I was raised Lutheran. I went to church nearly every Sunday growing up. Sang in the Youth choir. Participated in Youth Group. It was almost without exception, a positive experience.

It’s an experience my kids do not share. We maybe attend once a month at a non-denominational Unitarian Church. Even so, I still nominally consider myself Christian. There is a great deal about the faith that appeals to me. I sometimes question the existence of Jesus Christ the Son of God, but I remain pretty sure there was a Nazarene preacher named Yeshua who spoke some awesome and revolutionary truths about how we should treat each other and the type of people we should aspire to be.

I feel extremely confident saying that guy would be appalled at the people who pretend to speak on his behalf 20 centuries later.

https://twitter.com/jerryfalwelljr/status/1080155906720104452?s=21

If anyone ever asked me why my faith had waned, or why I no longer attended a Christian church, I could scarcely do better than direct that person to this interview. Amid all the grotesqueries therein, this one in particular stood out:

A poor person never gave anyone a job. A poor person never gave anybody charity, not of any real volume. It’s just common sense to me.

Among the many memories I have from my regular church attendance growing up, a handful of Pastor D’s sermons made an impression and remain with me. One in particular, given around the time Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart were having their very un-Christlike behavior become known, was a fiery denunciation of what the Bible calls false prophets.

I have no idea what ever became of Pastor D. He left our church in my 11th grade year. I have no idea how the years may have changed him, or what he thinks today of the younger Falwell.

But I know what the guy I heard preach so often would think. That guy would hold him with the same contempt he had for those other false prophets some 30 years ago. Which probably goes a long way in explaining why I do too.