Critical Review of Literature Surrounding 'Cultish' Evangelical Pastor Mark Driscoll

Phillip Cicero1,2,3

University of Dayton

300 College Park, Dayton, OH 45469

1. Department of English

2. Berry Summer Thesis Institute

3. University Honors Program

Thesis Mentor: Susan Trollinger, Ph.D.

Department of English

Abstract

This project focuses on the rhetoric utilized by Mark Driscoll in a series of blog posts that appeared on the Mars Hill Church website in late 2001 to early 2002. Using Amanda Montell’s theorization of the rhetorical characteristics of a discourse she calls “Cultish” in her book, Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism, this project identifies the various ways Driscoll’s rhetoric fits within her theorization of “Cultish.” The core of this project is a rhetorical analysis of Driscoll’s blog posts that seeks to demonstrate that his rhetoric mobilizes key characteristics of “Cultish.” Then, using Stuart Hall’s theorization of desire, identification, and investment in popular culture texts along with Judith Butler’s notion of subjectivation (the process by which we are always being constructed as subjects by the rhetoric within which we are immersed), this project will aim to explain how Driscoll’s “Cultish” rhetoric attracts and retains audiences one might expect would reject Driscoll. More specifically, this project will argue that Driscoll’s “Cultish” rhetoric has attracted white men who have felt emasculated and disempowered by neoliberal (and other dominant discourses) during late 20th and early 21st century American culture by constructing a “Cultish” form of “Christian” identity that aims to give these men a sense of masculine identity, power, and belonging. Driscoll’s rhetoric does this by constructing a homophobic and misogynistic form of “Christian” masculinity that he aggressively advances as the only form of “Christian” masculinity that is “good.” Thus, his rhetoric gives his reader two options: be actively and explicitly homophobic and misogynistic or admit that you have been “pussified” – that is, completely emasculated.

Introduction

Scandals involving white evangelical churches seem to appear daily in the news. Whether the scandals involve a male church leader engaging in bullying, sexual harassment, sexual abuse, financial fraud, or something else there seems to be no end in sight. The most recent news on the Southern Baptist Convention’s efforts to cover up the hundreds of sexual abuse cases committed by its leadership over the years provides one example of the systematic nature of this problem. One might imagine that in response to these scandals, white evangelicals would flee the churches where these leaders have or continue to serve through coverups or ignorance of the denomination. Only recently have the numbers began to dwindle at white evangelical churches. A notable example is Willow Creek, a white evangelical church with seven campuses and an attendance of more than 25,000 weekly members in 2017 (Smietana). Recently, however, the church has had to lay off thirty percent of their staff due to a 57 percent decrease in attendance following a major sex scandal among their top leadership (Smietana). That said, white evangelicals remain among the largest two religious groups in America (with mainline Protestantism as the other).

The apparent crisis within white evangelicalism invites us to ask why so many Americans remain committed to churches (and other affiliated organizations) and especially to the leadership of those churches when those in charge have been proven to abuse their power in scandalous ways? For those who choose to stay, and many do, what continues to sustain their loyalty and keep them committed to these ministries that have failed them?

To answer this question, this project draws on the work of Amanda Montell whose book, Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism, explores what she argues are the distinctive characteristics of “Cultish” language and how that language attracts and retains adherents. Through the course of the book, she argues that the language of cult leaders is distinctive and that there are strong commonalities among the rhetoric of individual cult leaders. Her goal is to identify and describe those commonalities so that we can identify a “Cultish” discourse when we hear one and understand how it works. This paper explores the connections between “Cultish” and the rhetoric of white evangelical leadership and how it gains and retains adherents amidst scandals.

This project takes as its case study the rhetoric of Mark Driscoll, a pastor who was heavily criticized and removed from his now defunct megachurch, Mars Hill, for aggressive language and bullying. But to understand Driscoll, who he is, why he is important and worth studying, it is important to have some understanding of the discursive context his rhetoric emerged within. To understand that, a brief history of white evangelicalism is needed.

