I read of another charismatic church in Texas, another young jeans-clad wannabe messiah getting piles of money from politicians and businessmen to fund another institution to spread their gospel, in the guise of The Gospel.
The young followers claim "they are called" as they wander streets and parking lots telling strangers God loves them. In other words, they are delivering the message I would hope to deliver, but with a different methodology.
I am intrigued by such church phenomena. Maybe I am envious of their clarity of mission. But my experience of fundamentalist church services and modern “praise” services and political rallies also leaves me acutely aware of my visceral response to modern amplified invocations of a high-decibel "holy spirit".
Those followers are good folks, sincere folks, and their pastoral and political leaders would be the first to know, even if not the first to admit, those folks are being manipulated. Was I any less manipulated in those guilt-fostering, emotionally not-so-subtle church services of my childhood? Were the villagers at an ancient Egyptian temple ceremony any less manipulated? How about the villagers in those Papua New Guinea tribal ceremonies I witnessed?
Why would God need masks or altars or guilt or amplifiers to reach us? What is it we feel in those invocations of fear, ecstasy, guilt, awe, and vibrating chest cavity? Why do we want to be manipulated? If the manipulation opens our heart and mind to Creator and Holy Spirit and Love, is it necessarily bad? If it's not bad, why am I so consistently appalled and repelled by it?
I am repelled by use of such visual - aural - ritual tools because they are so consistently used to deceive and manipulate innocent people to the benefit of the shaman - priest - preacher - politician - and despot.
Authentic and enduring faith is not inspired by deep bass vibrations, whether from log drums in a jungle village or a 1200-watt subwoofer. These are tools to be used to excite chimpanzees, not the children of God.
The adherents feel called. Once the speakers go quiet and the spotlights go dark, we'll see to what the worshipers were called, and by whom.