REEL REFLECTIONS

"RELIGULOUS"—PEOPLE OF FAITH SEEN AS FISH IN A BARREL
A Film Review

David Greiser

When I was in the eighth grade, I met my first agnostic. Arnold was a soft spoken, geeky-smart boy who sat next to me in social studies class. He actually wore a pocket protector in the pocket of his button-down shirt. Arnold was politely convinced that belief in God was a crock.

And I was amazed by Arnold. Until then, I didn’t know it was possible not to believe in God. As I attempted my first defense of the Christian faith with Arnold, the seeds of my own journey with doubt were planted, and a lifelong fascination with the relative rationality of belief was begun.

Bill Maher, the creator of the witty docu-comedy "Religulous" (and host of HBO’s "Real Time with Bill Maher"), is my friend Arnold on steroids. Maher is in no way neutral, or even polite, toward religion or religious people. Instead, he is a fervent evangelist of the gospel of doubt. "What we need to understand," Maher preaches, "is that faith makes a virtue out of not thinking. The plain fact is, religion must die for the world to survive."

In Maher’s well-researched view, most of the world’s wars and many of its ugliest prejudices have their roots in religious beliefs. The fundamentalist belief in a cataclysmic Battle of Armageddon could unwittingly become a self-fulfilling prophecy in the hands of fanatical Middle Eastern zealots. Even those who see themselves as religious moderates come in for a scolding from Maher. "You may be a moderate," argues Maher, "but you need to know that the solace of your religion comes at a terrible price."

"Religulous" is an equal opportunity abuser of the world’s faithful. Christian evangelists, ultra-orthodox rabbis, and Muslim clerics manage to look equally silly when seated in the interviewee’s chair next to Maher. Maher’s technique consists in flattering his unprepared subjects into dropping their guard, then pouncing. In one scene, he compliments former soul singer-turned-prosperity evangelist Jeremiah Cummings on his lizard-skin shoes and jewelry, then reels him in with a set of questions that expose the evangelist’s superficial knowledge of Jesus.

In another interview, he challenges a group of Muslim clerics arguing the peaceful nature of the Islamic faith by producing some well-chosen quotes of his own from the Koran. Perhaps the funniest moment in the film is a conversation with Arkansas Senator Mark Pryor, who expresses doubts about evolution, then unwittingly says something so self-incriminating that your heart goes out to the man.

Maher has done his homework. He knows the Bible better than many of the Christians he talks to. He has honed his arsenal of arguments against the existence of God to a fine point. And you have to hand it to the man—he has guts. Aside from the volume of hate mail he is bound to get from, ironically, Christians, just for making this film, Maher risks physical confrontation with several of his subjects. He tells a chapel full of burly Christian truckers just how little he thinks of their God. He walks off the set of an interview with an ultra-orthodox rabbi whose anti-Zionism leads him to doubt the veracity of the Holocaust. And he succeeds in getting himself kicked out of the Vatican and off the grounds of the Mormon Temple in Salt Lake City.

Maher may be well-informed and he is definitely gutsy, but he is by no means fair. He interviews only one genuine intellectual. Francis Collins is a biophysicist who was head of the Human Genome Project. While in that role, Collins’ lifelong agnosticism gave way first to a belief in God then to full-blown Christian faith. Collins likens the human genome to "the language of God," through which we can understand something of the Creator’s thoughts.

Unfortunately, we don’t get to hear any of that in the film. Instead, Maher chooses to talk to Collins about the reliability of the biblical gospels, a subject about which Collins knows decidedly less. Throughout the film, Maher edits the segments in such a way as to magnify the stupidity of his subjects. Occasionally he interrupts interviewees without letting them answer his questions; at other times he posts subtitles—jabbing, snide afterthoughts to his subjects’ comments. In short, Maher comes across as every conservative’s stereotype of a smug liberal elitist.

"Religulous" is directed by Larry Charles, who directed the 2006 film "Borat"—a similar exercise in cynicism with something to offend everyone. In "Religulous," Charles’ genius is limited to the film’s technical side. The message of the film is pure Maher, who clearly believes that a world in which people live by reason alone is the best of all possible worlds. That belief may be the biggest leap of faith of all.

—Dave Greiser’s well-seasoned doubts about God’s sovereignty took a big hit when his beloved Philadelphia Phillies won the World Series this fall. He teaches pastoral ministries, often with a goofy grin on his face, at Hesston (Kan.) College.