1 Boring Old Man

• Jesus plus nothing:
• Q&A with Jeffrey Sharlet
• The Family
• shouting out while watching is allowed…
• the real story…
• The Family
• Youth with a Mission
• National Prayer Breakfast

While this brand of Christianity [I call Christian Jihadists] is not all Christians, there is no apparent force within Christianity [as we once knew it] to counter these fundamentalist trends. Somehow, the Republican Party was able to mobilize these forces in 2000 to elect George W. Bush. It’s hard for me to understand why they supported him in 2000, or 2004, or his followers in 2008. But the Ensign and Sanford Sexcapades have called our attention to something else, though it’s not exactly clear what it really is. Even with all of the reports in our news media on "C Street," "Ivanwald," "The Cedars," "Youth with a Mission," "The National Prayer Breakfast," it remains cloaked in mystery. All of this seems to go back to a preacher named Abraham Vereide in Seattle who founded something called The Family in 1935 that sponsors the National Prayer Breakfast and prayer groups for Congressmen. They have a place called The Cedars [Ivanwald] on the Potomac and apparently operate the C Street House [owned by Youth with a Mission].

This is different from the Religious Right that we know, but even more ominous because of its secret connection to many of our Congressmen and Leaders. What are these people about? Who is Doug Coe, their leader? What does he have in mind? What does he preach? Right now, the hottest news celebrity is Jeffrey Sharlet, an editor at Harpers who wrote several articles in his Magazine and a book [The Family] after living at The Cedars for a time. I expect we’re going to hear a lot about this organization[s] in the coming days. It has to do with a peculiar view of the teachings of Jesus – something about the leaders being chosen to lead, something about the wealthy, something about a theocracy. I don’t yet get it [I expect because it’s cloaked in secrecy and anonymnity], but I have a creepy feeling when I read anything about it. An example:

^{A few weeks into my stay, David Coe, Doug’s son, dropped by Ivanwald. My brothers and I assembled in the living room, where David had draped his tall frame over a burgundy leather recliner like a frat boy, one leg hanging over a padded arm.}

^{“You guys,” David said, “are here to learn how to rule the world.” He was in his late forties, with dark, gray-flecked hair, an olive complexion, teeth like a slab of white marble, dark eyes so big they didn’t need to move to take in the room. We sat around him in a rough circle, on couches and chairs, as the afternoon light slanted through the wooden blinds onto a wall adorned with a giant tapestry of the Last Supper. Rafael, a wealthy Ecuadoran, had a hard time with English, and he didn’t understand what David had said. He stared, lips parted in puzzlement. David seemed to like that. He stared back, holding Raf’s gaze like it was a pretty thing he’d found on the ground. “You have very intense eyes,” David said.}

^{“Thank you,” Raf mumbled.}

^{“Hey,” David said, “let’s talk about the Old Testament.” His voice was like a river that’s smooth on the surface but swirling beneath. “Who” — he paused — “would you say are its good guys?”}

^{“Noah,” suggested Ruggi, a shaggy-haired guy from Kentucky with a silver loop on the upper ridge of his right ear.}

^{“Moses,” offered Josh, a lean man from Atlanta more interested in serving Jesus than his father’s small empire of shower door manufacturing.}

^{“David,” Beau volunteered.}

^{“King David,” David Coe said. “That’s a good one. David. Hey. What would you say made King David a good guy?” He giggled, not from nervousness but from barely containable delight.}

^{“Faith?” Beau said. “His faith was so strong?”}

^{“Yeah.” David nodded as if he hadn’t heard that before. “Hey, you know what’s interesting about King David?” From the blank stares of the others, I could see that they did not. Many didn’t even carry a full Bible, preferring a slim volume of New Testament Gospels and Epistles and Old Testament Psalms, respected but seldom read. Others had the whole book, but the gold gilt on the pages of the first two-thirds remained undisturbed. “King David,” David Coe went on, “liked to do really, really bad things.” He chuckled. “Here’s this guy who slept with another man’s wife — Bathsheba, right? — and then basically murdered her husband. And this guy is one of our heroes.” David shook his head. “I mean, Jimminy Christmas, God likes this guy! What,” he said, “is that all about?”}

^{“Is it because he tried?” asked Bengt. “He wanted to do the right thing?” Bengt knew the Bible, Old Testament and New, better than any of the others, but he offered his answer with a question mark on the end. Bengt was dutiful in checking his worst sin, his fierce pride, and he frequently turned his certainties into questions.}

