Culture & Politics

Secret Eater, Secret Reader

In the guest house of the Dochiariou Monastery on Mount Athos in Greece, there hangs an unsettling painting of a reported miracle that occurred in one of the monasteries there. As the report of the miracle goes, a monk had stolen some food from the kitchen and eaten it in secret isolation. In this, the monk had violated the vows of fasting he and the other monks had taken. Some time passed, and the monk thought his infraction had escaped notice. Then came the Great Vespers on the evening of a feast day. On this occasion, the monks would join together for prayer and singing and worship, followed by a communal meal of celebration. After the worship service, all the monks gathered in the dining hall to sit down to a particular feast. But before the secret eater could swallow one bite of the prepared delicacies, a chasm opened up beside him and a demon appeared. This demon then greedily consumed the secret eater’s soul. The painting depicts that moment when the demon eats the monk’s golden soul, and it is about as disturbing as you might imagine.

The Monk’s Main Sin

I hear the story of this reported miracle, and it strikes me as odd for many reasons. But one thing sticks with me most. To me, stealing food and breaking vows constitute the very worst of the monk’s sins. And I likely wouldn’t fault him all that much for even those things. And perhaps neither would even his fellow monks, who knew the pangs of hunger better than most. To those monks, though, the main sin lay in eating in secret, isolated from his brothers. That’s why the artist called his painting “The Secret Eater Monk” rather than “The Food Thief Monk” or “The Fast-Breaking Monk.”

Hillsong’s Marty Sampson and the Celebrity Christian Problem

Still reeling from the jab of Joshua Harris’ recent deconversion, unsuspecting evangelicals got another quick cross a few days ago. Marty Sampson—a praise and worship songwriter you might know from Hillsong—posted to Instagram that he was “genuinely losing his faith.” Uh-oh. Then, before anyone could say “30 to 50 feral hogs,” hot takes and news breaks had already fired off from every available digital missive silo on both sides of the Culture War. And the backlash triggered a whiplash the very next day when Sampson deleted his original post and issued a “clarification.” But the toothpaste had already exited the tube.

Marty Sampson Headlines in Relevant

“Relevant” headlines from two consecutive days

Some, like the satirical Babylon Bee, cast a mercenary light over Sampson’s career, clarification included. Others ignored Sampson’s clarification, still insisting that he represented just another Christian celebrity casualty in the epidemic of apostasy infecting the church.1  A crowd of Christians, many of whom had never heard of Skillet outside of breakfast, quickly viralized lead singer John Cooper’s rebuke of Sampson, which Cooper used to diagnose an apparently Christianity-wide problem. Bringing us up nearly to the present, a clearly beleaguered Sampson posted pained responses to Cooper and all those faceless thousands parroting him.

Who Will Be the Next Billy Graham?

It’s a question on many of our minds since Billy Graham died: What now?

This iconic moment for American evangelicalism paints a clear picture of what has weighed heavy on the heart of Christians, even before the passing of Billy Graham: who will carry the gospel into the next generation? The conversation has a tinge of hopelessness, as millennials flood out of the church at an increasing rate. “America’s pastor” is dead. Will the church in America die with him? It almost looks like it will.

Roe v. Wade isn’t the Main Problem

I grew up hearing a narrative about Roe v. Wade. Maybe you heard it too. It goes like this:

Abortion in America used to be illegal and socially frowned upon. Then, in 1973, the Supreme Court decided Roe v. Wade, forcing abortion on a predominantly pro-life culture in a radical act of judicial activism. Once abortions on demand were legalized, the number of abortions suddenly skyrocketed. Overnight, Roe v. Wade both legalized and normalized abortion, and if we are ever going to suppress the legal killing of unborn babies, we first need to take political action to overturn this decision. [2016 edit: And that’s why you need to vote for Donald Trump, since there’s an open seat on the Supreme Court].

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