COMMENTARY: Something fishy about cruises for Christ

c. 1996 Religion News Service (RNS)-Last week, I received an advertisement in the mail inviting me to participate in a program sponsored by a Christian travel agency. For $3,000, I could”feast my eyes and feed my soul,”vacationing with other true believers on”wholesome”gospel-oriented cruises. NOTE: These tours are only open to those who want to avoid […]

c. 1996 Religion News Service

(RNS)-Last week, I received an advertisement in the mail inviting me to participate in a program sponsored by a Christian travel agency. For $3,000, I could”feast my eyes and feed my soul,”vacationing with other true believers on”wholesome”gospel-oriented cruises.

NOTE: These tours are only open to those who want to avoid the more traditional tours where people actually cruise for Satan.


Among other things, the program touts the pleasures of cruising for Christ to Caribbean islands where there are”tales of swashbuckling pirates and buried treasures”and”romantic, sun-kissed beaches.” My guess is that these are wholesome Errol Flynn-type pirates, not the gap-toothed, smelly sort who slaughtered people for fun and profit. I assume the sun-kissed beaches frequentedby Christian tour groups were never graced by attractive savages like Bo Derek, but rather modestly attired island inhabitants like Gilligan and Mrs. Howell.

An additional irony in the brochure is that the average cruise for Christ costs about what it would take to feed an Ethiopian village for a year or put Bibles in every motel room in Texas.

Aboard the luxurious H.M.S. Sunday School, you can eat yourself sick, listen to gospel music, and have a romantic (but virtuous) time, all within hailing distance of some of the worst poverty on earth. Haven’t these people ever heard of Jonah?

Alas, I can’t take advantage of this offer. Not because I’m above it all. I don’t have $3,000. And if I did, I wouldn’t spend it on a Christian cruise. I’d spend it on the cruise I see on television, where Kathy Lee Gifford sings and women cavort in bikinis the size of an American Express Card. Actually, my wife says I’d spend it on a garage.

A gospel vacation sounds to me like yet another Christian marketing attempt to simultaneously serve God and mammon. Granted, it’s not as tacky as, say, a Las Vegas wedding chapel, but it comes pretty close.

The closest I’ve ever come to a”wholesome”Christian tour was the time I spent as a Mormon missionary. It cost a gob of money, lasted for two years and included ports of call in places so exotic that Christians were still considered delicacies. Worse, my fellow missionaries were some of the most uptight people in the universe. I wouldn’t want to relive that experience.

Mainstream Christians aren’t the only ones getting in on the gospel tours scene. I’ve also received advertisements for”Book of Mormon tours”to Central America where I can”walk the paths ancient Mormon prophets trod.”For upwards of $2,000 (plus local bribes), I can participate in this”unforgettable gospel experience.”No thanks. Forty years of Sunday school has been unforgettable enough.


When I go on vacation, I’m trying to escape the irritating routines of my life, one of which happens to be church. I’m not saying that church isn’t necessary, just that it isn’t necessary for a wholesome or even spiritual time on vacation.

It’s possible to be spiritually fulfilled on vacation without cruising for Christ. Heck, many of my life’s top 10 spiritual experiences occurred while I was on vacation, none of them while sitting in a church.

There was the sun rising over the Grand Canyon, tidepools on the Olympic coast and morning mist over the jungle falls in Iguazu, Paraguay. Oh, and having my bags searched by Bolivian customs officials. If that doesn’t put the fear of God into a person, nothing will.

Best of all, none of these cost 3,000 bucks.

LJB END KIRBY

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