 Popsugar Reading Challenge category: A book with a snake on the cover or in the title.
Wild Faith: How the Christian Right Is Taking Over America, by Tal Lavin. Lavin starts with a caveat: "There are many faithful people in this country who kiss the cross or take Communion and love their neighbor and keep up with old friends and listen to a nice sermon or two. This is not a book about those people." Rather, it's about a political movement that's deeply entwined with the notion of being "spiritual warriors" and preparing for an apocalypse that they sincerely believe will happen in their lifetime. Hallmarks are a belief in biblical inerrancy, the demand that their movement must rule politically, and an obsession with traditional gender roles and sexual purity. The section on child-rearing was a difficult read. The movement is dominated by voices like James Dobson (Focus on the Family) and Michael and Debi Pearl (To Train Up a Child). Their focus is on teaching children a single virtue: not kindness, empathy, or generosity, but obedience. Lavin interviewed adults who'd left the movement, and they uniformly described childhoods of being beaten with paddles, switches, and wooden spoons for any sort of infraction - including obeying orders but having the wrong facial expression or tone of voice. Lavin is passionately clear about the dangers of political power that uses religious faith as a shield to declare itself above question. A timely and sobering book. (Note: the author recently transitioned and now goes by Tal, but the book is published under his previous name.)
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