Thursday, October 23, 2003
Copyright © Las Vegas Mercury

Keep on keepin' on

Promise Keepers have a more tolerant tone, but critics remain wary

By Newt Briggs

Last Saturday at the Thomas & Mack Center--home to UNLV's Runnin' Rebels basketball team--nearly 7,500 men surged to their feet and cheered wildly for a popular hoopster. In this case, though, it wasn't because former NBA star A.C. Green had thrown down a nasty dunk or drained a game-winning three-pointer, it was because he had abstained from sex until marriage and is currently working on a series of feature-length films that explore "contemporary Christian issues."

Welcome to the peculiar world of Promise Keepers, a nondenominational Christian men's organization that hosts male-only conventions in sports arenas across the United States and calls on its followers to practice "spiritual, moral, ethical and sexual purity." Founded by controversial ex-University of Colorado football coach Bill McCartney--a man known simply as "Coach" to his devotees--Promise Keepers further requires that men go to church, be faithful to their wives and refrain from using drugs or alcohol.

As a result, it has been grouped among "the most dangerous and radical of America's religious groups." The National Organization for Women dubbed it a "feel-good form of male supremacy," and the Center for Democratic Studies accused it of conspiring "to advance the strategic political agenda of the Christian right."

"People have become accustomed to seeing men behave badly," explains Promise Keepers Vice President Harold Velasquez during a break at the group's Las Vegas conference. "So any time they see men gathering together, they immediately think that something's up, that there's some kind of vast conspiracy at work."

One can hardly fault such suspicion. Since 1991, more than 5 million men have participated in Promise Keepers' neo-revivals--this despite the fact that "Coach" McCartney aligned himself with the radical anti-abortion group Operation Rescue, called the abortion-rights debate "a second civil war" and described homosexuality "an abomination." During that time, Promise Keepers' leadership also blamed the "national crisis" on the "feminization of men" (Tony Evans) and endorsed "Uncle Tom" as a "role model" for African-Americans (Wellington Boone).

In recent years, though, the group has made a concerted effort to shift the focus back to its positive platform. "It's not about what we're against, it's about what we're for," Velasquez insists. "We call men to lead by serving. We ask them to put others first, to be more intentional about giving themselves to their family and to always consider their wives and children before themselves."

Considered in the abstract, this may seem a noble goal--one that recalls Martin Luther King Jr.'s edict, "Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness." In practice, however, the Promise Keepers' ideology is fraught with paradoxes. Even its polished rhetoric suffers from a series of obvious contradictions. For example, in accordance with the group's lead/serve dichotomy, men are encouraged to "revere" their wives but are told to firmly reassert their role as the "head of household."

"The language of Promise Keepers is intentionally ambiguous and misleading," says Megan Capehart, who helped organize a Friday afternoon protest by local feminist organization Third Wave in Nevada outside the Thomas & Mack. "They'll talk about how a lot of men grew up in controlling households and how that's not the way to raise a family, but in the next sentence they'll say that men should take charge. It's extremely hypocritical."

Even so, a blanket dismissal of Promise Keepers belies the group's potential for serving the social good. According to Jeff Sheetz--a volunteer for the Michigan-based, nonprofit recovery program Alcoholics for Christ--Promise Keepers has been instrumental in the formation of more than 50 satellite branches of his group. "They've helped us connect with troubled people who need treatment all over the country," says Sheetz.

And for many, Promise Keepers has served as a bridge back to forsaken family. "Years ago, my wife and I were separated," says Las Vegan Leslie Adolphus, who was subsequently estranged from his two sons for 12 years. "When I tried to reconnect and reunite with my boys, they were so bitter--and are still so bitter--that I found it very difficult to establish any kind of bond with them. I am hoping that this conference will give me tools that I might need to mend that rift."

To its credit, Promise Keepers has also noticeably toned down its public stance on divisive issues. Asked about Promise Keepers' history of misogyny and homophobia, longtime Promise Keeper and self-proclaimed "conservative comedian" Brad Stine replies, "Every movement has its fanatics and flaws."

"I find it problematic that any so-called Christian would go out and try to stigmatize another group--whether it be the homosexuals or whoever--as the ultimate evil," says Stine, whose comedy has been featured on MTV, Showtime and A&E. "You can't possibly argue to me that a tiny percentage of the population is doing more damage to the family than heterosexuals have done during the past 2,000 years. I mean, who are we to judge another group when many of us can't even live by our own standards?"

Ultimately, the whole hubbub over Promise Keepers may be of little consequence since attendance at its conventions has been in decline since 1996, when 1.1 million men attended 22 conferences across the country (an average of 50,000 per event). By comparison, 2002 saw only 176,000 men visit 16 conferences nationwide (or roughly 11,000 per event). And last month, "Coach" McCartney finally stepped down as the organization's acting president, passing the torch to former General Motors executive Tom Fortson. Only time will tell if Fortson will keep the Promise Keepers on the path toward tolerance and moderation.