54 pages • 1-hour read
Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation
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Chapters 9-12Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 9 Summary: “Tender Warriors”
In the 1990s, a Christian men’s organization, the Promise Keepers, adopted many conservative evangelical views, including opposition to gay sexuality and abortion. A leading Promise Keeper and popular evangelical writer, Gary Cole, tried to find a “middle way” between hard, rugged masculinity and modern effeminacy. He argued that the model of masculinity from Jesus included traits like sensitivity, “urged men to get in touch with their emotions” (152), and endorsed more egalitarian approaches to marriage.
Evangelicals like Gary Cole promoted “servant leadership,” which “framed male authority as obligation, sacrifice, and service” (153). This attitude toward masculinity fit with the economic situation of the 1990s, which forced both women and men in many married households, even evangelical ones, to hold jobs. Even then, the Promise Keepers used harsh and militaristic rhetoric against feminists and other enemies.
In public rallies, the Promise Keepers and other conservative evangelicals used sports metaphors as a “more palatable alternative” (156) to militaristic language. However, this language still presents a patriarchal view of the world. In addition, the Promise Keepers softened conservative evangelical rhetoric through the concept of “racial reconciliation.” This approach was criticized for presenting racism as an individual moral failing rather than acknowledging “structural inequalities.”
After 1997, the Promise Keepers declined, but they still inspired various smaller men’s Christian groups across Christian denominations. Books for Christian readers, like Gordon Dalbey’s Healing the Masculine Soul, (published in 1988), argued that men had become alienated from an innate masculinity. Dalbey held that the media and the generation that came of age during the Vietnam War protests caused this. However, Dalbey also blamed Christian churches for presenting Jesus as “‘meek’” rather than as a “warrior.” Healing the Masculine Soul inspired a “cottage industry of books” (160) addressing evangelical masculinity. One of these was Steve Farrar’s 1990 book Point Man: How a Man Can Lead His Family, which argued that, because society “had minimized the differences between women and men,” there was a crisis in masculinity that caused “divorce, single mothers, prostitution, drug addiction, out-of-wedlock pregnancies, abortion, suicide, [gay] sexuality, sexual abuse, and ‘social awkwardness’” (163). Stu Weber’s Tender Warrior: God’s Intention for a Man, published in 1993, asserted that men and women are innately different and that men have “‘warrior tendencies.’” Still, Weber believed that “a true warrior had a tender heart” (165), meaning that men should seek close relationships with other men.
The reevaluation of conservative evangelical masculinity connected to “‘complementarian’ theology,’” which was devised by the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. Complementarianism was defined in the Danvers Statement, which was published in the magazine Christianity Today. The statement “dictated that a husband’s headship be humble and loving rather than domineering” (167), but it still called upon women to be submissive to their husbands.
Another popular trend that showed how evangelical masculinity was adapting to the changing social circumstances of the 1990s was the rise of “‘purity culture.’” Evangelical youth pastors like Josh McDowell advocated for more honest discussions of sex between parents and their teenage children but also continued to emphasize that women must dress with “appropriate modesty” and ensure that they provided sexual satisfaction to their husbands after marriage. The best-selling 1997 book I Kissed Dating Goodbye by Josh Harris argued that, instead of dating, boys should court teenage girls, and the girls’ fathers should protect their virginity until their wedding day. Purity culture became a movement, and purity balls were held where fathers and daughters performed a ceremony signaling the fathers’ protection of their daughters’ virginity. At such balls, fathers “provided a model of masculine headship by ‘dating’ their daughters, and girls pledged their sexual purity before their families and communities” (172). Reflecting this movement was the funding that Republican presidential administrations provided for abstinence-only sex education in public schools.
Chapter 10 Summary: “No More Christian Nice Guy”
John Eldridge’s best-selling Wild at Heart: Discovering the Secret of a Man’s Soul (published in 2001) argued that men could not be truly Christian unless they embraced the fact that “masculinity was thoroughly militaristic” (173). Eldridge argued that both popular culture and churches had devalued masculinity and feminized boys, and he suggested that all girls had “a fairy-tale dream of Prince Charming coming to their rescue” (175).
