Review: Baal and Gods of More: Rescuing Church Growth from Idolatry, Anrew Root, Baker Academic and Weapons of Worship: How the Songs of Evangelicalism form the Soundtrack of Extremism, Rick Pidcock, Broadleaf
Throughout church history, the church has thought of growth in its membership as a good thing – and why wouldn’t it, if the church values itself as a means for salvation and a force for social good?
Yet modernity’s obsession with growth has affected the church, argues Andrew Root, bringing secular notions of success to the centre of church life. (Root is writing in the American church context, but his analysis is applicable wider.) The slow move of Western Protestantism from the centre to the periphery has only accelerated this process, as churches become more panicked about relevance and decline, and many turn to business models and the lessons of influencer culture – for Root, an exercise in idolatry and a betrayal of the churches’ central purpose of nurture.
Root compares this to the differences between the fertility cult of Baal and the Israelite worship of Yahweh. He distinguishes between the desire for prosperity and the Torah’s injunctions to reach out to the marginalised. (Historians of the ancient Near East might suggest the difference is not as stark as Root paints it, but never mind…) For churches with a modern focus, growth means stability or even prosperity, but that is not the point.
Growth is, of course, not necessarily bad. But it needs to be of the right kind. Growth for its own sake – characterised by Root as the desire simply for ‘more’ – is a modern affliction that not only has negative consequences for the church, but has contributed to our ecological crisis, not to mention the madness of Trumpism. Focussing on perpetual growth as a marker of success can eventually only end in failure. Though he doesn’t quite put it this way, Root is arguing for quality over quantity.
In a book about growth, it may seem inevitable that he compares churches to the economy. But he brings up a fascinating point, correlating economic stability and prosperity with healthy church attendance. This may seem counter-intuitive, but particularly in the American context, high postwar church attendance is an anomaly related to the boom of the postwar American economy. There was also a resurgence in churches during the tech boom of the 2000s. When church and societal success are entangled in this way, it is easy for the churches to judge their operations in terms of innovation and entrepreneurship.
In the twentieth century there was the temptation to apply business principles to church practices. In the twenty-first century Root thinks the churches have succumbed to the new cultural paradigm of personality and ‘networking’, while ‘wealth’ (as in the sheer number of congregants) is, as with the wider economy, consolidated in the hands of the few. (Think of the decline of small, traditional churches and the lure of modern megachurches.)
Root is critical of identity politics in the churches, seeing this as capitulation to another secular marker of success. He is writing in the enflamed American context, so we can understand his concerns, and he says he has some sympathy for ‘identity affirmation’, but lest his criticism come across as simply criticism of the left, let’s just emphasise here that there is just as much identity politics on the American right, but it is driven not by a desire for tolerance or justice, but by warmongering, a desire for homogeneity, Christian nationalism and the prosperity gospel.
Rick Pidcock is a former worship music leader who is similarly cautious about malign influences on contemporary churches. In his important book Weapons of Worship, he is primarily concerned with a toxic undercurrent in praise and worship music – the way it reflects and is being used in American conservative politics.
Praise and worship music is a lucrative industry, with global reach. The top worship songwriters seem to be as ambitious as any in the pop music business, though they justify their gains in the language of prosperity theology. As elsewhere, there has been a recent consolidation of worship music production – Pidcock tells us that there are now merely four major players (worship ‘oligarchs’) dominating what is played in churches (and subsequent revenue streams) and pushing a particular theology.
Modern praise lyrics, from the likes of Matt Redman and Chris Tomlin, have always had an individualistic focus, and, notes Pidcock, ‘yelling’ about the glory of God easily distracts from love of neighbour. When one’s focus is on the individual, the societal forces that hold individuals back (and which churches are in a position to challenge) can be easily dismissed. But Pidcock also notices a ‘subtle’ and worrying shift of late: these songwriters have been singing less about the individual, and more about Christian nationalism. (The likes of Phil Wickham are wholehearted Trump supporters.)
Music is a powerful emotional weapon. And Pidcock suggests worship music is being used to make people hunger for authoritarianism and accept the violence of conservative leaders. Americans, we might note, find it hard to distinguish between the literal and the metaphor at the best of times, but in general, the language of warfare so prevalent in worship songs can allow for militancy to creep into the worship space. This is not hype – Pidcock attends political rallies where worship leaders enthuse about destroying their (non-Christian) enemies.
Pidcock also notes how praise lyrics often confirm evangelical notions of what they think is divinely sanctioned authority – rich over poor, Christians over non-Christians, America over the world, men over women. He says that rather than challenging societal hierarchies, modern praise and worship, like pop psychology, simply affirms individual aspiration.
One collective of songwriters, Pidcock tells us, calls themselves ‘Sons of Sunday’. (Daughters need not apply.) With more male-centric songwriting comes, as one of these prominent male songwriters recently stated proudly, the chance to push more ‘warrior’ imagery, in line with the conservative push for hypermasculinity. (Pete Hegseth is an enthusiastic promoter of using modern worship music in military settings.) Meanwhile, Pidcock notes sadly, children, who are also not the best discerners of metaphor, are indoctrinated in the language of violence and fear.
Nick Mattiske blogs on books at coburgreviewofbooks.wordpress.com and is the illustrator of Thoughts That Feel So Big.
