As Tanya Luhrmann’s osculation of faith grow weirder and weirder in the New York Times, so that her most recent piece points out the benefits of the evangelical Christian purity cult, Jeffrey Tayler’s criticisms of religion get more and more “strident.” Yesterday’s jawbreaker-titled column, “Oh God! The Lord’s my sex guru: Pious perverts, incestuous misogyny and the twisted world of religious sexual repression,” is in fact a criticism of Luhrmann’s column, and of her refusal to take sides against the insane prudishness of Christian cults. After all, she’s an anthropologist, and must maintain the stance of objectivity, although it somehow always manages to put a spit of approbation on her “objective” take.

All I can say is that I got there first, but Tayler says it better (and gets paid for it!):

Luhrmann presents us with disturbing material showing the baleful influence religion has on its female adherents.  But, being an anthropology professor at Stanford, she refuses to take sides, evincing a frustrating non-judgmentalism that stems in part, no doubt, from her scholarly background, but also owes a good deal to the automatic respect our prevailing rules of discourse dictate we pay to anyone spouting faith-related nonsensicalities.  [JAC: After all, she gets a column in the NYT to osculate religion’s rump, while those who slap its face get no say.] That person over there is muttering to an invisible boss in the sky?  Shshshshsh!  He’s praying!  On your way to share your most intimate secrets with an old virgin male you hardly know?  Must be confession-time!  What, outlandish ancient fables tell us what to do about abortion?  Oh, you’re talking about the Bible, so I have to take you seriously!

He then takes apart the use of the Bible as a guide to sex, and the ridiculous “purity balls” of Christians, in which, as the film The Virgin Daughters documents, fathers extort from their daughters pledges that they won’t have sex before marriage. Tayler:

The Purity Movement’s key message shines through the documentary with arresting clarity: The value of a young woman resides in the pristine state of her (father-policed) hymen, until such time as she is penetrated by father’s duly approved surrogate.  Should her hymen be damaged before her wedding, would her groom have a right to return her to her father’s doorway to be stoned to death, as the Bible decrees?  We don’t know, but we assume not. There are laws in this country, at least as long as we keep the faith-deranged from tampering with our legislation.

. . . The unwholesome obsession the Purity Movement parents display with the state of their daughters’ genitalia should set off alarm bells.  Remember, a father concernedly intoning to his young teen, “I’m worried about your chastity, dear!” really means “I’m obsessed with your vagina, little one!”  Richard Dawkins has suggested that forcing religion on children be considered tantamount to child abuse – something Child Protective Services might want to keep in mind if they are ever called to the homes of Purity Movement members.

I can understand why an anthropologist might want to document this bizarre phenomenon embedded within American culture, and refrain from judgmental overtones. But the phenomenon has been amply documented by others; what Luhrmann adds is simply a new and approving spin: the New Christian Puritanism is radical and thus appealing to those disenchanted by religion. This isn’t documentation, but unconvincing editorializing. After all, Luhrmann ends her column this way:

The [Christian] sex manuals remind us that another factor is the sense of being a countercultural activist who sets out to remake the world.

That’s heady stuff. The mainstream churches offer nothing like this edgy rebellion, this nose-thumbing at ordinary expectations. Paradoxically, it may be this invitation that makes what seems like passivity feel so effective.

Would Luhrmann’s piece get published in the NYT if she documented how Americans who are not part of these cults, like Tayler, see them as obsessive and sick?

Luhrmann and the unctuous Krista Tippett are two of a kind: one with a faith-loving voice on NPR and the other giving the same spin at The New York Times. Where is the voice of secular rationality? You’ll find it every Sunday in Salon.