Rev. Dr. Mohler gave one sentence to hope: “Hopefulness is Christian.” He said that but left it hanging—hanging out there is the darkness that overshadows everything.

Rev. Dr. Albert Mohler went over to the dark side a long time ago, and this has made him impressively popular with many. Not with me, because the Gospel of God teaches us that “the light shines in the darkness” and “we walk in the light.” I know many people who “shine on” with the light of creation and redemption, radiating courage and compassion. Some of them are gay, lesbian, and transgender. In the midst of oppression from the doctors of darkness, people of all kinds are filled with the faith, the hope, and the love so exemplified by Jesus our Savior.

Everywhere I look there is hope: people radiating warmness and welcome, congregations serving the sick and starving, preachers poking holes in the pessimism of misguided prophets, and children skipping to school to learn how to read, count, think, and care. It is a wonderful world, the old man sang long ago. It is a wonderful, hopeful world.

I’m glad to live in the light and sing with my ASE friends, “Walk in the light, beautiful light. Come where the dewdrops of mercy shine bright. Shine all around us by day and by night. Jesus, the light of the world.”