Thank you for alerting me to your breaking-news scoop on a celebrity and his troubles.
No, I don’t think I need to blog about it.
I’ve been through enough hardships of my own to know that having people blog about them would only intensify the suffering for all involved and indicate that the public has a right to shove their noses into my personal business. There are far better ways to respond to celebrity gossip than to throw fuel on destructive flames.
Please write again when there’s something more rewarding to discuss.
Not a fan of the “I’m sure they’d appreciate our prayers” approach, eh?
Heh. Not really.
9 out of 10 times, such stories come across as “I have this GREAT gossip, but because I’m a Christian I’m going to cloak it in terms of spiritual concern.” And because I’m a tad-bit cynical, I suspect that many of those “reporters” don’t even bother to spend time in any kind of sincere prayer themselves.
Now, if it’s a matter of someone suffering a life-threatening illness, and the news is already public knowledge (say, for instance, the traumatic brain injury and eventual death of Natasha Richardson), I don’t see any harm in reminding people to pray for the victim, the family, and the loved ones who are suffering in the hour of their distress. Better to pray than to waste much time watching 15 different entertainment news stories about the movies that made this person important.
But no, not in cases of “So-and-so is pregnant and nobody knows who the father is!” or “So-and-so’s spouse walked out!” More often than not, the appetite of “inquiring minds” is what’s really driving the reports, however piously they’re reported.
After the news was common knowledge, I did make an online comment about how it might be a good time to pray for the Redgrave/Neeson families and their community, that they would be comforted and that God would speak powerfully into their distress. I received a response from a reader who said, “Why wait for a crisis? Shouldn’t you have been praying for them already?”
That was a rather bewildering response.
Do I have time to spend all day praying for every random celebrity and their family while they’re in good health and there’s no apparent urgent need? Uh, no. I hardly spend enough time in prayer for my own family, not to mention my neighbors, friends, and coworkers. I mean… if the person responding had felt moved to pray for Natasha and her family for months before there was any news, well… more power to him! That would have been an interesting impulse, to say the least, but far be it from me to criticize.
Still, I was rather baffled by that reply. Let’s spin the wheel: Which random celebrity shall I pray for tonight? If I really have *that* kind of time, I think of many other priorities that will rise to the top.
That’s why, when I get frequent mailings from organizations asking me to join their pray-for-celebrities networks (oh, and send money, so they can continue to generate lists of powerful celebrities who have been judged as spiritually lacking), I just toss them unopened into the recycle bin. I’m glad there are people willing to pray for celebrities, but if I’m really going to donate *money* to some kind of “prayer program,” there are issues both local and global that seem more necessary for my attention than than, say, whether or not Seth Rogen has accepted Jesus into his heart.