John H Armstrong

Seducing Your Audience

Today's blog is a guest article by my good friend Dr. Monte E. Wilson. Monte directs a children's charity that serves in Africa. His point in this blog may put you off, at least at first, but read it all the way to the end if you want to grasp what he is really saying and why it matters.

Seducing Your Audience

Monte E. Wilson

Recently, while speaking at a conference in South Africa, I went down to the local strip-mall. (Think twenty picnic-tables filled with trinkets and clothes manned by a host of Africans screaming to get your attention.) Seeing a really cool carving, I walked over, picked it up and was immediately told how many SA Rand this work of art would cost.

“What is the significance of the three women?”

“What do you mean?”

“Who are they?”

“Three African women.”

(Hesitating)“Let me ask you a question: do you get a lot of tourists here? Many American tourists?”

“Yes!”

“If you want to sell more, then you need to wrap these women in African lore. Americans don’t buy trinkets … they buy experiences… memories. (Why else do your parents still have that cheap pink Flamingo they purchased while on their honeymoon in Miami?) Do you understand what I am saying?

“Yes.” (Spoken as he was shaking his head “No.”)

Years and years ago, Toyota realized that it had to build a reputation for offering reliable, quality built cars. (Detroit’s sneering line was always, “Scratch a Japanese car and you will find a Budweiser,” implying they were built out of beer cans.) So the carmaker spent millions on advertising “quality.” Then, in a stroke of genius, it began running the now famous ad, “Toyota, O what Feeling!” the ad culminating with a satisfied customer jumping into the air—in s-l-o-w m-o-t-i-o-n. Slam Dunk. All competitors, both foreign and domestic, were left standing there with their shorts around their ankles.

Buying a Toyota was an experience—an intense feeling of joy and satisfaction. In the minds of millions of viewers, their product was, from then on, anchored into positive feelings. Of course, had the cars been nothing more than beer cans, the ad would have failed. However, it was the promised “feeling” that turned the corner and made Toyota the worldwide giant that we know today.

Seducing Your Audience
In his book, Selling Dreams: How to Make Any Product Irresistible, author Gian Luigi Longinotti-Buitoni (President and CEO of Ferrari North America) likens marketers to dream weavers or, in his words, “dreamketer.”

The role of the dreamketer is to seduce, to entice the customer into intense desire for the company’s creation. Seduction is much more than simply convincing: It is not about helping formulate a rational decision, but rather about provoking emotional locomotion. The craft of selling dreams, much like the seducers, requires continual surprise through a poetical transformation of reality into a romance that takes people into a dream state.

To succeed, dreamketers have to touch the customer’s dreams. They must ensure that the product or service is emotionally charged by creating a design worthy of the company’s original taste. They must construct a theatrical setting around the product or service, a home, an ambiance where objects of excellence are transformed into unforgettable experiences. They must assign a name to that setting: a credible and exciting brand that pulls the customers in and builds their expectations. They must relay a seductive message that confuses poetry with reality, truth with romance. Finally, they must find the customers worth seducing.

Every person reading this is in sales. Whether seeking to convince someone to buy your idea or product, influence your employer, win over the love of your life, or persuade your children that you do know where their present behavior is going to lead them, you are selling something. And those individuals that most effectively provoke “emotional locomotion” are going to close the sale.

Most people think that selling their product (idea, knowledge, service) is accomplished solely through recitation of facts. (Teachers and religious leaders are often the worst offenders, here.) However, the individual that constructs a theatrical setting, creates an unforgettable ambiance, and converts facts into poetry, will be far and away the more effective and successful communicator.

I realize that some of my readers will be uncomfortable with Longinotti-Buitoni’s use of the word “seduce.” This is because the word is usually used pejoratively. However, think of a time in your past when you wanted to attract the attention of a potential Significant Other. You dressed in a certain fashion, you carefully chose words that would help win the individual’s attention and affection, you spoke these words with an intentional tonality and timbre, and you took great pains to see to it that the Tambiance was exactly what you needed to accomplish your intention. Now – subtract all sexual connotations from these specific acts and you will have some understanding as to what it means to “seduce” your audience.