Evangelicalism all begins with the rise of fundamentalism, which came about in response to modernism and historical criticism critical readings of the Bible. Historical criticism is a reading strategy that emerged from modernism that treated the Bible like any other book- with a history, tensions, and contradictions, written by human beings in history instead of God. A scientific theory of evolution also emerged during modernism called Darwinism, which challenges the creation story of the Bible through the process of evolution. In response, Fundamentalists developed something called biblical inerrancy. Biblical inerrancy is the belief that the Bible is completely and truly inerrant, meaning that it is true in all that it says about both history and science. This all culminated in the popular Scopes trial where John Thomas Scopes was put under trial for teaching evolution in his high school science class which went against Tennessee state law. William Jennings Bryan, a popular fundamentalist and politician, joined the prosecution against Scopes, but the trial did not go as Bryan had hoped. The defense put Bryan and biblical inerrancy through a humiliating examination that culminated in public ridicule. While Bryan and the Fundamentalists won the trial, they had been humiliated on a nationwide scale and moved out of the national spotlight to focus on building a network of organizations (like radio stations and private school) which assisted neo-evangelicals when they returned to the public sphere. Neo-evangelicals arose in the 1960s and 70s to change the public perception of fundamentalism after the shameful reputation they gained from the trial. Hoping to “soften” fundamentalism and make it more credible and relevant, neo-evangelicals offered what can essentially be described as a re-branding of fundamentalism that consisted of all the same beliefs of fundamentalism presented in a more appealing way. This is where the problem of masculinity comes from within the evangelical community. The biggest issue for evangelicals at the time was the connection between them and femininity. Most people, when thinking about evangelicals, associated them with not being “manly” men or something that women should be associated with. Masculinity, therefore, has been a core principle for evangelicals and something that has been at the focus of their message for a long time.

Out of all the white evangelical leaders out there, this project chooses to focus on Mark Driscoll because of his overzealous and aggressive language that stood out among other white evangelical leaders. The other interesting thing about Driscoll was how he presented his arguments at Mars Hill. The services at Mars Hill consisted of rock bands playing religious songs, a young audience consisting of 20–30-year-olds, and an unabashed pastor (Driscoll) not afraid to talk about topics like sex, porn, and other taboo topics. This project focuses specifically on Driscoll’s blog posts during a 2-month period in late 2000 to early 2001 because they appear to resonate heavily with “Cultish” and emphasize the offensive nature of Driscoll’s rhetoric.

The methodology used for this examination of Driscoll’s rhetoric and its connections with “Cultish” first began with a content analysis of his blog posts. The purpose of the content analysis was to organize each blog post into two categories: unprompted posts and responses. Those posts were then organized into subcategories of statements drawn from Montell’s work with the purpose of understanding how certain notable statements of Driscoll’s function in the context of his larger rhetoric. Based on the content analysis, the next methodological move was to conduct a close reading of Driscoll’s posts with respect to Judith Butler’s notion of subjectivation in mind to discern how Driscoll’s rhetoric was shaping white evangelical masculinity. This paper argues that Driscoll’s particular cultish rhetoric constructs a Christian identity that goes well beyond common arguments of complementarianism (the idea that men and women have different but equally valuable roles and that men should be in charge) to an intensely misogynist and homophobic identity for what he considers “good Christian men.” This literature review summarizes especially valuable secondary sources that have shaped and will continue to shape this project. It is organized into three sections representing two key terms for the project (evangelicalism and militant masculinity) and, of course, the subject of my project – Mark Driscoll. The sources summarized have helped me to better understand the direction of this project.

Evangelicalism

The core of this project is focused on Mark Driscoll, and, therefore, a more extensive understanding of evangelicalism is needed to understand Driscoll’s misogynist and homophobic rhetoric. Three sources have proven especially helpful in understanding the origins of evangelicalism at a deeper level. The first of those is Margaret Bendroth, who describes Fundamentalism as following five fundamentals: the virgin birth, substitutionary atonement, resurrection, miracles, and biblical inerrancy. She also describes fundamentalism as inherently anti-intellectual (Bendroth 4). Another source that is helpful in understanding evangelicalism is Molly Worthen who describes evangelicalism as a broad concept that cannot be easily defined but mentions that practices that emphasize fundamental doctrines and born-again experiences are indicators (Worthen 4). Kirsten Kobes DuMez, another source, describes evangelicals as people who believe in biblical inerrancy, born-again experiences, and evangelization. She also argues that, while evangelicals certainly identify with those doctrines, but she also argues conservative politics are central to their identity as well (DuMez 5). Both DuMez and Bendroth also help describe the neo-evangelical movement. The neo-evangelical movement, aka new evangelicals, was a period post WWII and heavily in the 1970s where evangelicals tried to broaden their appeal to the public while still maintaining the same beliefs (Bendroth 5). Bendroth and DuMez then discuss the types of strategies and rhetoric that emerged during the neo-evangelical period. Bendroth and Worthen’s work helps this project in its understanding of the overlap between fundamentalism and evangelicalism. Bendroth and DuMez are also helpful in explaining the neo-evangelical period, which is the period where Driscoll gained popularity. This project hopes to build upon these sources by focusing on what Driscoll contributed to the neo-evangelical period and how much he aligns with their definitions of evangelicalism.

