Televising Testimony: Kathryn Kuhlman and Your Faith and Mine by Dr

Televising Testimony: Kathryn Kuhlman and Your Faith and Mine by Dr. Amy Artman Transcript of the Billy Graham Center Annual Lecture delivered on September 29, 2011. When I came to the University of Chicago to work on a doctorate in the History of Christianity, I knew I would have archival work in front of me-it’s part and parcel of the work of a historian. My colleagues who were studying Christianity from the 1300s or 1600s were the ones who would tell stories of days, months, years spent looking through brittle papers, reading diaries with “s’s” that look like “f’s”, tucked away in libraries or sorting through manuscripts in cavernous archival collections. What I did not understand at the beginning was that I had a somewhat different archival experience ahead of me, namely, learning how to do archival research when the “documents” were video, not text. While friends of mine in other PhD endeavors sat in study carrels and leafed through manuscripts, I sat in a little room right below us, watching hour after hour after hour of video, video of the healing evangelist Kathryn Kuhlman. And what did I discover? The best way to explain is to tell the story of the video stored here at the Archives entitled “Johnny Carson Show-Tonight Show, Kathryn Kuhlman segment,” (October 15, 1974, VHS, V125, Collection 212, The Kathryn Kuhlman Collection). And it turns out that this video will be playing in the exhibit after the talk, so please go and check it out—it is fascinating. On October 15, 1974, Johnny Carson welcomed his next guest on The Tonight Show with the words, “I imagine there are very few people in this country who are not aware of Kathryn Kuhlman.” He continued, “She probably, along with Billy Graham, is one of the best known ministers or preachers in the country.” After a few more words of introduction, Carson announced Kuhlman. Doc Severensen led The Tonight Show orchestra as she stepped through the iconic curtains into one of the most famous studios in television history. The applause continued as she greeted Carson, whose attention was then drawn to the enthusiastic studio audience. As the clapping abated, Carson informed the television viewers that Kuhlman had received a standing ovation from the as many as 100 members of the live audience. After he and Kuhlman exchanged pleasantries, Carson paused, looked intently at Kuhlman and stated in a courteous manner, “You have been called hypnotic, charismatic, hypnotizing.” Kuhlman smilingly protested that she was “just the most ordinary person in the world.” Carson disagreed, replying “You’re not quite ordinary. I find you fascinating.” Kuhlman smiled.i To be dubbed “not quite ordinary” and even “fascinating” by the king of late night television in 1974 represented a triumph for both Kathryn Kuhlman and charismatic Christianity, the brand of Christianity she represented. Since people like Kuhlman had once been caricatured as “holy rollers,” “pew jumpers,” and more recently “charismaniacs” and “Jesus freaks,” Carson’s willingness to interview her was nothing short of remarkable, and his wry comment that she was not “quite” ordinary—as if she could be considered even in the proximity of ordinary –was in fact a significant compliment from this governor of popular culture. Charismatic Christianity, known for its emphasis on the gifts of the Holy Spirit, operated on the fringes of American religion and culture until the middle of the twentieth century. 1 Charismatic Christians were believed by American society “to be insanely fanatical, self- righteous, doctrinally mistaken, and emotionally unstable.”ii One reporter described a 1923 Pentecostal service as “a mighty religious intoxication” and ended the somewhat sympathetic article with the gently ironic statement, “And out on the street, these ‘peculiar people’ looked sane and normal-even as you and I.”iii Church leaders of the time expressed their apprehension that “psychopathic cases would result if full bent was given to the rising tide of emotionalism at these services.”iv Prejudices against charismatic worship, practice, and theology persisted for decades. Pentecostal evangelist Oral Roberts, an historical cohort of Kuhlman, became a lightning rod for national discomfort with the charismatic emphasis on faith healing. David Edwin Harrell noted, “In 1955, the journal The Christian Century warned, ‘This Oral Roberts sort of thing . can do the cause of vital religion . harm.’” The following year, proponents of divine healing were dubbed “racketeers” and “practitioners of religious quackery” by the National Council of Churches.v These accounts demonstrate that the backdrop for the conversation between Kuhlman and Carson was not just the faux skyline of “lovely downtown Burbank,” but also almost a century of skepticism, uneasiness and even open hostility toward charismatic Christianity. Set against this history, the response to Kuhlman by the Tonight Show audience and by Carson himself revealed a significantly positive transformation in the cultural tolerance for charismatic Christianity by late 1974. The life and ministry of Kathryn Kuhlman provide a