Think of a communication context where you wish to be far more effective. Rather than solely considering how to change people’s thinking, if you will expand your focus to include the whole person -- captivating as many of your audience’s five senses as possible (Visual-Auditory-Kinesthetic-Olfactory-Gustatory) -- your effectiveness will increase exponentially.

The Storm Over President Obama's Address to School Children

President Obama will deliver a "back to school" message to children across America tomorrow at 11:00 a.m. CDT. What was intended to be a "feel good" motivational talk about how students can set goals and be better students has become a controversial move. I say, to the general plan: "What a great idea." The first African-American president speaks live to a high school in Arlington, Virginia, and the kids around the nation get to see it live on C-Span. But the bitter opposition to President Obama is now so strong that this has turned into a major political controversy.

Arizona state schools superintendent Tom Horne, a Republican, says plans for teachers made by Obama's Education Department "call for a worshipful rather than critical approach." That is not all. State Senator Steve Russell of Oklahoma says this speech gives the appearance of a "cult of personality." Districts in Texas, Illinois, Minnesota, Missouri, Virginia and Wisconsin have decided not to show the speech, proving the president has no control over local matters. Others were thinking about their response over the past weekend. Some are allowing students to opt out of the class and miss the speech.

What drives all this hoopla? It would appear that it is conservative bloggers and radio talk show hosts who are urging parents to fight back. They argue that Obama is using this time to promote a political agenda and is overstepping the boundaries of federal involvement in public schools.

The White House promised to release the president's speech online (today) and said parents could read it and then make up their own minds. The original White House release about this speech told students how they could write letters to themselves "about how they can help the president." The White House backed off that language  saying it was "in-artfully worded" thus they "corrected it."

President George H. W. Bush made a similar address to schools in 1991. Like President Obama he also experienced a wave of protest. Democrats accused Bush of making the event into a campaign commercial.

Do you think the far right and far left have poisoned our society? I do. I think they also poison the attempt of Christians to engage in legitimately civilized conversation. I am determined to do everything in my power to model a different approach. I am sure I sometime fail but I will not stop trying. We so need to learn how to have mature conversations without the fear, anger and hyped-rhetorical edge. The Scripture has a whole lot to say about this very kind of talk and what its says clearly condemns much talk on the left and the right.

The Cultural Legacy of Abraham Kuyper

No single theologian has more influenced my view of culture than the Dutch minister and statesmen Abraham Kuyper (1837-1920). Kuyper was an unconverted minister until he went to his first church and a woman had the audacity to tell him he needed to know Christ. Thank God she did because this was used by the Spirit to bring Kuyper to saving faith. Kuyper went on to be the pastor of other congregations and became the editor of a leading church newspaper of the time. He is remembered as well for his role in politics. He became the prime minister of the Netherlands (1901-05) and had considerable influence in many areas of life in his nation and beyond. It is worth noting that what we read today are not his political speeches but his sermons and theological reflections.

Perhaps no quotation of Kuyper's is more often cited by Christians than words he first gave at the founding of the Free University of Amsterdam. He said: "No single piece of our mental world is to be hermetically sealed off from the rest, and there is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human experience over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry: 'Mine!'"

From Kuyper's influence the doctrine of common grace was developed among Reformed Christians. This doctrine has had a great influence on many different Christians over the past one hundred years. Common grace meant that God was involved in nonbelievers in ways that should lead us to respect divine providence in all of creation.

Kuyper's view was that the Christian should be involved in every part of life: home, school, art and state. Christ was Lord of all. We must live so as to show how this Lordship is displayed in every sphere of life. This was what was meant by the term sphere sovereignty.

Some Thoughts on the Michael Jackson Funeral

Michael Jackson was clearly a pop culture icon. I make it a practice to neither bash nor praise such icons. They are what they are. Their legacy seems ephemeral, at least to me. Their importance is huge, at least to those who follow their art, music or writing. The whole idea that high culture, which is the product of certain mores and beliefs, trumps low culture, or pop culture, seems artificial so much of the time. What is apparent is that some culture will endure and some will not. The reasons may not be altogether clear sometimes. Who can account for taste in the end?

