"A True Elmer Gantry"
….was the comment on the only email we have received on the GOP Chairman David McLain stories. And we had to look it up, it was a movie in 1960 starring Burt Lancaster, two years after I was born so I can be excused for being ignorant about it.
It turns out that it is an erie parallel for the Jesse Rogers/David McLain story, a movie about a huckster salesman turned huckster preacher, hooking up with a woman who is also a huckster lying about her background and training. And it was loosely based upon the Canadian woman that founded a Pentecostal sect. Interesting.....
The original story was from a novel named Elmer Gantry, a 1927 book by Sinclair Lewis. The book is quite loosely covered by the movie, at least the first hundred pages or so but the characters and actions of the woman evangelist was fundamentally changed in the movie to spice it up a bit.
In the 1960 movie Elmer Gantry is a fast talking hard living traveling salesman who has learned to infuse biblical passages and fervor into his sales pitch to dupe the rubes out of cash easier. One of the earlier scenes shows Elmer walking into a black church as they are joyously and enthusiastically singing hymns. He winds up running into another evangelist, Sister Sharon Falconer and learning from her past from a gullible assistant. Elmer cons Sister Sharon and worms his way into the troupe preaching about “Christ in Commerce”.
Of course then as now, churches are all about money and keeping the doors open, and Elmer's showmanship drives the troupe to larger venues and attracts media attention. That reveals that both Elmer and Sister Sharon have no credentials to preach and quite humble origins. It wouldn't be a sixties movie or one about religion if sex didn't enter in so Sister Sharon succumbs to Elmer's charms. Up pops an old girlfriend, a pastor's daughter shamed by Elmer and rejected by her family so she turns to prostitution. Elmer winds up unknowingly leading a mob to the brother where the ex works, finds out the ex girlfriend is among them, and allows the hookers to escape out of town unscathed.
Poor Elmer just has to meet with the ex girlfriend, they embrace, and a hidden photographer snaps the picture that is used to blackmail the now wealthy and famous Elmer Gantry. Elmer shows up with nearly $350,000 in today's money, the pimp assisting the ex girlfriend publishes the pictures anyway and an angry mob ransacks the tent revival. The ex girlfriend joins the fun and witnesses Elmer get cursed by the mob, smeared with eggs and rotten produce and humiliated.
But it has to have a happy ending as all movies did in the sixties. The ex girlfriend runs back to the destroyed brothel, the pimp is expecting the money and starts whooping on the ex when she doesn't have it, Elmer shows up and saves the soiled dove and disposes of the pimp. The ex confesses to framing Elmer and clears his name, Elmer returns to Sister Sharon on the night their new rebuilt tent revival opens, and asks Sister Sharon to run away with him and leave the fake religion behind.
That doesn't work because “Gawd” has convinced Sister Sharon she is special, and a fire erupts burning poor misguided Sister Sharon to death. An excess of religious zeal is responsible for her death and Elmer walks away after quoting a bible verse.
The moral of the story and also the connection to the City Elders and GOP Chairman McLain is that false religion has a price. Religion and politics are the last refuge of con men, that is beyond doubt, but the piper demands his due. The truth doesn't stay hidden for long and when it bursts forth it is quite entertaining. True religion and true Christians do survive and prosper, they are all too aware of the face of charlatans using religion for their own ends.
Next week we will pick back up on the story of Oklahoma GOP Chairman David McLain and his minions. After posting the story on Facebook a handful of the less intelligent City Elders supporters popped up hollering persecution and witch burning so we rewarded their loyalty to their chosen savior with an additional week or research for every negative comment they posted. And they were smarter than we thought, it only took three times for them to learn arguing against the facts leads to poor decisions and a longer exposure of their savior in the news. Somehow I think that God is shaking his head over that and wondering if it was really, really, necessary to send his Son to save all of mankind.
