Kruse Kronicle

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Index

For the last six weeks, I have summarized the sixteen essays in Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Political Strategies for the Health of the Nation. This was my second time through the book, and I continue to be amazed at its wealth of information. If nothing else, this book demonstrates that evangelical thinking on public policy is far more diverse and reasoned than many critics of the evangelical movement are willing to acknowledge. I think it also demonstrates that evangelicalism is in flux and becoming ever more sophisticated. Ron Sider and the late Diane Knippers did the Christian community a tremendous service by producing this compilation.

Here is an index of my chapter summaries:

"Toward an Evangelical Public Policy" Book Discussion

PART I: Learning from the Past

Chapter 1 - Seeking a Place: Evangelical Protestants and Public Engagement in the Twentieth Century. John C. Green
Chapter 2 – A History of the Public Policy Resolutions of the National Association of Evangelicals. Richard Cizik
Chapter 3 – Evangelical Denominations at the Foundations of Modern American and British Social-Political Structures and Policies: A Philosopher's Perspective. Paul de Vries
Chapter 4 – The Mainline Protestant Tradition in the Twentieth Century: Positive Lessons and Cautionary Tales. Max L. Stackhouse and Raymond R. Roberts
Chapter 5 – Insights from Catholic Social Ethics and Political Participation. Kristen E. Heyer

PART II: Toward an Evangelical  Methodology

Chapter 6 – Toward an Evangelical Ethical Methodology. David P. Gushee and Dennis P. Hollinger
Chapter 7 – Theological Foundations for an Evangelical Political Philosophy. Nicholas Wolterstorff
Chapter 8 – Justice, Human Rights, and Government: Toward an Evangelical Perspective. Ronald J. Sider
Chapter 9 – Citizenship, Civil Society, and the Church. Joseph Loconte

PART III – Central Themes for an Evangelical Framework

Chapter 10 – The Sanctity of Life in the Twenty-first Century: An Agenda for Homo Sapiens in the image of God. Nigel M. de S. Cameron
Chapter 11 – Caring for the Vulnerable. Clive Calver and Galen Carey
Chapter 12 – Family Integrity. Tom Minnery and Glenn T. Stanton
Chapter 13 – Stewardship. R. Scott Rodin
Chapter 14 – The Ethics of War and Peacemaking. Glen H. Stassen
Chapter 15 – Human Rights. Paul Marshall

PART IV – Implementation

Chapter 16 – In the Arena: Practical Issues in Concrete Political Engagement. Stephen Monsma and Mark Rodgers

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Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Chapter 16

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part IV – Implementation

Chapter 16 – In the Arena: Practical Issues in Concrete Political Engagement.

By Stephen Monsma, fellow at the Center for Public Justice and a research fellow at the Henry Institute for the Study of Christianity and Politics, Calvin College; and Mark Rodgers, staff director of the Senate Republican Conference.

Politics “…is not an area to rush into with a maximum of enthusiasm and good intentions and a minimum of thought and planning.” (326) There is potential for doing great good and great harm. Good intentions must be coupled with thoughtful applications.

Living God’s Truth in a Broken World: Basic Perspectives

Monsma and Rodgers believe three truths must be acknowledged when we engage in politics:

• First, the sinful, broken nature of the political world.
• Second, Christians entering the political world – even when they do so prayerfully and with a passion for following their risen Lord and his Word – bring with them a burden of biased perspectives, incomplete knowledge, and their own sinfulness.
• Third, setting the context for Christian political engagement is that political activity is “downstream” of culture, and to truly shape the direction of the nation.

In response to these truths, the authors believe that Christians in politics must maintain perspectives with “…a realistic understanding of the modest gains one is likely to achieve by political involvement” and “…a strong sense of humility.” (329) Especially critical is the realization of how much politics is determined by what happens “upstream” in culture.

Different Forms of Involvement

Monsma and Rodgers believe that every Christian should be involved in politics. At the most basic level, involvement is being acquainted with issues and voting on them. When you have decided what issues you think are most pressing, the authors note that many find it helpful to have a set of indicator issues knowing that politicians who vote one way on a particular issue tend to vote similarly on related issues. While the authors warn against single-issue voting, some issues are better indicators than others of a politician’s political philosophy. Of course, one important indicator is party affiliation.

