Radio Free Church

Last updated on: February 1, 2019 at 8:00 am by Coyle Neal

Radio Free Church 2019-01-31T13:24:18-07:00 Coyle Neal

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Image: Penguin

There are two ways to look at the ideas in Bill McKibben’s Radio Free Vermont. The first is that McKibben has gone so far to the Left that he has functionally come full-circle into the Right. The other is that Left and Right still overlap in a few key areas. In either case, this book is a fun and thoughtful read and you should all go out and pick it up.

Vern Barclay didn’t set out to be a revolutionary. At the end of a decades-long radio broadcasting career (for you youngsters out there: ‘radio’ is what people listened to while working before the Internet. You couldn’t pick what was on it, though in many places there were lots of options to choose from), Barclay merely wanted to go out with a mild protest against the opening of a new Walmart in rural Vermont. Due to a series of events largely beyond his control, the protest gets out of control and he gets blamed for the destruction of large amounts of merchandise. On the run, he begins broadcasting pirate podcasts opposing Starbucks in favor of local coffeeshops, opposing Budweiser in favor of local brews, and opposing the national government in favor of a second Vermont republic. (Yes, there was a first one.) Due to a series of bungling missteps by various government officials, the movement takes off and spreads like wildfire, ending [spoiler alert] in a vote by town meetings across Vermont on whether to instruct the state legislature to consider secession.

Clearly to some extent this is outlandish–a “fable,” as the subtitle has it. But as with all good fables, Radio Free Vermont is both a rollicking good story and carries an important lesson: small and local is better. The farther away an institution is, the less it cares about what is actually good for you and me as individuals, and the less concerned it is with not destroying the things that matter most to us.

With that said, McKibben draws back from drawing the really controversial conclusions. Concerned Vermonters ask what will happen to their Social Security and Medicaid if they secede, and are told over and over that they’ll still receive it. Aside from whether or not this is really true (I suspect a state that withdrew from the Union would be cut off from all federal services, though of course it hasn’t happened in a century and a half, so who knows?), if big and distant are bad then the Social Security system and the Medicaid system are going to be vastly worse than anything Walmart can do. Rather than just say we shouldn’t depend so much on them in the first place, the book leaves that implied rather than tackling it directly (other than a brief mention by a supporting character).

Specific policies aside there is something here that should resonate with Christians. We do have a God who is powerful, apart, and above us; but he is not a God who is distant and unconcerned. Where we had separated ourselves from him by our sin, he sent his Son to become a man and reconcile us to him through his own life, death, and resurrection. What’s more, when we are reconciled to God, we are saved individually and then brought into a small, intimate, local institution. The church is not to be some distant, unapproachable, and uncaring institution. It is to be a concerned and intimate body where people know each other and because of that knowledge are better able to care for and serve each other. Small and local is better and, as it happens, Biblical in any case.

So enjoy Radio Free Vermont, and use it as a way to think carefully about politics and as a fable about what Scripture says the church should be.

Dr. Coyle Neal is co-host of the City of Man Podcast and an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Southwest Baptist University in Bolivar, MO

Previous Post

January 29, 2019

A melancholy glimpse of a hopeful future

Next Post

February 5, 2019 Malin Hatch is no Pendergast

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Action AFI Top 100 Animation Best Picture Winner BFI Top 250 Biography Biopic Books Childrens Christian Classics Classics Comedy Crime Documentary Drama Editor's Choice Family Fantasy Fantasy Films Foreign Historical Historical Fiction History Horror Horror IMDB Top 250 Indie Memoir Modern Novel Musical Mystery Non-Fiction Oscars Philosophy Poetry Popular Literature Reading and Writing Reality Romance Science Fiction Science Fiction Silent Sports Thriller TV Show Uncategorized Western Westerns Young Adult

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 June 2017 January 2017 December 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Who did angels visit, warning of Sodom's destruction?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Abram Lot Laban Noah