While the American left and the mainstream media focuses on the Tea Party movement, a massive shift in politicized rightwing Christianity is now poised to have a significant electoral impact in the 2010 elections.
Ever since John McCain picked Sarah Palin as his running mate, my colleague Rachel Tabachnick and I have been collaboratively researching, as a top priority, the New Apostolic Reformation.
In a new Alternet story, Heads Up: Prayer Warriors and Sarah Palin Are Organizing Spiritual Warfare to Take Over America, Bill Berkowitz, who for many years has covered the religious right, interviews Rachel Tabachnick about this movement.
Why should Americans, or Daily Kos readers, care ? Here is a partial list of where "apostles" of the New Apostolic Reformation have recently popped up:
- Leading the Family Research Council's "Prayercast" against health care reform, with 2 GOP senators (DeMint and Brownback) and 2 congressional representatives (including Michelle Bachmann) in attendance.
- Anointing and blessing Newt Gingrich and Mike Huckabee, at a summer 2009 event held in a Virginia Beach megachurch.
- Leading the capstone event of the anti-gay marriage, pro-Proposition Eight push in California, and running an organization that maintained eight CA field offices to manage the California church-based pro-Prop 8 GOTV effort.
- Leading a "spiritual warfare" prayer group that claimed as a member the 2008 US GOP vice presidential Candidate.
- Preparing to run as the GOP's gubernatorial candidate for the state of Hawaii in the 2010 election (see Alternet article.)
- Fielding a small army of "prayer walkers" (read: political organizers) in New Jersey's largest city, Newark.
- Sharing the stage with former US senator "Rick" Santorum.
- Heading an organization that claims to represent 15 million Hispanic Americans, and working to pull that political constituency to the right.
- Running an international business that claims to have one-half a billion dollars in contracts.
- Closely linked to the effort to pass the so-called "kill the gays" bill in Uganda and running an nationwide effort to "Transform" that country into a Christian theocracy.
- Describing how the movement is carrying out a forced (theocratic Christian) indoctrination of entire 180,000+ string national police force of the Philippines.
- Presiding over 6-8 percent of the active duty chaplains in the United States military, promoting anti-government conspiracy theory, and printing a letter, in the official newletter of a chaplain endorsing agency, that called for the execution of four US Democratic Party senators.
- Organizing a new, ethnically inclusive wing of the Christian right which may have the ability to shift electoral outcomes in 2010.
- Building and coordinating prayer-networks that reach millions of American evangelicals and serve as agile, quiet, and almost free communication networks for political organizing.
Here's an excerpt:
[Rachel Tabachnick] Imagine for a moment that a large block of the evangelical world decided to re-organize themselves in a hierarchy somewhat resembling the Roman Catholic Church, with leaders in authority over each nation and region. And additionally imagine that every person -- from the individual congregants to the top leaders -- would have someone to whom they are accountable. It seems unthinkable, but this is exactly what the "apostles" and "prophets" [of the New Apostolic Reformation] are doing.
C. Peter Wagner streamlined the ideology and named it the New Apostolic Reformation. Wagner serves as the presiding apostle of the International Coalition of Apostles (ICA) which includes several hundred apostles across the U.S. and about 40 nations, international training centers and prayer warrior communication networks in all 50 states and worldwide. Those in the top tier of Wagner's network each have apostolic authority over other ministries, sometimes hundreds or even thousands. (See Talk2Action's Resource Directory for the New Apostolic Reformation.)
This is not just a church movement. [Those called] market apostles work in business, finance, communications, media and also lead the Reclaiming the Seven Mountains of Culture mandate. Bruce Wilson [a co-founder of Talk2Action] and I have both written about this campaign encouraging Christians to take dominion over seven spheres of government and society.