Daily Blague

Thinking back on my Working Definitions (26 November, below), I read Burkhard Bilger's article about Ole Anthony, in the current New Yorker (Dec. 6 2004; unhappily, not online), with popping eyes. Mr Bilger writes of a religious service, so-called, at the Copeland complex (I don't know what else to call it), outside Dallas, at which the man on the stage puts his congregation in a trance with a rudimentary but rousing anthem set to the words, "No more thinking, I'm just drinking, drinking of the spirit." Where is the faith or religion here, I asked myself. Silly me, I answered: the ritual described by Mr Bilger is as old as religion. But it is missing some of the more important pieces. There is, for one thing, no sacrifice, no gesture of purification through offering. During the Reformation, the new protestant sects considered such gestures superstitious; they were too cerebral for hocus pocus. But evangelicals do without sacrifice because it's unpleasant and - sad. (Please don't confuse yourself with the idea that dollar-denominated contributions are "sacrifices"!) Another thing that's missing is covenant, no commitment either to Jesus (whose new wine is served up as grace - that is, gratuitously) or to the others in the congregation. Covenant would require thinking. Drinking the spirit, drinking the new wine. How on earth can an intelligent person respond to this without contempt?

For a stronger dose of dyspepsia, here's James Wolcott.