Why Pastors Don’t Get Political

Columnist

Pastors often loathe to weigh in on controversial topics. There are reasons.

Capitol

KP Tripathi/Flickr

I have never considered myself a very political person. As a proudly evangelical pastor, for a long time I possessed a somewhat bemused and distant attitude towards politics, focusing my attention instead on my calling to teach and preach the Word, which was above all worldly concerns. But that changed a few years ago. After my wife was diagnosed with breast cancer, and our insurance company tried to terminate her coverage using the dreaded “pre-existing condition” clause, I became a vocal advocate for health care reform. Shortly after that, as a resident of a city wracked with racial tensions, I timidly called for greater understanding between Korean and African-American communities.

These brief forays into the public sphere have taught me a lot, and have given me a lot more compassion on the plight of pastors. Evangelical pastors are often lambasted for their lack of engagement with society and politics. We accuse evangelical leaders of being too passive and silent on the most pressing issues of the day, and wonder if this is due to a lack of conviction, or a lack of courage. We call them cowards, dinosaurs, unbiblical, irrelevant. And I hate to admit that I have often joined that chorus of criticism. But the truth is not nearly so simple. Although I don't seek to totally exonerate myself from wrongdoing, here are five reasons why I personally hesitate to speak out on controversial issues:

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The Separation of Church and State

This might seem like something of a cop-out explanation, but you should remember that one of the foundational principles of American culture and government is the separation between church and state. It's an idea that was coined by Thomas Jefferson himself, and given (some) weight by the First Amendment. And for pastors, this goes far beyond the cultural pressure that a person feels to avoid coming off as overly-religious. For us, there are legal implications because the tax free status of churches depends on maintaining this separation, although instances of enforcement are admittedly rare.

Under the hazy definitions and wildly contrasting opinions of church and state, pastors around this country furrow our collective brows.

Moreover, this is a contested idea which is constantly undergoing both legal and cultural revision. Some people believe that this statement dictates a strict separation of spheres, while others believe that this statement was never meant to muzzle individuals in the expression of their opinion. And under the hazy definitions and wildly contrasting opinions of church and state, pastors around this country furrow our collective brows, trying to discern whether a statement about gay marriage or war or gun violence or welfare could be construed as political, and so legally inappropriate for us to share from the pulpit. We have this enormous but undefined pillar of American government and culture looming over us, causing us to hesitate in speaking our minds, or at the very least, making us to sit on our hands until someone figures it all out.

We don’t want to lose a single soul

By and large, pastors become pastors in order to win as many as possible to the love Christ, as Paul shares in 1 Corinthians 9. That is the real reason I became a pastor…that, and my score on the MCAT was not what I had hoped. I kid! I did well enough on my MCAT to attend any number of third-tier medical schools. But the fact that I have a heart to win people to Christ is one of the main reasons that I am hesitant to speak out on controversial issues.

You see, there are many social issues that I care very deeply about, and I believe that Scripture has a clear position on. But I also am acutely aware that if I say something that is even remotely political, or could be construed thusly, I may lose the ability to speak to John, because he’s a staunch conservative. Or I can’t counsel Rose, because she’ll think I’m a right wing nutjob. You see, we live in a cultural climate where line between “disagreement” and “hatred” is thin, and fraying fast. If someone differs from another politically, culturally, or theologically, they are not just different – they are enemies.

We live in a cultural climate where line between “disagreement” and “hatred” is thin, and fraying fast.

This dynamic puts pastors in a bewildering and nearly impossible situation, because we desperately want to win people to Christ, but realize that in order to do so, we can’t step on any toes. We feel forced to choose between one calling or the other, to be either proclaimers of God’s universal love, or to be prophets of God’s justice and compassion. It is not easy to balance these roles in any environment, and nearly impossible in our current one. So in order to retain the ability to speak to all, we sometimes end up speaking not at all.

Criticism from the Outside

I have received some fairly vocal and asinine criticism, even threats, in the past few years. I have been called “despicable”, “disgusting”, “racist”, and “a communist”. People have accused me of speaking out in order to make money, which I would love to do, but am thus far unable to figure how to accomplish. If you could let me know how I could do this, I would be very grateful. But I have to admit that I have some familiarity with the whole "communist" thing, given that my grandfather lost his life fighting communists in Korea.

Pastors are just people, equally fragile, and equally terrified of criticism and insults as anyone else.

I relate most of these instances with wry humor, but the truth is these criticisms anger me. But they also offend, and are often hurtful. They sometimes make me afraid. And they make me want to be quiet in order to avoid them in the future. That sounds cowardly, but the fact is I’m human. And we often forget this, that pastors are just people, equally fragile, and equally terrified of criticism and insults as anyone else. What’s more, the same sensitivity that serves us so well in counseling others also can make us especially and dangerously susceptible to personal discouragement as well. In order to preserve ourselves from the unbridled and vicious criticism of the outside world, we remain silent, and so, safe.

Criticism from the Inside

How I wish that the criticism was just limited to those outside of the church! But the brutal reality is that many pastors live in mortal fear of criticism not from outside, but from within the church. Too many congregations are lavish with their critique for pastors, but stingy when it comes to encouragement. They freely let the barbs fly, but not blessings. I can’t even begin to count the number of friends I have in ministry who have burned out because of harsh criticism from fellows Believers who were, ostensibly, supposed to be leaders of their church. Personally, the criticism that I have received from outside the church is nothing compared to the vicious attacks I have received from people within. Pastors often don't speak out because we are, for lack of a better word, traumatized. We are petrified that if we say something incisive, someone will approach us after the service and unleash a potent but often inaccurate broadside of criticism at us, or that a small group of influential people will unjustly call for our ouster, or even a governing board might fire us. These fears are not unwarranted nor unprecedented, trust me.

It is important that congregations own up to their role in this dynamic, that a spirit of hyper-criticism in church is muzzling its leaders.

It is important that congregations own up to their role in this dynamic, that a spirit of hyper-criticism in church is muzzling its leaders. Listen, if you want your leader to be intrepid, then support them, pray for them, stand by them in the tempest, even if you don’t always fully agree with them. But if you spend most of your time cutting down your leaders and talking behind their back (or even right to their face), then you shouldn’t somehow expect them to stand up and to speak out on the most pressing issues of this day. That's ridiculous, because unbridled and unedifying criticism doesn’t make courage more likely, but far, far less.