much-needed framework for understanding the movement of charismatic Christianity from periphery to center in twentieth-century America. At first, charismatic Christianity was identified primarily with Pentecostalism, and for many years the standard doctrines held by Pentecostals were considered backward and ignorant by contemporary mainstream Christians and American popular culture.vi In the middle of the twentieth century, a new category of Christian emerged on the scene: the charismatic Christian. A charismatic Christian was one who was participating in the “charismatic renewal,” a new movement that combined Pentecostal practice and doctrine with attachment to historic mainline churches.vii The new charismatics practiced a “softened” version of Pentecostal theology. They retained the emphasis on the present reality of the spiritual gifts mentioned in the book of Acts, but did not insist upon the evidence of speaking in tongues to prove the presence of the baptism of the Holy Spirit in the life of a believer. While many Pentecostal leaders were uncomfortable with the “Pentecostalism Lite” represented by the charismatic renewal movement, some evangelicals were at ease with the dual identity of charismatic evangelical, especially as evangelicalism began to organize around the more open neo-evangelical movement led by Billy Graham. Some Baptists even claimed to be “Holy Ghost Baptists.” But during Kuhlman’s lifetime and under her leadership the designation of charismatic developed into something different from Pentecostal or evangelical or mainstream. In a chart of sets and subsets, “charismatic” would intersect the sets of mainstream, evangelical and Pentecostal Christianity, creating a new subset in American religious history. Kathryn Kuhlman was a leader in the transformation of charismatic Christianity from a suspect form of religion to a respectable form of religiosity that was accepted and even celebrated by mainstream Christianity and culture by the end of the twentieth century. During the course of her life, 1907- 1976, charismatic Christianity began to move from fringe to center, from questionable to 2 respectable, even desirable, for a growing number of American Christians. I call this transformation “gentrification.” The term “gentrification” is evocative and provocative when used in reference to urban areas, and no less so when applied to the changes charismatic Christianity experienced in the twentieth century. In urban neighborhoods, as interest builds, there is a change in public perception of an area from being uninteresting or even dangerous to being the new “hot spot.” Charismatic Christianity experienced this kind of media-driven metamorphosis; by the latter part of the twentieth century, it was not just tolerable, it was trendy. Popular culture as well as mainstream Christianity began to perceive charismatic Christianity as a valid, if still peculiar, religious choice. Kathryn Kuhlman’s life provides an orienting narrative, a road map for studying the gentrification of charismatic Christianity. At the time of her death in 1976, Kathryn Kuhlman was at the center of a charismatic ministry known throughout the world. Attracting capacity crowds throughout her 55 years of ministry, Kuhlman preached to hundreds of thousands of people. In just one example of her drawing power, in the last ten years of her life she preached at services every month to capacity crowds in the 7,000 seat Los Angeles Shrine Auditorium. During her career Kuhlman also hosted radio and television shows and headed a successful non- profit corporation, the Kathryn Kuhlman Foundation. In addition to her speaking and preaching, Kuhlman authored several best-selling books such as the collection of healing testimonies entitled I Believe in Miracles, which sold over a million copies. In 1975, when she came to Las Vegas to present one of her world-famous “miracle services,” she was greeted at the airport by the mayor, who declared the date Kathryn Kuhlman Day. And what about the Carson interview? How did it end? Kathryn Kuhlman held her own with Johnny Carson in Studio One. The rest of their conversation, which lasted until the band began to play the closing chords to signal the show’s end, was comfortable and congenial, but Carson never fully relaxed in the presence of his formidable and not-quite-ordinary guest. By the latter part of the twentieth century, the relationship of American popular culture and mainstream religion with charismatic Christianity was much the same as that between Kuhlman and Carson. The journey of charismatic Christianity from religious and cultural contempt to acceptance, albeit somewhat uneasy acceptance, was the narrative of Kuhlman’s life and is the focus of my work. Despite her successful career and remarkable popularity, Kathryn Kuhlman is largely forgotten by historians of American Christianity. There has not been much written about her. Once I decided that Kuhlman was the subject I was looking for to tell the story of charismatic Christianity’s rise and transformation in twentieth century America, I had to start to find more information about her.

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