Since I was forced to think a bit about Michael Jackson (as little as possible I confess) this past week I thought back over my sixty years and the rise and decline of pop stars of all sorts. I thought about Elvis and Graceland and my first remembrance of a pop star in the 1950s. I thought about the rise of pop and rock music in general. I still believe some of the music and lyrics of some of these great artists will endure. I think, in this regard, of the Beatles. Their music had a particular brilliance and some of their lyrics are memorable. I doubt, however, that people will sing their music in a hundred years. I then thought about Michael Jackson's music and lyrics and realized how great the Beatles really were. Don't misunderstand me. Jackson was a star and he was very talented. But I do not see his legacy enduring for more than a few years. Such art moves on at a such fast pace. He will be remembered by some historians of the genre but by very few besides these historians once a few decades have passed.

What I could not avoid, but tried, was the funeral at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. I did not watch it but I got a few brief parts of the event on the evening news. What never ceases to amaze me is how we speak about heaven in the popular culture. We still have a deep sense of the afterlife and thus talk a lot about heaven. No one seems to believe in anything other than heaven when you come right down to it.

Jackson's funeral underscored this point profoundly. People who have some undefined faith, or even no faith at all, spoke about Michael and his place in heaven and with God. Everyone, I mean everyone, assumed that he just had to be in heaven! We have no conception of any other reality in the culture. Where once people were preoccupied with hell now they have forgotten it altogether.

Don't misunderstand. I do not assume any knowledge about the state of Michael Jackson's soul. God is his judge. But what I noticed in almost everything said about him, at least in the clips I did see, was this universal theme that he just had to be in heaven smiling, watching and enjoying the whole scene. People spoke about God "needing Michael" thus he took him to heaven prematurely. Others spoke about all the good he had done and why this meant he was in heaven. Some of these speakers were ministers, at least of some sort. So much assurance and little or no basis for any of it at all.

Over the years I have been asked to preach many funerals for people who I did not know. I would never talk about them being with Christ if I had no real assurance that they likely were accepted by him at their death. I refused to preach about their unbelief since I did not see into their heart. What I did was preach one verse time and time again: Hebrews 9:27. The writer says "people are destined to die once and after that to face the judgment." I know of nothing more clear in all the scripture. We who live will die. When we die we will face divine judgment. God is merciful, but he is also just thus all of us should prepare for this final day.

Some years ago the popular movie "Ghost" underscored this very powerfully. The lead character dies. His life demonstrated no faith at all. In fact, he was living in immorality and sin. But when he dies he goes straight to heaven as you discover in the movie. The great assumption here is clear. To got to heaven you need do one thing: die! Those who challenge this great assumption will not be popular in modern culture but challenge it we must. We do not need to challenge it with the old "hell fire and brimstone" approach of our cultural past but we should challenge it with the truth in all of its fullness. This will take both tact and courage. I doubt we are up to it in most cases since we lack one or the other. Come to think of it I think we may lack both.

Oprah and Crazy Talk

Weston Kosova and Pat Wingert believe television celebrity Oprah Winfrey possesses a “lifelong quest for love, meaning and fulfillment [that] plays [itself] out on her stage each day. In an age of information overload, she offers herself as a guide through the confusion” (“Crazy Talk: Oprah, Wacky Cures and You,” in Newsweek, June 8, 2009). I can’t think of a better description of the star appeal of Oprah Winfrey than that—she is a guide to millions of viewers who see her as a normal person, just like them in some ways. She struggles with gaining and losing weight, with aging and health, beauty and friendship, and most of all, with the deepest moral and spiritual questions being asked in our culture. She speaks to people who feel that no one else speaks to them so plainly and humanely. In a previous post I praised this very quality in Oprah.