Cowardice

So are pastors irrelevant cowards? The answer is: yes, often times. After everything that I've shared, the fact still remains that we pastors often lack the courage to stand up and to be heard, and potentially to be hated as a result. Our silence is a subtle tool used preserve our egos and standing before people. This is often the case for me, and I repent for it. I am laughably weak, even if the faith that I represent is not. But there is one thing that would help me tremendously, and that is the support of my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. If I could count on the church to stand by me, then you can count on me to stand up and speak.

Third Culture: This column by Peter Chin looks at matters of faith from the multicultural and minority perspective.

Ideas

Why A Little Denomination Hopping Is Not A Bad Thing

Peter Chin

Columnist

Although sometimes frowned upon, experience with other Christian traditions may be just what we need right now.

Church

Barnyz/Flickr

Sometimes, I’m a little embarrassed to be identified as an American Christian because it feels like we fall into one of two camps: either we hate everything that we are not familiar with, or hate everything that we used to like.

A good example of the former is a controversy that recently sprang up at Gordon College, where undergraduates were scandalized at the introduction of a strange and foreign type of worship experience during their chapel services: gospel music. Yes, GOSPEL MUSIC, one of the oldest and richest liturgical traditions in American faith.

Examples of the latter are too numerous to count. The Christian blogosphere and publishing industry are filled with memoirs of people ranting about how terrible their church experience was growing up, and how their current place and style of worship is what Jesus had in mind all along. When cast in this adversarial light, what should have been personal stories of finding one’s home in faith instead read like a harrowing escape from a doomsday cult, and serve as yet another salvo in our nation’s already raging cultural wars.

These two tendencies have unfortunately come to define Christians in this country, that we either despise everything with which we are unfamiliar, or the exact opposite. But personally, I have never had much of a problem with either, and it’s not because I’m all that great of a person – just ask my wife. It’s probably because I have spent so much time in diverse kinds of churches.

I grew up in the Roman Catholic church, and can still remember the cathedral in which Sunday mass took place. The entire building was constructed in a cruciform shape, the main entrance located at the foot of the cross, and the altar placed at what would have been the intersections of its beams. The ceiling was painted sky blue and dotted with bright recessed lights, which made it easy for a young boy to spend most of the mass staring upwards, lost in his own imagination. The altar was made from white marble streaked with dark brown, like the best kind of ice cream. And dominating this scene was the cross, painted gold and sumptuous crimson, and adorned with an ivory white life-size statue of Christ, eternally in his suffering. To this day, I can still recall the beauty of that vaulted space and the spice smell of incense, and how my breathing would change when I walked through the doors, the way it does when you enter any sacred place.

When my parents decided that I should switch schools, we switched traditions as well, and began attending a local Korean Presbyterian church instead. Although located only a few miles apart, the two could not have been more different. The Korean church was modern and sparse, its design and decor efficient and linear. But what the church lacked in physical beauty, it more than made up in spiritual passion. My first Sunday service was a shock, three hundred young people praying to God in loud voices, some of them in languages that have no earthly root. They prayed in tears, and almost always on their knees, not upon the cushioned kneelers that I was used to at Our Lady of Perpetual Help, but directly upon the floor. It was in the Catholic church that I learned that God was everywhere, but in the charismatic church that I learned that God was in me, and the connection I shared with him personal, and passionate.

It was in the Catholic church that I learned that God was everywhere, but in the charismatic church that I learned that God was in me, and the connection I shared with him personal, and passionate.

After several years in the charismatic tradition, I eventually found myself in a reformed church, a movement rooted primarily in the writings and life of John Calvin. It was at that church that I had more debates than in all other years of church experience combined – debates about worship, debates about theology, debates about authority, debates about debates. This sounds exhausting, and it often was. But Reformed Christians believe faith is so rich that it should engage the totality of the mind. So we should have debates on theology and the like, because those ideas are as deep and complex as any other topic of human experience. Consequently, their approach to faith is thoughtful, intelligent, and cerebral, sometimes to a fault. While the charismatic church engaged my heart, the reformed church engaged my mind.

I have had experiences in other churches as well, Mennonite, Pietist, non-denominational, and can say that I have honestly enjoyed (and sometimes loathed) my journey through them all. Now some might say that these denominational meanderings put me at a disadvantage, but I wholeheartedly disagree. It is this exposure that allows me, and others who share my background, to avoid that terrible tendency to either despise other Christian traditions, or despise one’s own.

After years in the charismatic church, I’m completely comfortable when someone prays in tongues. But neither am I scandalized by those who contemplate in silence. I have spent far too much time in those types of churches to arrogantly dismiss such a powerful means of connecting with God. I know my fair share of hymns, but also own a few Chris Tomlin CDs, and can belt Fred Hammond with the best of them. I own a New International Version translation of the Bible, as well as the New King James, New Living, and the English Standard Version. Because I’ve witnessed firsthand people connecting with Christ in a myriad of beautiful ways, it takes a lot to scandalize me – not that it’s impossible though.

And so in the case of Gordon College, while it's easy to be outraged at their outrage, many of these students had probably never been exposed to any form of worship other than what they experienced in youth group. And really, do any of us willingly and easily engage with things with which we have no exposure? Hardly. But you could imagine that if these students had spent even a small measure of time visiting and learning about the spiritual and cultural heritage of the black church, or really any tradition different from their own, their outrage would have been blunted significantly, if not avoided altogether.

Also, when I get frustrated with a specific church or with a specific denomination, my reaction is not simply to turn around 180 degrees and stalk off in the opposite direction. I know what lies on the opposite end of that spectrum, and that what I will find there will most likely be equally good (and equally bad) as where I am now. So the movements in my life of faith are not pendulum swings from one tradition to its diametric opposite, but more like soft oblique meanderings. I don’t believe in a denominational promised land, just an eternal one.

I don’t believe in a denominational promised land, just an eternal one.

Millenials so often express deep disillusionment with the churches where their faith was first cultivated, but I wonder if this is not due to the fact that many of them have been brought up their within a fairly narrow Christian tradition, usually a conservative and racially homogenous evangelical church. Their concept of "The church" is in reality only "The church that I knew growing up", which is not the only kind of church in existence.

But having no other experiences to draw from, their reaction to natural and inevitable disenchantment is sharp and reactionary, to push off from their sole point of reference to the opposite direction: from low liturgy to high, from conservatism to progressivism, from Southern Baptist to Episcopal, or vice versa. But had they been more aware of strengths and weaknesses of other forms of worship and theology, perhaps they would not be so quick to throw their spiritual heritage under the bus.

