The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power

The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power - Jeff Sharlet

A journalist's penetrating look at the untold story of christian fundamentalism's most elite organization, a self-described invisible network dedicated to a religion of power for the powerful.They are the Familyfundamentalism's avant-garde, waging spiritual war in the halls of American power and around the globe. They consider themselves the new chosencongressmen, generals, and foreign dictators who meet in confidential cells, to pray and plan for a "leadership led by God," to be won not by force but through "quiet diplomacy." Their base is a leafy estate overlooking the Potomac in Arlington, Virginia, and Jeff Sharlet is the only journalist to have reported from inside its walls.The Family is about the other half of American fundamentalist powernot its angry masses, but its sophisticated elites. Sharlet follows the story back to Abraham Vereide, an immigrant preacher who in 1935 organized a small group of businessmen sympathetic to European fascism, fusing the far right with his own polite but authoritarian faith. From that core, Vereide built an international network of fundamentalists who spoke the language of establishment power, a "family" that thrives to this day. In public, they host Prayer Breakfasts; in private, they preach a gospel of "biblical capitalism," military might, and American empire. Citing Hitler, Lenin, and Mao as leadership models, the Family's current leader, Doug Coe, declares, "We work with power where we can, build new power where we can't."Sharlet's discoveries dramatically challenge conventional wisdom about American fundamentalism, revealing its crucial role in the unraveling of the New Deal, the waging of the cold war, and the no-holds-barred economics of globalization. The question Sharlet believes we must ask is not "What do fundamentalists want?" but "What have they already done?"Part history, part investigative journalism, The Family is a compelling account of how fundamentalism came to be interwoven with American power, a story that stretches from the religious revivals that have shaken this nation from its beginning to fundamentalism's new frontiers. No other book about the right has exposed the Family or revealed its far-reaching impact on democracy, and no future reckoning of American fundamentalism will be able to ignore it.

Published: 2008-05-20 (Harper)

ISBN: 9780060559793

Language: English

Format: Hardcover, 454 pages

Goodreads' rating: -

Genres

Christianity Politics History Religion Nonfiction

Reviews

Gabriello rated it

The Family - Jeff SharletThe book comes with a thick armor of recomendations. I won't need to add mine.What i had heard of this book and expected was the sort of conspiracy you might find in a Dan Brown novel. Not here. That's not to say it doesn't exist, it's just not described in the book. Certainly this book scores, but it's not a 'bomb-shell'.You may find the historical side (250 years) of this book of interest. You may find the personal relationships and interviews of value. You may find that the weaving tendrils that hold this story together compelling. I guess it's my armor that's thicker.What i did like was the chapter called "Interesting Blood" which details interactions of the fundamentalist right and members of congress in the last ten years and the Bush White House. The details about Hillary Clinton (motivated perhaps by aspiration to the White House) came as a surprise to me.I also liked the author's insight that this movement is less about true religion and moral belief, and more about the raw corruption of power and control. That all is a pretty classic theme.

Mead rated it

This book terrifies me. I knew that conservative Christians WANTED to seize control of the country, but this convinces me that they already have. We who value our freedom must fight back. Unfortunately, this book is too balanced to be the battle cry that we need, but it does give plenty of evidence that secularism in America is at risk. Be very afraid.

Heinrik rated it

I'd been looking for some light reading -- something quick -- and thought this was an expansion of Sharlet's 2003 article on Ivanwald (http://harpers.org/archive/2003/03/00...). As I indicated, I had a personal interest in the topic, and had been putting off reading the book (which I'd never seen). Instead, I ended up with this long, sprawling book on the whole structure of "elite fundamentalism" going back to the 17th cen.There is very little on Ivanwald here -- and Sharlet seems to think of himself as the James Michener of the genre. The book is MUCH too long (for my taste), and over-written -- it reads for long stretches almost novelistically -- and he ain't no Faulkner. So I found this frustrating. I also should note that Sharlet himself is sympathetic to the project of faith. He's just a bit uncomfortable with the fascistization of it that he is witnessing. And I am not sympathetic to that either.On the other hand, there is a lot of material here of importance on the structure of American fascism. What I found most useful was his discussion of the absorption of fascist elements and Nazi personnel into the Family during the 1930s and 1940s (ch. 5), and his chilling account of Coe's 1989 lecture in ch. 9. The rest of the book could have been reduced by at last 80%. That said, the book terrified me. Sharlet makes a strong case for the pervasiveness of Coe's influence -- at the very highest levels of government and business and the miltary -- something I can confirm from anecdote and private communication. Coe's message or agenda, ultimately, is that the nations are made to bow, in obedience and loyalty, to an entrenched capitalist power-elite (sanctified and privatized - that is, any countermanding State will be defanged) in the centuries to come. This elite will operate not through institutions, but through covenants of faith.It is hard to argue that this has not already largely come about.This is Jeff Sharlet: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Sha...This is his father: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Sha...He also shows how far into all this stuff Hillary Clinton has drifted.Having just read the book, I then caught this article:http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/07...Having just read the book -- I asked questions about this article I never would have asked before (I have no answers). Who precisely IS this organization she was speaking to: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communit...It is official, not NGO... What, then, are the "liberties" they are trying to protect: freedom of speech or freedom of religion?Why are all the signatories (or most of them) from right-wing countries?And why is HIllary involved with such a group....?I have no answers -- but my nose is starting to twitch.