The fun is the hook, but the congregants are still fish. David French recently wrote an article about how right-wingers - and particularly evangelicals - are bl

The fun is the hook, but the congregants are still fish. David French recently wrote an article about how right-wingers - and particularly evangelicals - are blind to the way their religious and political institutions (with too little separation between them) spread hate and lies. What they see is the bonds of fun and love among their own kind, with churches often the center of that. It's hard to think of fun, likeable people doing bad things, so they just don't. https://archive.is/P1Cf5 https://archive.is/P1Cf5 In that context, the rise of megachurches is a Very Bad Thing. In my experience - being from a family with multiple generations of missionaries and pastors in that tradition - these types of unaffiliated churches often tend toward cults of personality, spreading a message that is at best oblivious to the concerns of anyone outside their extremely homogeneous congregations. True hate from the pulpit is rare, but fear of others and belief in literal devils trying to drive an anti-faith agenda are quite common. People thinking one's own community is special or blessed usually goes hand in hand with an implication that The Other is defective or diabolical. While not harmful in itself, it's a stepping stone to some pretty bad places. It's a common error to think that repressive regimes are unstintingly serious. In fact, the worst elements can never have their way without the support of a broader community, which they often nurture through recreation, religion, etc. "Church is fun" can be a good thing, but it doesn't mean those "fun" churches' effect on the body politic is a good one.