Evangelical popular culture overrides pastors’ authority over their congregations

Evidence

At times, evangelical popular culture can subvert the authority of the evangelical elite. During the Trump campaign, many pastors were surprised to find that they wielded little influence over people in the pews. What they didn’t realize was that they were up against a more powerful system of authority—an evangelical popular culture that reflected and reinforced a compelling ideology and a coherent worldview. A few words preached on Sunday morning did little to disrupt the steady diet of religious products evangelicals consumed day in, day out. — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 19

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The claim that pulpits lost authority to a consumer product stream inverts the standard top-down model of religious influence — pastors, not laypeople, turn out to be the ones without leverage — a genuinely reorienting observation about where religious authority now lives.
• XREF: Resonates with Shannon/Wiener-style questions about which channels actually carry influence — the same implicit theory of communication-as-culture from Carey. — connects to: A talk-show host’s spiritual authority rivaled institutional Christianity — Tim Wu, The Attention Merchants, 808