Checking in with Allie Beth Stuckey and other denizens of The Blaze

Following up on some of the rightwing nonsense around the latest conservative moral panic over "critical race theory," I've listened to some podcasts by Allie Beth Stuckey, a Southern Baptist who is able to attract people who count as rock stars in the SBC (Southern Baptist Convention), like Brother Al Mohler, who has a reputation as the leading Southern Baptist theologian. Although as the SBC continues to lurch rightward in its theology and politics, even Brother Al is starting to be regarded as dangerously moderate by many SBC conservatives. Other guests featured on her podcast recently include more secular figures like Georgia's pro-voter-suppression Republican Gov. Brian Kemp and longtime rightwing Republican ideologue Ken Blackwell.

Political chameleon Joe Rogan is also a recurring guest on Stuckey's program. Both Stuckey and Rogan are part of Glen Beck's politically conservative Blaze group. There a 06/16/2021 video of her with Rubin as a guest in which they exchange current Republican talking points with each other while warning that Joe Biden intends to Communize the US.

Her podcasts are pretty boring. Because a major theme is to provide reassurance and comfort to fundamentalist Christians who are constantly plagued by having to interact with people from what they disparagingly call "the world." But they do recall for me some of the long-standing, typical features of fundamentalist theology and church teaching.

In this episode of Stuckey's, How to Talk to Progressive Christians 05/04/2021, her guest is Alisa Childers.

This episode is sponsored by something called the Freedom Project Academy, which sounds pretty dodgy to me. To be fair, not everyone thinks so. The John Birch Society touts it on their website.

Stuckey's broadcast seems particularly targeted to women. This is consistent with the SBC principle of "complementarianism," a church doctrine/policy/ideology that holds not only that women cannot be SBC ministers - a policy the SBC shares with the "papist" Catholic Church - that they shouldn't even teach men in a religious context. (See: Yonat Shimron and Bob Smietana, Beth Moore apologizes for her role in elevating ‘complementarian’ theology that limits women leaders Religion News Service 04/07/2021)

The conversation with Alisa Childers doesn't really offer much new in conceptual terms. That's kind of the whole point of Christian fundamentalism, as the stereotypical but unfortunately realistic example of "God said it, I believe it, and that's all there is to it." Or some variation thereof:

Of course, there is always more to "it."

One thing that strikes me is that Stuckey takes a pleasant, intelligent tone. Don't look for Marjorie Taylor Greene types of provocations from her. And the fundamentalist framework she uses is effectively in staying in that tone, because she normally engages with like-minded believers and continually frames the discussion in the terms of fundamentalist thought. This approach doesn't work so well in a context where critical analysis is called for, or with guests who would respectfully decline to accept the really narrow fundamentalist framing she uses.

But I do have to give her credit for one of the more eye-catching podcast titles I've come across, Was Jesus a Palestinian Communist?

In Stuckey's corner of Christianity, the kind of doctrinal references she provides can sound like serious intellectual engagement when takes on their face. For instance, Stuckey and Childers discuss the Trinity, one of the more inscrutable Christian doctrines, that holds God to be a single deity but three divine Persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. This is a concept that took a long time to emerge in its current form and is very much a later interpretation, not a formula spelled out in that way in the New Testament Scriptures fundamentalists hold to be "inerrant." The Britannica Online article on the life of Jesus by Jaroslav Pelikan, E.P. Sanders et al, has a section called The dogma of Christ in the ancient councils of Jesus that gives an overview of the longstanding theological controversies over the definition of what mainstream Christianity came to call the Trinity.

Stuckey and Childers use the concept of the Trinity is the most narrow sectarian way, to argue that the God worshipped by the Jews (including Jesus of Nazareth, btw) and Muslims is not at all the same God Christians worship because Jews and Muslims don't acknowledge the Trinity. And to argue that other groups who emerged from the Christian tradition and consider themselves Christian, like the Mormons, are not really true Christians at all because they depart in some way from their fundamentalist formula of the Trinity.

In that podcast after 29:00, they discuss the observation that women fundamentalists seem to be more likely than men to be attracted to what the call "progressive" Christianity, "progressive" being like a cuss word in their environment. That would be an interesting topic on which to elaborate, though any thoughtful discussion of it would quickly start trampling on the SBC's "complementarian" understanding of proper gender roles.

But that episode is also striking in how we can see to whom the discussion is addressed: to men and particularly women who are in fundamentalist church communities who feel that they should only be personally close to people in that sphere, but are confronted with the reality that there are people they care about who do not share the fundamentalist worldview. Childers even starts off by acknowledging that it is not unusual for people to become alienated from the fundamentalist environment because of some real harm or serious disappointment they encountered within it.

Still, the context is not about how good conservative Christians can find a way to appreciate that their parents, siblings, close friends, and even husbands may experience their religious views, or reject religious views altogether, and still maintain those relationships. The framework in which they discuss it is proselytizing, which is a central impulse for fundamentalist Christians. And even imperative, because their view holds that people who are not "saved" (in a right relationship to God) will spend eternity in Hell, a place of eternal torment. For some people, that can become a painful dilemma.

But the Stuckey-Childers conversation doesn't suggest any helpful coping strategies for people in that situation other than trying to convert the others. The discussion is largely about talking points to use in proselytizing pitches to people who have succummed to "progressive" Christianity.

Stuckey's most recent YouTube video of the moment (06/18/2021) about the dangers of demons with a former "faith editor" at The Blaze, Billy Hallowell. Stuckey seems to think the anti-demon guy might be a touch too liberal for her liking.