New York Times Op-Ed: The Dissenters Trying to Save Evangelicalism From Itself, by David Brooks:
There have been three big issues that have profoundly divided [millions of American Christians]: the white evangelical embrace of Donald Trump, sex abuse scandals in evangelical churches and parachurch organizations, and attitudes about race relations, especially after the killing of George Floyd. …
Of course there is a lot of division across many parts of American society. But for evangelicals, who have dedicated their lives to Jesus, the problem is deeper. Christians are supposed to believe in the spiritual unity of the church. While differing over politics and other secondary matters, they are in theory supposed to be unified by their shared first love — as brothers and sisters in Christ. Their common devotion is supposed to bring out the fruits of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
“We are one in the Spirit, we are one in the Lord,” say the opening lines of a famous Christian song commonly known as “By Our Love.” In its chorus it proclaims, “And they’ll know we are Christians by our love, by our love.” The world envisioned by that song seems very far away right now. The bitter recriminations have caused some believers to wonder if the whole religion is a crock.
Russell Moore resigned from his leadership position in the Southern Baptist Convention last spring over the denomination’s resistance to addressing the racism and sexual abuse scandals in its ranks. He tells me that every day he has conversations with Christians who are losing their faith because of what they see in their churches. He made a haunting point last summer when I saw him speak in New York State at a conference at a Bruderhof community, which has roots in the Anabaptist tradition. “We now see young evangelicals walking away from evangelicalism not because they do not believe what the church teaches,” he said, “but because they believe that the church itself does not believe what the church teaches.” …
Over the past decade or so, many of the country’s most celebrated Christian institutions were rocked by a series of horrific scandals. … Power is the core problem here. First, the corruptions of personal power. Evangelicalism is a populist movement. It has no hierarchy or central authority, so you might think it would have avoided the abuses of power that have afflicted the Roman Catholic Church. But the paradox of decentralization is that it has often led to the concentration of power in the hands of highly charismatic men, who can attract enthusiastic followings. A certain percentage of these macho celebrities inflict their power on the vulnerable and especially on young women. …
The turmoil in evangelicalism has not just ruptured relationships; it’s dissolving the structures of many evangelical institutions. Many families, churches, parachurch organizations and even denominations are coming apart. I asked many evangelical leaders who are wary of Trump if they thought their movement would fracture. Most said it already has.
Over the past few years, the atmosphere within many Christian organizations has grown more tense and bitter. As an evangelical friend of mine noted, what used to be open fields are now minefields. If you invite such and such a speaker to your Christian college, it means you’ve surrendered to the woke brigades. If you use this word in your sermon, you’re guilty of critical race theory. Pastors across the political spectrum are exhausted — partly because of Covid but partly because every word they use is scrutinized to see if it passes this or that ideological litmus test. …
Hints of Christian renewal are becoming visible.
When I was young, I had a weird obsession with people who adopted and then broke with communism around the middle of the 20th century — Arthur Koestler, Stephen Spender, Richard Wright, Andre Gide and Whittaker Chambers. Breaking ranks was brutal for many of this set; they were ostracized and condemned.
They were also liberated. They began to think new things, find new allies and sometimes embark on new causes. Some of them contributed to an anthology describing their experiences called “The God That Failed.”
I’ve watched a lot of evangelical Christians endure similar experiences. They’ve broken from the community they thought they were wed to for life. Except for them it wasn’t God that failed, but the human institutions built in his name. This experience of breaking, rethinking and reorienting a life could be the first stage in renewal. …
Over the past several years I watched fellow journalists Peter Wehner, Michael Gerson and David French earnestly and in good faith engage with Trump-backing Christians, trying to understand what was going on. Now they are courageously and passionately opposing the Trumpification of American Christianity. They’ve become leading spokesmen for reform and participants in the discussions that are now happening over what needs to be done. …
If breaking ranks and rethinking is the first stage of renewal, bearing witness is the next. There are now many, many people who refused to be silent about abuses of power. …
The next stage in the renewal is what you might call the social reorganization of American Christianity. Denominational differences are becoming less important. People who used to be in different silos have been prompted by the turmoil to find one another and seek common cause. …
One source of division could be a force for renewal: generational differences. Christians who are millennial and younger have different views on things like L.G.B.T.Q. issues and are just used to mixing with much more diverse demographics.
Mark Labberton is the president of Fuller Theological Seminary, which engages with students from 110 denominations and 90 nations. He says the average student at Fuller is about 31. Many Fuller students, Labberton says, believe in the central creed of Christianity, but not the institutional shroud it has come wrapped in. That is to say, they love Jesus, but they have had it with many of the institutions their elders have built in his name. …
There can probably be no evangelical renewal if the movement does not divorce itself from the lust for partisan political power. Over more than a century, Catholics have established a doctrine of social teaching that helps them understand how the church can be active in civic life without being corrupted by partisan politics. Protestants do not have this kind of doctrine.
Those who are leading the evangelical renewal know they need one. … Over the past few years, I’ve joined and observed a few of the conferences and gatherings organized by Christians who are trying to figure out how to start this renewal. …
[L]ately a much clearer understanding of what needs to happen is emerging. The most detailed agenda I’ve seen has been produced by Tim Keller, the founding pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City. Tim is a friend of mine, but a lot of other people would agree that he has one of the most impressive and important minds in the evangelical world. Tim laid out for me an ambitious agenda to renew this community. I’ll just give you the bullet points: …
[E]vangelicalism has survived division before. It has historically had a Christian nationalist current and also a more justice-oriented current, which was powerful as recently as the 1970s. Both of these currents ebb and flow over the decades.
And young believers are a powerful force. Mark Labberton says that many of the seminarians at Fuller are moving away from church as we normally conceive it. They want to build communities that are smaller, intimate, authentic, which can often fit in a living room. They see faith as inseparably linked to community service with the poor and marginalized. There’s a general interest in getting away from all the bitterness that has devoured the elders and just diving back into the Bible.
Finally, Karen Swallow Prior said something that rings in my ears: “Modernity has peaked.” The age of the autonomous individual, the age of the narcissistic self, the age of consumerism and moral drift has left us with bitterness and division, a surging mental health crisis and people just being nasty to one another. Millions are looking for something else, some system of belief that is communal, that gives life transcendent meaning.
Christianity is a potential answer for that search, and therein lies its hope, and the great possibility of renewing its call.