Now don't get me wrong, it’s perfectly okay to cleave closely to a tradition that fits us best, and in my honest opinion, some traditions follow Christ far more closely than others. Also, I am not advocating for reckless church-hopping that is encouraged by our consumer instincts, if not by churches themselves.

But I truly believe it should be required for every Believer to spend at least a modicum of time visiting and being exposed to Christian traditions that are starkly different from their own: Protestant, Catholic, Charismatic, Reformed, High Liturgy and Low. And not just churches that are diverse theologically and liturgically, but ethnically and racially as well: Black and Korean churches, Hispanic and Hmong ones. Perhaps then, we'll stop summarily rejecting the beautiful ways in which other people understand Christ. And if we ever get tired of our current tradition, we will transition to wherever God wants us to go with grace and peace, instead of leaving burnt bridges as our only testimony to the world.

Third Culture: This column by Peter Chin looks at matters of faith from the multicultural and minority perspective.

Ideas

A Letter For My Son

Peter Chin

Columnist

A letter to my son, who is a testament to God’s wild goodness

Jonathan

Peter Chin

Oh Jonathan, you turned four years old this month! Amazing how time flies so fast. You are my little guy, and I love you, although there are times when you drive me up the wall. Like yesterday. And the day before that. And the entire month of July, for that matter.

I still remember the day I first heard that you were coming into our lives. Your mother was going into surgery for her mastectomy, and her doctor called me in to the surgical ward because she had to tell me something important. When I heard that, my heart dropped into the pit of my stomach. In fact, I almost vomited. You see, the prior year had taught me to expect the very worst from life, and from God: miscarriage, burglary, cancer, health insurance cancellation. And so that morning I braced myself for another kick to the teeth, perhaps news that the cancer had spread, or that the surgery couldn’t be performed.

But the last thing I ever expected to hear was that mommy was pregnant, and that you were in her belly. I was at an absolute loss for words, something that doesn’t happen to your father often. It was in that moment that my understanding of God completely collapsed. I realized that I didn’t understand God in the least, a God who could allow your mother to suffer so terribly, but also would bring such an unexpected gift into our lives. I felt like Job standing before the whirlwind, my haughty theology eroding and folding in upon itself in light of the sublime mystery of God and His ways.

So thanks, Jonathan, for completely destroying your dad’s theology.

Fast forward a few months, and I was with your mother at the Sculpture Garden of the National Mall. I got another call from a doctor, this time from a wonderful cancer specialist in San Francisco. Her words to me, although kind, broke my heart. “Peter, I hate to say this, but this is the advice that I would give my own sister: you need to terminate that baby and get Carol started on treatment right away.” Despair swept over me, and from some deep place in me, I lamented, “God, why? Why give me this gift only for it to be taken away? Why do you do things for no reason?!”

And somehow, I swear that I heard God say this: “I don’t.”

"Why do you do things for no reason?!” And somehow, I swear that I heard God say this: “I don’t.”

Your mom and I then decided that no matter what, no matter what anyone told us, we were going to keep you. We were convinced that God had given you to us, and no matter what anyone told us, we were going to protect you and bring you into this world. We had faith that God does and gives nothing without great purpose…faith as small as a mustard seed.

The next few months were hard, so very hard. Dad was trying to plant a church, and having a terrible time with it. People looked to me for leadership and guidance and faith, not realizing that my own faith hung by the thinnest of threads. And your mother – oh Jonathan, your mother. She was a sight to see, a woman who had lost all her hair, but at the same time, was heavily pregnant with you. The stares we got from people wherever we went! My heart would burn with anger, and I would glare at them, but who could blame them? Who would have been able to keep from staring at such a jarring juxtaposition, such a powerful and saddening image of cursedness and blessing, of health, and sickness. Of life, and death.

But we managed to make it through those months, mostly because your sisters. I wonder if you will ever understand what wonderful sisters you have, how strong and gentle they are, and how much they take after your mother? Your sisters' laughter and joy and triumphs became ours, inherited strength that came from child to parent, rather than the other way around. So you be good to your noo-nahs.

You were born a month later, September 9, 2010. I didn’t cry any tears that day, because your dad is a big stud. But it’s also because your mom insisted in having you without any epidural. Can you imagine that?! After enduring chemotherapy while pregnant, your insane mother decided that she still had one more thing to prove to herself, that she could have a child without drugs. So I couldn’t cry that day because your mom was screaming at me, and the doctors were casting their judgmental looks at me, and things were just generally chaotic and unpleasant for your dad.

But you came, your perfect toes and fingers, your huge head, seemingly untouched by everything you had endured for the last 9 months…how did you do that? How did you come out unscathed by such terrible circumstances? By the moment you were born, and were one minute old, you had already endured so much, and overcome! Not many children can make such a claim.

I didn’t cry that day, but I did in the months to come, and sometimes still do. Sometimes I take your face in my hands and just look, marvel. Yes, you’re my son, one of my beloved children (EQUALLY beloved, mind you). But you are more than that. You are a symbol to me, an incarnation of sorts, a tangible reminder of the amazing and inscrutable ways of God. It is a rare and precious blessing to be able to physically see God’s love and power, and to be reminded that His ways are not my ways, but much higher and better. Truthfully there have been moments where your dad has lost heart and faith, overwhelmed by all the random and minute disappointments of life. But then I look at you and remember who God is, and what he is able to do, and I laugh. After all, if a God who can bring you into the world against all odds is with us, who can be against us?

No one, Jonathan – no one.

Third Culture: This column by Peter Chin looks at matters of faith from the multicultural and minority perspective.

Ideas

Why I Stopped Hating Christian Music

Peter Chin

Columnist

It’s easy to hate on Christian music, but Christian musicians often find themselves in impossible terrain.

Concert

Beatrice Murch/Flickr

I have a confession to make. I really dislike Christian music.

Now, Christian music is a very broad term, so I think some defining is in order. I don't mean music that is written expressly for use in the church for praise and worship. I'm talking about Christian music that does not exactly fit in church, but has an unmistakable Christian theme in its lyrics and content, what I think is commonly referred to as CCM, or Christian Contemporary Music. It tries to cleave to some of the lyrical and theological orthodoxy of worship music, but with the musical sensibilities of pop and rock (and sometimes even hip hop), and somehow manages to mangle both. I don't like this kind of Christian music, and I know I'm not alone.

