UF Campus Preachers: A Review - Part 2

Read all articles on UF's campus preachers here. I have lots of relevant images here.

Since the first installment of this review, replete with a picture index and the emails and webpages of five of our infamous UF campus preachers, I have had phone interviews with Brother Jed and Ruben Israel, and compiled more information to report.

Ruben Israel and Bro. Jed accepted, while Tom Short, Frank Zaccaro** and Mike Siemer declined, phone interviews. (RI, BJ, TS, FW and MS, respectively) FW was even witty enough to reply to my email with a blank email, except for a signature at the bottom: "Sincerely, Frank". I responded and alerted him to the missing body of the email, which turned out to be intentional:

Daniel,
There was nothing in the message because that is all that the Bible has to say to Atheists. If God is not good enough for you then I certainly am not. The only warm regards you'll get from God is your butt burning in hell unless you snap out of it and trust in Jesus.
Saved by grace,
Frank

Hilarious. The "warm regards" he mentioned is from my own email signature: "With warm regards, Daniel".

I will summarize the phone interviews in as concise and interesting a format as possible.

Worst Beating/Heckling:

BJ -- "I had my ankle broken at the U of Wisconsin, my arm at Western Kentucky U." He said he received the ankle injury when, "someone pushed me off a bench," and, "[they] never found out who it was, and the police didn't do anything." He thinks that this was back in 1985. In telling me about the young man responsible for the broken arm, Jed said, "he was charged, given a plea bargain -- had to pay restitution...back in 1998."

RI -- On one of the most memorable backlashes from the audience: "I've been whipped with rosary beads." However, his worst beating was, "Not on college campus, it was with Jews...every May...your large city [sic] has a large 4th of July thing (that's when Israel won its independence [May])...Westwood, 3rd largest Jewish population -- that's where you go if you want to reach Jews...as we were going in, we knew it was going to be hostile. They got me as I was walking back to my car -- I was walking by some Jewish guys and they started to beat on me; if not for one Jewish guy who shielded me, cause they were pounding on me, it would've been pretty bad..."

Comment on success:

BJ -- "Salvations have remained about the same -- typically people who get saved through my ministry don't get saved on the spot...read my letters on the website." Jed thinks that only about 10% of Christians agree with him, because they have been taught friendship evangelism: find an unbeliever, introduce yourself, make yourself friendly, find some common ground, etc. "Initially you don't even say anything about your faith...gradually introduce your faith to them...I find the main approach to evangelism biblically is preaching publicly out where the sinners are and preaching against sin -- [it comes with] different rules for preaching than one-on-one..."

RI -- Despite the obvious lack of support from the audiences, Ruben assures me, "it is growing incredible". He continued, "Many churches will say, 'I disagree with what they're doing,' but behind closed scenes, they pat us on the back...We were just in Georgia, and now there are 5-6 Bible studies from what we did there...we look at this as fruit...we're not just a hatemongering group." He told me that people don't know how large their network is -- Bible Believers has 40 chapters nationwide -- in Atlanta, PA, Columbia. He bragged a bit about their legal support and legal successes in cases where campus preachers have been challenged.

Comment on interacting with our generation [Next]:

BJ -- "I still virtually wherever I go gather good sized crowds...back into the 70s and well into the 80s my crowds were generally larger...I have made some adjustments in my ministry -- I'm probably less provocative than I was in my earlier years...I don't think it is necessarily the hearts of the students...more distractions for the students -- the two main ones are the internet and cell phones. So often now...they're talking to someone over the cell phone...they're more distractions that you have to compete with...sometimes the new technology works in your favor -- for example a cell phone caller telling a friend [that BJ is out there preaching]. I don't think the changes over the years and the reactions of the students are significantly different...same questions, inane comments, not much has changed in 32 years; they think they're coming up with these original brilliant comments or questions, I've heard it literally thousands of times..."

RI -- "We have what I would call a microwave generation...I would say 20 years ago you could actually debate on a college campus for 2 hours, and actually have the students involved in the debate for two hours. Now you only have a quick time with this student before he gets bored...if you're not a little bit provocative and shocking, you're going to lose this student...satellite TV, 300 channels, but they put the remote down and say, 'there's nothing on TV'...you have to be shocking. [Student] attention spans used to be hours, now it's just 20 minutes, if that...we are a little bit entertainers...our motive is to try to make that student stop, miss class, ask questions..."

I asked Ruben how he thought the atmosphere was today versus 20 or 30 years ago: "I think they're a little bit more mellow...Berkeley was radical...professional mockers would wait for guys with a black book with their hand; nowadays it's nothing, usually a younger preacher will call me and say, 'This happened...' and I'll say, 'That's nothing!'"

