There are many people who will find David Petersen's documentary Let the Church Say Amen inspiring. I am not one of them. This is not to say that there are not individuals portrayed in the film whose personal crusades are inspiring, but I am not of the school of thought that the benefits of religion -- specifically organized religion -- outweigh its detriments.
The film follows the proprietors and congregants of the World Missions for Christ Church in Washington DC. Battling poverty, hunger, drugs, violence, and mass dismissal by the affluent, these people fight a never ending crusade to help themselves and their brethren rise above their regrettable situation. Many of these individuals have stories which are touching, but their militant theism is alienating. It is not enough for Pastor Bobby Perkins and his brothers and sisters to help the destitute; all the good in the world it seems must be done by and for Jesus Christ.
The old saw that "God helps those who help themselves," is possibly the greatest example of a pernicious, self fulfilling prophecy ever recorded and the most transparent proof of organized religion's gleeful appropriation of autarchic acts of altruism and chance; that theists will still use this expression unironically baffles me. And this is what upsets me the most about institutions such as the World Missions for Christ Church. Why must the benevolence of these groups be so rooted in religious fundamentalism? I am of the opinion that organized religion -- and the concept of the afterlife, specifically -- developed as an empty solace for those who wondered, What is the point of this after we die? Rather than embrace the temporal nature of life, and in doing so value every choice and every action that much more, so many of us prefer to believe that there is an eternal reward waiting for us on another plane.
I could argue (as I have frequently to many people) that the question of an afterlife is irrelevant. All of our knowledge comes through our physical experiences, experiences which are filtered through our five senses. Without our physical bodies, we would experience the afterlife in ways we cannot even fathom now; we would be entirely different beings in an entirely different context with no relation to who we were before our death. This seems self evident to me. It also seems largely hypothetical, as I don't believe in an afterlife of any sort. But regardless, I am still hard pressed to understand why so many people in our world need the hollow comfort of organized religion. I am not one of those agnostics who will attack religion on all fronts; rather, I accept and appreciate the good that it does for those who live better lives for it. What bothers me is the inability of those people to accept an objective, relativist view of life and act generously to their fellow men for reasons that are not self serving. For ultimately, isn't all of this a little selfish? Aren't we all just trying to secure ourselves a spot in heaven with the angels? And escape eternal damnation and hellfire?
I admittedly haven't said much about the film, which is a competent, if somewhat uneven documentary. But when you're shouting at people with megaphones and singing "We're gonna kick the devil's butt!" with the fervent zeal of a man possessed by some unholy spirit, you can surely understand having a reaction more than a response.