PASTOR
OPRAH

Topics: Authenticity; Entertainment; Idolatry; Integrity; Longing; Spirituality; Teachers; Television

References: Deuteronomy 11:16; Mark 13:22; Acts 17:29; 2 Timothy 4:3–4; 2 Peter 2:1; 1 John 5:21

She has hosted The Oprah Winfrey Show for more than twenty years, amassing billions of dollars in assets and attracting more than 49 million viewers each week in the United States. People look to Oprah Winfrey for advice on everything from genocide in Rwanda to the best-tasting oatmeal cookies.

Many people also regard her as a spiritual leader. According to USA Today, “By the late 1990s, Winfrey’s focus was Change Your Life TV, and a New Age message was more prevalent. She preached, making the message of her life—take responsibility, and greatness will follow—the substance of the show. Keep a personal journal, purchase self-indulgent gifts, take time for you because you deserve it. The notes rang true to millions of viewers.”

Cathleen Falsani, religion writer for the Chicago Sun-Times, asks straight out: “Has Oprah become America’s pastor?”

There is evidence to support this conclusion. According to a November 2006 poll conducted by Beliefnet.com, which looks at how religion and spirituality intersect with popular culture, 33 percent of its sixty-six hundred respondents said Winfrey has had “a more profound impact” than their pastors on their spiritual lives.

Chris Altrock, pastor of Highland Street Church of Christ in Memphis, Tennessee, says, “Our culture is changing as churches are in decline and the bulk of a new generation is growing up outside of religion. People are now turning up at The Church of Oprah instead.”

Jim Twitchell, a professor at the University of Florida, believes that Oprah reverence makes sense. “Religion essentially is based on high anxiety of what’s going to happen to you,” he says. “Winfrey pushes the idea that you have a life out there, and it’s better than the one you have now, and go get it. It has to do with this deep American faith and yearning to be reborn. To start again.”

In The Gospel according to Oprah, Marcia Nelson says Oprah’s integrity has enhanced her spiritual stature. “One of the things that’s key is she walks her talk,” Nelson says. “That’s really, really important in today’s culture. People who don’t walk their talk fall from a great pedestal—think of scandals in the Catholic Church and in televangelism. If you’re not doing what you say you do, woe be unto you.”

—Ann Oldenburg, “The Divine Miss Winfrey?” USA Today (May 11, 2006)