Wittenburg Door #203

Confession time: I used to admire Pat Robertson. I was a media obsessed Pentecostal kid growing up in Warren, Pennsylvania and what he was doing with The 700 Club in the seventies and eighties seemed amazing. I loved the idea of combining the Christian message with the TV newsmagize format. (Yes, writing that last line made me smirk.)

I do occasionally turn on the program these days, but it's changed so much that I barely recognize it. The newsmagazine format is still there, but the whole philosophy behind the program has changed. Maybe it was always there and I lost my naivete on the way to adulthood. It just seemed like the theme of the program used to be God changes lives. Its current theme appears to be keep Christians in a constant state of panic.

Whether it's a natural disaster, politics, or culture, Pat Robertson will be there with his commentary which can be summed up as: BE AFRAID. After the Chavez fiasco, I wrote up a satire piece about this constant crisis mentality and it appears this month in The Wittenburg Door, issue #203.

In case you've never heard of it, The Wittenburg Door is "the world's pretty much only religious satire magazine." It has been delighting and/or horrifying readers since 1971. You can find subscription info by clicking here. The magazine also publishes a free biweekly newsletter that you can sign up for here.