The Soft Middle of Evangelical Assimilation
June 29, 2005
Christianity Today would like you to know “George W. Bush is not Lord.” The editors there are pleased as punch when Evangelicals get favorable coverage in the mainstream media, but following a few exposés of crude Evangelical political-pastors and the like, they get all verklempt.
Megachurch pastor Rod Parsley and the Family Research Council have recently uttered their belief that the United States was founded by godly men, and Ted Haggard espouses an implicit belief in original-intent constitutional interpretation. David Barton, Peter Marshall, James Kennedy, and others are on record with similar offenses. CT would like to point out that to the contrary American government has always been the province of the ungodly, and in other countries it is somehow relevant for us to know that “original intent” theories would help corrupt and evil judges be more corrupt and evil.
While the upshot of this message is not supposed to be that Christians should stay out of politics, apparently many who are in politics shouldn’t be or should change their message to something else which the CT editors would approve but unhelpfully do not describe. Instead they commend the paramount importance of religion untrammelled by politics in the churches–the long march “Sunday by Sunday”–except of course the churches of the aforementioned offenders.
There may be immediate dangers to the inchoate neo-Constantinianism that upsets the CT editors, but they do not investigate or even suggest this possibility. It might be helpful to do so and to weigh what stands to be lost with what stands to be gained, as well as to consider their worst representatives in light of the best, on pressing issues related to “separation of church and state,” stem-cell research, or abortion. Instead it seems they’d rather make mountains out of mole-hills, while stroking the juvenile anxieties that are emerging in force in soft Evangelical quarters today. You may find this anxiety articulated a little more clearly by CT editor and blogger Ted Olson in his comments at The Revealer.
Olson, and perhaps his cohorts at CT, seem dangerously afflicted with the delusion that true, good, and pure religion exists and has those superlative attributes only to the extent that it is indifferent to and wholly set apart from the base and vulgar tentacles of (political) Power. It seems to me that people who think this way will be upset with any non-marginal status–unless perhaps the dominant politics of their group matches their own views perfectly and/or receives rave reviews in the mainstream media.
Most oddly, the late rash of Evangelicals distancing themselves from their brethren whom they deem crass and wrongheaded seem to have the gall to think they are the very picture of humility as they presume to stand for the true Christian position of thoughtful nuance, moderation, politeness, and accuracy! As you know, I am afflicted by no such delusion–I know when I am right. God forbid that CT goes so soft that it begins taking its cues from Jim Wallis, The New York Times, Jeff Sharlatan, and blogs other than my own.
Addendum: Isn’t it funny that the strongest public complaints of Evangelicals against Evangelicals are usually political, seldom doctrinal (unless a doctrinal issue is deemed political), and hardly ever commercial? I can’t for the life of me figure out why you’d be upset with the politics of a Ted Haggard given what his church and services look like. He puts the Rolling Stones to shame! And then there is his investment in fighting demons with Canola oil. I’d bet that critique and reform at these more practical levels would have more impact on the theoretical-philosophical levels than confronting the latter directly by themselves. (Too much abstraction for the rank and file.) But if Evangelicalism fought the Mammon within, with what would they buy political and cultural capital to fight the devils without? CT ad revenues would fall by more than half, for certes!
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