When I talk about Liars For Jesus like David Barton functioning as Dungeon Masters for the fantasy role-playing game of American evangelicalism, what I mean is things like this: “Disgraced Former Liberty Dean Ergun Caner Gets New Job, Seeks to Silence Critics.”
Ergun Caner got canned by Liberty University, where he was dean of the seminary, when it turned out that his claim to fame — being a former Jihadi zealot and an expert on Islam — wasn’t true.
But while Caner was a bad liar, he was still a fun Dungeon Master, so he was quickly re-hired — as president of the Southern-Baptist affiliated Brewton-Parker College in Georgia. A trustee of the college explained this hiring decision:
We didn’t consider Dr. Caner in spite of the attacks; we elected him because of them. He has endured relentless and pagan attacks like a warrior. We need a warrior as our next president.
Caner’s ability to spin a web of culture-warrior lies was seen by Brewton-Parker as a feature, not a bug. That’s exactly what they were looking for in a college president. (I guess David Barton didn’t want to take the pay-cut such a job would’ve meant for him.)
Christianity Today also reported on Caner’s hiring, but where Right Wing Watch referred to “Disgraced Former Liberty Dean Ergun Caner,” CT just timidly and fuzzily refers to Caner as a “controversial educator.” Muffling truth lest it offend power isn’t quite the same thing as speaking truth to power, is it?
Bob Allen’s report for the Associated Baptist Press is clearer and truer than CT’s waffle:
Ergun Caner, former head of Liberty University’s seminary found guilty three years ago of “factual statements that are self-contradictory” in a popular testimony claiming he received terrorist training before converting from Islam to Christianity, has been named president of Brewton-Parker College, one of three colleges affiliated with the Georgia Baptist Convention.
… Controversy arose in 2010, when bloggers questioned written descriptions of Caner’s academic credentials and apparent embellishments in recorded versions of his “Jihad to Jesus” testimony popular with evangelical audiences in the aftermath of 9/11.
“Jesus strapped a cross on his back so I wouldn’t have to strap a bomb on mine,” Caner said in a sermon at the Southern Baptist Convention pastors’ conference in 2004. He preached in high-profile pulpits including First Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Fla., and Prestonwood Baptist Church in Plano, Texas, claiming he came to America to do what the 9/11 terrorists did before being saved from a martyr’s death by accepting Christ.
Bloggers investigating the story found documents indicating that Caner in fact grew up in Ohio the son of a divorced Muslim father and Lutheran mother.
Growing up in Ohio with your Lutheran mother just isn’t exciting enough. “We need a warrior.” That’s exciting.
And that’s what the culture war is all about. It’s a fantasy role-playing game.
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