But the problem, say Kosova and Wingert, is that Oprah not only offers some pretty good advice, mixed with the success stories that multitudes believe should be their own story but she gives people guidance that is often false, even bordering on quackery. The Newsweek authors provide numerous examples of this point. (I am sure Newsweek had this article critiqued by good attorneys before it was published. Newsweek, under the guidance of editor Jon Meacham, has become my favorite general news magazine.) While the authors of this article give a generally positive nod to regular guests like Dr. Oz, who is my personal favorite, they are wary of guests like Suzanne Somers, Jenny McCarthy and Dr. Christiane Northrup, a regular physician on the show. (I do not watch Oprah faithfully but I have seen enough to get a good feel for her show and sometimes watch it, by reading the closed captions, while I am exercising at my Lifetime Fitness center.)

Oprah holds up almost all of her guests as “prophets.” She clearly has the power to summon the most learned authorities on any subject. But again and again she “puts herself and her trusting audience in the hands of celebrity authors and pop-science artists pitching wonder cures and miracle treatments that are questionable or flat-out wrong, and sometimes dangerous” (Newsweek).

One of the more shameless and sad Oprah moments, at least for me, was the appearance of former pastor and NAE president, Rev. Ted Haggard. Haggard appeared on the show with his wife. I watched in utter amazement as this “evangelical confessional” unfolded before millions of viewers. (The HBO documentary on Ted Haggard, done by Nancy Pelosi’s daughter, was more responsible television journalism but still a very one-sided and unbalanced account that made Haggard out to be a person somehow persecuted by his former elders.) The whole Ted Haggard episode, and the way he has presented himself after his fall, is a sad commentary on the kind of media-made confession that is prominent in evangelical circles. In reaction against the Catholic “private confession” we have developed an incredibly dangerous and spiritual misleading way to confess sin and speak about repentance and recovery. It is a veritable cottage industry in our ranks. Oprah taps into this need in strange ways, thus speaking to millions who I feel sure are Christians of some sort.

But evangelicals too often clean up their own sub-cultural mistakes by attacking each another in public. I associated this with Oprah in my previous piece (May 7). She makes an inviting target for evangelical prophets who want to show a sinister motive and connect her directly to the work of the devil. My sense is that there is nothing sinister about her at all. She is a “self-made American” if there ever was one. She is a truly great story. She sells well and people love her. There is a lot to like in Oprah but there is also enough to make us wary of whether she represents real virtue to the wider culture. (One could make the case that she sometimes opposes real virtue since she always takes the popular line on everything related to sexual morality!) The odd thing to me is that the very ministers who make an industry out of attacking celebrities like Oprah have a deep need to be celebrities in their own right. At least that’s how I see it. 

Michael Moore Hates America

Michael Wilson is a not-so-famous filmmaker who decided to produce a documentary on the very famous filmmaker Michael Moore. He followed the approach that Moore himself took in Roger & Me, a film in which Moore tried in vain to get an interview with multimillionaire General Motors CEO Roger Smith. Moore made this pursuit in order to demonize both the man and his money. By this method he turned his strange critique into a new, and highly-praised, art form. From there Michael Moore went on to win an Oscar for another documentary, wrote several best-selling books and in general made millions while appearing to be the friend of the downtrodden. What I seriously question, and this film made very clear to me, is whether or not you can honestly call Moore's films documentaries.

My view is rather simple---a really good documentary tries to provide ways to see the complexity of an issue by telling the viewer the truth, or at least mostly the truth. Editing requires choices and these choices limit the storytelling. Since the filmmaker does cut and paste clips and interviews this genre is admittedly fraught with serious problems and is very often abused on both the left and the right. Most documentaries have a fairly strong viewpoint---i.e., the presupposition of the filmmaker---and that viewpoint is admittedly very liberal politically and socially, or at least it is in the majority of documentaries. In Michael Moore's work this is always the case. One wonders if Moore could have made his millions without George W. Bush in the White House as his foil for eight years. One also wonders what he does next, since Barack Obama is now the president. He lives a fabulously wealthy lifestyle in New York City and I doubt we have seen the last of him. And he did promote Ralph Nader but then I doubt he will go after Obama as he did Bush. (Without Bush to bash what will many of these types do in the next four to eight years?)

