Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Chapter 1

(This is the first in a series of sixteen posts summarizing, for discussion purposes, a collection of sixteen essays edited by Ronald J. Sider and Diane Knippers on public policy.)

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part I – Learning from the Past

Chapter 1 - Seeking a Place: Evangelical Protestants and Public Engagement in the Twentieth Century.

By John C. Green, Professor of Political Science, University of Akron.

Green gives a brief history of political engagement by Evangelicals over the last century. He categorizes identifies three avenues of engagement:

• movement politics – challenges to political institutions
• quiescent politics – detachment from political institutions
• regularized politics – adaptation to political institutions

Green believes that the first two avenues dominated Evangelicalism in the 1920-1940s. After 1940, with the founding of the National Association of Evangelicals, regularized politics became part of the mix. From about 1970 on, quiescent politics waned. Having defined these avenues, Green explains that American Protestantism fractured into mainline an Evangelical camps. He identifies three Evangelical streams that emerged. First, there were denominations that emerged in direct response to modernizing events in the mainline churches. These denominations would include the Holiness, Pentecostal, Neo-evangelical, and Charismatic movements. Second, there were ethnic churches like the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod and the Christian Reformed Church. Third, there were the Southern Protestant churches, most notably the Southern Baptists. From here Green gives a chronology of events that affected Evangelical engagement.

1901-1940, A People Displaced

Green believes that during the first half of this period politics was not significantly different from the politics of the 19th Century. World War I was the turning point. Increasing fragmentation in American Protestantism erupted in the fundamentalist-modernist controversy. A focal point of the controversy became the evolution debate. Anti-evolution organizations sprang up and the issue reached a climax when evolution opponent and former Democratic presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan squared off against secularist Clarence Darrow. It was a show trial but Darrow succeeded, with the help of the press, in making Bryan look foolish to the entire nation. Bryan died unexpectedly a few days after the trial.

Heading into the 1930s the mood of Evangelicalism became increasingly pessimistic. Political engagement tended to move from the national to local levels. However, events like the arrival of the New Deal and the repeal of Prohibition convinced many Evangelicals that America was in moral decay. Many began to question the value of being involved in politics and focused on evangelism for change.

1941-1970, A People in Flux

As Evangelicals began to turn more exclusively toward evangelism, a need was felt for greater and more effective cooperation. Two groups emerged in response to this challenge. First, was the more separatist and strictly fundamentalist wing formed organizations like the American Council of Christian Church in (ACCC) 1941 and the International Council of Christian Churches in 1948, led by Carl McIntire. Second, were what some called the neo-Evangelicals led by Carl F. Henry who was instrumental in founding the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) in 1942. The NAE saw themselves as a reform movement to fundamentalism and advocated social and political engagement.

The ACCC, ICCC and affiliated groups became increasingly strident about anti-communism and antagonistic to the aims of the NAE. The movements parted ways in 1957. The former group went on to relative obscurity and isolation. The NAE contingent popularized and given credibility by Henry’s Christianity Today and the work of evangelist Billy Graham, grew in numbers but still seemed reticent about political action. The turmoil of the 1960s movements concerning civil rights, women’s rights, environmentalism, and war opposition drew some evangelicals, largely from colleges and seminaries, into political engagement.

1971-2000, A People Prominent

Green gives a wider ranging overview of this era. He notes the significance of the proposed Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) for women in 1972 and the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision as turning points in Evangelical political concern. He points to the 1973 Chicago Declaration as significant event (It led to the formation of Evangelicals for Social Action.) Green also notes that this re-engagement with politics led to a more diverse if somewhat divided Evangelical movement. Some of the trends he noted were the, ‘… the moderation of the separatist impulse among fundamentalists, the development of the ‘electronic church’ of televangelists, and the rise of the suburban “megachurches.” (p. 26) The election of “born-again” president Jimmy Carter gave Evangelicalism a new respectability but by 1980 many Evangelicals were dissatisfied with Carter's leadership and the direction of the nation.

