Miracle Man.

Religion and politics intersect at the point of power, and how best to keep it. Hypocrisy only seems to be the inevitable consequence. In fact, it can't really be hypocritical if power was the basis for the equation from the very start.

Jerry Falwell Jr. might well have been telling the truth about his unzipped trousers. But this isn't the point, is it?

The Last Temptation of Jerry, by Jeet Heer (The Nation)

A scandal at Liberty University proves that white evangelicals are starting to copy Trump.

Jerry Falwell Jr., recently deposed as president of Liberty University, is a new type of Christian sinner. The figure of a pious hypocrite is as old as religion itself, an inevitable by-product of the fact that any moral system will be upheld by flawed people. But usually godly miscreants try to keep their transgressions secret.

A prime example is Jimmy Swaggart, who was disgraced and defrocked after revelations of hiring sex workers in 1987. Furtive, sweaty, twitchy, and given to wailing, “I have sinned,” Swaggart acted like an escapee from the fictions of Fyodor Dostoevsky or Flannery O’Connor: a God-haunted and superstitious primate driven by compulsions he could neither understand nor control. As creepy as he is, Swaggart has given every evidence of a complex and tormented inner life.

Falwell Jr., by contrast, is a shallower creature who has not tried to hide his misdeeds. Rather, he has flaunted them. The latest scandal involving Falwell Jr. grew out of a photo he himself posted on Instagram, showing him with his arms around a woman who was not his wife, both parties with their pants unzipped. “Yeah, it was weird,” Falwell admitted in a radio interview. “She’s pregnant. She couldn’t get her pants zipped and I was like trying to like… I had on a pair of jeans I haven’t worn in a long time and couldn’t get zipped either. So, I just put my belly out like hers. She’s my wife’s assistant, she’s a sweetheart. I should have never put it up and embarrassed her. I’ve apologized to everybody. I promised my kids I will try to be a good boy from here on out.”

This explanation wasn’t sufficient, coming as it did on top of a long list of previous scandals, including still unexplained land deals he made with his pool boy and photos seemingly showing him drinking and dancing at a Florida nightclub. These photos were a problem because Liberty University holds its students and staff to strict moral standards. Students can receive demerits if they dance with a partner of the opposite sex and be expelled for drinking. Sex outside of marriage is prohibited for students.

As Politico reported last year, Falwell Jr. was notorious for flouting these rules, taking an exhibitionist’s glee in lewd conversations ...

Creepiness exalted: "Purity balls, Plan B and bad sex policy: inside America's virginity obsession."

Like the Supreme Court justice suggested, one knows obscenity when he or she sees it. The entire notion of a "purity ball" is raincoater creepy.

Purity balls, Plan B and bad sex policy: inside America's virginity obsession, by Jessica Valenti (Guardian)

We are teaching girls that their virginity makes them special. But we're also sending the wrong message – that without their virginity, they're damaged goods

The men and girls in the photos hold hands and embrace – the young women are in long white dresses, the men in suits or military regalia. If some of the girls in the pictures weren't so young - Laila and Maya Sa up there are seven and five years old, respectively - the portraits could be mistaken for wedding or prom pictures. What they actually capture, though, are images of those who participate in purity balls – father-daughter dances featuring girls who pledge to remain virgins until marriage and fathers who promise to protect their daughters' chastity.

The images from Swedish photographer David Magnusson's new book, Purity, are beautiful, disturbing and tell a distinctly American story – a story wherein a girl's virginity is held up as a moral ideal above all else, a story in which the most important characteristic of a young woman is whether or not she is sexually active. This narrative of good girls and bad girls, pure girls and dirty girls, is one that follows young women throughout their lives. Purity balls simply lay that dichotomy bare. In a clip from a Nightline Prime episode on these disconcerting events , a father tells his braces-clad daughter, "You are married to the Lord, and your father is your boyfriend."

ROCK and role-play all night, and pray every day.

It's been a while since we checked in on the nanny theocrats at ROCK, mostly because I hate disturbing these selfless Theatair-X stall monitors while they're working toward the Christian equivalent of Sharia law, all the while remaining utterly clueless as to the analogy.

From 2012: REWIND: Some ROCK ‘n’ role playing.

Today, via the group's ROCK Ayatollah e-newsletter, we learn that the churchgoin' part of ROCK is usurping the civic engagement. Surprise, surprise, surprise.

We are newly energized !!

We are pleased to announce that God has a new plan for ROCK. After a nearly 10 year journey of faith and preparation, ROCK will start a Tuesday night prayer meeting in leased space on 7th Street Road at Energized Baptist Church.

On November 14, 2013, ROCK publicly announced our plan to downsize activities until there was renewed interest in ROCK's mission. In less than one week, God made it clear that He did not approve of our stated plan ...

 ... We believe it is God's desire for ROCK to start a Tuesday prayer meeting at Energized Baptist Church on 7th Street Road. The prayer meeting will model what we learned at Brooklyn Tabernacle. It will include, among other things, worship music; and prayers for our country, Louisville, each other, specific prayer requests submitted online, and healing. (We do need a musician!!).

Please, someone give them a musician. Maybe they'll get back aboard the spaceship and colonize elsewhere.