I'm Disappointed
I wrote a thing about Michael Tait a couple of months ago.
The post was 1. reactionary, and 2. speedily written as I was headed on sabbatical and had to write five Substack posts in a short amount of time.
A couple months later, I’ve had some time to digest his admission and have a few more thoughts.
For context, Tait was an evangelical darling. For the last thirty years he was a frontman for TWO of the biggest Christian music acts of all time.
He helped lead DC Talk, the biggest name in Christian music for a decade, then turned around and did it again as frontman for the Newsboys.
Absolute legend in the Christian music world.
And then, a few months ago, he quit his band and vanished. Rumors swirled.
Then accusations of sexual assault surfaced - accusations to which he later admitted.
Turns out he’d been assaulting people for decades.
I, like most everyone else, was shocked. Saddened. Disappointed.
It’s not like Tait was infallible in my eyes. The opposite, actually. My disappointment with him had been steadily growing for years.
The movie God’s Not Dead is bad faith Christian propaganda1 which ends with Tait encouraging everyone at the concert (and in turn those watching the movie) to text their atheist friends “God’s not dead.”
Probably wouldn’t be offensive to most of your friends, but it would be a little annoying.
After God’s Not Dead, Tait and the band leaned in hard on the “be strong in your faith and become a martyr” talk in future songs. “Become a martyr for your faith” talk wasn’t new for Tait. The Jesus Freaks book series from the 90’s did happen, after all.
But it hit different in the early 2010s. Modern Tait’s words felt more pointed toward the idea that the government was going to shut down Christianity.
And slowly over the late 2010s, I watched Tait turn MAGA.
I saw all of the pictures of Tait and Donald Trump together in 2016-2020: photo-ops to pander to the evangelicals.
(Evangelicals love their photos of politicians praying in public)2
When Tait’s confession hit the internet earlier this year, it hurt to read.
The revelations were shocking for what they were, but they also hurt me personally.
Jesus Freak and Supernatural were two of the most formative and important albums for me growing up.3
And the albums hold up about as well as most albums from that era.
Some of DC Talk’s lyrics haven’t aged the best, but they stretched me and my faith when I first heard them.
Despite being put off by many aspects of the current mainstream white evangelical church for quite a while now, it still hurts my soul to see what’s become of one of my heroes from childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood.
Other recent disappointments that surprised me and maybe shouldn’t have:
Kim Walker put out a song for the pro-Trump film The Trump I Know, which released during the 2020 presidential campaign.4
Chris Tomlin, Phil Wickham, and Kari Jobe lead a big ol’ worship event to begin Charlie Kirk’s funeral.
Which, fine. They were asked, they accepted.
But I can’t get over how upsetting and unsettling it is for a giant worship set to precede an event that would later see government officials saying, “I hate my opponent and don’t want the best for them” and use language about a fiery fury against “our enemies.”
I’ve been trying really hard to give these musicians the benefit of the doubt; to try and justify why they may have written a song or done an event like these.
Were the worship leaders asked to have a worship event, and then after the fact the speakers were announced?
Did the worship leader sign a contract to submit a song for a movie without really knowing exactly what the movie would be?
I’m not trying to defend any of these folks. At least, I don’t think so.
I think I just really don’t want to believe a worship leader would write a song for a Trump campaign movie.
I don’t want to believe worship leaders would have glowing words about seeing an “awakening” and how God is moving in the wake of someone’s death, but say nothing in response to words of hate toward enemies at that person’s funeral.
But, like, both of those things happened.
Something else that happened: the guy who wrote and sang about racial reconciliation in the 90s had a bunch of photo-ops with the guy whose political career began with “Mexico is sending drugs, crime, and rapists” and continued with “s—hole countries,” “poisoning the blood of our country,” and “the enemy from within.”
When I predicted a bunch of “Tait made a mistake, but all of us are sinful” comments in the days following Tait’s confession, I was hoping I was wrong.
I wasn’t.
So many people jumped in to protect the guy.
To soften his image.
Within two years I’m confident he’ll be back on podcasts, probably advertising an album he wrote filled with songs of repentance.
And his victims will still be in therapy untangling everything he did to them.
I didn’t mean for this post to sound as nihilistic as it does.
I hope you enjoyed this probably-not-filtered-enough bit of frustration.
(BTW I super recommend the 33 1/3 book about the album Jesus Freak written by two queer scholars and former closeted gay evangelicals. It rides the line between critical and kind/gracious beautifully.
It was written long before the Tait revelations. I’d be curious what they’d write in an additional chapter)
Also my buddies spent a few months talking about every track from the album on their podcast in 2022/23.
If you like it, fine. But it’s a propaganda film with unrealistic portrayals of atheists, college professors, Muslims, journalists, lawyers, liberals, and surprisingly, Christians.
“And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others” (Matthew 6:5 NRSV).
This is a bit of a hot take, but screw it: Supernatural is better than Jesus Freak. I’ll die on that hill.
Kim is probably the second biggest celebrity to come out of my hometown. I went to high school with her. We never talked, and her music isn’t really my vibe, but I’ve been rooting for her for a long time. Hometown hero, you know?
The Trump song disappointed me so, so much.
I feel you so deeply. It’s a grief for me like no other. As of late, I have found myself listening to old worship music from people who have since turned MAGA, I have the memory of both deep love they gave to me *and* the deep pain, like listening to old voicemails from an abusive ex.
I’m holding on so hard to Jesus, but it’s very hard to stay.
Altho this saddens & Angers me, its absolutely well written David...I Grieve with Thee!