Evangelicals rethink their public face

Evangelical leaders are re-examining whether American evangelicalism has suffered from its portrayal as a conservative political movement rather than as a broad religious philosophy rooted in a close reading of the Bible.

Although evangelical leaders have been among the most prominent spokesmen for conservative causes, “evangelical” and “religious right” are not the same thing. Studies indicate that as many as 40 percent of Americans who call themselves evangelicals are politically moderate or identify with the Democratic Party.

But two recent declarations by evangelical and conservative religious thinkers suggest that evangelicals have become too closely identified with conservative political activism, at the expense of attracting new followers. The declarations are likely to be hot topics of conversation when the Southern Baptist Convention holds its annual meeting next month in Nashville, Tenn.

“Because evangelicals have been portrayed as being very, very limited in their range of societal concerns, there is an element of challenge in the evangelical community to say, ‘Let’s not get caught up in narrow partisan concerns,’” said Mark L. Sargent, provost of Gordon College, a nondenominational Christian institution in Wenham, Mass. “Many evangelicals say they feel very alienated with the partisan rhetoric in the nation.”

Evangelicals seek broader focus
The declarations — a statement of principles by the National Association of Evangelicals and a study of growth in Southern Baptist congregations — serve to crystallize discontent among many evangelical and conservative Christians with their public perception in recent years.

Evangelical call to action The National Association of Evangelicals’ statement identifies seven areas of concern in which evangelicals should step up their social engagement: — We work to protect religious freedom and liberty of conscience. — We work to nurture family life and protect children. — We work to protect the sanctity of human life and to safeguard its nature. — We seek justice and compassion for the poor and vulnerable. — We work to protect human rights. — We seek peace and work to restrain violence. — We labor to protect God's creation.

The NAE document, “For the Health of the Nation: An Evangelical Call to Civic Responsibility,” was the product of three years of work. It was created by two dozen scholars who bridged the spectrum of conservative to liberal evangelical thought encompassed by the organization’s 45,000 churches, which represent 52 U.S. denominations. It was released in March for general distribution with a book of essays that expanded on its seven main points.

The statement is a diplomatically worded synthesis that reaffirms evangelicals’ traditional opposition to abortion, embryonic stem cell research, pornography and “sexual libertinism.” And it urges evangelicals to remain deeply engaged on those issues.

But “evangelicals have failed to engage with the breadth, depth, and consistency to which we are called,” says the statement. It was signed by nearly 100 of the nation’s most prominent evangelical leaders, among them James Dobson, chairman of Focus on the Family; Richard Land, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention; David Neff, editor of Christianity Today; Charles Colson, president of the Prison Fellowship ministry; and the Rev. Rick Warren, author of the best-seller “The Purpose-Driven Life.”

Southern Baptists examine evangelism
The NAE statement is being debated simultaneously with a study published this month by theologian Thom S. Rainer, which concluded that the Southern Baptist Convention, the nation’s largest Protestant denomination, has fallen into an “evangelistic crisis.”

The Southern Baptist Convention is not a member of the NAE, but it has become predominantly evangelical since 1979.

Rainer, dean of the Billy Graham School at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., argues that while the “conservative resurgence” of the last quarter-century has effectively transformed the convention into a theologically purer body, it has failed to attract new followers.

“The Southern Baptist Convention is less evangelistic today than it was in the years preceding the conservative resurgence,” writes Rainer, who found that the denomination’s number of annual baptisms has remained virtually unchanged since the 1950s. “We must conclude that the evangelistic growth of the denomination is stagnant, and that the onset of the conservative resurgence has done nothing to improve this trend.”

Rainer’s article supports the campaign for a renewal of broad evangelistic fervor in the denomination by the Rev. Bobby Welch, who was elected president of the Southern Baptist Convention last year partly on the strength of his promise to baptize 1 million new Southern Baptists.

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