USCIRF exports extremist pastor Steve Berger to Syria
By: Saint Dymphna
Tags: Syria, Foreign Policy, Fundamentalism, Rojava, Religion

USCIRF exports extremist pastor Steve Berger to Syria

The disgraced hardline evangelical appears to be advocating for “religious freedom” in the Autonomous Regions of Syria, but whose freedom? And with what authority? Saint Dymphna Jul 28·9 min read

Steve Berger and Nadine Maenza during a photo op with AANES representatives

Recently surfaced photos show far right pastor Steve Berger traveling to the Autonomous Region of North East Syria to accompany Nadine Maenza, the Vice Chair of the United States Commission On International Religious Freedom in October of 2020. Only a few months later, Berger, who publicly sympathized with the Christian and nationalist extremists who attacked the Capitol on January 6th, suddenly stepped down on January 25th as head pastor of the church he founded, Grace Chapel Leipers Fork. Berger referred to his exit from Grace Chapel as part of a “controlled 3-year plan”. The irony of a man who publicly joked about wanting the United States to be a theocracy traveling to a secular community to teach about freedom of religion is palpable, even by the standards of the then-waning Trump Administration.

The “American delegation” during a meeting in Qamishlo

When asked for comment, USCIRF stressed that Vice Chair Maenza had travelled to Syria “in an independent capacity”, although multiple articles published by regional outlets seem to contradict this narrative. Maenza had prefaced a video interview she gave to North Press Agency with the same phrase. In the video, she is credited as the Vice Chair of USCIRF and repeatedly makes statements about the opinions of the organization. Another article by Arabic language Syrian news outlet Al Wakale refers to Maenza and Berger as a “delegation from USCIRF” and shows them partaking in a meeting with representatives of the AANES (Autonomous Administration of Northern and Eastern Syria) although the article does not mention him by name.

While the autonomous regions of Syria are still reeling from their heroic ongoing fight against the Islamic State and its various militia groups, as well as the atrocities Turkish backed forced have committed in Afrin, the AANES is in many ways more progressive than the US government: it is a secular, libertarian society that supports gender equality, sustainability and pluralistic tolerance, as well as restorative approaches to justice and abolishment of the death penalty.

Steve Berger praying at Tennessee Governor Bill Lee’s inauguration

Made up of more than a dozen ethnic groups and half a dozen religious ones that all “believe deeply but respect each other’s religion”, said Maenza, “… it’s not just a model for the Middle East, but for the world.” Sadly, the same can’t be said for the United States, which still isn’t able to pass the Equal Rights Amendment, enact criminal justice reform or universally recognize slavery as morally wrong. Compared to the America Steve Berger wants to build however, the current-day United States can certainly pass for a shining city on a hill.

Berger’s closest followers and allies in Government, from left to right: State Senator Jack Johnson, Judge Deanna Johnson, Senator Marsha Blackburn, Governor Bill Lee, Secretary of State Tre Hargett

He has joked about wanting the United States to become a theocracy, saying to his congregation during a sermon in 2018, “you know,.. it isn’t a theocracy, as much as we would all want that!” This remark was greeted with hearty laughs from the audience, which likely included Tennessee Governor Bill Lee and his wife, as well as State Senator Jack Johnson and his wife Judge Deanna Johnson, who all call Berger’s former congregation their home church.

Summary of a podcast Berger published on separation of church and state

Berger has also supported other dominionist approaches. Dominionism describes several Christian belief systems that advocate for the redirection of government power and resources to further religious goals. Broadly speaking, this is achieved by placing Christian Dominionist leaders in positions of power and letting them shift public policy to erase the separation of church and state. Berger professed as much in a podcast available on the Grace Chapel website titled “The Truth About Separation of Church and State”. In it, he explains that religious freedom is the freedom of religious people, not the freedom to abstain from religion.

Even more troubling though are Berger’s views on homosexuality, women and sexual abuse. Berger has called homosexuality “the greatest issue confronting the church today”, supported conversion ‘therapy’ and preached that conversion or celibacy were the only acceptable ways for LGBTQ+ people to live. In that regard seems much more at home with the religiously blinded zealots of the Islamic State, but that’s not where the similarities end.

Multilingual Kurdish newspaper Hawar states that the “American delegation” and the Autonomous Administrations Foreign Affairs Committee discussed the situation of women in Syria, their achievements, and the horrific physical and sexual violence faced by many Syrian women and girls at the hands of enemy forces backed by Turkey, the Assad regime or the Islamic State.

14-year-old Gracie Solomon in the YouTube video accusing her father

This would appear ill-advised, considering Berger’s continued silence about sexual abuse allegations in his community, where a 14-year-old girl recently took to Youtube to accuse her father, a church member of abusing her since she was only 6 years old. She also accused Berger and other community leaders of knowing about and ignoring her years long suffering. While Grace Chapel has released a statement, claiming that they are “very concerned” about the girl in question and pinning the troubling allegations on her parents divorce, Berger has made no direct comment.

