Christian right regroups after Obama victory

Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, said immigration is another issue that holds promise.

"Social conservatives are open to some sort of immigration reform that will be far less offensive to Hispanic voters than some of the more nativist forces" within the Republican family, he said.

But make no mistake. These leaders have no intention of shifting focus from their big three issues: abortion, gay marriage and judges.

'Hateful immigration rhetoric'
Obama's election might open the door to a different breed of evangelicals — those who advocate consensus-building and expanding the agenda to include global poverty and the environment.

Joel Hunter, an Orlando, Fla., megachurch pastor, fits that definition. Hunter, 60, is anti-abortion but also signed a statement on climate change and has denounced "hateful immigration rhetoric." He also delivered the closing prayer at this summer's Democratic National Convention and prayed with Obama by phone Tuesday before the president-elect took the stage in Chicago's Grant Park.

"What really works in this country is not inciting the base, but making partnerships with people with different views to advance your agenda," Hunter said. "Those who don't will marginalize themselves politically. I don't think advancement of a cause primarily by attack is the way of the future."

On gay rights, Hunter said evangelicals can find a home in coalitions that support restricting the institution of marriage to one man and one woman but advocate that gays be able to form legal relationships short of marriage — and that no one face job discrimination.

Even on a divisive issue such as abortion, evangelicals have found success in promoting laws on parental notification, late-term abortion bans and prohibiting federal funding for abortion, Rozell said.

Richard Cizik, vice president for governmental affairs of the National Association of Evangelicals, has clashed with culture war-oriented leaders over his activism to combat global warming. He said white evangelicals' support for McCain is not a repudiation of a broader issues agenda.

"Evangelicals, whether showing it at the ballot box or not, are showing a larger palette of concerns," Cizik said. "... There is a spiritual renaissance occurring here and it is broad-based."

Young drawn to wider agenda?
There was some evidence Tuesday that younger evangelicals are drawn to a wider agenda. While younger white evangelicals did not vault en masse to Obama, the Democrat made significant inroads. Exit polls showed the proportion of white evangelicals under age 30 who backed Obama this year was double the 16 percent who supported Kerry in 2004.

Four years ago, white evangelicals under 30 were even stronger Bush supporters than those over 50.

"It's too early to say this portends really badly for Republicans in the future and means Democrats are going to pick up a lot of support from the evangelical community for the next 20 years," said D. Michael Lindsay, a Rice University sociologist who specializes in evangelicals and politics. "Younger evangelicals desperately wanted a change because they were so disappointed in the Bush administration."

Obama and the Democrats will have to deliver on issues dear to young evangelicals or they'll become disillusioned by more empty rhetoric and vote Republican again, he said.

Most evangelicals won't agree with Obama, but they can learn from his positive brand of politics as they regroup under an administration movement leaders fought so hard to prevent, said Mark DeMoss, an evangelical public relations specialist who initially backed Mitt Romney and voted for McCain.

"I don't like the fact that a lot of evangelicals are taking this view of Barack Obama, that he's the anti-Christ or something," DeMoss said. "I'm going to disagree with him politically on probably a whole lot of things — maybe everything. But we ought to try to win on the strength of ideas."

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