Conspicuous Religiosity
(© 2004 by John P. Hewitt)
On a Saturday night not long ago we tuned into the Grand Ole Opry on TV — something we do less these days as country music endlessly churns out colorless musical clones and beats the war drums for Bush. There on the tube was Marty Stuart, a once young but now middle-aged neo-rebel country singer. He sang a forgettable song, but he was dressed in a memorable outfit
Imagine a jet-black country and western cut jacket, the closely fitted kind with gaudy jewels and sequins. Now remove the jewels and sequins, and in their place put large, raised, sculptured black crosses — yes, the religious variety — one stitched onto each side of the chest, a couple on the back, a couple on each arm. I mean really big, really raised, no mistaking them for anything but crosses. We’re not talking a modest crucifix around the neck here, the kind you might see peeking out of the cleavage of many a female country singer. We’re talking in-your-face-sized religion here, the kind you can’t ignore, the personal equivalent of the largest cross in the Western Hemisphere, a steel monster rising out of the plain next to Interstate 40 at Exit 112, Groom, Texas.
Marty got me to thinking about what I’d like to call conspicuous religiosity — what it is, where it comes from, and why some forms of it bother me a great deal more than others. By religiosity I don’t mean faith, or the belief in god or gods or God, or particular theologies, or anything of that sort. Thankfully you can’t detect people’s religious beliefs by looking at their faces, and the bulk of everyday interaction entails no expression of religious belief, so that one is generally spared intimate contact with others’ religious commitments. It’s much like sex. You presume that your friends and neighbors — even your parents — have sex and that they do pretty much the same things you do. But you don’t need the details, thank you very much.
Religiosity is display as opposed to belief, the visible performance of religious activity as opposed to its theological underpinnings. Every religion that I’m personally familiar with requires some element of public religiosity. Roman Catholics cross themselves, in and out of church, Amish and Mennonite people dress differently, as do Orthodox Jews, and I suppose even Methodists and Baptists do things that are peculiarly Methodist or Baptist, though I can’t think what they might be. Perhaps only Methodists and Baptists know. These things don’t generally bother me. Just the other day at the Zoo in Columbus, Ohio, for example, I saw an attractive Mennonite family, and my eyes were drawn toward them to the point that I found myself staring. How quaint, how appealing, I thought.
I didn’t think Marty Stuart was quaint or appealing. Here is one more born-again country music singer shoving his born-again Christianity in my face, I thought, as gaudy and vulgar as they come. As I am wont to do when confronted with displays of that sort, I gave my imagination license to fly. Somewhere, I imagined, there is a well-endowed young woman with “Got” on one butt and “Jesus?” on the other, walking rhythmically down the street: Got Jesus? Got Jesus? Got Jesus? Got Jesus? I thought of every idiotic bumper sticker I had ever seen— God is My Copilot, Jesus Saves, I Brake for the Rapture. I remembered pot bellied tourists at Yellowstone watching the geysers in their Jesus t-shirts and tank-tops. Nothing like a fat hairy belly with an inspiring religious message hovering above it to get the religious juices flowing. Praise the Lord! Sign me up! When I drive past the largest cross in the Western Hemisphere I marvel at the cars in the parking lot, their pilgrim occupants probably moved to be in the presence of the world’s largest anything.
Conspicuous religiosity is in-your-face religiosity, to be sure, but it’s more than that. After all, an orthodox Jew dressed in the clothing of fifteenth century Europe is pretty much in your face; you can’t avoid seeing the beard and the heavy black wool clothing and hat. On a hot summer day I might wonder about his discomfort, but otherwise treat him as just another inhabitant of the human zoo. Likewise for the devout Catholic with schmutz on his or her face on Ash Wednesday. The first time I saw that as a kid I told a man his face was dirty, but soon learned to keep my eyes averted and my mouth shut. A Sikh with traditional head wrapping is pretty much in your face as well, but when I’m in New Jersey, they pump the gas and I pay and that is pretty much that.
