Ridiculing Religion
Bill Maher’s new film makes the case against religion by interviewing a few fringe characters.
By Sarah Dreier
October 16, 2008
In one scene of Bill Maher’s much-discussed new movie, Religulous, Maher talks with a zealot tourist at Florida’s Holy Land Experience Jesus theme park who assured Maher that she will triumphantly return to Earth after the Rapture—adorned in seraphic attire, no less—to help save the souls of non-believers. This is just one of many interviews with a cherry-picked religious fanatic that make up the movie. Maher, the crass and (at times) very funny comedian and HBO talk show host, travels around the world to talk to Christian, Muslim, and Jewish votaries about their faiths. Although Maher makes some good points about the bad effects that proselytizing can have on public policy, Religulous grossly misrepresents religion and ends up engaging in some of the dangerous stereotyping it seeks to expose.
Maher’s interviewees do not represent everyday American believers. A recent poll showed that 92 percent of Americans believe in God, and 70 percent of those who believe in God reject dogmatic approaches to belief. But you wouldn’t know that from watching Religulous. The whacky characters Maher interviews, like the founder of the Kentucky Creation Museum and the former gay man who is now a Christian gay conversion “therapist,” display ignorance of their own faith, extreme and contentious literal interpretations of sacred texts, and an inability to consider theological complexity. But Maher’s biggest blunder is the uniquely cutting critique that he reserves for Islam alone, thus exacerbating a dangerous political climate that angers and isolates Muslim Americans and Muslims around the world. Nuanced ideas about theology, politics, culture, and identity are lost on Maher, who concludes that all religion is destructive and violent.
It is important for the public to discuss the implications that biblical stories and theological beliefs have on questions that effect public policy and social structures. Maher rightly asks evangelical U.S. Senator Mark Pryor (D-AR) if his personal beliefs in creationism and dominion (“end-times”) theology inhibit his commitment to work toward a better future for all Americans. The policymaker proved unwilling to acknowledge the overwhelming scientific evidence of evolution.
Here, Maher was not being sensationalist. Last summer, Minnesota Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann railed against Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s commitment to solving the climate change crisis because, “We all know that someone did that over 2,000 years ago, they saved the planet—we didn’t need Nancy Pelosi to do that.” Bachmann seems to insist that her faith will undo the harm of a carbon-heavy economy, joining other House Republicans to advocate environmentally irresponsible policies.
An exchange with the evangelist Rev. Jeremiah Cummings, who looked more like a Wall Street stock broker than a minister, revealed that his own wealth is a higher priority than the teachings of Jesus. A famous metaphor the Bible attributes to Jesus states that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven, but Cummings twisted the metaphor and insisted that his fortune was theologically sound.
Other extremist individuals Maher interviews include the anti-Zionist orthodox rabbi, a cult leader claiming to be the descendent and second coming of Jesus Christ, and even the founder of Amsterdam Cannabis Ministries.
Maher’s interviewees disregard basic theological tenets—caring for the poor, refraining from judgement, or working to strengthen the common good. Maher should have talked to Christians volunteering in hurricane disaster sites, students committing nights and weekends to inter-faith dialogue, or congregations supporting the poor during the economic crisis. Faith-based communities and activists have been at the forefront of progressivism, from Martin Luther King, Jr.’s dedication to civil rights to the National Association of Evangelical’s commitment to addressing climate change. They have led the nation to frame its domestic and international policy in terms of our moral commitments to equality, alleviating poverty, and sustainable development. Unfortunately, Maher misses the opportunity to make this important point, because he is too married to his own fanatical pursuit—the case against all religion.
Religulous is vacuously absent of these important, mainstream voices. This makes Maher’s scoff at Christian and Jewish “crazies” superficial at best, and his apocalyptic conclusions dangerous. What is deeply disturbing about Religulous is not that Maher exposes the wacky and problematic beliefs of the religious fringe, but that he takes these ridiculous perspectives to conclusions that falsely implicate and demonize religion as a whole, particularly Islam.
What is laughable about his interviews with Muslims, apparently, is that they claim their religion to be peaceful. Maher wants his audience to fixate on violent terrorist extremists (jihadists, as they call themselves) instead of positive examples like Muslims observing Ramadan by serving the hungry and homeless. A Muslim Imam is ridiculed by Maher for asserting that Islam is a peaceful religion, as is a thoughtful Dutch Muslim woman for asserting that violent terrorist extremists are ultimately driven by politics, not faith.
Maher’s particular distain for Islam is no secret. The Catholic Church (which is no fond entity in the eyes of Maher) has calmed down since the 14th century, Maher said on his show, but “they still whack people in Islam.” Maher’s view is far from mainstream: The world’s most prominent leaders—from the United Nations to the Vatican and the Organization of Islamic Conference—recognize that terrorists do not represent Islam. Nevertheless, this egregious misrepresentation of Islam is all-too-common in the American consciousness, but is not without its detrimental effects and consequences.
By mocking and alienating the religious, Maher is engaging in the kind of diatribe that divides communities. In the end, this is the message—and, I fear, the ultimate effect—of Religulous. Because it wasn’t the clever, cheeky quips with the Jesus impersonators that attracted applause in my theatre, it was the images of jihad warfare and apocalyptic conclusion that got the ovations. That is scary.
Sarah Dreier is a Fellows Assistant with the Faith and Progressive Policy Initiative at the Center for American Progress.
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Comments
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Nice review, thanks.
— Jeff - Oct 20, 07:10 PM - #Bill Maher, like Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, and others, are rightly pointing the finger of blame partially at religious “moderates” who help prop up the notion that it’s taboo to discuss — let alone criticize — religious beliefs and tenets. Extremism has a much better time flourishing if it is exempt from criticism, hiding behind the veneer of “tolerance.”
Like Maher said in his stand-up act several years ago: “don’t be so tolerant that you tolerate intolerance.”
— Patrick - Oct 24, 01:41 PM - #I just finished reading the Thomas Jefferson Bible. After TJ took out all the miracles, zombification, exorcisms, and impossibilities, what is left is still enough to keep me an atheist- Christ is a contradictory character, peaceful and violent. Christianity, like all other organized religions to date, is utter bull crap.
— matt - Nov 9, 10:07 PM - #The Movie is well edited with voice over machinery and dumb writers and readers bought into it.
— Justice - Jan 29, 06:59 AM - #Why did’t Maher and Charles go to Iran or Saudi Arabia and mock them. They would have came back Headless
— faith 19 - Jan 29, 07:02 AM - #