He did however release a devotional series of videos on his Facebook and YouTube channels, encouraging his followers to pray curses on those who accused their pastor. He also espouses the so-called “Two-Witness-Rule”, a biblical rule stating that unless there have been two or three witnesses to a crime, no allegation can be brought against the perpetrator. It has been used in many Christian denominations for decades to silence survivors and cover up domestic violence and child sexual abuse, most notably among followers of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and Jehova’s Witnesses.

In a sermon that Berger released in August of 2018, occasioned by Christine Blaise-Ford’s testimony accusing then-Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her when she was a teenager, Berger argues that an accusation that is not supported by two or three witnesses should not be prosecutable. Among other, supposedly biblical arguments he makes, he also suggests that false accusations of abuse were as common as real cases of sexual violence.

Large parts of that sermon focused on the damage done to powerful men like Kavanaugh, who are accused of sexual abuse, never meaningfully centering on the trauma that survivors of sexual violence experience. At one point, Berger brought up the anecdote of a mother coming to him in tears, asking for help because her daughter had been molested by a relative but there hadn’t been any witnesses. He recalled asking the mother what she did in response, and the mother replying that she had reported the incident to police but that it hadn’t “worked out great” for her. The only response Berger was able to muster, even in his own anecdote, was “That’s heartbreaking.” He then quickly moved on to patronize Blaise-Ford and valorize repentant biblical rapists.

In Berger’s world view, the emotional pain experienced by survivors of rape and abuse is a by-products of their lack of faith in God. In one episode of the aforementioned series entitled “Exposing The Enemy: Securing Our Victory” Berger and his wife Sarah state that survivors who feel hurt, angry or sad about the assault they experienced “know God to a degree but are unable to accept the full extent of his healing.” Steve Berger also calls some survivors “just devils” and bemoans the criticism of abusive pastors as anti-authoritarian and unbiblical. It’s barely even comprehensible how a person holding these views could be able to have any meaningful or supportive input on the experiences of the brave women of Syria, many of whom joined militias like the YPJ to fight the Islamic States, wielding assault rifles and grenade launchers together with their male comrades.

Female Syrian Fighters of the YPJ

Some reports even tell of the fear IS fighters had about being killed by one of these fighter women, reportedly viewing it as a shame or dishonor to be killed by an ‘inferior’ woman. And yet, as detailed in books like “Daughters of Kobane” or Robert Evans’ insightful documentary podcast “The Women’s War”, it is hard to overestimate their bravery and significance in the Syrian fight for liberty.

A monument dedicated to martyred female Syrian fighters

There is a common saying in the autonomous Syrian territory, often attributed to Abdullah Öcalan. “A country can’t be free unless the women are free.” This mirrors other feminist language like Black American feminist Audre Lorde, who said that she is “not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different” from her own. Women’s rights are explicitly mandated by the AANES’ constitution and tributes and murals to the female and male martyrs alike value their sacrifice to the community.

In direct opposition to this, Berger has preached sermons about the fundamentally different nature of men and women, commonly referred to in contemporary Christianity as “Complementarianism”. This construct holds that western gender constructs are the god-given biological nature of men and women and that while they are supposedly equal in value, men are naturally strong dominant leaders whereas women are naturally submissive nurturing followers and mothers. He is also on the board of a US para-church organization called “PromiseKeepers”, which strongly emphasizes “traditional” masculine traits like strength, dominance and leadership.

Berger and his wife Sarah, far-right, with Renee Rizzo, proprietor of Crisis Pregnancy Center Hope Clinic

Berger holds strong opposition to women’s access to reproductive healthcare, supporting a Nashville-based “clinic”, that belongs to a growing group of so-called “Crisis Pregnancy Centers”. These facilities present themselves as medical clinics that are easily mistaken for abortion providers. Once a person carrying an unplanned or unwanted pregnancy makes contact with them, they pressure the pregnant person with inaccurate and religiously tinged language and in some cases misdate pregnancies in order to minimize the pregnant persons ability to obtain a legal and safe abortion within the increasingly restrictive American legal framework.

Berger further opposes comprehensive sexual education and divorce. A long history of US evangelical beliefs being exported to disadvantaged areas under the guise of humanitarian aid or concern shows that little good can spring of these missionary attempts. Undue influence from far-right evangelical pressure groups has caused countries like Jamaica and Uganda to suffer endemic rates of hate crimes and ‘corrective’ rapes, and criminalized reproductive healthcare, contraception, homosexuality, and divorce. These countries have also become home to a growing industry of ministry tourism, attracting hordes of well-meaning but incompetent Christian tourist missionaries looking for the perfect photo opportunity to demonstrate their moral and religious superiority. In other cases, grifters like Renee Bach, founder of the Uganda-based Christian charity “Serving His Children” and woman accused of practicing medicine without a license, are drawn to these places to live out their fantasy of being a white savior. In Bach’s case this cost the lives of 105 Ugandan children.

Renee Bach in a now infamous photo, presenting herself as a saintly figure, surrounded by images of starving Black children

At time of publishing, USCIRF has not commented on why a fundamentalist rape apologist was accompanying their delegation. As mentioned previously, the organization repeatedly stressed that Vice Chair Maenza was in Syria “in an individual capacity”, but declined to comment on Berger’s presence at the meetings or whether they were previously aware of his regressive views. Steve Berger could not be reached for comment.