‘The Chosen’ Director Responds to Pride Flag Critics: ‘We Are Not a Church…We’re Not a Ministry…We Do Not Police Individual’s Social Media’
‘The Chosen’ director Dallas Jenkins has responded directly to recent controversies of his show, following the revelation that gay pride and pro-trans propaganda are freely and frequently visible on the set of his Jesus production (as well as the fact that nearly half of the actors who play the apostles have come out in support of the flag on set.)
Jenkins shared that all the cast and crew are contractors who can do or say what they want on their own time and on social media and that they don’t police people’s actions on set “as long as they’re not harming anyone else on set, you know, kind of the usual rules of you know, everyone’s just kind of respecting each other.”
After explaining that he hasn’t responded to the controversy because he’s been busy with season four of the show, Jenkins revealed that he was fine that one of his ‘favorite’ crew members, who is an independent contractor, has a three-inch pride flag on his own personal equipment:
“He has it on every project that he works on. He’s had it on his equipment on our project for over a year. He’s been with us for a while. And it happened to show up in the corner of one of our behind the scenes videos for a few seconds. And someone asked about it, which isn’t the first time we’ve been asked about things like that, and maybe even that specifically in the past, and we violated our own rule about responding on someone else’s turf. And we ended up giving kind of a standard answer that we give when asked about our cast and crew’s personal beliefs, which we get asked about all the time. And that was a mistake, because this issue is a little bit more nuanced than just a standard ‘what does your cast and crew believe answer?’
Explaining that “we do not have a religious or political litmus test for who we hire. And we also do not police, individual’s social media, or their own personal workspaces, like their own gear, their own equipment, their own T shirts,” Jenkins elaborates:
We are not a church. We are not a nonprofit. We’re not a ministry. We’re not any kind of religious or political organization. Now the content itself can be ministerial, of course. And even the term ‘Christian production’, I’ve heard that thrown around. Again, I haven’t been paying much attention to social media. But when my team has been obviously, asking me some questions about how to respond, and I’ve heard the term ‘on a Christian production, you shouldn’t XYZ…’,
I’m not exactly sure what that term means to be honest. Now don’t let that scare you. Can a production be Christian? The content can of course, I mean, we’re a show about Christ. So we’re probably one of the most Christian content in history, because we are about Christ, who’s in the word ‘Christian’.…So strangers to the show or people online who keep saying ‘The Chosen Inc’, is a ministry or a church or should be like one, that doesn’t necessarily make it true. Our company’s standards and practices and my own personal calling and ministry in my personal life and how I run my business, it might not be the same as yours. Can that be okay?
While saying that cast and crew are free to post whatever they want on social media, we doubt that this is truly the case. They are posting words that the world loves, which gets a pass, but if they started posting troubling racist messages such as calling Jews ‘vermin’ and wearing swastikas on set and in their profiles, would Dallas really have a laissez-faire attitude? “Contractors are free to wear nazi regalia on set all they want…” Or perhaps Jenkins, who believes Mormons are Christians and therefore has a skewed view of the gospel and of saving faith, doesn’t understand how offensive and grotesque a pro-pride or pro-trans flag truly is.
Dallas notes that in the same way, Solomon built the Holy temple with the help of pagan materials and goods, so is he doing likewise, describing that as one of his guiding principles. “if Solomon can work with people on a holy temple with people who disagree with him, then so can we.”
“I know you’re saying, some of you are saying, ‘Yes, we’re okay with you working with people of different faiths, but we’re not okay with them promoting something, their own agenda on set.’ And that’s fair, if you disagree with that, I’m not sure how that quite relates to the content of the show, or how it relates to your particular life, if you don’t work on the show with me. But we can have a difference of opinion about that. And that’s perfectly fine….We don’t find that anyone on our cast or crew are actively pushing anything in our face or saying things on set that are difficult or offensive.”
…Our cast and crew, the majority of them who believe the spectrum of things including the things I just above, don’t expect me to agree with them on everything and don’t expect me to celebrate their thing or celebrate their cause. I love our cast and crew. I will go to war with them any day and I will stand in the breach to defend them any day. And we are a family and always have been And we take that very seriously, even though we know we disagree on some big stuff.
