I recently posted about my favorite web sites, the ones I must check out every morning to get my “daily fix” and feel caught up with the world. One of those sites is now gone; Doug TenNapel has decided to stop writing his blog. The warnings began a couple of weeks ago when he stated that once he hit one million “hits” (in other words, one million people viewed his blog) he had been planning on stopping. He also stated that using a blog to air his conservative right-wing views had become a problem for his career: it was hard to get hired in Hollywood while espousing the views he was posting on his blog everyday. Doug is a conservative Christian working in Hollywood – something extremely rare. To date, it seems he has been quite successful – his most well-known work is the current series “Catscratch” running on Nickelodeon.
I did not agree with Doug’s viewpoints all of the time, but it gave me good insights into the views held by others farther right in the political spectrum than I. I also found his candor about his feeling and his faith refreshing. So many times a blog is just another protected persona someone is putting up and, when you meet in them “in the real world”, they seem so different. I will miss his blog.
This also raises a question: what does this do to his testimony as a Christian? Is he any weaker a Christian because he has shut his blog down? Is he “hiding his light”? Should we criticize Doug for doing this, or should we understand? There is no requirement that Christians write blogs. But once Doug had started writing his, he attracted hundreds (thousands?) of visitors a day to read it. It only took him 20 months to get to one million hits! He shared his faith many times over, as well as his controversial views on issues of the day. He shared his daily life, to the point where he wrote that his blog readers knew more about him than his family! I myself reluctantly support Doug’s decision to stop – it is between him and God to determine how to best present his testimony in the future. At Biola, we talk about “Business as Ministry” – Doug is doing this every day he faces his peers in Hollywood and continues to practice the principles taught by Jesus Christ.
Lessons From Babel 