On finances:

BJ -- On his finances, Jed said, "most of my support is from individuals, not churches, about 15% from churches...from individuals that I have met from speaking in churches...and then there will be a percentage that are people who were influenced during their college years by my ministry...probably about 10% supporters." "We live comfortably, we have a 5BR, 3BA home in a nice subdivision in Columbia MO...when I travel I stay in homes with people or have a nice motel room...the Lord has provided well for us over the years...with my oratorical skills I probably could have made more money in some other type work than I do..."

RI -- Ruben is a businessman out of LA, and his painting business must be doing fairly well -- he reports that he finances his own preaching, spending around $20-25K a year on travel. That is certainly something I respect of him: that he solicits no donations. Of course, you could argue that he is unlikely to receive much from his typical audiences: NOW marchers (he calls them "rebellious women"), Mardi Gras partiers, atheists...even football fans!

Next planned visit:

BJ -- he told me the second week of classes this spring, and his schedule here says the 18th-19th of January.

RI -- no clear date, but he said sometime in February or March.

More information on Ruben:

Ruben Israel Chavez learned much under the tutelage of "Bible Jim" Webber, whose Vegas antics are renowned, as he preaches frequently at the Bellagio Hotel. Now involved in open-air preaching for almost 3 decades, Ruben heads up the Official Street Preachers website, and is an Asst. Director of Street Preachers Fellowship. He tells me he has been doing open-air preaching and has been affiliated with the activity for the past 27 years. His infamy has even landed him a mention on the Glenn Beck website and show.

You can watch video of Ruben preaching in various venues on his media page. Thus, he is an authoritative voice in the arena of street-preaching (or, as they call it, "open air preaching") as administrator, organizer and participant. Ruben told me that Bible Believers, with its 40 chapters nationwide, acts as a sort of umbrella for himself, BJ and other independent ministers.

Part of this organization's major effort is directed at defending the right to conduct their open-air preaching in the "free speech zones" on university campuses. He claimed that recently, at UNO, a campus preacher was kicked off campus, even with a permit. He said he brought in 13 other campus preachers in his organization, returned, and that they got into a small altercation with the university police, which then went all the way up to the dean.

Ruben said there were 12 different teams that traveled the country doing this that he knew of -- all affiliated in some way one of the organizations he's connected to. He said that, "We've had many people who have decided it's not for them; [it's] counting the cost, not for everyone -- confrontational evangelism. Your younger Christian will say, 'this is horrible' but they don't understand...we're all the body, different parts..." While RI believes that some Catholics are saved, he is, "Against religion in general; religion is the worst thing that mankind can make...when the pope comes to town we try to send guys out there with banners: don't pray to Mary; there's no purgatory; we don't find the word 'Pope' in the bible..."

Finally, remarking on the disruptive character of what they do, Ruben called on the Constitution: "Freedom of religion surpasses freedom of speech; not even the laws can surpass you...we have a lot more rights than some guy just walking to class...If I offend the whole campus, I'm not going to miss one meal...I just don't want to offend God."

More information on Bro. Jed:

Jed's campus preaching started in Indiana 32 years ago. He has been on college campuses virtually 5 days a week, from around 12 PM - 5 PM during class days, ever since.

**UPDATE (1/29/07): See 12 videos of BJ at UF here**

I hate to rehash when much has been written about the man already: see the Wikipedia article, Who Will Rise Up? (autobiography which details his life and ministry), and his FAQ from an alt.usenet group. A lot of our phone call involved Radical Bill, longtime friend and somewhat an alter-ego of BJ; Bill and BJ were almost in collusion in the way they would stage their dialogue and debates here at UF, and then Jed would ask Bill to go out and buy dinner for him. I wrote more about Bill about in part 1, and he recently appeared in this recent Alligator article, which features a picture of Radical Bill sitting out in the Plaza of the Americas like the Buddha, debating a campus preacher.

In learning more, it seems Bill stretched the truth about Jed's wife -- Jed claims she never got involved in the drug or alcohol scene, just disco dancing. Some of the most interesting stuff I found was when I located, scanned and uploaded the six page Rolling Stone article on BJ. You can visit the index to download them or right-click and save each page. It's definitely worth your read. If the following links are broken, see here.

--index-- --page 1-- --page 2-- --page 3-- --page 4-- --page 5-- --page 6--

BJ's comments on the article: "I did not think it to be too bad an article," although Jed believed that it had a "particular slant you would expect...the quotes were accurate, but sometimes taken out of the context in which I said these things..."

