Pastor tells congregation, "Don't be weird in front of the cameras."

[AnnInLa]

http://nonprophet.typepad.com/nonprophet/2005/05/ted_haggard_don.html

Ted Haggard: Don't be Weird

This is interesting. Apparently a bunch of important media sources are going to be filming news stories at New Life, recently cited by Harpers as the Nations Most Powerful Megachurch, during the next week and Pastor Ted Haggard is asking everyone to tone things down a few notches so that they don't come off as crazy people in front of the nation. This is a church that claims to never hide anything from the general public, so this attempt at faking what actually goes on is particularly relevant. He mentions that Barbara Walters is working on a piece, and that Tom Brocaw will be visiting and offers these coaching tips for those who will be present.

Source: List e-mail to the congregation from Ted Haggard:

Now we're heading back to the United States and will be in church on Sunday, but I wanted you to see this e-mail about some upcoming media attention that was just forwarded to me so you can help me. Why? Because it indicates the importance of all of our doing a good job. The Lord has sovereignly placed all of us, as a congregation, in a position where we are representing born-again, Bible-believing Christians to groups outside our normal spheres of influence.

Here are a few tips:

1. If a camera is on you during a worship service, worship; don't dance, jump, etc. Secular people watching TV are touched with authentic worship, but jumping and dancing in church looks too bizarre for most to relate to. Remember, people watching TV news are not experiencing what you are experiencing. They are watching and thinking. Worship indicates sincerity, dancing and jumping looks like excessive emotionalism.

2. If reporters want to interview you, talk with them, but use words that make sense to them. Speak their language. Don't talk about the devil, demons, voices speaking to you, God giving you supernatural revelations, etc. Instead, tell your personal story in common sense language (I was a drunk but God changed me and now I'm sober, I'm grateful, etc.).

3. Don't be nervous. Be friendly and open. Reporters typically don't have an agenda, they authentically want to know what we do and why we do it. For example, Barbara Walters is working on a story about heaven and will interview me and get some supporting shots from the church. She might not use any of it, but she wants to put together an interesting story. Since we believe in heaven, we are, in fact, a good source. So, if she talks with you, don't be spooky or weird. Don't switch into a glassy-eyed heavenly mode, just answer, "Heaven is real. It's the place where God will be fully present with his people. He will reward people in heaven. Heaven is better than Colorado Springs." Say it straight and clear. Don't worry (Yeah, sure!).

snip....more at:

http://nonprophet.typepad.com/nonprophet/2005/05/ted_haggard_don.html

[Wickerman]

1. "Heaven is better than Colorado Springs"

sorry, that just struck me as funny.

[mcscajun]

12. Me, too. I don't believe in Heaven, but if it *does* exist...

...I certainly HOPE it's a whole helluva lot Better than Colorado Springs, or Palm Springs, or wherever. :)

[LdyGuique]

2. I especially liked the admonishment

". . .So, if she talks with you, don't be spooky or weird. Don't switch into a glassy-eyed heavenly mode. . "

[Lowell]

3. In other words

don't be your normal, spooky, kooky selves. These guys are pretty weird period

[jazzjunkysue]

23. In other words: Act like libruls.

[jazzjunkysue]

24. "Don't talk about the devil, demons, voices speaking to you."

Awwww! That's the GOOD part! They're leaving out the good parts! No fun! I wanna know what the voices are saying! This is my big chance to find out what the fundies know that I don't.

Pagans never have any fun. Geesh.

[anarchy1999]

4. I wish God would just send down a few lightening bolts, a swarm of

locusts, something. Or could he maybe just hurry up and come on back down and straighten out this planet. Maybe another 40 days of rain would be good.

[Wheezy]

5. *snicker*

So, if she talks with you, don't be spooky or weird. Don't switch into a glassy-eyed heavenly mode, just answer, "Heaven is real.

This is just funny.

[Fleshdancer]

6. I suddenly feel the need to go to church in order to act weird

put the camera on me because I'll be the one yelling in tongues to the melody of "We Will Rock You" and having violent convulsions on the floor with my eyes rolled in the back of my head. ;)

[Bill McBlueState]

7. ha, ha

Remember, people watching TV news are not experiencing what you are experiencing. They are watching and thinking.

Yep, the people watching TV are thinking. The people in church are most certainly not.

[Tux]

9. Er

Who is to say TV viewers are thinking? I know Fox News viewers don't.

[KurtNYC]

8. Here is a leap of faith...

Remember, people watching TV news ...are watching and thinking.

Barbara Walters should use their instructions to parishoners as the basis for her interviews. She should print it out and carry it around. Make them swear to God that they are telling the truth then whip out the memo.

[undeterred]

10. cool it with the mule sex, snake handling, Bush worshipping

at least till the cameras are gone

[warrens]

11. He's actually kinda refreshing

Doesn't sound like he has the usual stick up his butt. They're free to believe whatever they want to believe; it's when they start telling me what I should believe that I get cranky.

