I'm Reading: "The Family" by Jeff Sharlet

I've been chugging away at Jeff Sharlet's The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power for a couple of weeks now. It was difficult for me to read more than a bit of it at a time. I would read a little, then put it down for a couple of days to let it sink in. I wouldn't have thought that American fundamentalism required a conspiracy - everyone already knows they're out to run the country and they're not shy about saying so.

However, Sharlet's scholarship is unimpeachable. Behind the scenes a brotherhood of powerful men, sworn to secrecy, operate a network of cell groups. The largest and best known is the National Prayer Breakfast, which every US president has participated in since 1953. But the National Prayer Breakfast is just the public face. Family members also operate Senate and Congressional prayer beakfasts where powerful members meet to talk about God first and politics second. Hillary Clinton during her time in the Senate attended one of these. Now that The Family is in print, I do think it's time people start asking her questions about her connections. It does seem strange that the woman who coined the phrase "vast right-wing conspiracy" would be a member of it.

But who is the Family, and why is it scary? Founded in the 1930s by Abram Vereide and later run by Doug Coe up to the present day, the Family reinvented American revivalist fundementalism for the wealthy elite. In the '30s and '40s they ministered to corporate CEOs engaged in strikebreaking, telling the CEOs that they were doing God's will and that God wishes for the workers to be subservient. After World War II they helped ex-Nazis escape public criticism and criminal charges. During the '50s and '60s they really hit their stride, organizing anticommunist groups and setting national policies during the Cold War. In 1954 they added 'In God We Trust' to the currency and 'Under God' to the Pledge. During this period they also arrived at their strategy of secrecy.

In 1966, with the Christian Right just starting to emerge as a visible front for fundamentalism, Coe decided to go in the opposite direction. "The time has come," he instructed the Core, "to submerge." Thereafter, the Fellowship would avoid at all turns any appearance of an organization, even as Coe crafted ever more complex hierarchies behind-the-scenes.

In the '70s and '80s the Family built an international network of foreign diplomats and dictators who owed their American connections to Coe and his organization. Indonesian dictator and mass-murdered Suharto secured American weapons and funding through his Family connections. Conservative estimates put Suharto's death toll as at least 600,000.

Reading about the Family is a study in contrasts. Their causes are trupeted by their visible members, but the machinery of the organization gets the deals done in secret. They stress their subservience to God's will but shamelessly seek individual self-promotion. They talk about the love of Jesus, but cast him as a relentless warrior.

There is a lot that has happened in the history of this country over the past 75 years that only makes sense in light of these recent revelations about the Family. The truly scary thing is not that they want to turn America into a Taliban-style theocracy, the scary thing is the extent to which they have already succeeded. In order to understand the Family, you have to understand their reading of Romans 13 "The powers that be are ordained of God" and "For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God."

The Family approaches the question of authority backward. Whoever has gained power must have done so by the grace of God, so any acts that were done to attain or maintain power were sanctioned by God. In this way any sort of injustice can be justified. To the members of the Family, ethics or morality are only for the weak and the poor. Members - those in power - have recieved the blessings of authority and therefore mundane ethics cannot apply. This is why Mark Sanford referenced King David during a press conference about his recent affair. Remember that David was not at all a nice man - he had an affair and had his mistress's husband murdered, but God did not condemn him for that.

What do we do? Reading this book is likely to throw secular readers and kindhearted Christian readers into a sucking despair. How do we counter the corrupting influence of the Family?

• Develop a new mythology of religious freedom.

The fundamentalist movement has captured the public imagination by reinventing the meaning behind the stories of Jesus and the stories of American history. Biology is not the only academic subject under attack by fundamentalism - history also requires a vigorous defense and is in many ways the more important battle. We need a new narrative which can start to rebuild Jefferson's wall of separation. In the last chapter Jeff Sharlet recommends talking about the concept of exodus as a way of moving out of the old ways and into an unknown but promising future. Contrast this with the Family's salvation which requires submission to the order imposed by these self-proclaimed key men.

• Ask your politicans about their Family connections.

I mentioned Hillary Clinton earlier, but we can also ask our FL Sen. Bill Nelson about his participation in the Senate prayer breakfasts. One by one the questions can chip away at the veil of secrecy around this group.

• Shut down the offices of the faith-based initiatives.

Money that should go to the poor through welfare and medicare and head start is being funneled through many hidden channels to religious and fundamentalist groups. These organizations give preferential treatment to believers when they distribute aid. Unlike government agencies they are allowed to discriminate in their hiring practices.

• End the Family's tax-exempt status

The Family operates a house on C Street which is now categorized as a church. This house provides housing for members of Congress at below-market rates and operates as a center of operations for lobbying and political contacts. They should have to pay taxes and submit to the same rules as every other lobbying group.