It was also during the 1970s that the “Christian Right” was born. Responding to events that they saw as threatening to traditional family values (e.g. abortion, sexual-permissiveness, no-fault divorce, pornography and homosexuality) some Evangelical began to mobilize to stem the tide. Secular humanism came to be seen as the primary problems as popularized by Francis Schaeffer’s Christian Manifesto (1981). Jerry Falwell founded the Moral Majority around 1980 and it became the most prominent of a host of similar “values” political organizations. Most of these organizations were spent by the end of the decade. In 1991, we witnessed the organization of the Christian Coalition by Pat Robertson and the Christian Right revived, mostly in opposition to the election of President Bill Clinton.

The reality was that after all this political action little of the Christian Right’s agenda was accomplished. By the late 1990s, former leaders like Cal Thomas and Ed Dobson had become disillusioned with politics and believed that Evangelicals needed to get back to evangelism as a way to address social ills. Green believes this is a re-emergence of quiescent politics.

Green also acknowledges the presence and contribution of “completely pro-life” groups like Evangelicals for Social Action, led by Ron Sider, who have embraced a set of political perspectives that are a mixture of what many would consider to be left and right positions. Center for Public Justice was another such organization. Also of significance was the work of Jim Wallis and the Sojourners community in Washington, DC.

Finally, Green notes that party voting was split almost equally among the two major parties in the 1970s. By 1984 the Republican voting percentage of Evangelicals was 74% and in 2000 it was 71%. By and large Evangelicals have become a reliable Republican constituency.

Implications

Green notes that both movement politics and quiescent politics have attractive features yet neither has ever accomplished much over the last century. Movement politics tends to build up considerable energy and enthusiasm at first but when it becomes clear there will be few short-term victories, support often wanes. The quiescent approach tends to lead toward an unhealthy apathy. That leaves regularized politics. It has the danger of getting caught up in power for power's sake and loosing Christian moorings. Green ends the essay with this observation: “There are no easy answers, only tough choices with real consequences.” (p. 32)

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Comments

[Denis Hancock]

[As soon as I saw this, I posted a short article on The Reformed Angler directing people over here. I hope all 2-3 of my loyal readers will join in.]

I appreciate Green's organization of the different approaches to engaging the political system. I would gravitate toward the "regularized politics" option, since the other two represent (for me, at least) two poles that are not very effective.

Movement politics, all too often, attracts people who I'd rather not have representing the "evangelical" point of view. I won't name names, but I think people can come up with a list on their own...

Quiescent politics is ineffective for the obvious reason, but more than that, we ARE called to engage with those who establish public policy. Isaiah 10:1-2 has some harsh things to say to those who make unjust laws. Jeremiah urged the people to seek the "peace and prosperity" of the city where the Jews were carried into exile (Jeremiah 29:4-7).

I was interested to see Falwell's opinion from 1965 regarding his view then of what he was called to do. I was also unaware of the internecine conflicts that fragmented the evangelical community.

I am about halfway through the book, and it provides a lot to consider.

Thanks for hosting this, and I look forward to the discussions.

[Michael Kruse]

Thanks Denis. I too like the framework he develops here. In later essays, authors talk about politics being "down-stream." Politics generaly tends to enact what has already become the majority view. Changing culture requires "up-stream" work. I think this is a "both and" not "either or" proposition. Like you, I think I lean toward the regularized approach although I can point to times in my life where I have ventured a little toward the other two.

Since these essays were likely being written in 2004 or earlier, the Emerging Church phenom had not yet ... well ... emerged on the radar of many. I have been thinking about how I would characterize it. It strikes my that there is a stong dose of quiescent politics involved but it is hardly universal.

[Denis Hancock]

"Since these essays were likely being written in 2004 or earlier, the Emerging Church phenom had not yet ... well ... emerged on the radar of many. I have been thinking about how I would characterize it. It strikes my that there is a stong dose of quiescent politics involved but it is hardly universal."

Many if the emergent websites I have seen reveal a lot of political opinion. I wonder if they compartmentalize their politics -- i.e. they keep politics out of church, but not out of their lives?

[Michael Kruse]

I notice the same tendency to talk or promote causes and I guess this fits with the movement approach. I don't see a sustained regularized approach which I suspect is deeply connected with institutional phobia. Then again, it could be an age thing, as the movement is overwhelming made up of young adults. It may change with age. Most Emergent leaders I see take great measures not to be associated with specific political groups or parties. Maybe what we are looking at here is individual empowerment and involement but official distance. I wonder if this should be a fourth approach.