Jay Bakker is No Ordinary Chip Off the Old Block.

This Bakker preaches revolutionary change
By Frazier Moore, Associated Press December 13, 2006

NEW YORK -- He was born into the glare of televangelist parents Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker. Then the "Praise the Lord" empire collapsed in scandal. His father went to jail for fraud.

Jay Bakker spent his teens in the darkness, rebelling and bent on self-destruction from alcohol and drugs.

But now, about to turn 31 on Dec. 18 this tattooed, multi-pierced pilgrim is on a righteous path: preaching God's grace to a flock of young, downtrodden, and disillusioned parishioners most any other church would turn away.

Jay is the focus of "One Punk Under God: the Prodigal Son of Jim & Tammy Faye," a reality series about the back-to-basics church he calls Revolution, which, notwithstanding his decade-long sobriety, holds services in an Atlanta bar.

Keeping the faith while keeping Revolution going will prove to be a challenge for Bakker.

"I think Revolution is kind of stuck between a rock and a hard place," he muses in the first episode, airing tonight at 9 on the Sundance Channel. "With some groups we're too Christian, and with the Christians we're not Christian enough." ...............


Now "One Punk Under God" finds Bakker continuing a mini-crusade for an alternative to the God he could never make peace with: a wrathful God who hated him for all the flaws he hated in himself.

"God loves us for who we are," contends Bakker, explaining that it comes down to "grace": "God's love for all people, and his unconditional love."

In defiance of both his billing as "punk" and his calling as preacher, Bakker is an affable, unassuming chap who happens to wear a stud in each ear as well as a lip ring. And tattoos: He got the first of many -- it praises Revolution -- at 19 while living in Phoenix, where he helped found the church. In the series' finale, he will get a tattoo in tribute to his mother.

He never set out to be the punk anti-Bakker for a lost generation. Nor has he disavowed his parents, whose past disgrace could easily fuel skepticism about his own ministry.

"I don't have a strategy like, 'OK, I'm gonna distance myself from them, so I can build a church and be my own man,' " he says. "Me and my dad have a hard time getting along, and now, with my mom being as sick as she is, that's hard -- but I love them, and they did a lot of great things, as well as make mistakes."

A mistake of theirs he means to avoid: building a church so big and all-consuming that its own sustenance is its primary cause.

In episode two, Bakker will make a tough decision that could threaten his church: Should he declare himself a gay-affirming minister?

"Absolutely, without question," Amanda says, but warns of a backlash.

She's right. A conservative foundation wastes no time pulling thousands in funding.

That's OK. "Salvation is free. It's a gift," Bakker says.

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