^{“That’s nice, Bengt,” David said. “But it isn’t the answer. Anyone else?”}

^{“Because he was chosen,” I said. For the first time David looked my way.}

^{“Yes,” he said, smiling. “Chosen. Interesting set of rules, isn’t it?” He turned to Beau. “Beau, let’s say I hear you raped three little girls. And now here you are at Ivanwald. What would I think of you, Beau?”}

^{Beau, given to bellowing Ivanwald’s daily call to sports like a bull elephant, shrank into the cushions. “Probably that I’m pretty bad?”}

^{“No, Beau.” David’s voice was kind. “I wouldn’t.” He drew Beau back into the circle with a stare that seemed to have its own gravitational pull. Beau nodded, brow furrowed, as if in the presence of something profound. “Because,” David continued, “I’m not here to judge you. That’s not my job. I’m here for only one thing. Do you know what that is?”}

^{Understanding blossomed in Beau’s eyes. “Jesus?” he said. David smiled and winked. “Hey,” he said. “Did you guys see Toy Story?” Half the room had. “Remember how there was a toy cowboy, Woody? And then the boy who owns Woody gets a new toy, a spaceman? Only the toy spaceman thinks he’s real. Thinks he’s a real spaceman, and he’s got to figure out what he’s doing on this strange planet. So what does Woody say to him? He says, ‘You’re just a toy.’ ” David sat quietly, waiting for us to absorb this. “Just a toy. We’re not really spacemen. We’re just toys. Created for God. For His plea sure, nothing else. Just a toy. Period.”}

^{He walked to the National Geographic map of the world mounted on the wall. “You guys know about Genghis Khan?” he asked. “Genghis was a man with a vision. He conquered” — David stood on the couch under the map, tracing, with his hand, half the northern hemisphere — “nearly everything. He devastated nearly everything. His enemies? He beheaded them.” David swiped a finger across his throat. “Dop, dop, dop, dop.”}

^{Genghis Khan’s genius, David went on, lay in his understanding that there could be only one king. When Genghis entered a defeated city, he would call in the local headman. Conversion to the Khan’s cause was not an option, as Genghis was uninterested in halfhearted deputies. Instead, said David, Genghis would have the man stuffed into a crate, and over the crate’s surface would be spread a tablecloth, on which a wonderful meal would be arrayed.}

^{“And then, while the man suffocated, Genghis ate, and he didn’t even hear the man’s screams.” David stood on the couch, a finger in the air. “Do you know what that means?”}

^{To their credit, my brothers did not. Perhaps on account of my earlier insight, David turned to me. “I think so,” I said. “Out with the old, in with the new.”}

^{Yes, he nodded. “Christ’s parable of the wineskins. You can’t pour new into old.” One day, he continued, some monks from Europe show up in Genghis Khan’s court. Genghis welcomes them in the name of God. Says that in truth, they worship the same great Lord. Then why, the monks ask, must he conquer the world? “I don’t ask,” says Genghis. “I submit.”}

^{David returned to his chair. “We elect our leaders,” he said. “Jesus elects his.”}

^{He reached over and squeezed the arm of Pavel. “Isn’t that great?” David said. “That’s the way everything in life happens. If you’re a person known to be around Jesus, you can go and do anything. And that’s who you guys are. When you leave here, you’re not only going to know the value of Jesus, you’re going to know the people who rule the world. It’s about vision. Get your vision straight, then relate. Talk to the people who rule the world, and help them obey. Obey Him. If I obey Him myself, I help others do the same. You know why? Because I become a warning. We become a warning. We warn everybody that the future king is coming. Not just of this country or that but of the world.” Then he pointed at the map, toward the Khan’s vast, reclaimable empire.}

Jeff Sharlet July 14th, 2009 at 4:45 pm … The Family helped found Officers Christian Fellowship, the group I wrote about in my May Harper’s cover story that declares the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan “spiritual war of the highest magnitude” and has 15,000 military officers in its ranks. Also: Campus Crusade, Young Life, Promise Keepers, and a whole host of smaller outfits.

Jeff Sharlet July 14th, 2009 at 6:46 pm … I came across what looked like some Mike Pence connections but didn’t follow up for the book. That’s worth investigating. Of course, the easiest way to start is to ask him — that’s how I learned of Rep. Frank Wolf’s involvement, for instance. As for connections to youth ministries: galore. The House on C Street is actually owned by Youth With a Mission. The Family has long looked at Young Life, a mostly innocuous outfit, as something akin to a farm team. Likewise the Navigators, from whence the current leader, Doug Coe, came. Bill Bright and Campus Crusade were helped out in the early days by the Family and repaid the favor many times over during the last couple decades.