Dr. Metablog

Thoughts about Elmer Gantry, Sinclair Lewis's fraud of a preacher, were still reverberating in my brain when I read in The New York Times the outrageous stranger-than-fiction story about the "nationally renowned evangelical preacher," Darlene Bishop. Reverend Bishop, who pastors the 4000-member Solid Rock Church in Monroe, Indiana, and has a famous-in-certain-circles TV program, apparently convinced her wealthy songwriter brother that she could miraculously cure his throat cancer. She failed to do so, he died a painful death, and now the dead brother's children are suing to reclaim a share of the estate which Darlene somehow contrived to inherit. It's a Gantryesque tale — though one that's more sordid than even Sinclair Lewis, who hated demagogic religiosity with a rare passion, could possibly have invented.

I was sufficiently intrigued by The Times' story to visit Darlene Bishop's website, where she's posted a spiritual autobiography of sorts.  Here's the crucial paragraph:   

Being that Darlene was raised so poor she began to try to fill the void inside of her with shopping. She bought 2 Cadillacs and 18 fur coats in one year. Finally, one day she came in from a shopping excursion and as she pulled out all the dresses to show her eldest daughter, Jana pointed to one and stated, "Mom you already have that dress." Sure of herself, she replied, "Oh, no I don't." So Jana led her upstairs to her closet and dug the dress out from the collection of many only for Darlene to find that she did already have one of the dresses hanging there with the tags still attached. At this, she realized it was not working. The big house, the diamonds, fur coats, collections of designer clothes, none of it was filling the emptiness residing in her inner most being. She threw herself on the floor sobbing and declared, "Lord, I want more of you! I just want you. And I'm going to seek you until I find my true place in the kingdom."  From then on, instead of going shopping Darlene would delve into the Word of God.

I read Darlene's conversion narrative with conflicting feelings. On the one hand, it exudes authenticity. It's so unapologetic and downright and un-literary that it can't possible be contrived. On the other hand, it's appallingly trite. Darlene doesn't experience the "dark night of the soul"; instead, she shops. She doesn't go through a spiritual crisis; she discovers that she's bought the same dress twice. Nor is she overwhelmed with the beauty and majesty of the Lord. "Instead of going shopping Darlene would delve into the Word of God"; that is to say, and I don't mean to be snide, she started to shop at a bigger and better mall. In a way, her very triteness serves as a guarantee of her authenticity. 

Darlene's story also reminded me, once again, that I'm just not on the same wavelength as many of my fellow Americans. I don't think that either shopping or delving can give meaning to life. And yet Darlene Bishop is a celebrity of American religion, who, people believe, can perform miracles.

And what about Darlene's wonder-working power? In her books and on her website, she claims that she cured her own breast cancer. Did she?  I'm skeptical. According to The Times, when Darlene was on the stand testifying under penalty of perjury, she confessed that "no doctor ever diagnosed the breast cancer." Instead, "she thought that she had cancer in 1986 and that it was cured." Here's a pretty howdy-do. Darlene imagined she had cancer and then imagined that it disappeared — and on such a basis she proclaims a miracle. In my book, that's setting a mighty low threshold for divine intervention. 

On the website, there's nary a word about her brother's death or about the lawsuit, but there's some fine, excruciating detail about the miracle. Unlike the account of her rampant shopoholia, this story is not one bit credible: it's either delusion or fabrication — and I think the latter.      

I had been preaching on faith for six weeks, when one night while laying in the bed the devil said to me, "If you don't stop preaching like this, I'll kill you" and without hesitation, I replied, "You're not big enough, devil". He said, "Feel your right breast". When I felt my breast, I felt a lump the size of a silver dollar….  Soon the whole bottom half of my breast became a solid mass. The pain would be so bad some nights that I could only sleep a few minutes at a time. It was as if someone had put hot coals of fire in my breast.

Let's get this straight. Darlene experienced hot coal pain in her breast, and didn't take herself to the emergency room. She's not only a fake;  she's dangerous. What sort of example does she set to the Solid Rock congregants (and to her readers and her TV-watchers)?  "Let's pause here for a Solid Rock public service announcement: if you experience excruciating pain, under no circumstances consult your physician."

What should you do for that burning coal feeling?  For pain medicine, I would write down scriptures on little pieces of paper and place them in my bra. 

Are we to believe that the medieval remedies are still practiced in twentieth-century Indiana?  Egad.

This went on for nearly four months until eventually my breast began to hemorrhage. I had to put nursing pads in my bra to prevent the blood from coming through my clothes. Some nights I would bleed all night and wake up with my gown and bed sheets covered in blood. Until one day, as I was hunched over the sink, my tears splashing into the bloody water, I heard Him speak my name in an audible voice. He said, "Darlene!"  I rose up and cried, "Yes Lord". He said, "Because you've continued in my Word and not leaned on the arm of the flesh, as of this day you're healed.  Go! Proclaim it! 

David Hume, whose "On Miracles" is still the definitive analysis, says that when we evaluate a supposed miracle, we discount the testimony of a person "who has an interest in what he affirms." Darlene has built a megachurch and a flourishing business and has inherited her brother's estate on the basis of this supposed cure. Enough said.

But what about the Solid Rockers?  Can't they see through such palpable nonsense?  Are they mesmerized or stepfordwived?  Is there any hope that they — and other victims of similar hocus-pocus — will some day get their brains in gear again?  Not bloody likely.