Wilson, who is the documentarian in this 2004 film, set out to make Moore his big fish by pursuing the multi-millionaire guy just as Moore pursued people in his films. Moore proves to be as elusive, if not more so, than all of his film subjects. This makes for a film that Ebert & Roeper give "two thumbs up" as you can see on the DVD cover above. The St. Paul Pioneer Press says of Wilson's 96 minute film: "One of the country's most polarizing figures gets hoisted on his own petard in Michael Moore Hates America."

Does Wilson land the interview with Moore? I will not spoil the fun here (the video is rated R for language, which is definitely rough in tone) but let's say that he goes to great lengths and this made for some extremely amusing moments. He shows up at a University of Minnesota public appearance of Michael Moore and gets some microphone time to ask him a simple question, which Moore answers without really answering at all and then attacks Wilson, whom he does not know at all. Wilson also heads to New York, where Michael Moore lives, and tries a number of funny ways to land the appearance.

In the University of Minnesota segment Wilson interviews about five students outside the U of M arena by asking them what they make of Michael Moore. Their responses are enough to make your realize that the "dumbing down" of the minds of many college educated young Americans is quite real. I have no love for the far right but when college students keep responding the way they do to questions like those Wilson poses it makes me fear for our collective cultural future. Most of those interviewed openly said that even if Moore lies in his films that is fine with them since he takes the right position on the important issues. But if he is lying how do you know he takes the right position? Do these students enjoy being brainwashed? It appears that way but I leave to your viewing of this troubling insight your own decision. Believe me it is haunting. 

Viewers will readily see that Michael Wilson is not a right-wing nut job at all, just an interesting filmmaker seeking some measure of truth in a documentary film form. The end result spares no one, right or left. (He has a clip that makes former liberal professor David Horowitz look almost as bad as Michael Moore!) But Michael Moore, being the major subject, is clearly shown for who he really is. If you love him or despise him you owe it to yourself to see Wilson's very cute and very well-done film, especially if you like documentaries as much as I do. (I will always watch such films with more caution, and honest skepticism, after seeing this one.) Jeff Strickler, of the Star Tribune, is right when he says: "This film isn't about ideology as much as accountability."

Is Michael Moore just a brilliant liberal with an edge or is he actually a very dishonest hypocrite? My view is that Wilson's film makes it plain the answer is the latter. Michael Moore is, if Wilson gets it right, a truly disgusting person who has made millions by selling hate and hopelessness. The biggest fraud of all has to be the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences (AMPAS) that gave him an Oscar for his work, a choice that casts real doubt on their whole process. If you doubt this conclusion then watch Michael Moore Hates America. It is really an entertaining and excellent film.

Obama's Approval Ratings?

In a culture where we want "instant" everything even I was amazed to read today that there is already a poll out on President Obama's approval rating. "You have to be kidding me," you respond. No, I am dead serious. John F. Kennedy had the highest rating after his first three days in office, at 72%. Obama is tied with Dwight Eisenhower's rating, who enjoyed 68% approval after his first few days in office. Thus Obama has the second highest approval rating since World War II, about the time all this tracking of opinion began.

How can anyone have a "serious" opinion about the president's job approval by now? How can any thinking person even bother respond to such a question/survey. If they surveyed me I would tell them to leave me alone. I am dead serious. This is about the most insane stuff I have read since last Tuesday and the inauguration.

It is this same endless taking of the pulse that harms the church. A pastor can't be on the job for a few weeks without the so-called "honeymoon" being over and done these days. Woe be the pastor who seeks to lead a flock by "approval." Vance Havner was right when he said a true pastor needed a tender heart and the hide of a rhinoceros.

The Screwtape Letters on Stage

When I first came to Wheaton College, on a snowy January Sunday in 1969, I was transferring from the University of Alabama, where I had enjoyed a most happy three semesters. I loved Tuscaloosa, the Tide and all things Crimson. But God led me to Wheaton. I have never doubted it.