Conspicuous religiosity isn’t just in your face, it’s in your face in a particular way and for a particular reason: We are in your face because we have the truth, and we are going to stay in your face until we get you to accept it. The Sikh doesn’t want you to join his religion. If you’re a Jew, the Orthodox Jew would like you to see the light, but otherwise he’d just as soon you kept your distance. The Amish aren’t interested in having converts — except, perhaps, the occasional Harrison Ford with really good carpenter skills who is really nice to Kelly McGillis and her son. The Roman Catholics would be delighted if you joined up, but they don’t overly exert themselves seeking you out.
It’s the Jesus people that really irritate me. When the Jehovah’s Witnesses come to the door displaying Watchtower and offering to share their faith with me, I send them away politely, but inwardly I seethe for a while, because I understand this is a no-win situation for me. Were I to invite them in, I would lose by cooperating with their need to expose me to their truth. If I send them away, I confirm their belief that I and others like me must be saved, even if we do not want to be. It’s the same with the Mormons, all those LDS youth in white shirts and ties who walk the streets and roads in search of converts. They might as well be wearing neon signs: “We’re Mormons and we’re coming to your house soon!” We have the truth, and it can be yours as well.
One has to say for the Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Mormon missionaries, however, that at least they are acting on their beliefs and not merely displaying them. It takes a lot more energy and commitment to walk down hot and dusty streets with the word of god than to put on your Jesus cowboy jacket. The Witnesses come to the door, make their pitch, and then leave politely when I tell them we are Jewish. (Although the last Witness at my door replied, “Oh, Really?” when told this, as if flabbergasted that a Jew creature would be found out here amongst the snakes and coyotes.) And when the Mormons approach, they use a kid glove approach. No hard sell for them, but rather a soft approach that emphasizes “family values” and those parts of the LDS faith that are pretty much standard Protestant fare. No doubt this is because some of the tenets of their faith are pretty bizarre, and seem less so only after the potential convert has developed personal relationships with other Mormons. The Moonies take the same approach.
Conspicuous display is in your face display for the sake of display. No doubt the hairy tank-topped believer would be delighted if his “Jesus is Lord” message caused me to fall to my knees and declare my faith. But the real purpose may be simply to announce that he is saved, and the rest of you take notice. In this sense, conspicuous religiosity is like any form of conspicuous consumption: the display is the thing. I have a Lexus, you have a Chevrolet. I have Jesus, you have nothing. Conspicuous religiosity announces the individual’s moral standing, just as the Lexus or Mercedes announces economic standing. The guy driving a Lexus with a God is My Copilot bumper sticker must feel like he’s in heaven!
If conspicuous religiosity is like status display, then one wonders if it shares the tendency for consumer goods quickly to lose their value as items of status display. A new Lexus works for a time to display and confirm the status of the owner, but not forever. The craving for status that led to the purchase returns, like hunger after a good meal, and leads to the purchase of other things. The new car smell wears off. Other people acquire the same goods, or close imitations, and so one must get something else to display. Are there religious equivalents of newer and better status goods? Larger crosses? More outlandish public statements of thanks to Jesus for the Grammy or the Emmy? Bolder slogans on license plates and shirts? Since the craving for theological standing is probably just as strong as the craving for social standing, it seems reasonable to expect similar kinds of status competition.
Perhaps that is why religiosity seems so much more conspicuous these days than it used to. There’s a frightening, and growing, amount of religiosity around, and it must be difficult to stand out from the crowd, to announce how fervently one believes in a way that others will notice. If every country singer mentions Jesus at the Grand Ole Opry microphone, then what’s next? A “thank you Jesus” before and after the song? Religious tears? Bigger crosses? Sequins and jewels on the crosses? Musical instruments in the shape of crosses? Graphic movies about what happens on crosses?
Oh, I forgot, we’re already there.