The authors also note that to truly have a political impact, you must join others in political action. Joining associations that reflect your concern for issues can be a productive strategy. Some will work within a political party to achieve their ends. Finally, there is the option of running for office.

Monsma and Rodgers acknowledge that Christians who involve themselves in politics quickly discover five things (332-333):

• First, Christians quickly realize that they must advocate in the public square for their positions using “natural law” arguments that are accessible and persuasive to all.
• Second, as we discuss more fully later, it does not take Christians long, whether they work in the legislative, judicial, or executive branch, to realize that to compromise on tactic or policy is not always the same as compromising on principle.
• This leads to a third challenge that we believe plagues many Christians who engage in politics inside or outside of the system – discouragement and cynicism. Many tire of compromise.
• The combination of frustration and an “us-versus-them” mentality can lead to a fourth challenge for Christians – loving your enemy.
• Finally, the greatest challenge we believe Christians who work within the political system face is to approach their vocation in an integrated way, rather than in compartmentalized, dualistic manner.

Compromise and the Christian

Monsma and Rodgers distinguish between what they call a “half-a-loaf” compromise and a compromise resulting from losing one’s independence by the alliances one makes. Too many Christians see every political effort as an all-or-nothing contest, while politics is usually about coalition building and making incremental change.

The compromise that concerns the authors most is where a politician becomes so beholden to some party or faction that they lose their ability to act independently when it is needed for them to do so. This is always a danger.

Forming Alliances with Others

Monsma and Rodgers point out that politics only happens by developing collations, and that often means joining forces with others with whom we differ on some issues or many issues. There is always risk involved when we do this. One possibility is that we will develop an overly dependent relationship and lose our independence. Another danger is that we become closely identified with partner organizations in the mind of the media and the public and lose our independent voice.

This problem is especially pronounced when discussing the two major political parties. The authors list three potential dangers.

• Being co-opted by a political party.
• Inadvertently, assisting factions and causes that are contrary to Christian principles.
• Becoming overly identified with one political partying the mind of the public.

Conclusion

The authors conclude by reminding us that, as Christians, we are responsible for engaging in the political arena.

Assessment

I have always had an interest in politics. I have been deeply involved in political campaigns, including one US congressional campaign a decade ago. Much of this chapter rings true to me. I particularly liked the observation of politics being “downstream” from culture. In recent years, I have turned my energies toward addressing some of the “upstream” issues, though I still occasionally do various political activities.

I also thought the authors did a good job of describing the pitfalls of working in alliances. The mainline denominations like the PCUSA have been so closely aligned with Democrat politics that they no longer have any truly prophetic voice. They are seen as mere extensions of the Democrats. Evangelicals are flirting with the same problem with the Republicans. Examples of why we should be on guard are all around us.

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Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Chapter 15

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part III – Central Themes for an Evangelical Framework

Chapter 15 – Human Rights.

By Paul Marshall, senior fellow at the Center for Religious Freedom, Freedom House, Washington, DC.

Marshall observes that human rights have become a central topic in evangelical public policy questions in recent years. However, nailing down exactly what is a "human right" is difficult. Many use "right" in place of "should have," as in, "I think everyone has a right to decent housing. "

Furthermore, getting something into the public mind as a "right" is a powerful tool for gaining its acceptance. Marshall quotes L. W. Sumner.

It is the agility of rights, their talent for turning up on both sides of an issue, which is simultaneously their most impressive and their most troubling feature. Clearly, interest groups which agree on little else agree that rights are indispensable weapons in political debate. (309)

Marshall has a wonderful quote from G. K. Chesterton's Orthodoxy.

When a religious scheme is shattered it is not merely the vices that are let loose. The vices are, indeed, let loose, and they wander and do damage. But the virtues are let loose also, and the virtues wander more wildly, and the virtues do more terrible damage. The modern world is full of old Christian virtues gone mad. The virtues have gone mad because they are isolated from each other and are wandering alone. Thus some scientists care for truth; and their truth is pitiless. Thus some humanitarians only care for pity; and their pity (I am sorry to say) is often untruthful… (310)

We have a proliferation of rights without paying attention to personal and civic obligations.

