npr | On Wednesday's Fresh Air, Rachel Tabachnick, who researches
the political impact of the religious right, joins Terry Gross for a
discussion about the growing movement and its influence and connections
in the political world.
Tabachnick says the movement currently
works with a variety of politicians and has a presence in all 50 states.
It also has very strong opinions about the direction it wants the
country to take. For the past several years, she says, the NAR has run a
campaign to reclaim what it calls the "seven mountains of culture" from
demonic influence. The "mountains" are arts and entertainment;
business; family; government; media; religion; and education.
"They
teach quite literally that these 'mountains' have fallen under the
control of demonic influences in society," says Tabachnick. "And
therefore, they must reclaim them for God in order to bring about the
kingdom of God on Earth. ... The apostles teach what's called 'strategic
level spiritual warfare' [because they believe that the] reason why
there is sin and corruption and poverty on the Earth is because the
Earth is controlled by a hierarchy of demons under the authority of
Satan. So they teach not just evangelizing souls one by one, as we're
accustomed to hearing about. They teach that they will go into a
geographic region or a people group and conduct spiritual-warfare
activities in order to remove the demons from the entire population.
This is what they're doing that's quite fundamentally different than
other evangelical groups."
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