Militant Masculinity

Bendroth writes in her book Fundamentalism and Gender that evangelicals used language akin to “militant masculinity” long before neo-evangelicals popularized it in the 70s. Bendroth describes how in the 1920s, the masculine language utilized by evangelicals became more combative in hopes of making Christianity appear less effeminate and pastors depicted as more masculine (Bendroth 64). White evangelicals hoped to construct a Christianity that was less effeminate and connected more with masculinity. Going beyond just the leadership, white evangelicals wanted male members of churches to be looked at as “full-blooded” men. Bendroth describes that, to show their masculinity, pastors began to emphasize their fondness for outdoor sports, would always carry pistols on them, and were not afraid to walk the mean streets of New York’s red-light district. Bendroth’s work reveals that masculinity has been at the core of evangelicals message for decades. (Bendroth 65-66). DuMez writes about how the message from 1920s evangelicals was taken a step further in the 70s with the introduction of militant masculinity.

The term militant masculinity comes from DuMez’s book, Jesus and John Wayne, in which she describes how militant masculinity became ingrained in evangelical culture. DuMez describes in her book how Christian media and notable figureheads, such as James Dobson and Billy Graham, promoted a specific type of white evangelical masculinity, specifically one that highlights a heroic masculinity perhaps best exemplified by popular culture versions of cowboys– like John Wayne. Militant masculinity became part of evangelical culture as events like the Vietnam War, secondwave Feminist movement, and Civil Rights movements were threatening the evangelicals’ important values of family, sex, power, and race (DuMez 12). This period in the 70s during the Vietnam War and social movements is when white evangelicals began to discern what was good and bad in the world by pointing to the symbols of the past, like John Wayne’s cowboys and Mel Gibson’s warrior character, William Wallace, in Braveheart. Evangelicals pointed to the bravery, aggressiveness, and violence that these symbols from the past represented and argued that these were good characteristics for Christian men to have (DuMez 12). The defining of what is good and bad based on agressive symbols of the past is what DuMez describes as militant masculinity, and she argues that this militant masculinity is tied with a culture of fear that calls Christians to arms against the “forces of evil” in the world (with those forces of evil being feminists, other races, and anti-war protestors). Pastors like Tim LaHaye, Bill Gothard, and Mark Driscoll utilized militant masculinity to garner large audiences by generating fear in their audiences towards the “forces of evil” they would determine (DuMez 13).

The work Bendroth has done provides an important contribution in understanding how masculinity has been at the core of evangelical’s arguments for more than 100 years. This work helps understand the origins of Driscoll’s masculine rhetoric and the connections it has with evangelicals from decades before. DuMez’s work on militant masculinity and how it has been used to generate fear within audiences puts the strategies that Driscoll uses to garner audiences in a brighter light. This project is going to focus specifically on how Driscoll was able to garner large audiences through the use of fear but also on what people are identifying with in Driscoll’s language.

Mark Driscoll

Given that this project is a case study of Mark Driscoll’s rhetoric, secondary sources on him as an important figure within white evangelicalism are essential. DuMez’s book, Jesus and John Wayne, provides helpful insights into the man and his rhetoric. The chapter titled “Holy Balls”is particularly helpful because it focuses on Driscoll and the language he used as a pastor at Mars Hill Church. DuMez describes how Driscoll would preach about a “manly-man” Jesus who was an aggressive warrior that rides into battle against the devil (DuMez 194). She talks about how Driscoll became known as “Mark the cussing pastor” who was not afraid to talk about sex in vulgar ways and did not tolerate any of the soft rhetoric, such as acting as your friend or personal enrichment, that other pastors, like James Dobson, would use to talk about Christianity (DuMez 194). The most striking point DuMez makes is in reference to the series of blog posts posted in late 2001 under Driscoll’s pseudonym, William Wallace II, that provide further evidence of Driscoll’s hyper- militant masculinity rhetoric and, thereby, provides an opportunity to understand exactly what was going on in that rhetoric. These posts are what I analyze in this project, and she describes that these blog posts reveal the misogynistic, homophobic, and downright offensive language Driscoll used to preach his beliefs in a much harsher way than other evangelicals had done before (DuMez 195). DuMez provides helpful insight into Mark Driscoll’s career as a pastor and how he utilized hypermilitant masculinity rhetoric. I hope to build upon her work with Driscoll’s blogs by using Butler’s notion of subjectivation and Hall’s theory of identification to understand the ways in which Driscoll’s militantly masculine rhetoric mobilized the desires of emasculated white evangelical men on behalf of identification with his concept of the ideal man.

