Any story of moral failing has religious overtones, and sex scandals are no exception. They usually involve broken religious vows and provoke all sorts of questions about the religious views of the participants.
Usually the mainstream media can't get enough of sex scandals. But for some reason, they constructed a cone of silence around John Edwards' affair with Rielle Hunter. Whether or not the media should cover sex scandals such as these, the bizarre double standard only reinforces perceptions of bias. Anyway, there will be many more stories to come out of the sordid affair, probably dealing with the payments Hunter has received from those within the Edwards camp. And there may be interesting religious angles to come.
The story with the biggest religious angles thus far isn't about Edwards so much as Hunter. I'm not quite sure why Newsweek reporter Jonathan Darman didn't publish this story months ago, but he has a really interesting look at Hunter and her spiritual views:
I struck up a conversation with the woman at the next event, as we waited outside. She told me her name and asked me what my astrological sign was, which I thought was a little unusual. I told her. She smiled, and began telling me her life story: how she was working as a documentary-film maker, living with a friend in South Orange, N.J., but how she'd previously had "many lives." She'd worked, she said, as an actress and as a spiritual adviser. She was fiercely devoted to astrology and New Age spirituality. She'd been a New York party girl, she'd been married and divorced, she'd been a seeker and a teacher and was a firm believer in the power of truth.
Hunter told Darman that she had met Edwards at a bar in New York and thought he was giving off a special energy. Darman cultivates Hunter as a source -- in his mind at least. She appears to think of him more as a friend. They meet at a bar in New York:
Her speech was peppered with New Age jargon--human beings were dragged down by "blockages" to their actual potential; history was the story of souls entering and escaping our field of consciousness. A seminal book for her had been Eckhart Tolle's "The Power of Now." Her purpose on this Earth, she said, was to help raise awareness about all this, to help the unenlightened become better reflections of their true, repressed selves.
She explains to Darman that Edwards is an old soul who had barely tapped into his potential. She believes that he could become a transformational leader such as Martin Luther King, Jr. or Ghandi. Eckhart Tolle is a popular spiritualist author who is big in the church of Oprah. Here's a snippet from his Wikipedia entry explaining his writings:
Tolle's non-fiction bestseller The Power of Now emphasizes the importance of being aware of the present moment as a way of not being caught up in thoughts of the past and future. His later book A New Earth further explores the structure of the human ego and how this acts to distract people from their present experience of the world. It is the feeding of the human ego that is thought to be the source of inner and outer conflict. Only in examining one's ego may people begin to see beyond it and obtain a sense of spiritual enlightening or a new outlook on reality.
Interesting. Hunter told Darman that she and Edwards discussed Tolle "all the time." It seems that other players in this story share some of Hunter's spiritual views. In his Nightline admission, Edwards said that Bob McGovern called him and asked him to meet with Hunter at the Beverly Hilton. He also said that he would only go if McGovern would be there.
McGovern apparently lives in Santa Barbara, which is where Hunter was relocated by Edwards associates. Principals' Web sites are dropping like flies but there is some information available on McGovern. The New York Times used some such information for its profile of McGovern today:
But little is known about Mr. McGovern, who is 64, according to records, and lives with his wife in a modest ranch-style home a few miles from downtown Santa Barbara. The Web site Margaretsweet.com, which promotes spirituality and New Age practices, recently carried a brief biography of Mr. McGovern, describing him as "an intuitive" and "a healer since 1988" who had worked "with energy in the area of the emotional fields." The biography is no longer on the site.
"He uses philosophy, psychology and the intuitive to find resolutions that move people back into alignment with the universe and into a place of peace, harmony and joy," the site said. "Bob uses the intuitive to help people with a variety of life issues, including relationships, career and health."
The description of Mr. McGovern, posted in a section called "Helpful Dudes," also said he tried to empower people so they could deal with the challenges of everyday life with greater understanding.
"His knowledge of the past and the future helps people find balance in the present," it said. "He is able to separate out surrounding negative energy, which allows people to have a clearer perception of their own options and choices."
It is interesting that Edwards trusted McGovern so much. Perhaps the media will continue to do a horrible job with this story. But as the money trail gets scrutinized and the ties to Santa Barbara and Hunter's trusted network undergo more examination, will it treat the New Age aspects as something loopy and marginal or will they soberly examine whether or how New Age beliefs played a part in this story?