Eldridge was one of several conservative evangelical writers in the early 2000s to reject the rhetoric of the tender warrior. In Bringing Up Boys, published in 2001, James Dobson argued that men inherently had a “competitive nature.” Also, he accused feminists of attacking masculinity in society. The same year, Douglas Wilson published Future Men: Raising Boys to Fight Giants, which made similar arguments, portraying men as natural initiators and women as inherently receptive. Furthermore, he wrote that women should always be sexually available to their husbands, arguing, “Woman was made for man, not the other way around” (179).
George W. Bush’s election as president and the 9/11 attacks restored political ascendency to conservative evangelicalism. The War on Terror after the 9/11 attacks restored the moral certainty that American foreign policy had lacked since the end of the Cold War. Steve Farrar’s 2005 book King Me urged American men become more masculine both for the War on Terror and for the culture war against the evils of liberalism and secularism. Farrar not only attacked the media, academia, and schools for undermining masculinity in society, but also criticized churches for “emphasizing ‘feminine traits’ like tenderness, compassion, and gentleness” (181). Other books likewise painted feminists, gay people, and Muslims as threats while drawing on “militaristic imagery.” Accordingly, conservative evangelicals overwhelmingly supported the US invasion of Iraq.
Chapter 11 Summary: “Holy Balls”
Following the 9/11 attacks, conservative evangelicalism became even more militant and masculine, denigrating the image of Jesus as an advocate for peace and drawing on activities like mixed martial arts. Such views were promoted through the Christian homeschooling movement, which had grown since the early 1980s. An attempt by Congress to more closely regulate homeschooling failed.
Doug Phillips, an author and leader of the homeschooling movement, “believed that patriarchy and patriotism were inextricably connected, and both were God-given duties” (190). At the same time, Philips supported the Quiverfull movement, which encouraged evangelical couples to have as many children as possible to help in “birthing an army of God” (191). The Quiverfull movement remained small but did receive national attention through a reality TV show focused on one Quiverfull family, the Duggars.
The renewed fixation on evangelical masculinity likewise emerged in the preaching and public persona of Mark Driscoll, the founder of Mars Hill Church in Seattle. The church targeted young men, and its congregation often dressed casually and had tattoos. Driscoll’s church “offered a refreshing model of cultural engagement” but “his gospel message was infused with militant masculinity” (193). Driscoll argued that men were abandoning Christianity because churches presented Jesus as effeminate rather than “an aggressive, anger-filled leader” (194). Driscoll often discussed sex in his sermons, though mostly in the sense of encouraging women to pleasure their husbands. Furthermore, Driscoll blamed national problems on men becoming effeminate and women having too much influence over boys’ upbringing. The atmosphere Driscoll cultivated had a “military spirit” that not only valorized the War on Terror but also presented effeminate and gay men, “‘sexualized single women’” (196), and Christians who disagreed with Driscoll’s theology as threats. Driscoll’s authoritarian leadership style reflected this militaristic attitude.
Driscoll was a figurehead for a new evangelical movement, the New Calvinists (199), mobilized through organizations like Acts 29 and the Gospel Coalition. The movement’s leaders included successful evangelical thinkers like John Piper and Tim Keller. Despite disagreements including “rather significant theological differences,” these men worked together due to “a common reverence for patriarchal authority” (201-02). The New Calvinist network came to include and whitewash the writings of Doug Wilson, who in the 1990s advocated that men should shame wives who were insufficiently submissive, that the death penalty or banishment apply to gay people, and that the brutality of American slavery was exaggerated. Du Mez argues that this reflected an overall pattern of conservative white evangelicals “promoting more extreme expressions of patriarchy, making it increasingly difficult to distinguish margins from mainstream” (204).
Chapter 12 Summary: “Pilgrim’s Progress in Camo”
Colorado Springs, a geographical “central hub” for conservative evangelicalism, is the hometown of numerous evangelical organizations. They include James Dobson’s political advocacy organization Focus on the Family, which was pivotal in the defeat of Democratic senator Tom Daschle. Also located in Colorado Springs is Ted Haggard’s megachurch, New Life Church. Both Dobson and Haggard’s interpretation of Christianity was “explicitly political,” opposing abortion and same-sex marriage and supporting the US invasion of Iraq and free-market capitalism. New Life Church drew on militaristic imagery, promoting the view that women should remain submissive and sexually pure and the need for “a rigid chain of command to ensure strict ideological conformity” (209).
