Naomi Wolf follows Madonna to sainthood

In an article called "Naomi Wolf: I had a vision of Jesus," the Glasgow, Scotland Sunday Herald reported that feminist heroine Naomi Wolf has turned to spirituality.

This will outrage the feminist Left, but it may actually mark a new trend, since Madonna last year revealed her conversion to Kabbalah mysticism. Whether Madonna ever bothered to convert to Judaism before becoming a Kabbalist is doubtful. But those distinctions mean little to the Beautiful People as they grow older and get bored with their younger persona. Madonna began her fabulous career as a Material Girl, but that's so retro by now. So she is gunning for sainthood, with other aging Boomers hot on her heels.

Wolf's conversion experience, however, is bizarrely homoerotic:

'I actually had this vision of Jesus, and I'm sure it was Jesus,' said Wolf. 'But it wasn't this crazy theological thing; it was just this figure who was the most perfected human being that there could be — full of light and full of love.' More bizarrely, she experienced this as a teenage boy. 'I was a 13—year—old boy sitting next to him and feeling feelings I'd never felt in my lifetime,' said Wolf. '[Feelings] of a boy being with an older male who he really loves and admires and loves to be in the presence of. It was probably the most profound experience of my life. I haven't talked about it publicly.'

Well, it is certainly good to know this wasn't any "crazy theological thing."

One trouble with these spectacular conversions is that the sheer seductiveness of fame taints whatever may be sincere. It is impossible to know whether Wolf or Madonna mean anything they say. In traditional religion, self—proclaimed saints are treated skeptically. That is one reason why humbleness and privacy plays such a great role in traditional faith.  Neither Madonna nor Wolf seem humbled by their new spiritual feelings.

There is such a thing as spiritual arrogance, and it lives right next door to the moral arrogance that marks so much of the Boomer Left.