The Evangelical Manifesto

It's an intriguing document, but I think Alan Jacobs - who takes it on, here and here - is right to be frustrated with it, and with the extent to which it merely reflects a muddled moment iin religion and politics, rather than offering a plausible way out of the muddle.

Update: Michael Brendan Dougherty - like me, a Catholic eyeing Evangelical developments with interest - has a more positive take on the document.

Comments

I'll take issue with Jacobs' point that only conservative Protestants care whether someone is an evangelical or a fundamentalist. I'm a lapsed Catholic, and it makes a huge difference.

An evangelical is not going to try to stop my kids' school from teaching evolution; a fundamentalist will.

An evangelical will likely have more tolerance for gays and lesbians; a fundamentalist less.

Those are enormous distinctions.

Posted by Dave | May 9, 2008 1:32 PM

There's a reason that nailing jello to the wall is a cliche; it's called evangelicalism, an overused religious identity that bears remarkable similarity to the consistency of jello. To borrow a line from Ron Wells, who taught history at Calvin College, I'd turn in my evangelical membership card if there were an office to which to send it. Worse, there isn't even a membership card. So why bother trying to attach a body to the evangelical spirit? It has been a disembodied version of Christianity since the First Great Awakening.

Posted by Darryl Hart | May 9, 2008 3:50 PM

Shorter Manifesto:

"We intend to be evangelicals without being ignorant, blinkered, intolerant embarrassments, and as soon as we figure out how we'll let you know."

Posted by Mike | May 10, 2008 1:24 PM

As someone who was raised within the Evangelical tradition and attended what many consider to be one of the foremost Evangelical seminaries, I can say I find not just this document, nor just the idea of this document, but that a group of self appointed Evangelicals set themselves to the task of preparing such a document highly disturbing. The obvious need for such a document is that those who became Evangelical to avoid the embarrassment of being labeled a Fundamentalist are now embarrassed to be associated with what the term Evangelical has come to signify in the wake of the movements' leaders having crawled into bed with the right wing of the Republican party and the aftermath thereof summed up in the failed Bush administration. Fortunately, I had the good sense to get off the bus long before it derailed into the rather significant mess that has made the term Evangelical so distasteful in the mouths of so many, including unfortunately those to whom were have been charged with being salt and light. Its time to move beyond false labels, identity and the need thereof and to focus on Jesus withing the historical context in which he took on human flesh to show us what God was/is like, which quite unfortunately, looks nothing whatsoever like those who in the name of Evangelicalism claim to be his followers.

Posted by Leroy | May 10, 2008 2:49 PM

Not exactly Spe Salvi, is it?

Posted by Aaron | May 11, 2008 9:43 AM

As a Catholic, you should scorn Evangelicals. They are the natural enemy of Catholics. Just look where their missionary work is: Latin America. You know, that place that is overwhelimingly Catholic. They are autocephalous and decentralized, and all come from the Lutheran "Read it yourself" philosophy that is very anti-Catholic.

Posted by freddiemac | May 11, 2008 11:49 AM

What is great is that evangelicals are realizing that it is morally bankrupt to just always vote Republican.

And it has been seeing what Bush has done that has really triggered this response. Evangelicals were told to vote for Bush because of his pro-life stance, but what did they get?

They got someone who waged a preemptive war, manipulated the intelligence and news agencies to gain public acceptance, and even resorted to torture.

That's hardly pro-life, yet McCain wants to continue the same policies.

There are so many points to the Republican agenda that evangelicals want to simply vomit out of their mouths and cleanse themselves of. There's war, torture, anti-science, anti-environment, not caring about the poor, being totally for the wealthy, just care about yourself, etc.

Whether the document is "flawed" is not the point; the point is that this is the beginning of the dam breaking and the GOP needs to be worried. They have used evangelicals and played on their fears for far too long.

Posted by cm | May 12, 2008 12:27 AM