[noonwitch]

15. At least he understands how uncomfortable some might be with certain

practices. Charismatic/pentecostal worship services are really freaky if you go in and not know what to expect. Speaking in tongues, in particular, is a really unnerving thing to witness for the first time. If your experience with church is mass or mainline denominations' services, basic evangelical services involve people swaying, responding to sermons with "alleluja" or "amen", and waving their arms around in the air. It's very different.

[mcscajun]

13. "The Lord has sovereignly placed all of us..."

Uh-huh. Sure. Right.

[toddaa]

14. Christian minority complex

Why do we live in a country where opinion polls tell us that some 85% of population believes in a physical heaven and yet Christians still think their beliefs are misunderstood. Misunderstood? By who? The 15% of us who've heard your damn story over and over and yet you still insist on bothering us? No offense, Ted Haggard, but SHUT THE FUCK UP!

[understandinglife]

16. A primer for Fristianism -- how to be a hypocrite and hide it (nt)

www.missionnotaccomplished.us

[BornLeft]

17. So this is proof that

They can choose to be "in the spirit" and God doesn't control them? This proves what i have known all along, religion is a choice, god is a fraud, and jeebus exists only on Homers mind.

[Democracy White]

18. LOL!

And they call *us* weird?

Dee

[smoogatz]

19. Fundamentalism is the pig in America's kitchen

These folks are trying to dress it up like a golden retriever. George Bush has proved that reality is what you make it; you can fool enough of the people enough of the time to bankrupt the country and trash the constitution. The religious right is just following his lead.

[Maraya1969]

20. One of the comments from that blog was a suggestion to send

undercover reporters if they want to get the real scoop. Not a bad idea. You can see a lot of the craziness on some TV stations but it would be great to get some photos of Delay flopping on the ground or at least ONE of these leaders acting like a freak would be good enough.

I hope a reporter can get to this church after the people try and look normal and THEN show them in all their finest insanity.

[Tesla]

22. Last Sunday was probably the first

time ol Tom has been in a church for awhile...
you know...
weekends at the ranch....
parties here and there....

I've been to a Pentacostal church a few times with some friends....
just one bit of advice......Don't go on acid!!!

[RaleighNCDUer]

26. What would a lapel pin camera reveal? nt

I bet they have American Flag models available. Fit right in.

[AnnInLa]

21. Anyone know where New Life Church is located?

[geniph]

25. Since it's the Holy Spirit that supposedly causes them to act that way,

shouldn't he have addressed the memo to God?

Just goes to show you that the vast majority of those "slain in the spirit," rolling on the floor, leaping up and down, fainting, and babbling in tongues are not possessed by the Holy Spirit; they're possessed by the desire for attention.

My husband was reared holy-rollin', speakin'-in-tongues Pentecostal. He remembers lying on the ground at age 14, with the congregation gathered around him expressing praise that he'd been "slain by the spirit," and thinking to himself, "Wow. This is all bullshit. I don't feel anything. I'm doing this to get the positive attention. I wonder how many others are doing the same thing." It was his personal epiphany.

I do like the admonition not to show themselves for the shiny-eyed, frightening zealots they are. Some of these radical clerics are sly little bastids!

[noamnety]

29. One of my students relayed a similar experience

She was young (elementary school at a fundie private school), and they had to go to one of those things, and she got scared and passed out from stress and fear as she described it. They surrounded her and were hugging her, I guess they all thought she was collapsing in some kind of spiritual frenzy, and she said it was nothing like that, she just got weak and collapsed, but she didn't feel like she could say that to them. So she just went along with it - "alright, whatever," as she put it.

[RaleighNCDUer]

27. This shouldn't be surprising.

Cult leaders always tell their followers how to behave when exposed to the public and, particularly, the press.

Remember how weird the Moonies used to be? And see how far they've come since they figured out they looked weird to the rest of us?

[yorkiemommie1]

28. like we don't already know what goes on

LOL!!!!!!!!


got shanghaied by my brother into going to his church ONCE.

[shadowknows69]

30. yeah, we wouldn't want excessive emotionalism in our worship

actually its only excessive negative emotionalism that scares me.

[ComerPerro]

31. I hope he f**ks up and starts advocating GOP candidates

on camera

[Rose Siding]

32. Maybe the "voices" and the "supernatural revelatations" SHOULD be part

of the story!

If "jumping and dancing in church looks too bizarre for most to relate to", then maybe the MAINSTREAM should have a peek at who is having so much influence on our government.

[Ripley]

33. What is "authentic" worship?

So there is a right and a wrong way to worship? Geeze, it's a good thing I'm not religious. I probably wouldn't do it right.

[DS1]

34. and NO CIRCLE JERKS when the red light is BLINKING!

Amen