I listen to it everyday on the radio, partially because I find the lyrical content that's broadcast on other stations repugnant ("Cuz your sex takes me to paradise, yeah your sex takes me to paradise…"), and partially because as a pastor, I feel somewhat guilty if I don't. But I regularly grit my teeth while listening to the local Christian radio station. My beef is that even though the music has such high production values and is performed by such high caliber musicians, it often lacks realness and authenticity. Amazingly, it manages to sound shallow even when talking about ideas of incredible depth. The lyrics are prosaic and affected, and the themes that it covers are shockingly narrow. There are the "I'm a bad person but you love me anyway" songs, the "Teach me to love like you songs", and the "Don't give up" songs. Aaaand, that's about it. Of course, I'm being facetious and stupid, which comes as no surprise to those of you who read this blog regularly.

But in mid-tooth grit this week, I realized something that made me have a lot more respect and compassion for people who are in the Christian music industry: they are in a ridiculously impossible position. Think for a moment of the opinions and influences that a Christian musician must cater to:

Being creative while striving to be orthodox isn't easy – in fact, the creative process usually flourishes in the opposite environment.

First, Christian music must be theologically orthodox. Even though Christianity is better understood as a relationship than a religion, it has obvious doctrines and beliefs associated with it. So that means that Christian musicians must write songs that are theologically consistent with the doctrines of Christianity. This is a constraint that no other songwriter is forced to adhere to. After all, Britney Spears doesn't write songs with a mind towards theological orthodoxy…actually, I don't even know if she can write songs at all. And being creative while striving to be orthodox isn't easy – in fact, the creative process usually flourishes in the opposite environment. But Christian musicians are forced to walk a difficult line: to be creative and expressive, while making sure that every word is consistent with a faith that is many thousands of years old. Not easy.

Then, Christian music must also minister to people. Music of any kind makes a statement. But for Christians, they can't simply write a song without care of how it affects people, but make sure it is consistent with Christian values and purposes, and doesn't "stumble" people, as the phrase goes. And in order to accomplish this, many Christian artists hedge their bets and write songs that are of saccharine sweetness – not because they themselves are not familiar with suffering or have nothing deeper to say, but because they don't want to take the risk of writing a song that is so honest that it might negatively impact a person spiritually or emotionally. I can't really think of too many secular artists for whom such concerns are any kind of consideration. Maybe Chris Brown? Probably not.

Third, these unfortunate people must then think about all of the other more general considerations of musicianship: is the song catchy? Is it musically creative? Will it sell? Do I sing well? Am I out of tune? Is this the right kind of drum beat, or should I ask to compress that snare some more? Why can't I get along with my guitarist? How do I get my music out there? How do I set myself apart? How do I feed my family? Is law school totally out of the picture??

And lastly, Christian artists make music for some of the harshest critics in the world. As much as I hate to admit it, evangelicals are a touchy and judgmental bunch, given to vocally criticizing the smallest perceived infraction of their values, even when it comes to music. You think I'm making this up, but I'm not. For instance, the children's show VeggieTales once wrote an episode where the antagonist sings a song about how chocolate bunnies are awesome to eat. And there was an outcry about this song, parents writing in that they didn't think it was appropriate for their children to be singing a song about bad eating habits, even if it was sung by the antagonist! I guess they didn't trust their children to pick up on the fact that a song sung by the bad guy is not supposed to be prescriptive. Anyway, the outcry was hot enough to make the creators of the show re-write the song with more palatable lyrics!

Unfettered non-Christian artists laugh and laugh as you labor under a sodden wet blanket of unrealistic expectations.

So imagine trying to write music that is theologically orthodox, positively uplifting, not to mention musically awesome…all for people whom you know might rip you to shreds if you mess any one of those up. If you are orthodox but lack coolness, younger Christians will mock you mercilessly for being out of touch. If you are cool but your lyrics are theologically not sharp enough, older Believers will lay into you. If you don't blend these dynamics to perfection, then hyper-critical people like me write stupid blog posts about it. And all the while, unfettered non-Christian artists laugh and laugh as you labor under a sodden wet blanket of unrealistic expectations.

*shudder*

When you consider all of these factors, it's no wonder that Christian music sounds like it does, trying for so many things, and falling short. And so, I've resolved not to be so critical of Christian artists anymore. In fact, I would take it a step further and say that I have to repent for my judgmentalism, and perhaps more than a few of us need to confess that we have been unduly critical of Christian music. Christian artists already find themselves in a difficult position, and it's a shame that their position should be made any harder by their own brothers and sisters in faith being overly-critical and mean-spirited, especially when I doubt that many of us could come even close to doing any better. So even though I don't really enjoy it, I will continue to listen to CCM in the car. I may not enjoy the songs, but I do appreciate what they are trying to achieve, and respect the artists who create them, and that's no small thing.

Plus, it's not like the music on the other stations is anything to write home about either. "Cuz baby you're a firework! Come on show 'em what you're worth…"

Third Culture: This column by Peter Chin looks at matters of faith from the multicultural and minority perspective.

Culture

The Streaming Roundup

Rebecca Calhoun

Veggie Tales, quirky romance, artistic Polish films, and more.

'New Girl' is back, and you can catch up on Netflix.

A diverse array of new watchables was added to video on demand this week. For starters, Netflix brought on the third season of “that girl” (that New Girl) in sync with the Season 4 premiere of the series on FOX. Also on Netflix is the 2013 documentary Evergreen, about the legalization of marijuana in Washington. Indiewire called it a momentary “victory lap” here.

For a somewhat less controversial movie experience, you can now see Silver Linings Playbook on Netflix and read the CT Her.meneutics opinion here. In the same vein of lighthearted love stories, stay tuned for the Netflix-produced series, Love. Two seasons are set to stream in 2016, but the Huffington Post gives the full story here and now. For the girls who like to be crossed in love now and again, or any other Jane Austin fans, the 1990’s TV miniseries version of Pride and Prejudice is available on Amazon Prime.

If you like to curl up with your kids and a good VeggieTales story, then Hulu is the streaming site for you. Recently added to the long list of Hulu’s veggie tales is Robin Good and His Not-So-Merry Men—“a lesson in handling hurt.”

The second best reviewed movie on Indiewire’s Criticwire site, Ida, is now on video on demand. The indie drama follows the story of an orphan whose parents were killed in the Holocaust. Indiewire’s review says the film tackles religion and anti-Semitism head on; Alissa Wilkinson also reviewed it for CT, noting the film’s exploration of incarnation. I suggest saving this emotional experience for after VeggieTales (when the kids are asleep) and before a binge-catch-up with Jess.

