In my opinion, Carrie Prejean is an example of what is wrong with American Christianity.
Two weeks ago if you had asked me, “Who is Carrie Prejean?,” I’m not sure I could have remembered. But last Tuesday morning, before I left home for the office, as she was being interviewed by Meredith Vieira on the “Today Show,” I was reminded. What I heard astounded me.
While most of you are probably better informed about such things than I, some of you may not recall that Miss Prejean was the California contestant in the Miss USA pageant last April. In the course of the competition, she was asked by an activist homosexual contestant judge if she thought states should legalize same-sex marriage. Prejean replied, “"I think it’s great that Americans are able to choose one or the other. We live in a land that you can choose same-sex marriage or opposite marriage and, you know what — in my country and my family I think that I believe that a marriage should be between a man and a woman. No offense to anyone out there but that’s how I was raised and that’s how I think it should be — between a man and a woman.”
She finished the competition as the first runner up. Understandably, she believes that she was set up and that it cost her the crown. Immediately she took the offense in criticizing her critics for mocking her beliefs. Religious-right groups almost as quickly saw in her a high-profile champion to give voice to their agendas.
That’s when the lingerie photos surfaced. I haven’t seen them, but as they have been described in print they seem rather like some you might see in a really racy underwear ad. Prejean responded, “I am a Christian, and I am a model. Models pose for pictures, including lingerie and swimwear photos. Recently, photos taken of me as a teenager have been released surreptitiously to a tabloid Web site that openly mocks me for my Christian faith. I am not perfect, and I will never claim to be.” She went on to say that since she was only 17 at the time it was illegal for her detractors to distribute the photos. It has since been reported that she was, in fact, 21 when the photos were taken — sometime after January of this year when the California pageant had paid for breast augmentation surgery, but before the Miss USA competition in April.
In June, pageant officials stripped her of her Miss California crown claiming that she made a false statement in her application and that she missed scheduled appearances. She responded by filing suit, claiming libel and religious persecution. Pageant officials counter sued to get back the $5,200 they invested in her implants. I don’t know whether repossession was being considered. Last week when officials produced in their negotiations a sexually explicit video of Prejean, the suit was quickly settled.
Naturally, she has been asked whether such a video exists and if so, is it really she? Prejean reluctantly admits that the answer to both questions is, “Yes.” She replied to Larry King’s questioning saying that because she has signed a confidentiality agreement regarding the settlement he was inappropriate to ask about it. To Sean Hannity she said, “I was, you know, alone [in the video], sending it to my boyfriend, who I cared about and loved about the time. When you’re young, you think, you know, this is the one. And, you know, never did I think it would come to slap me right in the face.”
She says when she became famous her ex-boyfriend betrayed her by selling the tape she had made of herself. Still, she says she takes total responsibility for the bad judgment she exhibited in making the tape. Make that a series of bad judgments. At least seven and perhaps as many as 15 different tapes are reported to exist.
This brings me back to the “Today Show,” where Prejean plugged her new book released the previous day. It is called Still Standing — The Untold Story of My Fight Against Gossip, Hate and Political Attacks. She told Vieira she believes conservative women are being targeted and that she wrote the book to reveal what is going on. “There is a conspiracy,” she says, “to silence me.” Now that’s a conspiracy I would be willing to join.
Don’t get me wrong. Not being perfect myself, I can sympathize with her. To the degree that she has been victimized by voicing her opinions, she needs to seek and be rewarded with apologies and remedies. It is wrong to demonize her because of her Christian perspective.
What I found appalling, however, wasn’t that Prejean isn’t perfect. Nobody, not even unbelievers, expects Christians to be perfect. Rather, I was shocked by the rank worldliness of her attitude. Even the bad judgment to which she referred was in believing that her boyfriend at the time was “the one” and that he could be trusted with the raw video she made of herself.
That’s what I mean by saying Prejean is an example of what is wrong with Christianity in America. Here is one more very public example of blatant hypocrisy. If there is nothing different about how we live, why should we be surprised if people sneer at our beliefs? If we are as worldly as the world, why should anybody listen when we speak of right and wrong?
Prejean is not alone in needing to mend her ways, of course. Neither is she alone in needing to simply shut up! She is too compromised to be heard. Her life is laughable in its lack of Christian distinctiveness. Until we Christians walk the walk, our talk will be only noisy gongs or clanging cymbals. We can sue for the right to say our piece, but it doesn’t mean that anybody will care enough to listen. They might even scoff at what we say.
On the other hand, when we lead exemplary lives; when we authenticate the values we hold by the way we live, we will earn not only the right to speak, but respect when we do. That kind of life will earn a crown that can’t be taken away.