Jessica Johnson’s book, Biblical Porn, is the only book-length study of Driscoll’s career during his time at Mars Hill Church. Johnson’s book examines how Driscoll’s audiences were recruited into thinking of power through sexual and militaristic means (or Driscoll’s teachings) through a concept called “biblical porn”. “Biblical Porn” refers to the affective labor (something being done to shape someone’s emotions or desires) of branding Driscoll’s teachings on masculinity, femininity, and sexuality as a marketing strategy to bring in more members (Johnson 7). Using Michel Foucault’s teachings on “knowledge of pleasure,” she describes how members of the Mars Hill church were essentially trained to embody Driscoll’s understandings of masculinity, femininity, and sexuality through the nature of his discourse (Johnson 8). Johnson explains this phenomenon as something like a multi-level marketing scheme (MLM) where the person at the top of the chain (Driscoll) recruits members who learn his teachings and then, either voluntarily or involuntarily, end up bringing in more members through the beliefs that are “theirs” but stem from Driscoll. Johnson’s insights provide a new understanding of how Mars Hill worked as an organization that brought in new members and retained current members with unique strategies. It also provides insight as to how Mars Hill functioned with Driscoll at its head and how integral Driscoll was to Mars Hill’s success. Since this project looks at blog posts written during his time at Mars hill but appeared after the fall of Mars Hill, it extends Johnson’s work by taking it further toward the present and enables comparisons among his rhetoric before and after his time at Mars Hill.

Conclusion

This literature review focuses on key secondary sources that shape this project. Bendroth, Worthen, and DuMez all show the importance the Bible, conservative politics, and the neo-evangelical movement are to understanding the ways Driscoll came to become so influential in the white evangelical world. Bendroth’s work in Fundamentalism and Gender reveals that masculinity has been at the core of white evangelicals’ identity for the past 100 years, and DuMez’s work in Jesus and John Wayne reveals that militant masculinity and the construction of “real men”as aggressive, brave, and violent became ingrained in evangelical culture following the many sociopolitical movements of the 70s. In addition, DuMez’s work with Driscoll’s blog posts argue that Driscoll’s rhetoric takes militant masculinity further than other white evangelical leaders at the time provides a framework for this project to analyze the ways in which Driscoll’s militantly masculine rhetoric mobilized the desires of emasculated white evangelical men. Lastly, Jessica Johnson’s book-length work in Biblical Porn provides insight into the organization that Mars Hill was, the ways they gained and retained new members, and what Mars Hill was like under Driscoll’s leadership. This project aims to contribute a deeper understanding of Driscoll’s rhetoric through the theorization of Montell’s “Cultish” which makes it possible to understand the rhetorical processes by which Driscoll’s blog posts attracted and retained an audience in terms of identification and subjectification.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the Berry Summer Thesis Institute and the University of Dayton Honors Program for providing me the opportunity to conduct this undergraduate research opportunity, as well as my mentor, Dr. Susan Trollinger, for helping to guide me through my work this summer. I would also like to thank the English Department for its help with resources and the Berry family for its support. Lastly, I would like to thank my cohort for an amazing experience this summer.

References

Bendroth, Margaret Lamberts. Fundamentalism and Gender, 1875 to the Present. Yale University Press, 1993.

DuMez, Kristen Kobes. Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation. W.W Norton and Company, 2020.

Johnson, Jessica. Biblical Porn: Affect, Labor, and Pastor Mark Driscoll’s Evangelical Empire. Duke University Press, 2018.

Smietana, Bob. “Willow Creek Cuts Staff Budget by $6.5 Million.” Christianity Today, May 2022. Worthen, Molly. Apostles of Reason: The Crisis of Authority in American Evangelicalism. Oxford University Press, 2013.