God and country collide in “Seeing Red: A Journey Through the Moral Divide”
Jessica Alpert, a first-year graduate student in the Indiana University Bloomington Department of History, helped to produce the recently released documentary, Seeing Red: A Journey Through the Moral Divide. The film explores the intersection between faith and politics in America and features interviews with local and national religious leaders and scholars. Evangelical voting culture is a major focus of the film. So far, the documentary has aired at the Boston Film Festival, the ArgusFest Film Festival in Denver and the Dixie Film Festival in Atlanta. Alpert discusses her experience below.
What were your hopes for the documentary?
It's been my experience that Democrats really don't know how to communicate with evangelical America. They basically imagine these fanatical Christians who refuse to think outside church doctrine. So the idea was for people to be able to step back and look at each other. Maybe it's naive to think that we could have dialogue between liberals and right-wing Christians, but what we wanted to do was serve up a view of America that people may not have seen. It's like, "Hello, welcome to your country."
How did you get involved?
Growing up in Texas, I got to know an incredible amount about evangelical culture. I'm Jewish, but most of my friends were really into their churches and always trying to get me saved.
My friend Leah Belsky is one of the producers of the film, so what I did was essentially walk the crew around Texas and made sure they met all the big characters. My title was "field producer." I set up the meetings and was able to help facilitate most of the initial interviews.
IU History graduate student Jessica Alpert was a Field Producer for "Seeing Red."
What did you find out during the filming?
Church culture is really all across the board -- that's what the film found. The stereotype of mega-churches that are pro-war and anti-gay is alive and well. But we also saw that maybe there is this growing pocket of Christians that are thinking outside that box.
One pastor, Jim Herrington, bought a string of homes in a gay area of Houston, where he takes people in -- ex-convicts, drug addicts, pregnant teenagers -- and helps them put their lives back together. His perception is that the emphasis on politics is the wrong direction for the church. He would question the emphasis on proselytizing in the mega-churches as well -- I think he definitely wants to spread Jesus' message, but he would say that our shared humanity is more important than adding points to his list of converted. The people should be the concern of the church.
When I watched the film, I was really struck by the over-the-top red-white-and-blue Fourth of July celebration in one of the mega-churches, in contrast to the quiet voice of one of the ex-convicts in Herrington's community who said that the people who took him in had made Jesus real for him.
I, too, thought the Second Baptist celebration was fascinating. Funnily enough, it was all very normal to me as these are the types of events my friends would invite me to when I was growing up. The money these congregations pour into this stuff -- just amazing. I think Herrington has big problems with this type of spending. Who wouldn't when he is trying to create homes, churches for all of these people trying to start their lives over?
Based on this research, do you think the church has a strong influence on voting patterns?
It's absolutely a factor. I think we are now experiencing the Third Great Awakening, a time of absolute emphasis on religiosity. Churches legally can't endorse a candidate, but they can preach about only voting for people who are pro-life or voting for people who line up with Jesus' teaching.
What I saw were people who want to elect someone they could talk to -- a Godly president. They want someone they feel comfortable with, someone they would meet in church. For many voters, there's not much room for diversity. They would never, ever vote for someone they consider a non-Christian. The language about George Bush was along the lines of "He's the only chance we have to keep the Bible in government."
How did the film turn out?
I really like this film. I feel like it speaks to what's going on today and it's not afraid to ask these questions head-on. I hope that lots of people can see it from both ends of the political-religious spectrum.
"Seeing Red" is available for purchase from the movie's Web site, http:// www.seeingredthemovie.com. The Web site also enables viewers to register their screening of the film so that others may attend. Discussion guides are included with the DVD.
