I came across an advert a while back for a new book published by Harvard University Press that delves into the life of one of America's most colorful religious leaders, Aimee Semple McPherson. It purports to connect Aimee to what became the Religious Right. It's a book that I plan to read, as I've read all the other major pieces about her, from Lately Thomas' exposes of years back to Edith Blumhoffer's more recent biography.
Well yesterday I came across an
LA Times review by Michael Gross of the newest book, and from the looks of things, this is something of a disappointment. It appears that Sutton's book:
'Aimee Semple McPherson and the Resurrection of Christian America' uses Aimee as a foil for other agendas. And, perhaps Sutton finds it difficult to understand this figure who in her own day was bigger than Hollywood's starlets.
She remains a difficult figure to understand, not merely because of celebrity culture's idolatrous tendencies, but also because she embodies a contradiction that threatens Puritan, fundamentalist and New Age pieties alike: Everyone is unavoidably crooked, and everyone can receive the power to be good, and there is no end to the repetition of getting lost and finding the way back to the truth of this confounding situation.
Sutton's apparent difficulty accepting this contradiction is the great weakness of his book. McPherson often becomes a vehicle for Sutton's arguments, which almost overshadow her agonizingly, absurdly fascinating character. Even the pitiless H.L. Mencken, who usually looked at a Christian and saw a "half-wit," was so moved by McPherson's story as to set aside his formidable prejudices. "The lady, indeed, was so tragic that she made me uncomfortable,
hardened though I was to the grinning mask of Hollywood," he wrote.
Perhaps writing is a less effective mode for understanding McPherson than performance. But that would take an actress who can suggest the redemptive in the intolerable without overplaying one to explain away the other. Reese Witherspoon, your future awaits.
I still plan to read this book, but it would appear that we still await the definitive work about her life. As I understand it there is more to be said. As for the purported dalliance with Kenneth Ormiston, the church continues to deny it, though circumstantial evidence suggests otherwise. Perhaps with Roberta Semple's death
Edith Blumhoffer will shed further light -- I have heard that Roberta gave her information that she wasn't to release during Roberta's lifetime. And Gross is probably right -- Aimee's story needs to be told on the big screen!!
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