Rebecca Calhoun is an intern with Christianity Today Movies and a student at The King’s College in New York City.

- More from Rebecca Calhoun

Culture

The News Roundup

Jessica Gibson

Another ‘Mockingjay’ trailer, ‘Ben-Hur’ casting news, and more.

After months of teasers, Mockingjay: Part 1 finally has a full length trailer! The much-anticipated third installment of The Hunger Games series is set to be even darker and more suspenseful than its predecessors as the story hurtles towards its intense conclusion. You can watch the trailer, titled “The Mockingjay Lives,” here.

Also big news in YA movies this week is the casting of model Cara Delevingne in the adaptation of John Green’s Paper Towns. Delevingne will star opposite Nat Wolf, who starred in Green’s first book-to-movie adaptation, this summer’s The Fault in Our Stars. You can read more about Paper Towns and Delevingne in The Guardian’s article here.

Ben-Hur fans can get excited as the remake slated for 2016 moves steadily forward with the announcement of its lead this week. Boardwalk Empire actor Jack Huston landed the titular role and will star alongside Morgan Freeman as Ildarin and possibly Fantastic Four actor Toby Kebbell as the villain Messala. Yahoo! Movies gives a short profile on Huston and sum up of the casting news here.

The indie film Band of Robbers wrapped production this week, though its release date has not been announced. Kyle Gallner and Adam Nee star in this modernized adaptation of Mark Twain’s most beloved characters, Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. You can read about some of the details of this imaginative comedy thriller from Variety here.

The Toronto International Film Festival ended this past weekend and Indiewire has a comprehensive list of the good, the bad, and the disappointing for your perusal here. (And check out Ken Morefield’s list of the best performances!)

Jessica Gibson is an intern with Christianity Today Movies and a student at The King’s College in New York City.

- More from Jessica Gibson

Culture

The Critics Roundup: “The Remaining” and “No Good Deed”

Larisa Kline

Two thrillers that don’t quite hit the mark.

Idris Elba in 'No Good Deed'

“Un-scary, un-sure of its theology, in-consistent in its methods” are the words Crosswalk’s Shawn McEvoy uses to describe the newest Christian thriller/suspense The Remaining. The film is an alternative to the upcoming Left Behind reboot coming out next month. McEvoy sums the film as one that “hopes to offer a ‘Christian horror’ thrill with a message via another take on the Rapture and those it, um, leaves behind.” Despite its decision to tell a familiar story without changing much of the story, McEvoy believes the movie’s biggest problem is its struggle between pleasing horror film lovers and Christian moviegoers. The film teeters between the two audiences and makes a major (in McEvoy’s mind, bad) decision not to show the monsters it hypes up: “This film may have the weight of Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions behind it, but a big budget it does not.” The Washington Post’s Mark Jenkins agrees with McEvoy completely, saying The Remaining is “a low-budget, low-impact attempt to rewrite the Book of Revelation as a horror flick.” Interestingly enough, Jenkins believes the “fundamental problem” with the film is the actual story. He notes, “The movie relies on the instinctual human fear of death, but its message is that dying is a promotion.”

Fans of Idris Elba (most famously known for the BBC’s Luther) and Think Like A Man’s Taraji P. Henson might have been looking forward to No Good Deed, but Crosswalk’s Christa Banister wonders why the talented actors “would sign up for something so dreadful.” Even though the average horror story causes audiences to roll their eyes at the protagonist’s stupidity, Banister says the only way to make it through the entirety of the film is to suspend your disbelief. “For whatever reason, the writers made sure every single woman tosses her usual feminine intuition to the wind once they encounter the elusive Colin Evans (Elba).” One of the biggest disappointments Banister noticed was the absolute ridiculousness of the story; unfortunately, “in the absence of unique ideas, filmmakers resort to a big, fat plot twist no one could've predicted.” Variety’s Dennis Harvey agrees that “despite competent performances” by Elba and Henson, “the dialogue and situations in Aimee Lagos’ script are too routine to create much excitement.” In an extremely short review, Harvey brushes aside No Good Deed as “dullish and forgettable.”

Larisa Kline is an intern with Christianity Today Movies and a student at The King’s College in New York City.

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Church Life

Study: Where Are the Women Leading Evangelical Organizations?

Interview by Katelyn Beaty

That’s the mystery the Gender Parity Project, whose results debut this weekend, sets out to solve.

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One striking finding of the Gender Parity Project—the largest study to date of women leading evangelical organizations (nonprofits, not churches)—is that the men in such organizations identify as egalitarians. At least when it comes to women leading in society, writ large. Janel Curry, provost of Gordon College, and Amy Reynolds, professor of sociology at Wheaton College, found in their two-year study (funded by the Imago Dei Fund) that 93 percent of the men surveyed agreed with the statement, “Men and women have freedom to pursue their gifts and callings without regard to gender roles. Men and women should share leadership roles within society.”

So why do women hold 21 percent of board positions, 21 percent of paid leadership positions, and 16 percent of CEO positions in the evangelical organizations surveyed (about half the number of women leading nonprofits broadly)? Curry and Reynolds posit that, while a few organizations explicitly say they want only male leaders, or belong to denominations that do, the problem may be that most organizations say nothing at all. “At one point we tried to look at mission statements and strategic plans . . . and it was amazing how few clearly state whether leadership positions are open to both men and women,” says Reynolds. “Given the different views in the evangelical world on this, we found that fairly troubling, that you could not find that information out.”

Still, Curry and Reynolds say that most nonprofits surveyed want more women leaders, if for pragmatic rather than theological reasons. “When we went to the Christian Leadership Alliance (CLA) conference, there was really no defensiveness about this issue,” says Curry. “The response was, ‘Give us the tools. Tell us what we need to do to help women move into these positions.’ ”

The study itself doesn’t provide the tools, but it does identify a structural gap—and, Curry and Reynolds hope, provoke more organizations to be explicit about wanting women leaders. They spoke with managing editor of CT magazine Katelyn Beaty about their study, whose findings are being presented today at the Religion Newswriters Association conference.

To gauge the gender breakdown of these organizations, you used Form 990 data (tax forms), which asks organizations to list employees making more than $100,000, as well as board members and other key employees. Why use this metric to gauge something as broad as leadership?