The US Air Force academy, also located in Colorado Springs, was the site of a battle to resist attempts to evangelize the military. As part of the evangelical effort there, actor-director Mel Gibson’s film The Passion of the Christ was screened. The film was accused of being “anti-Semitic,” Gibson was caught in a drunken anti-Semitic rant, and speakers at the academy were accused of promoting “evangelical warrior rhetoric” (212) that glorified killing. Evangelical influence in the Air Force may have been “connected” with a sexual abuse scandal and a poll suggesting that “one in five cadets felt women didn’t belong among them” (214).
Oliver North returned to the media spotlight in the early 2000s as a subject of interviews and the author of novels and nonfiction books. He “persisted in blaming the American media for failing to support the troops” (216). North’s occasional coauthor, Chuck Holton, also wrote books that depicted masculine men defending women and Muslims as constant enemies.
Chapters 9-12 Analysis
In her research, Du Mez often draws on best-selling novels, nonfiction books, and films. Discussion of such sources helps Du Mez illustrate popular ideas, arguments, and themes across white conservative evangelical culture. However, popular books and films not only provide material for analysis and evidence but also demonstrate one of Du Mez’s core arguments concerning The Development of an Evangelical Consumerist Culture. Du Mez describes the Religious Right as a “sprawling network” that is both cultural and physical. It includes a market of cultural products as well as churches, bookstores, conferences, websites, online forums, religious schools, homeschooling, and nonprofit organizations. Such a network is how movements specific to the Religious Right are spread, marketed, and, to an extent, normalized in the wider culture. One example is purity culture. Du Mez writes, “Countless local churches promoted purity teachings, and purity culture found expression in an array of consumer products” (171). Another kind of network was the New Calvinist network of churches. The existence of such cultural and institutional networks is central to understanding Du Mez’s argument about why conservative white evangelicals supported Donald Trump despite the initial skepticism among important evangelical leaders. Also, these networks helped exclude more liberal and moderate views on key issues: “Through deliberate strategies and the power of the marketplace, the exclusion of alternative views would contribute to the radicalization of evangelicalism in post-9/11 America” (204), Du Mez argues.
Gender, particularly The Emergence of Militant Masculinity, remains a core part of how Du Mez understands the development of the Religious Right. Still, it is not a straightforward trajectory. Du Mez explains how, in the 1990s, a widespread effort strove to develop a more moderate perspective on marriage in response to changing economic and social circumstances while preserving patriarchal authority: “By promising intimacy, servant leadership passed off authority as humility, ensuring that patriarchal authority would endure even in the midst of changing times” (154-55). However, a new sense of national crisis that emerged after the 9/11 attacks fueled and vindicated the militant masculinity of conservative evangelicalism. As happened with the Cold War, the 9/11 attacks and their aftermath influenced the construction of evangelical masculinity and militancy, just as the public personas and decisions of leading individuals like Mark Driscoll shaped conservative evangelicalism.
While Du Mez focuses on gender, she also suggests that such militant masculinity was intertwined with issues of race and class. For example, she argues that evangelical masculinity in part stemmed from the anxiety over the generational transition from working-class Protestants to becoming comfortably middle-class: “Despite pressure for men to achieve higher socioeconomic status, and despite the nascent popularity of ‘servant leadership,’ American culture still associated masculinity with working-class jobs” (162). Similarly, Du Mez finds that race can be used as a category for understanding conservative white evangelicalism. Looking at how an evangelical group like the Promise Keepers tried to acknowledge the problem of racial relations in the US, Du Mez notes, “Framing racism as a personal failing, at times even as a mutual problem, [Promise Keeper] speakers routinely failed to address structural inequalities” (157). In Du Mez’s view, this idea of racism as an individual sin or flaw, rather than a systemic problem, helps allow evangelicals to dismiss or combat any attempt to critique the racism that pervades US history and benefits the cause of Christian nationalism.
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