Sing to the Lord a Hillsong

In my busy New York internship life, it’s difficult to find time to pencil in some fun between my workplace obligations of sexual harassment and Xeroxing Xeroxes so that colleagues can Xerox my Xeroxes of Xeroxes and promptly lose them. When I do get a break from having my knees massaged and trying not to vomit, I then find it difficult to find affordable fun. As I’m sure you know, New York is expensive. The temptation is to buy several industrial-sized bottles of wine that taste like the loose change that has collected at the bottom of my purse and lock myself in my room, but even this loses its appeal after the first several times. I say “loses its appeal” when actually I mean I can’t afford it.

My British neshama suggests going to museums. After all, the National Gallery (which is free) had become my London free toilet. (One of my hobbies is establishing toilets around cities the way some nations establish colonies.) However, in these United States most museums are actually quite expensive. I did manage to find something free called the “Museum of Biblical Art.” But after accidentally posting this picture on their giant TV screen through the wonders of social media:

…I was disappointed that the “Museum of Biblical Art” turned out to be the “One Room of Artistically Rendered Scrolls of Esther.” I had hoped for some meaty paintings. A Thomas ramming his hand into Jesus’ side the way I like to poke packages of ground beef at the supermarket. A panicked, bound Isaac asking Abraham, “WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK, DAD?” Instead I got a handful of mediocre Hebrew calligraphy.

So what does one do in New York for fun when one is poor?

One can go to church.

It’s free, and you’re guaranteed some kind of a show. In fact, the more you go the easier it is to spot a disaster. Usually my free-time trips to church involve a visit to a charismatic venue, but after joining the serving team at an Anglo-Catholic parish I have invented a new game called “Spot the Me,” in which I visit high churches and look for the server who cannot go two minutes without touching her nose, rolling her ankles, or accidentally doing “The Sprinkler” when her legs get caught in her cassock. So far I appear the be the only me.

However, the more I treat churches like a sporting event...

(or indeed sports like a church—see the Mets prayer circle)

…the more I notice the international phenomenon of the Weeping Australian, found in any denomination of church that refers to God as “awesome” in the Californian sense.

You’ve probably come across the Weeping Australian before if you’ve ever been to a charismatic church. He’s the teaching pastor who is so overwhelmed that you won’t let his mate Jesus Christ into your heart that he has to wipe away tears into the tiny vest he wears paired with his skinny jeans. What’s jarring about the Weeping Australian is that you’re used to seeing the Australian as either perpetually friendly or perpetually stabby/drunk, and yet here he is choking back a sob as he leads you in a round of applause for Jesus Christ, who was so kind as to grace us with His presence at this club tonight. His eyes are so overwhelmed with emotion that they are forced shut as he joins the band onstage to repeat the chorus for the 563rd time, in case God didn’t know how swell He is the first 562 times we let Him know.

My favorite Weeping Australian story occurred just last week. In a nightclub packed with young and lost New Yorkers, the WA invited us to close our eyes. Which was, of course, my cue to keep mine open. Experience told me that this was my favorite part—the Weeping Australian would stress to us the need to let Jesus back into our hearts as though JC were crying and hanging out on a porch in the rain waiting to be let inside. Usually the long closed-eyes ramble would increase in urgency, and when panic about how badly we need Jesus reached a climax the WA would invite us to put up our hands if we felt Jesus had been locked out for long enough and we wanted to let the poor man back in. With eyes closed, usually a hefty majority would put their hands up. However, on this particular Sunday at this particular service, I noticed that something like 10 people put their hands up. The Weeping Australian soon became the Panicked Australian. Over and over again he repeated the call to put your hand up if you wanted to vote for Jesus, and still no one else put their hand up. Realizing that this was as good as it was going to get, he then started “ooooing” and “aaaahing” at the sheer number of people who were recommitting themselves to Christ at this service. “Wow,” he told the temporarily blinded audience, “there are just SO many hands. This is really incredible.” Still the same 10 or so were not joined by more hands. “Wow…this is just so inspiring. So overwhelming.” Then, “Don’t open your eyes, keep them closed. This really is awesome, I wish you could see how many people want to recognize that Jesus Christ died for them." The music swells, the lights dance, and still no additional hands go up. "Just awesome, awesome. Amazing. …Okay, you can put your hands down…and open your eyes now.” It was, quite honestly, the most convincing argument I’ve ever witnessed that religion is complete crap.

And it’s not just Hillsong, which started in Australia and thus understandably has a heavy proportion of Australian team members. No, the Australians are everywhere in the evangelical world. As I sit through “Four Minutes of Fellowship” and sip a glass of water that a hot man in a tight t-shirt brought me on a silver tray, I reflect on the sheer number of Weeping Australians and can only assume that evangelism is a front for Australian imperialism. Secretly, the Australians are here to take over America through what they call “planting” these things they call “churches.” All I can say is, “LEAVE US BE! TAKE YOUR OUTBACK STEAKHOUSES AND BE GONE WITH YOU!”

I often like to imagine what it must be like for this never-ending stream of Weeping Australian pastors to come through US Customs and Border Control. The border control officer would subject the W.A. to a series of questions, during which the W.A. would silently and seamlessly cue a previously hidden band to start picking up their instruments behind him. Their seemingly nonsensical plucking and fiddling would ever so gradually form into an increasingly loud and coherent return to an evangelical power ballad. The pastor would get more frantic and out of breath and weepy with each answer, “16 Main Street.” “Four months!” “[*sniff*] for business!! [*choked sob*]” And still the music would grow in the background.

Finally the customs officer would say, “Anything to declare?” And the W.A. would respond by bellowing, “ONLY THE LOVE OF CHRIST CRUCIFIED!” as he bursts into tears and drops the mic that had seemed to materialize from nowhere, while the band erupts with yet another deafening refrain from Hillsong’s “I Will Rise."

Crap. I think I need to find a new free hobby besides churching.