Reynolds: We know that the measure of leadership we have is just a proxy for the measure we would ideally want, but we were most interested in having a study that measured as close to a full set of evangelical populations as possible. And since we knew we wanted 1,500 different organizations, we were looking for something that would be the same across them, which is what led us to the 990 data. On the 990, the leadership it lists is that over $100,000 [paid leadership positions] and board members. We also tried to code out non-leadership positions. But we went with that because we wanted a way to operationalize it, that we could do the study five years in the future and use the same metric, and use the same metric across organizations.

Curry: The $100,000 mark was merely there because the 990 tax form uses that, and we tried to compensate for that by looking at other data, because there are some religious traditions that would be paying less than that, so we tried to get them into the study.

The reason for looking at leadership positions is that there have been quite a few studies done on the gender climate of organizations and how women move up. But there really has not been something among the evangelical population about actual women who are in leadership, and factors that led to their success, their being able to be there.

You sent the survey to 425 organizations, and you wanted to ensure that the organizations were part of a larger evangelical umbrella group, such as the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability (ECFA) and the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities (CCCU). From those 425 groups, you received 698 responses from men and women representing 135 organizations. Which groups and which people responded the strongest?

Curry: The people who were asked to respond were those in the top 3 tiers of leadership in those organizations. So the survey asked somebody in the organization to identify the top three layers of leadership, so that was the group that filled out the survey.

Reynolds: Because the top leaders knew this was a survey aimed at issues of gender in leadership, they nominated more women than men. But actually with the survey, we had more than 40 percent of the people nominated being women, so that reflects organizations wanting to give us the names of all women that could maybe be conceived of in the leadership realm.

Curry: This reflected almost a misunderstanding, that men in leadership weren’t being asked to fill it out, so we had to clarify that both men and women were being asked to fill it out, because it’s an issue that affects both of them.

Women in leadership is not a women’s-only issue.

Curry: Exactly. And I would say that’s the tipping point that we’re at. I do think men are starting to understand and become vocal on behalf of women because they need the skills of women. Everybody’s skills and gifts are needed in order to achieve the mission.

Reynolds: The best response rate was among the CCCU—more than half of those organizations responded. The other groups—development groups, student ministries, large ECFA organizations with budgets over $10 million, and ECFA groups with budgets under $10 million—were more similar to one another, with about a quarter responding.

Which type of evangelical organization tends to be doing the best when it comes to gender parity? The worst?

Reynolds: In the nonprofit sector in general, women do better in smaller organizations—as the size of the organization goes up, the number of women in leadership goes down. We find that same dynamic in our study, but if anything our numbers don’t look as different as they do in the nonprofit world at large. So the largest nonprofits we looked at, while they aren’t doing very well, we don’t see that same degree of variation where the budget seems to be this key part of the story.

The group that stands out—student ministries, 15 of them, and these are just ministries that are part of the ECFA—their numbers are lower at every level.

That surprised me because of how many women leaders I can think of in InterVarsity Christian Fellowship (IVCF).

Reynolds: They are the exception. They are the ones that have done well.

Curry: That’s because at the very top level, Alec Hill is a spokesman for women, and IVCF is clear that they are supportive of women in leadership. That’s one of the things that we found out, or a best practice, if you want: For an organization to be quite explicit about its view, whether it’s a complementarian or an egalitarian view.

Reynolds: So many people we surveyed experience a mismatch between their own views on gender and leadership and other leaders’ views. At one point we tried to look at mission statements and strategic plans of a subset of these organizations, and it was amazing how few clearly state whether leadership positions are open to both men and women. Given the different views in the evangelical world on this, we found that fairly troubling, that you could not find that information out.

You found that about 1 in 4 (24 percent) of all organizations surveyed have no women on their boards. Similarly, among the organizations whose 990s do list their top 3 paid leaders, more than half have no women in top positions. What accounts for organizations having a complete absence of women on their boards and among top leaders?

Graph Note: It is harder to assess variation among the number of paid employees. Of our sample of over 1,481 organizations, only 387 had at least 3 paid top leaders listed on their 990 forms. Of those, 56 percent (over half) have no women holding those top positions (while 12 percent had 40 percent-plus females on their paid leadership).

Reynolds: Some of these we could tie to groups that are associated with a denomination with specific views about which gender should hold leadership roles, and they have all men on the board, so it seems intentional. But most of these groups in the ECFA, it’s not actually clear what their theology is. So it’s hard to tell, is it on principle, or is it because it just wasn’t a priority? It’s probably some of both, because we’re finding that the boards that have a high number of women on their boards are often very intentional about that. But we haven’t parsed out how many are because they don’t really care, or because they do care and that’s how they want it—women or no women.

Curry: It’s easier to see the pattern in terms of who does have women, especially in the CCCU, because you have institutions that are affiliated with certain Christian traditions. For example, Wesleyans (Free Methodists), the Church of God, the Anabaptist tradition, tend to have more women in leadership. It’s interesting how important that denominational heritage is, because the schools are not always on the liberal end, and they might be culturally very conservative, but somehow that tradition has carried on, that it’s more of an option than within other traditions.

I was struck by the graph that gauged complementarian vs. egalitarian views on family, church, and society. I wasn’t surprised to see that more women than men supported women’s and men’s equal roles in the family and church. What seems surprising is that nearly all men and women surveyed hold an egalitarian position when it comes to women’s roles in society: “Men and women have freedom to pursue their gifts and callings without regard to gender roles. Men and women should share leadership roles within society.” What does this finding portend for the gender parity you hope to see?

Option 1: “Men and women have freedom to pursue their gifts and callings without regard to gender roles. Men and women should share leadership roles within [family/church/society].”

Option 2: “Distinct gender roles are ordained by God, with men and women serving in ways that complement one another. Men should hold distinctive leadership roles within [family/church/society].”

Curry: It raises the question as to whether we’re losing women’s leadership gifts to the society at large, because it’s more acceptable for them to use those leadership gifts in the society than in the church. . . . for example, you see evangelical women running for political office, and that seems to be acceptable. We also wondered if the number of women leaders were low in student ministry because that work more closely aligns with church.

It's unclear whether leadership in evangelical organizations would fall under “church” or “society” leadership.

Reynolds: The University of Denver put out a 200-page report last year on women’s leadership across many sectors, and nonprofits is a sector, and religion is a sector, where they just look at churches. But the reality is, there are a lot of evangelical nonprofits, and nonprofits are a place where the church is very active in the world. But it doesn’t really get studied because it’s not seen as religious, but they are obviously different from regular nonprofits—the boundary between church and not-church is blurred. Part of the reason we separated this question out is that we wanted to see if people were consistent in their views about church and society. I was struck by how different the men are in their views on family/church and their views on society. I thought that society number would have been lower—I was surprised that when it comes to that society level, most men and most women supported women in leadership.