One of several reasons for my transfer was to get to a place where I could begin to formally study the Bible and Christian theology while still pursuing my B. A. degree in history. The first Bible class that I ever took was a freshman-sophomore New Testament survey course taught by Dr. Walter M. Dunnett, now a retired Episcopal priest who lives nearby and remains a dear friend to this day. Dr. Dunnett began each class, three mornings a week, with readings from C. S. Lewis’ classic book, The Screwtape Letters, and then with prayer. Lewis (1898-1963), the well-known British writer, professor and Christian apologist, died on the same day as President John F. Kennedy. He is the author of numerous books but plainly The Screwtape Letters is one of the more humorous and practical things he wrote.

In the Introduction to this fine book Lewis wrote: “There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them. They themselves are equally pleased by both errors and hail a materialist or a magician with the same delight. Lewis added, “Readers are advised to remember that the devil is a lair. Not everything that Screwtape says should be assumed to be true, even from his own angle. There is wishful thinking in hell as well as on earth.”

My good friend, Pastor Keith Duff, invited me several weeks ago to hear actor Max McLean’s dramatic presentation of Screwtape Letters at the Mercury Theater in Chicago, I jumped at the opportunity. So on last week, on Thursday evening January 8, Keith and I were joined by mutual friends Jeff Malas and Pastor Tim Badal for a great evening in Chicago. The drama was presented by this brilliant actor who offered his own careful rendition of the Lewis’ material. The stage was simply adorned to give the appearance of a part of hell. McLean was assisted by Yvonne Gougelett, who did a great job playing the role of Toadpipe, the assistant to Uncle Screwtape. She helped record his messages and got them to the junior devil, Wormwood. This was cleverly done with a ladder and a mail box that mysteriously carried letters from the teacher, Uncle Screwtape. The theater, which must seat about 350 or so, was about half full and McLean’s voice was all we needed to hear the famous words. It was melodious and brilliant.

The drama, written for stage production by McLean himself, featured two locations. The play began with Screwtape giving a prolog in “A Dining Hall in Hell: A Graduation Banquet at the Tempters’ Training College for Young Devils.” This gave the context for the rest of the play. Screwtape explained the concept of training junior devils in his opening remarks and this showed us how the work proceeded. The bulk of the play was “thereafter,” or scenes from Screwtape’s office in hell. The whole production lasted for eighty minutes with no intermission. It was well received by an interested audience.

Readers of Lewis will know that the characters in the work include “the patient,” who is the young man on earth who becomes a Christian. “The enemy” is God and “our father below” is Satan, the devil himself. Slubglob is the principal of the training college and “the woman” is the patients new romantic interest who is also a Christian. Tempters include devils named Glubose, Triptweeze and Slumtrimpet. (Lewis had a great use of names!)

McLean’s performance of C. S. Lewis's The Screwtape Letters was simple but beautifully captivating. Having read the book, as I stated at the outset, while in college forty years ago, I was personally concerned about how the portrayal would compare to my first impressions and those I have formed in re-reading it over the decades. I was more than pleasantly pleased. This performance was outstanding and left me wanting even more at the end. I would highly recommend this play to anyone who could see it in Chicago or anywhere else it might appear in the coming years. It was memorable and reminded me of one reason I love the city and what it offers by way of serious art.

McLean’s performance was plainly a dramatic reading at its very best. Included in the oral presentation was a minimal amount of acting but what was included, especially that supplied by Yvonne Gougelet (Toadpipe) was both amusing and quite well done. She added a great deal to McLean’s work.

McLean has done a number of recorded readings including works from Augustine, Luther, Bunyan, Edwards and Whitefield, as well as Bible readings for audio use. At one time he made appearances in churches. I assume he still does but he may limit his work to the stage more these days. He has a great voice, enunciates words very powerfully and makes older readings into first rate dramas for a modern audience. His Screwtape Letters performance at the Mercury Theater has been going for well some months and has been a real hit in the Chicago art scene.

