Laura<\/strong>\u2014sitting for their first interviews since the scandal sent them into functional exile.<\/p>\nThe Lentzes breaking their silence isn\u2019t the only reason to make room for\u00a0Secrets<\/em> in your weekend-viewing schedule. Is it the\u00a0main<\/em> reason? Let\u2019s run down the biggest draws in\u00a0The Secrets of Hillsong<\/em>\u2019s first two episodes.<\/p>\nCarl goes on the record.<\/strong>\u00a0The Lentzes\u2019 interviews for\u00a0Secrets<\/em> are the couple\u2019s first since their exit from Hillsong pastorship in the autumn of 2020, and that prodigal-son-tinged exclusivity is a big part of the docuseries\u2019 allure. What will Carl say? What\u00a0could<\/em> Carl say?\u00a0<\/p>\nWell, he says plenty, and I\u2019ll look at the substance in a moment, but\u00a0Secrets<\/em> has a solid handle on another major component of its own appeal, namely Carl himself\u2014whether he\u2019s giving a present-day interview or appearing in older footage. In the aughts and 2010s, Lentz was everywhere, and the series\u2019 first two episodes unpacks how that came to be. More than one former Hillsong congregant interviewed for\u00a0Secrets<\/em> describes Lentz\u2019s irresistible charisma, remembering his megawatt charm in sometimes regretful tones, and the fact is, whether you buy into Carl\u2019s hipster gospel or you think it\u2019s shtick, your eye goes right to the guy.<\/p>\nThe Secrets of Hillsong<\/em> understands that its\u00a0brief isn\u2019t\u00a0only<\/em> seeing what Carl has to say, or updating French and Adler\u2019s investigative file. It\u2019s also to acknowledge, and even invite, the schadenfreude the Carl Lentz\/Hillsong scandal\u2014and all the celebrity-church scandals like it,\u00a0going back at least as far as the disappearance of Aimee Semple McPherson almost 100 years ago\u2014evokes in the culture at large. Carl baptized Bieber in NBA player Tyson Chandler<\/strong>\u2019s XXL bathtub; this isn\u2019t a guy who\u00a0doesn\u2019t<\/em>\u00a0want people to pay attention to him. At one point in his interviews with director Lee, Carl adapts the serenity prayer to ask for the strength to get through the documentary. Whether a viewer sees such a moment as goofily profound or profoundly goofy will, of course, vary by person. But whatever one thinks of Lentz, as usual, he\u2019s eminently watchable.<\/p>\nCarl gets specific about his past.<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019ll avoid spoilers, but Carl tries to unpack the reasons\u2014not excuses\u2014for some of his bad acts, including the extramarital affair\u00a0that brought his house down, as well as the \u201ccompromising position\u201d his wife Laura had earlier found him in with the family\u2019s nanny,\u00a0Leona Kimes.<\/strong> Carl points to unhealed trauma from his childhood as a catalyst for his acting out.\u00a0(He also faults, to a lesser extent, getting married too young, not exactly an endorsement of Hillsong\u2019s \u201cpurity-forward\u201d approach to intimate relationships.)<\/p>\nAnd there\u2019s the fact that there still<\/strong>\u00a0is<\/strong><\/em> a Carl and Laura.<\/strong>\u00a0Laura Lentz\u2019s presence is notable on its own, but the fuller portrait of the Lentzes\u2019 marriage presented in the series is full of subtext\u2014especially via the background\u00a0Secrets<\/em> outlines on Hillsong\u2019s earlier years, and Laura\u2019s parents\u2019 close friendship with Hillsong founders\u00a0Brian<\/strong> and\u00a0Bobbie Houston.<\/strong>\u00a0Secrets<\/em> illuminates the ways Laura\u2019s upbringing may have led her into marriage\/super-couple status with Carl. Laura\u2019s own exhausted \u201cI lost\u00a0everything<\/em>\u201d as she remembers the last months of 2020 makes it clear that she didn\u2019t see any roads leading out of that setup. As with any other marriage, much of the decision-making remains personal.\u00a0<\/p>\nThe Lentzes\u2019 secrets are the least of Hillsong\u2019s issues.<\/strong>\u00a0Carl Lentz is a fascinating figure, but he\u2019s the tip of the mess-berg at Hillsong\u00a0(though testimony from former New York branch congregants, such as\u00a0Ashley<\/strong> and\u00a0Mary Jones, Janice Lagata, Abby Fitzsimmons,<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Ajanet Roundtree,<\/strong> paint a detailed picture of the culture during Lentz\u2019s time at the church).\u00a0Secrets<\/em> puts Carl\u2019s scandal in context with descriptions of Hillsong\u2019s larger history of sexist cronyism, not to mention allegations of sexual abuse (including assaults Brian Houston\u2019s father, Frank, confessed to decades ago, though he was never charged with a crime) and cover-ups (by Brian, awaiting his fate in his native Australia in a criminal case surrounding his alleged concealment of his father\u2019s predatory behavior).\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"You might recall many of celebrity pastor\u00a0Carl Lentz\u2019s trademarks\u2014the tats, the skinny jeans, the mentor relationship with\u00a0Justin Bieber and other big names\u2014before his late-2020 ouster from Hillsong Church and news of his marital infidelity. Or you might\u00a0not remember much about Lentz, or Hillsong, or that Carl\u2019s expulsion as one of the lead pastors of Hillsong\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18954,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[1236,1235],"class_list":{"0":"post-18953","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrity","8":"tag-carl-lentz","9":"tag-hillsong"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18953","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18953"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18953\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18954"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}