What did you find out about how leaders’ attitudes on women in leadership corresponded or didn’t correspond with their own churches?

If we run those numbers on the organizational level, 28 percent of women say they have more progressive views on gender than their churches do. But a similar number, 30 percent of women, say they have more progressive views about women in leadership than their organizations do. A book called Evangelical Christian Women (2003) reported many of these women are leaving the church, because they’re kind of told they can lead, perhaps they’re given a leadership position, but it’s clear there are mixed feelings about whether they should exercise it, and so they exit the church, and some even exit the faith. Many of the people involved in this study were passionate about it because we don’t want to lose women from the church. When we look at this finding, when over a quarter of women say they are in places where they have different views about how they can exercise their leadership gifts than others around them, do they just stay [in those organizations] for 40 or even 10 years?

Curry: When we presented at the 2014 CLA conference, there were many people saying, “We want women to come and they won’t.” So we want to know, what are the barriers both psychological and structural that keep them from stepping up?

Janel, you wrote in a column last week, “The study is not about empowering women but rather about fostering institutional change.” What’s the difference between the two?

Curry: Organizations, whether they are led by men or women, realize that they just need everyone’s gifts at the table, and ask how they can structure their institutions in order to make that happen. In the past, when it’s about women, it’s about making women assertive, but it’s all about women somehow trying to get in. I think it’s a more faithful view to say, “God calls us all. How can we structure our organizations to use everybody for his mission?”

In the article you noted that the male leaders of big-name evangelical organizations—CLA, ECFA, but also World Vision and IVCF—are pushing more urgently for widespread institutional change. Is this actually a new shift? Is this different from what you’ve seen from these organizations five or ten years ago?

Curry: I sense that it is. When we went to the CLA conference, there was really no defensiveness about this issue. The response was, “Give us the tools. Tell us what we need to do to help women move into these positions. What are the barriers, tell me, because I’ve asked them, and some won’t do it, and I know I need them.” At the CLA meeting, you see more women who are the head of missions organizations because they are the right person for the job, not worrying about whether it’s a woman or not, but, “This is the person that has the skills that we need at this point in time.” So that kind of urgency: “Let’s not let the fact that it’s a woman get in the way of getting the person we need to lead the organization.”

Janel, you mentioned that one "best practice" is for organizations to explicitly state their views on women in leadership. Beyond this, what are other best practices evangelical organizations might use if they want to draw a greater number of women leaders?

Curry: Being very intentional about board composition is important—it starts at the top. And men being advocates for women—their champions—in moving them up. Often we think about maternity policy, but when it comes to moving women into leadership, it may be different elements to best practices.

How might you respond to the charge that gender parity is really about political correctness, and that organizations should instead seek the most qualified candidate, regardless of gender?

Reynolds: I don’t see our project as being about [political correctness] at all. The reality is that the very low numbers of women leaders in these sectors—most dominated by women in their staff—suggests that institutional realities make leadership opportunities more available to men than they do to women. We want to help organizations encourage all people to use their gifts to build the kingdom. There are lots of organizations that want to see more women in leadership, and a primary goal of our work is to help them do that.

I would reject the assumption that more men are in leadership because they are more qualified, and sociological evidence shows that in the secular world, women also face a number of institutional and cultural barriers that hinder them from becoming leaders.

As you see women holding more leadership positions in these organizations, do you anticipate some men reacting negatively, even if silently, evidenced in a drop in attendance numbers or job application numbers?

Reynolds: There are a number of evangelical organizations that will still want men only to be in leadership. Those are still going to exist, and the purpose of our study is not to tell those organizations that they are wrong. The point of the study is for people who want more women in leadership to be able to facilitate that.

Curry: What you see in society at large is more partnership, not women dominating or men dominating, but more partnership. If Christian organizations don’t have more women in leadership, it becomes out of sync with society and starts to seem strange. But you can always get an imbalance and have too many women and not men. It’s about needing everybody.

Pastors

An Unintentional Drift of Mission

Daniel Darling

An Interview with Peter Greer and Chris Horst

Today we hear from Peter Greer and Chris Horst. Greer is president and CEO of HOPE International. Horst is the vice president of development at HOPE International. Together with the support of Anna Haggard, they coauthored Mission Drift and Entrepreneurship for Human Flourishing. We talked about what it means to stay focused on the mission God has for you and how easy it can be to drift away.

1) As an organization, you faced a crossroads at one point where you were forced to choose between a large donor and your core values. You ultimately chose to reject the funds and stay true to yourmission, but it was not without some serious soul-searching. What ultimately lead to your decision?

Several years ago, a large foundation offered us an ultimatum: We’ll fund you if you tone down the “Christian stuff.”

Cash-strapped, we really wanted to make this work, but this was when we began actively researching "drift." Ultimately, we decided to turn down the funds because we began to recognize how small decisions—when compounded over time—lead to "mission drift." We might have figured out a way to broker a deal with the donor while still protecting our core identity, but concluded this situation had real potential to pull us away from our full mission.

Researching mission drift, we discovered how we already had opened the door to drift through our hiring practices, and metrics, among other decisions.

2) Nonprofit organizations, especially evangelical ones, are constantly facing these kinds of decisions. You say in Mission Drift that it is not necessarily what happens in that moment of decision but a series of decisions and systems leading up to that moment that decide if a organization will stay true. Can you explain?

One hypothesis in Mission Drift is that small decisions matter. In physics, a theory for drift exists. The second law of thermodynamics states that in the natural order of the universe, things degenerate, rather than come together. For example, when a frying pan is taken off the stove, the energy of heat will diffuse in the air, leaving the pan cooler. Unless more energy is added—someone puts the frying pan back on the stove—it will lose its heat and return to room temperature.

We found that to be the norm within organizations, businesses, and in people’s personal lives. Particularly with parachurch organizations, walking the line of being faithfully, distinctively Christian is a daily challenge. If you are not intentional about small decisions, you will experience drift.

3) It seems some organizations stay on course long after their founder is dead, while others begin the eventual drift from their original mission. What keeps an organization on track for the long haul?

One of Harvard’s founding documents states: “To … consider well that the main end of your life and studies is to know God and Jesus Christ.” At one time, Harvard’s purpose was to equip their students to share the gospel. We’re not here to challenge what Harvard is today. We’re here to contend with what Harvard is not.

