As you may be aware, America’s right-wing, fundamentalist Christians continue to work to not just cross, but eliminate, the long-established, constitutional division between church and state. This can be problematic for at least a couple of reasons. Most obviously, this divide protects both the state and religions from dominating or even taking the other over. AsSeparation of Church and Hatemakes clear, religion in politics is such a monumental threat to freedom and democracy that while there can be a tight focus on maintaining that division, another serious problem gets overlooked. That is, the religious right is not always adequately challenged on whether they are even accurately representing what Jesus said and stood for.
Fairly or not, it can seem like right-wing Christians in America have cornered the market on Jesus and the word of God. For example, the most viewed episode (7.5 million views) on the YouTube channel, Surrounded, is the aptly named matchup: “Jordan Peterson vs. 20 Atheists”. That is, often the religious right gets to claim not only the “word” of Jesus and God, but the wisdom, and the spiritual and moral footing that goes along with that.
No matter what you think about religion, this is a problem. John Fugelsang seems to grasp this as well as anyone, hence: The Separation of Church and Hate: A Sane Person’s Guide to Taking Back the Bible from Fundamentalists, Fascists, and Flock-Fleecing Frauds.
Fugelsang is a first-time author, but a long-time actor and comedian, and as host of the popular Sirius radio show, Tell Me Everything, he addresses a variety of social and political matters. The author also happens to have a fascinating background. He notes early on in this book that his parents were a former nun and a former Franciscan friar, who left their religious callings to marry one another.
One result of his upbringing is that, today, Fugelsang is a rather unique social commentator in that he is decidedly left-of-center on most major issues, but also possesses an encyclopedic understanding of, and deep respect for, the Bible. He brings all of this to The Separation of Church and Hate.
Fugelsang, who has 450,000 Twitter/X followers, is also known for a widely-shared, Jesus-related meme, repeated at the beginning of The Separation of Church and Hate, which concisely lays out some 26 things Jesus was and was not, e.g., “Jesus was a radical, nonviolent revolutionary…was anti-wealth and anti-death penalty…never mentioned abortion…” In short, Fugelsang’s position is simply that the words and deeds of Jesus, as recorded in the Bible, often have far less to do with what right-wing Christians suggest.
A good percentage of Fugelsang’s online exchanges regarding the Bible go something like this:
Right-wing Christians: [attributes something to Jesus that Jesus didn’t say.]
Fugelsang: “Where did Jesus ever say that?”
Right-wing Christians: [quotes Old Testament/Paul/John/or anyone else but Jesus]
Fugelsang: “That’s [Old Testament/Paul/John/or anyone else but Jesus]. Where did Jesus ever say that?”
Right-wing Christians: [no response]
Self-identifying Christians who don’t actually know what Jesus Christ said? This must just be the fringe types, right? Well, no. Fugelsang was thus inspired to write The Separation of Church and Hate, the purpose of which he gives in the Introduction: “This is a book about what Christianity started out as, what it became, and why it is still worth fighting for.”
In the end, he succeeds in what seems like a long-overdue and bold endeavor, and he keeps it accessible. Along the way, he includes quips and pop culture references to keep it relatively light and entertaining.
By and large, Fugelsang is remarkably respectful of those he debates, at a time when seemingly so few on social media are, and let alone while discussing religion. He has, in fact, explicitly organized The Separation of Church and Hate to be a reference guide of sorts for any time a Biblical topic comes up, and one wants to have thoughtful discussions and debates with friends, family, or anyone else. Eh, wut? Overly optimistic? Maybe. Maybe not.
There are 15 chapters, each focusing on a specific topic, such as feminism, immigration, abortion, and all the other biggies you would expect. Fugelsang very much knows both who and what he is dealing with. Seven of the 15 chapter titles start with the same four words, “Thou Shall Not Hate…”, which are then followed either by “… Poor People”, “Feminists”, or “‘Illegals’”, and so on. In other words, instead of solely arguing for any particular policy, it becomes: “Thou Shall Not Hate ‘Illegals.’” The author is thus getting to the real point: Jesus’ core message, and smartly reframing and even reclaiming these issues from the right-wing narrative.
Many of the main topics in The Separation of Church and Hate are broken down into three parts: “The Claim” of the right wing, “The [relevant] Scripture”. followed by “The Debunking”. Fugelsang supports every point with plenty of Biblical citations, and he clearly knows the Bible inside and out. He also acknowledges that he is not a Biblical scholar. Where more complex topics benefit from it, he speaks directly to and quotes theologians to support his points.