Jed told me he also was followed a little by Bill O'Reilly back when Bill was still with ABC News, around 1986, Jed believes. "[A] NPR radio interview [was] probably about the best thing I've had the national media do on me 2003-4, when the interviewer asked me the media coverage I got -- I never noticed Bill being so confrontational and aggressive as he is now, [interviewer said] 'maybe you influenced O'Reilly...I see the value of your confrontational-aggressive approach, I'm reconsidering my style.'"

Jed told me that he did not actually train Tom Short, as Radical Bill informed me, but he did influence Tom's career: TS and Jed are "good friends," but "Tom never really traveled with me...I first met Tom in about '78..." Tom was a student in Ohio at the time, when BJ came to preach, and as a Christian, Tom "...questioned my approach and methods," but Jed turned the tables on him, after asking Tom what he did as a Christian to spread the gospel: after affirming that Tom wasn't very active in ministry, Jed retorted, "I like the way I'm doing it wrong better than the way you're not doing anything at all!" Within a year, Jed said Tom was preaching.

Another interesting little intersection [it's a small world, after all...] is that David Miller, dad of Christine, is often Jed's host when Jed is traveling here to preach at UF. For more on that story, see footnote [2] of part 1.

I'll close out the information on BJ by quoting some of his views on politics. I asked him these questions to see if his views had much changed in the 20-odd years since the Rolling Stone article, when he answered these same questions:

On poverty in the US: "Virtually no one is starving in America...perhaps suffering from malnutrition...I haven't heard of people starving, and I don't see a reason they should have to with all the church programs..."
On disenfranchisement: "If you're on welfare, and not really contributing to the system, then you ought not be allowed to vote."
On welfare: "Robbing from the more productive members of society to redistribute ... I believe in charity...but I don't think they ought to be required by law to help the poor."
On the rise of the Religious Right: "I don't think the religious right has been at all able to implement its agenda in the political realm to any great significance."
On political theory: "My 3 principles of good civil government are based on limited civil government, individual responsibility and private property...Democrats and socialists want to victimize everybody...they fail to make distinctions between public and private property...I oppose anti-smoking legislation in public places...these restaurants and hotels are open to the public but they are privately owned."
On education policy: "I don't believe the state ought to be in the business of handing out scholarships...it should be privately done."
On slavery: "In these tribal societies, the members of the tribe were virtually slaves of the tribal chiefs...I think they often had more freedom in the slave system in America than they did back in Africa...cannibalism was prominent...various tribes found out they could, instead of cannibalizing their POWs, they could sell them to slave traders."

Some UF incidents:

Although both Bro. Jed and Ruben agreed that college campus atmospheres are much less violent in their reactions to them, there is always a little drama, and both admitted to trying to entertain a bit and engage in theatrics in order to procure an audience. Two incidents I witnessed recently include an angry student getting in Tom Short's face and some backlash from Catholics who Michael Siemer condemned.

The most dramatic point I have personally witnessed was during my 3 days interacting with Tom Short when a young man, a skeptic, got in Tom's face and yelled at him not to malign science. He literally screamed right in his face. This was during Tom's tortured attempt to try to argue that science is bad because it doesn't say "God might've done it." The young man was very angry, and I strongly disagreed with his outburst. It actually had me worried for a moment that the young man was going to assault Tom. I booed at him. He looked like a fanatic loon, as if Tom had insulted his mother, rather than stumbling and fumbling his way through a pitiful refutation of science. The young man screamed something along the lines of, "LEAVE SCIENCE ALONE!!!" or "DON'T EVEN TALK ABOUT SCIENCE!!!"

Some of the flak comes from other Christians. Michael Siemer, for example, was recently beset by Catholics who surrounded him and were angry that he included them on his giant "surefire goin' to hell list". They began to chant the "Holy Mary, Mother of God..." thing, which Mike later told me was a sort of demonic chant [snicker]. There were probably about four of them, and they continued to pray, with Mike saying, "They're praying to a false god, man."

Conclusion:

Like, love or hate campus/open-air preachers, they aren't going away anytime soon. In part 1 I suggested some methods to use to counter their more offensive and outrageous antics, but I think that rational discourse will always win over dogma and fanaticism. I'll certainly be out in Turlington [see webcam] each time I am able when one of them is out there, and part of my effort here is directed towards the hope that others will join me. We come to a university to broaden our horizons, and these sorts of people present us with another opportunity to do just that -- to learn; and it is always healthy to question what we, and others, take for granted.

• UF Campus Preachers -- Part 1 of 2
• UF Campus Preachers -- Part 2 of 2

**It turns out that Frank Zaccaro is the correct name, not Frank Warner. "frankwarner" was his email, but he told me he meant "warner" as in "to warn".

Read all articles on UF's campus preachers here. I have lots of relevant images here.
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