Katelyn Beaty - Celebrities for Jesus: How Personas, Platforms, and Profits Are Hurting the Church

The ancient temptations Jesus experienced in the wilderness have morphed into toxic cultures of celebrityand this is cause for great concern. Katelyn Beaty prophetically helps us to see the dangers compromising the churchs witness in the world and ways we can live with greater integrity. This book is a great gift and should be required reading for all who love the church.

Rich Villodas , pastor of New Life Fellowship; author of The Deeply Formed Life

The way of Jesus isnt usually found in brands, name recognition, or programs. Its found in relationships, humility, and servant leadership. In Celebrities for Jesus , Beaty beautifully reminds us that pastors and churches shouldnt try to compete with the world by looking like the world through programs, platforms, and numbers but instead should work toward resembling the life of Jesus by making little Christs. Celebrities for Jesus is a much-needed book at this very moment in the church.

Chris Hennessey , stay-at-home dad

In this stupendously convicting and well-researched book, Beaty probes the soul of the celebrity pastor and, more hauntingly, examines how we the people help create such larger-than-life figures. With the inexorable transition to more online forms of discipleship in the digital age, Celebrities for Jesus provides a timely, sober reflection on the toxic culture that often arises when piety and popularity mix.

Jemar Tisby, New York Times bestselling author of The Color of Compromise and How to Fight Racism

The word celebrity comes from Latin and its root means often repeated. In this book, Beaty reveals how the stories of celebrities too often end the same way, even for those claiming to follow Jesus. With the tone of a trusted confidant, she shines a light on what happens behind the scenes of Christian celebrity culture. She illuminates the problem this presents to the church, while offering hints of ways we might change our current trajectory to prevent repeating history. Its a timely read.

DShan Berry , follower of Jesus and lover of words

We are in the midst of a reckoning on the role of celebrity within American evangelicalism. From her position of being inside the machine, Beaty brings two key elements to this compelling book. First, she brings knowledge and insights that will help anyone wanting to disentangle their faith from celebrity culture. But, even more than this, she offers an honest, humble self-examination that is a model many of us in the church need to follow.

Karen Swallow Prior , professor, Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary; author of On Reading Well: Finding the Good Life through Great Books

This timely book offers the reader a close, revealing, and challenging look at celebrity Christianity. It doesnt point fingers but rather holds up an overdue mirror to American Christian pop culture. Beatys journalism bona fides are on full display as she highlights familiar and maybe unfamiliar stories about large segments of American Christianity filled with unchecked power, manipulative charisma, and cultures of enablement. Her vulnerable self-reflection and theological survey are an added bonus that strengthens her credibility. This work contributes to a growing body of thoughtful commentary on church dysfunction with the hope of transformation.

Christina Edmondson , leadership development consultant, Certified Cultural Intelligence facilitator, and cohost of the Truths Table podcast

We are living in an age where celebrities are not just the people we see on TV or the movies, but people who have grown a following on social mediaand in Christian culture, the pulpit. Celebrities for Jesus perfectly captures how and why we continuously see popular Christian celebrity leaders fall from the high pedestals we put them on. Amid the scandals and heartbreak caused by trusted leaders, this book was a reminder of the power of proximity and true friendship that we Christians need the most.

Kellie Koch , strategic communications professional

With insight and empathy, Beaty diagnoses the broken patterns of leadership we see in the church. This book shows us the isolation and loneliness and abuse that can come from, and contribute to, these expectations of celebrity. But this book is no mere jeremiad. It points the way forward to renewed visions of power, accountability, and humility.

Russell Moore , chair of public theology, Christianity Today

Media stardom is a relatively new phenomenon, but the corrosiveness of power and authority is not. Celebrities for Jesus chronicles the abuses and scandals invited by the rise of eminent Christian personalities. It persuasively demonstrates that the embrace of celebrity culture is folly: whatever growth and outreach it achieves for the church comes at great personal and institutional costs.

James Havey , attorney

A wit once said a celebrity is a person famous for being famous, but the quip needs to be modified for American evangelical celebrities. For evangelicalism, a celebrity is someone who has formed, cultivated, and platformed a persona of themselves that attracts a following. In some cases, there is substance behind the persona; in many cases, there is not. In all cases, we need a demotion of the celebrity culture and the expansion of leaders who are followers of Jesus, the Jesus whose greatness came from the surrender of himself for the sake of others. I am so glad to see Beaty expose this serious problem in our churches. It will be a must-read for all those who want to lead.

Scot McKnight , professor, Northern Seminary