Brad and Dan begin by discussing the new Hillsong documentary, "Hillsong: A Megachurch Exposed," and the various sexual abuse and infidelity scandals that have rocked the church of the stars. They draw on work by Dr. Leah Payne in order to link Hillsong to a long line of celebrity megachurches that use spectacle, entrepreneurial tactics, and slick marketing to attract young, hot, and rich parishioners. History tells us that eventually scandal will rock the church, due in large part to the authoritarian leadership structures that often characterize this type of ministry.
Leah Payne's op-ed: https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/justin-biebers-former-church-hillsong-usa-decline-hypepriests-will-end-rcna23685
They then dig into the news that the Saudi Crown Prince helped funnel 2 billion dollars to Jared Kushner's new firm, despite reservations from pretty much everyone else involved. This leads to a discussion of how propaganda and corruption mark autocratic regimes whose constituents lack trust in their leaders and government. It also provides a helpful rebuttal to Uncle Ron's "whatabout Hunter Biden" line.
“The real concern here is that the public has no way of knowing exactly what favors someone like Kushner may have done for the Saudis.” - Walter Shaub
The episode finishes with substantive discussion on the Georgia Senate runoff and how it illuminates the failed promises of the Democratic party and the incredible war the GOP has made on the state level in just over a year.
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Welcome to Straight White American Jesus.
My name is Brad Onishi, faculty at the University of San Francisco.
I'm here today with my co-host.
Dan Miller, associate professor of religion and social thought at Landmark College.
And Brad, it's always nice to see you on a Friday, bright and early for you, a little bit later for me.
Yeah, it is.
It is always bright and early, but it's also a good Friday.
So I know some folks will be celebrating that, the Friday before Easter.
I know also some folks out there will Be, you know, feeling like this is a tough time of the year just because of memories of church and other things that they've, they've been through.
So thinking about everybody and I hope it is a good weekend, whatever you are up to.
I will be, Dan, going to my family's house down in Southern California and nothing religious about our Easter gathering, but it's, the food is amazing because it's homemade Japanese food, homemade Hawaiian food, and then like, Traditional Easter Americana stuff, so I look forward to it every year.
Anyway, all right, a couple things to announce.
First of all, Sarah Mosliner is teaching our next Swag Seminar in May, Periodic Culture, Race, and Embodiment, and we have some spots left.
If you'd like to sign up, check out straightwhiteamericanjesus.com slash seminars.
In these seminars, you have a two-hour meeting every week, a two-hour class per se, with with the teacher who is Sarah and a small group of other folks.
You have exclusive videos, you have readings, one-on-one meetings, all kinds of stuff.
So it's really cool.
And if you'd like to dig deeper into these issues, then that's the perfect place.
We also want to congratulate Dan Miller on finishing up an amazing series on identity politics that ran for a long time.
I mean, Dan, you had a lot to say.
Do you feel like you're a professor who didn't have to, like, worry that, you know, your hour of class was up and you could just talk as much as you wanted and it went for a while, you know?
Well, it's even better because it's not a full hour and everybody will thank me for that, right?
not 50 minute sessions.
And what really matters is not having to grade or like answer questions.
So yeah, just being able to sort of monologue into the mic though there was, I say this all the time, some great discussion and the feedback I was getting from folks and questions and things like that that made their way in.
But yeah, I always have more to say as probably everybody knows.
So yeah, but I did eventually stop it.
I was originally aiming for like an 18 month series, you know, just figure we'll do that.
And we decided that maybe that was a little bit over the top.
So we cut it short of that.
No, it was great.
There would be more to say.
We may have some developments coming related to that kind of material later with some other things that we do here.
But shifting gears and kind of taking a week off from that, but I'll throw out there that we'll keep the Wednesdays.
We'll keep going with these kind of Different kinds of topical series.
I'm going to be starting a new series next week on called It's in the Code.
And people who've listened to us for a while know that that phrase.
But what I really want to look at, I'm responding to a lot of emails I get from folks, people who reach out who maybe they aren't satisfied with their religious experience, but religion still matters to them.
Or they have friends or family who are trying to figure out what to do because they have a kid who came out and they're not sure if they can go to church anymore.
And just trying to figure out how church speak works.
And so we're going to spend some time looking at stuff like doing really concrete things like, you know, if you go to a church website and it says we welcome you no matter where you are in your spiritual journey.
I think, Brad, you and I can read that and already know all kinds of things about that church, and a lot of other people maybe can't.
Or what does it mean if a church says they're welcoming and affirming?
Like, that's a sort of code.
It's a flag that people put up.
And so we're going to spend some time exploring that and those kinds of themes.
So people, whether, again, it's for them, it's for somebody else, it's just an issue of cultural curiosity, can begin to kind of understand those things.
We're going to We're gonna shift to that and spend some time looking at that in the Wednesday series.
That's gonna be good and I would say so for some of y'all you know who have been part of Whether it's Evangelical or Catholic or other kinds of Christian communities, this might be really helpful because it might really help you just sort of make sense of some of the things you see or maybe you've left Evangelicalism or Fundamentalism and you're like you want to find a church that works for you in terms of your value system.
I think this is really helpful, but it also and I if you're somebody who's not religious and never has been or never been part of one of these communities.
I still think it's like super helpful because This is a whole language that unless you know it, right, it doesn't make sense or it may just not register.
And so when you're talking to your Uncle Ron, you're talking to a friend, you're trying to figure out what a loved one is up to, or if you're a journalist or somebody who studies this stuff and you're just like, I just don't understand.
What this church pamphlet or sign is telling me, I know that this series is going to be awesome.
I think of it as a decoder ring, right?
Dan is going to basically be teaching you how to read a different language.
And if nothing else, tune in, because I just think you'll be shocked at how many signals and signs are hidden in a one-paragraph church pamphlet or website or something like that.
Thanks for listening to this free preview of our SWADGE episode.
In order to get access to the full episode and so much more, become a Straight White American Jesus Premium Subscriber by clicking the link in the show notes.
It'll take you like two clicks, I promise.
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