He also has credits for the performance of plays like A Streetcar Named Desire, The Threepenny Opera, Love’s Labor’s Lost, A Man for All Seasons, Good Man, Charlie Brown, etc. McLean directs the work of the Fellowship for the Performing Arts, which expresses a passionate concern for restoring the arts among Christians. You can connect to his numerous resources and interests online and learn a lot more.

A Cultural Earthquake

Cardinal J. Francis Stafford told an audience at The Catholic University in Washington, D.C. in November that the election of Barack Obama was a "cultural earthquake." The media responded to this comment by calling it a "rant" and a "diatribe." This is the same media that sees the new president as the consummation of all things progressive and as "that rare kind of attuned being who has the ability to lead us not merely to new foreign policies or health care plans or whatnot, but who can actually help usher in a new way of being on the planet . . ."

Which is it? Colin Powell says Obama has the potential to be a "transitional figure." I think this gets a little closer to reality. If you take Obama's record on some issues, especially on abortion, bio-medical ethics and civil unions then he could create a "cultural earthquake." But I tend to think he merely reflects where the country is already going so his election is simply another step in a decidedly different direction. Some of this may prove to be good. Some not so good. Time will tell, not Obama's past record per se.

Doug Kmiec, the former dean of Catholic University's law school, sees Stafford's comments as "caricature" and declared that "President Obama has far more in common with our great faith tradition than any political administration in recent memory." He added that the "change" President Obama speaks of is the same cultural transformation that Cardinal Stafford has been working for over many years. The problem is clearly in the eyes of the beholder I think. Kmiec, to put it mildly, has stirred considerable interest and controversy for endorsing Obama after supporting Romney in the primaries last year. (His own parish priest refused him communion for his support of Obama!)

Obama appealed to all the radical groups that want to remake the cultural direction of the nation to move it toward a new social ethic. Among Catholics the debate is over whether Obama will move us more toward natural law or further away from it. Is America moving toward new unity or deeper division? My own guess is that it is some of both and always will be some of both. We are seeing a huge generational shift, make no mistake about this. We hear new calls for peace, justice and unity. But what is the moral basis for this call and how will it work unless we see spiritual transformation in the church, and then in the culture?

I do not agree with Cardinal Stafford, at least not in a simple way. But I do not think he is entirely wrong either. The culture is moving. Some of this movement I welcome. Some I fear. This is why my concern is much more with the church, which exists to serve and advance the kingdom of Christ, than with the government or what it does in the next four years. We cannot transform culture in any sense unless we first transform the church. Is it not obvious that the church needs transformation and thus the real earthquake we need is one that breaks open the people of God to the gospel of the kingdom and the ministry of the Holy Spirit? Having fought for cultural change through political means isn't it time we rethink this strategy?

Coerced Consensus

Sociologist James Davison Hunter has coined a term that very effectively describes what is going on in our culture in terms of how people are taught to define reality. Hunter writes that there is a "coerced consensus" that comes about through the imposition of a particular viewpoint on a people at large. The ultimate goal of this consensus, adds Bishop Michael Sheridan (Colorado Springs), is "unconscious acceptance." When this happens reality is then defined through the multitude of messages that are fed to us continually through a media saturated culture. Bishop Sheridan believes that this "unconscious acceptance' makes dissent an act of "virtual treason." Through the clever use of media the enemy of our souls has accomplished, in less than one generation, a complete reordering of the moral life of most people, even most Christians. Bishop Sheridan calls this the "principal tool of the culture of death."

This "coerced consensus" permeates our society through television and film stereotypes and an anti-religious social system. When a Christian challenges these messages they are made to feel as if they are the real radicals who reject the basic norms of society and a proper social response. Words like "extremist" and "intolerant" are commonly used for those of us who disagree with this reigning consensus.

We have not yet been required to shed our blood for the truth of the gospel but we are now regularly put in the place where to resist the ideology of the "coerced consensus" is to invite serious ridicule and social rejection. We should not be surprised at this reality. With the death of Christendom comes the social situation that approximates the culture the church faced in its first three centuries. This means we need to train Christians much better than we have been doing for more than a generation or they will end up professing a faith without any real evidence of conformity to the truth of God.