Fugelsang provides ample history as well as context of life in the time of Jesus, while keeping things concise and understandable. He also traces matters out in detail when the “Biblical telephone tag” (wherein a message passed along is inevitably distorted) shapes how things landed in the Bible, which is quite a lot.
This is not to say that all arguments in The Separation of Church and Hate are clear-cut. One particularly hot-button topic is illustrative of those tougher issues. Fugelsang explains that when the Bible was written, there was not even a Greek or Hebrew word for homosexuality. The concept as we understand it today did not exist, and the word that has been translated as homosexuality in the Bible, arsenokoitai, was only translated as such in the last few decades. Readers can sort this part out for themselves, although it is just the beginning of the analysis of the topic.
Contemporary denigration and even hate of homosexuals, as Fugelsang explains and many others have pointed out, is also a result of essentially cherry-picking a rarely mentioned sin from the Old Testament, while no one, believer or not, could care in the slightest about the many other “sins” enumerated precisely the same way, be that wearing mixed fabric clothing or stoning women to death if not a virgin on their wedding night. Even more importantly, none of these referenced anti-gay words ever came from Jesus.
One of Fugelsang’s main points is simply that in “fulfilling the covenant”, Jesus effectively overturned much of what came before. He notes that Jesus was not even ambiguous about it: “It WAS said, an ‘eye for an eye,’” but then it was turning the other cheek. Yet, the right wing continues to fight to put the Old Testament Ten Commandments on the walls of public schoolrooms, while ignoring the most important words that Jesus ever spoke—Sermon on the Mount—like the plague.
Fugelsang takes these topics seriously, of course, but he is indeed very much a comedian throughout. Traditionally, Biblical analyses, even those intended to be more accessible, can run on the dry side, like unbuttered toast. So, the author deftly interjects humor and pop culture references throughout. At times, the comedy is a bit much, but then again, how else to address such a long string of erroneous, and often blatant, misinterpretations? Still, he largely hits the mark (“Literalism: Faith’s Tricky Pal”), even if a bit corny at times (“The Sacred Diss Tracks of Matthew 23”).
Fugelsang also adds other, welcome, and entertaining notes, such as the fact that Jesus’s three-year evangelical career was less than the time the Smiths were together but more than the Jimi Hendrix Experience, among others. This is funny, but, honestly, it really does give perspective as to just how short and yet ridiculously influential the Messiah’s run was. Seriously. Otherwise, there are other good references in The Separation of Church and Hate, such as citing great pop songs that tell specific Biblical stories like Sam Cooke’s gospel outfit, the Soul Stirrers, or Bob Dylan.
Any serious Biblical scholar has long since accepted that, for all of its wisdom and truths, the Good Book also has some indisputably contradictory messages, and parts that cannot possibly be taken literally. There is, for example, Adam being created first in one book, but being created simultaneously with Eve in another, and there is God telling people it is cool to eat their children, or sell off daughters as sex slaves. Etcetera.
Recalling all of this can be rather shocking and even infuriating. How about the fact that there were actually 15 apostles (or more)—but the three women among them don’t get counted? Or Onan! It turns out God’s issues with him have nothing to do with him pleasuring himself. He actually followed God’s orders and had sex with his dead brother’s widow, but he refused to impregnate her. Yet his name is associated with shameful masturbation, possibly for all eternity. Fugelsang regularly and coherently shines a light on point after point that have been misrepresented or misunderstood for centuries.
In the end, Fugelsang’s argument is that people could just listen to Jesus’ message—without the unabashed cherry-picking, the unsupportable literalism, and the ignoring of the telephone game effect. Fugelsang actually makes this seem genuinely uncomplicated, and that’s why the book is such a success.
Will Separation of Church and Hate, as a reference guide, however, lead to deeper and more respectful discussion on religion? For right-wing Christians who have reconciled accumulating, or aspiring to accumulate, massive wealth, owning mansions, and a “prosperity theology”—with “Sell your possessions and give to the poor” (Luke 12:33), maybe not.
Still, this is the kind of book that can open a door for many, and afford them some all too rare common ground: namely, that Jesus himself, and his actual words and deeds, were largely pretty fantastic. Plus, it has also been said that the truth will set you free, and Separation of Church and Hate certainly moves the ball in that direction.