Here’s the reality: mission drift is the natural course for organizations. Though pervasive, mission drift is not inevitable. Along our journey we have discovered several organizations—like Compassion, InterVarsity, Cru, among others—staying "mission true." What sets mission true organizations apart? First, we discovered that mission true organizations believe that mission drift will happen unless they safeguard against it. Even more important, they believe that a Christ-centered identity is worth protecting.

4) Some organizations stay true to their values, but ultimately become ineffective and irrelevant. How do healthy organizations marry principle and performance?

Mission true organizations understand how to distinguish their mission from their means. Consider the contrast between one organization that drifted from its original mission to one that stayed mission true. A man named George Williams started a Bible study in 1844 for displaced young men on the streets of London. These Bible studies became a movement known as the Young Man’s Christian Association (YMCA). But along the way, the YMCA substituted its mission—to share the Gospel—for one of its means: fitness centers. We love the YMCA, both the song and the fitness center, but in many communities where the Y works in the United States, it no longer has the same mission.

Contrast that with Young Life. In the early days Young Life ministered to high school students with evangelistic barbershop quartets. Men in pinstripes singing in four-part harmony wouldn’t capture the imaginations of today’s teenagers. Instead Young Life has taken to cell phones and social media. But they haven’t forgotten why they exist: today they still proclaim Christ to students. Though their means have changed, they continue to remain faithful to their core purpose.

If you are not intentional about small decisions in your personal goals, marriage, and business, you will experience drift.

5) If you could give Christian leaders one piece of advice as they lead their organizations in the 21st century, what would that be?

Today, Christians recognize the importance of Good Samaritanism—there’s been a rise of those advocating for justice, poverty alleviation, and education. But have we forgotten that our most precious asset is the gospel message, one that brings reconciliation, hope, and redemption?

We must not forget that we are not just world-class humanitarians or educators or urban ministers or philanthropists or business leaders, but we are Christians. We must do good, but we must not forget we have good news to share. Unless we proactively integrate this conviction into the practices, policies and operations of our organizations, it will slowly and assuredly fade.

To better assess the prevalence of drift and what keeps organizations mission true, we have created the Mission Drift Survey (available here), which faith-based organizations can take to better understand their susceptibility to drift.

Daniel Darling is vice-president of communications for the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. He is the author of several books, including his latest, Activist Faith.

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Culture

Review

A Walk Among the Tombstones

Timothy Wainwright

A potentially great Liam Neeson vehicle gets marred by some very poor taste.

'A Walk Among the Tombstones'

Atsushi Nishijima / Universal Pictures

A Walk Among the Tombstones, the sophomore directorial outing of veteran screenwriter Scott Frank, is almost a good movie. It’s got a sense of humor and suspense. It’s aware. It’s intelligent.

It also takes a few bizarre turns, some in damningly poor taste.

Universal Pictures

Liam Neeson in ‘A Walk Among the Tombstones’

Tombstones, adapted from the novel by Lawrence Bock, begins in the New York City of 1991. NYPD Detective Matthew Scudder (Liam Neeson) is enjoying the breakfast of champions: a cup of coffee and two shots of whiskey. An odd beige sweater and wispy, writhing facial hair complete this portrait of a troubled man. Suddenly some gangsters walk in and start shooting. He shoots back.

Cut to New York City, 1999. Private Detective Scudder has shaved. He’s in AA now, and slices his steak with the side of his fork. It’s a nice routine—until he gets an unusual case. Millennial drug trafficker and Nabokov-reader Kenny Kristo (Dan Stevens) says that someone murdered his wife, and needs Scudder’s help getting revenge. Scudder at first doubts the quest—he’s unlicensed, he’s no angel, but killing? For a drug dealer? Not at his age. But when Kristo reveals the total depravity of the crimes committed by men we will come to know as Ray (David Harbour) and Albert (Adam David Thompson), Scudder can’t refuse to help.

Universal Pictures

Liam Neeson in ‘A Walk Among the Tombstones’

The movie well-crafted: bullets fly with a crisp cacophony; the music is vintage, pleasantly mysterious. There’s some great dialogue (“What gave me away?” “Everything. You’re weird, Jonas.”) Also, Frank is making strong choices from the director’s chair. There has been an undeniable trend in recent years—perhaps because so many directors cut their teeth on commercials and music videos—towards frenetic filmmaking, with shots that last only a few seconds before jumping to another angle and an over-reliance on close-ups. In contrast, half of Tombstones seems to be wide shots, with a measured editing pace. Liam Neeson can walk from the background to the foreground of a shot without seven different angles and close-ups on his feet being spliced in.

Neeson himself is in great form. This film lets him showcase his considerable talents as the archetypal film father, hopeless with computers but good at killing giant spiders (or drug dealers or terrorists), with one of the best deadpans around. And Tombstones is not just Liam Neeson Rescues a Missing Person VI. One great moment: “I bet all the corruption got to you, huh.” “Not really. It would have been hard to support my family without it.” The line doesn’t exactly shine on the page, but he owns it.

There’s a lot to like in this movie. This is why it’s such a shame that the whole thing was ruined by a few minutes of footage. Moments of sickening, unjustified sexual violence towards women soil the film—make you cringe and de-immerse you in a way that’s hard to recover from. It’s torture porn, plain and simple. Specificity would be overrated here. Let’s just say that it goes beyond a good old fashioned severed body part or two and wanders into a far darker realm. (This complaint is coming from a guy who likes horror movies, by the way.)

Universal Pictures

Dan Stevens in ‘A Walk Among the Tombstones’

It’s a shame that just a few minutes of footage manage to sour the whole movie. Take away those scenes and you have the best Neeson vehicle since Taken. And it’s smart! Tombstones clearly wants to say something. The main character is devoted to AA, but he’s helping drug dealers from criminals who have it out for drug dealers. The idea of addiction and recovery is never far. It certainly is the only time I’ve seen a final shoot-out juxtaposed with someone reciting all the Twelve Steps out loud.

In short: it could have been good. But with the random, gratuitous sadism, A Walk Among the Tombstones is like a dinner guest who, between many good conversations, throws a plate against the wall or pokes you with a fork. Despite the charm, you won’t be inviting them back.

Caveat Spectator

Lots of swearing (the whole range), lots of blood, women are tortured and ravished and their remains are strewn across New York City. 1991 Liam Neeson has a scary haircut.

Tim Wainwright's writing has been featured in The Atlantic, CT, and RealClearMarkets. He tweets here and blogs here.

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Caveat Spectator

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