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The Power of Pious PR

The Power of Pious PR

Last updated on: September 23, 2025 at 3:45 am by Stuart Delony

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The Power of Pious PR 2025-09-21T15:03:25-04:00 Stuart Delony

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A gallery worker paints one tooth brighter on a massive framed portrait of a smiling mouth, symbolizing the act of whitewashing truth.

Image created via DALL-E

When I graduated high school, one of my closest friends left to be a Mormon missionary. He wasn’t devout. He wasn’t burning with the bosom for what Joseph Smith was selling. Honestly, he was just a kid doing what his parents wanted. Three months in, he was diagnosed with cancer and forced to come home. A year later, he was gone.

I thought I was prepared for his funeral. I wasn’t.

What I saw that day has haunted me ever since. The church didn’t bury my friend — they buried him under a pile of marketing copy. Leaders turned his death into a recruitment drive. They spoke of a young man ablaze with faith, a missionary martyr, an example for the flock. Never mind that he already had cancer before he left. Never mind that he was dry, funny, and mostly indifferent to religion, just trying to make his parents happy. That truth wasn’t useful. What was useful was the fiction they spun — a symbol designed to guilt others into Mormon submission.

That was my first taste of religious whitewashing. And it’s exactly what’s happening right now with Charlie Kirk.

Martyr by Marketing

Kirk’s killing was senseless violence, the kind of American nightmare that plays out far too often — in churches, schools, and parking lots. His life was complicated — white-nationalism-lite wrapped in gospel packaging, grievance politics baptized in the name of Jesus. Less theologian, more curated social media shock jock.

But none of that matters now, because the myth machine is humming. Regardless of where one stands on Kirk, what’s happening now around his memory demands sober attention.

Timothy Cardinal Dolan went on Fox & Friends to crown Kirk as a “modern-day St. Paul.” He praised him as a missionary, an evangelist, a man who always spoke with “respect.” That’s one hell of a rewrite. The Kirk we actually knew thrived on outrage, sneers, and division. Respect wasn’t his brand; contempt was. But Dolan wasn’t giving an obituary. He was delivering a sales pitch.

Over at Prestonwood Baptist, Pastor Jack Graham — joined by other pastors — rolled out what he called Kirk’s “final words.” Except they weren’t. They were AI. A cloned voice conjured to preach from beyond the grave: “Pick up your cross, and get back in the fight.” The congregation rose to their feet, cheering an algorithm. Forget resurrection — we’ve got digital necromancy. Weekend at Bernie’s meets the Book of Revelation, and the church ate it up.

The Myth Machine

This is how the machine works: reality is inconvenient, so it gets paved over. Kirk didn’t die as a martyr for Jesus. He was a political brawler who courted controversy and monetized grievance. But that doesn’t sell. What sells is sainthood. What mobilizes the base is martyrdom.

So the spin cycle begins. House Speaker Mike Johnson calls him a man of deep faith. Megachurch pastors insist his death should “not be in vain.” Congress passes a bipartisan resolution in his honor. The right rages in his name — which is just code for another excuse to rage — while viral clips of AI-Kirk are passed around as if they were gospel truth.

It’s the same trick I saw at my friend’s funeral, just scaled up. Institutions don’t want messy humans. They want usable legends. The living Charlie Kirk wasn’t enough. They need Saint Charlie, patron martyr of the culture war.

Why the Lies Matter

None of this is harmless. Whitewashing rewrites history in real time. It manufactures consent. It canonizes a man whose legacy should be examined, not embalmed in sanctimony. Worse, it teaches the faithful to cheer for propaganda, even when it’s generated by a machine.

When Dolan, Graham, or Congress sanctify Kirk, they’re not just honoring a man. They’re discipling a movement in the art of willful delusion. They’re preaching that truth is optional, narrative is king.

And that’s the point. They don’t just want to control policy. They want to own memory.

My Friend, My Fear

At my friend’s funeral, I sat in the pew listening to leaders describe someone I didn’t know. It felt like gaslighting — though I didn’t have that word yet. I wondered if anyone else noticed or if I was the crazy one for remembering who he really was.

That’s what I feel again now. I remember the Kirk who sneered at opponents, stoked division, and built an empire on grievance. And I see the Kirk being sold as a saint, a martyr, a hero of the faith. The dissonance is jarring, but it’s deliberate.

And if we don’t push back on this whitewashing, we’ll let lies become liturgy.

Benediction

Charlie Kirk wasn’t St. Paul. He wasn’t a martyr. He was a culture-war brawler — and his legacy deserves truth-telling, not sainthood. His death was tragic, like every life lost to America’s gun violence. But the myth machine grinds on. It always does.

The question is whether we’ll keep letting pious PR rewrite reality while we nod along in the pews. Because if truth can be swapped out this easily — with sermons, soundbites, and AI deepfakes — then maybe the only real martyr left is reality itself.

For more Snarky Faith, check out the podcast and more:

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About Stuart Delony

I’m Stuart Delony, a former pastor who walked out of the church but couldn’t shake the ways of Jesus. These days, I host Snarky Faith—a podcast and platform that wrestles with faith, culture, and meaning from the fringe. I’m not here to fix Christianity. I’m here to name what’s broken, find what’s still worth keeping, and hold space for the questions that don’t have clean answers. If you’ve been burned, disillusioned, or just done with the noise—welcome. You’re in good company. You can read more about the author here.

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