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religion in the marketplace…

Posted on Tuesday 5 January 2010


… Brit Hume was certainly full of something on "Fox News Sunday" this week. Hume, a part-time analyst at Fox since stepping down from his daily anchor role, sought to redefine the job of political pundit, apparently, when he stepped boldly up to the task of telling people what religious beliefs they ought to have. He prescribed in particular a remedial, therapeutic dose of Christianity for disgraced golfing champ Tiger Woods, a man whose lubricious private life has been haunting the headlines for weeks.

Noting that Woods has referred to himself as a Buddhist, Hume knocked his fellow "Fox News" panelists for mortified loops when he dissed about half a billion Buddhists on the planet with the remark, "I don’t think that faith offers the kind of forgiveness and redemption that is offered by the Christian faith" … "My message to Tiger would be: Tiger, turn to the Christian faith and you can make a total recovery and be a great example to the world"…

Hume has a message for Woods; lots of people will have a message for Hume. First off, apologize. You gotta. Just say you are a man who is comfortable with his faith, so comfortable that sometimes he gets a wee bit carried away with it. If Hume wants to do the satellite-age equivalent of going door-to-door and spreading what he considers the gospel, he should do it on his own time, not try to cross-pollinate religion and journalism and use Fox facilities to do it. At the same Republican convention where Hume bemoaned his advancing years, he spoke of knowing when to leave the party and go home. "I’d like to walk away while I’m still doing okay," he said, "and not have people say, ‘He was fading.’ " It’s easy to understand the sentiment, but Hume ought to know that what people are saying right now is a whole lot worse than that he’s fading.
I had a reaction to Brit Hume’s remark. On a trip to Egypt and Jordan last month, I heard Buddhism mentioned twice. In Egypt, the guide explained that Islam accepts that Muslims, Jews, and Christians could go to heaven, not "Buddhists or Atheists." In Jordan, another guide said, "Muslims accept people of the book – Christians and Jews. But Muslims don’t believe in Buddhism." I suppose comments like that register with me because I’m something of a secular Buddhist myself. One can read Buddhism as a personal psychology of the self and a solution to the problem of the painful aspects of personal narcissism. Others find it more than that – reincarnation, nirvana, etc. Lots of us leave off that second part – which is fine to do. Buddhists don’t have belief cops. So I was surprised that Hume made such an uninformed comment. I was surprised by the guides as well. But neither bothered me. They were like Republicans talking about global warming or Christian Fundamentalists talking about evolution – discussing something they had not investigated thoroughly.
Earlier, though, when it was still the 20th century, Hume discussed, in an interview, his spiritual epiphany and what motivated it. "I came to Christ in a way that was very meaningful to me," he said; it was in the aftermath of his son’s death by suicide in 1998. It would be indefensibly insensitive to mock Hume for his beliefs, especially considering the way he came to them…
That, of course, clarifies the source of Hume’s comment. He was probably saying something like, "Christianity offered me forgiveness for my guilt that my son killed himself. Maybe Tiger should try it." and "Then you can come back to your life and make a contribution, like I did." In that sense, Hume was trying to help Tiger in the way many people try to help others – "Here’s what helped me." It usually doesn’t help, but the thought is nice. But it wasn’t Hume’s political incorrectness, his lack of understanding of Buddhism, or his unsolicited advice that struck me. It was his consumer’s way of looking at religion in general:
  • If you are in financial trouble, vote Republican. They’ll lower your taxes.
  • If you are in need of forgiveness, go with Christianity.
  • If you want broad 3G coverage, go with AT&T Wireless.
And in that sense, maybe Hume is giving us insight into how the Christian Right has invaded our national religious marketplace – by offering a more desirable product. Christ taught that one should look at one’s own sins – Judge not that you be not judged, Let he who is without sin cast the first stone, Love thy neighbor as thyself, Turn the other cheek, etc. The Religious Right changed the focus to looking at the sins of others – Homosexuals, Abortionists, Stem Cell Researchers, Godless Liberals, Secular Humanists, Tiger Woods. Forgiveness, legitimized hatred, maybe even lower taxes – it’s as good as broad 3G coverage. Oh yeah, everlasting life…

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