Marshall writes that "rights" can be understood as gifts or endowments from God. We are not autonomous creatures with rights. Marshall examines several Scripture passages, pointing out that humans are made in God's image, and because they are God's image, they have certain rights.

Hence, a Christian understanding of right should flow from the recognition that, through God’s continuing justice, mercy, and provision for us, we have a claim to be in right relation with one another and we can claim what God says is right for us. (314)

Here are two paragraphs that get at what Marshall thinks would be involved in a Christian view of human rights.

We, along with all creatures, are God’s servants. We may say that each of us has a right to be a servant of God, to fulfill our particular office and calling for God’s glory. Human beings have a claim to be able to do what God calls them to do. Our rights relate to our God-given human duties and responsibilities. Human beings have a right to the institutions and the resources they need to carry out their responsibilities. Hence, the political order must be one in which men and women can express themselves as God’s imagers, or to put it another way, there must be social space for human personality.

This necessarily implies, first of all, the right to be, the right to life itself, the right to be unharmed. This right belongs to each human life. Such human life always exists in bodies of flesh and blood and bones; hence, humans have a right to remain whole, not to be harmed, aborted, maimed, tortured, molested, place in hostage, or terrorized. The basic needs of individuals for food, nurture, shelter, and care are implicit in the right to life itself. The biblical message pointedly indicates that the fulfillment of such needs is a matter of God’s requirement of justice. This justice therefore requires an allocation of material and cultural goods such that human life is made possible, protected, and enhanced so that humans can realize their God-given tasks within human history. These tasks entail the use of “nature” and its resources. This use is not only a right of the human species or of the human “community,” for each of us is so called. The earth is the Lord’s, and persons have the right to a stewardly possession and use of it. In a differentiated society, this implies some right to privacy and, its concomitant, private property. (315)

Marshall points out that the primary difficulty with rights is when two legitimate rights come into conflict with each other. He makes a critical distinction between justice and rights.

In this situation, justice points to the manner and means of weighing and simultaneously meeting different rights. Rights, in turn, as God-given arenas of authority, point to what it is that must be related in a just fashion. (316) (Emphasis in the original.)

So how can we secure human rights? Marshall suggests Constitutional laws are critical. Democracy is important because it can act as a check on government tendencies to erode human rights. International human rights are considerably more difficult. Communities of nations often come to some agreement through treaties. However, in many places around the world, like Muslim nations and in many Asian countries, human rights is often viewed as Western impositions on populations that do not share Western values on freedom of religion, family, or economics. Are they universally applicable human rights?

Marshall points out that more agreement can probably be reached about proscriptive restrictions on governments than on prescriptive requirements for government. He notes that the Bill of Rights of the US Constitution, the first ten Amendments, are overwhelming statements about what government must refrain from doing. "no law…not be infringed…no soldier…no person…no fact…not required…not to be construed… not delegated…" (322)

In concluding his essay, Marshall emphasizes that human rights can only truly be found as endowments by the creator to those made in his image. "Hence, rights should not be multiplied endlessly according to the assertion of human will but must reflect a normative understanding of genuine human responsibility and authority." (322) These will likely best be protected by restricting what government may not do. When we add to this a laundry list of things a government should try to achieve (ex., economic prosperity, clean environment, education for everyone, healthcare for everyone), we move into an alternate definition of rights that may diminish genuine human rights.

Assessment

This essay was a good reflection. I find especially helpful his relation of justice to rights.

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Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Chapter 14

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part III – Central Themes for an Evangelical Framework

Chapter 14 – The Ethics of War and Peacemaking.

By Glen H. Stassen, Lewis B. Smedes Professor of Christian Ethics at Fuller Theological Seminary.

Stassen identifies three approaches to violence in Christian ethics: just war theory, pacifism/nonviolence, and just peacemaking theory. While there is considerable debate about which of the first two is most faithful to Jesus' teaching, he reasons that "just peacemaking" supplements these two and brings us to some common ground. 

The Basis for All Three Ethics: Jesus' Way of Peacemaking

Stassen begins with the understanding "…that Jesus fulfilled Isaiah's prophecies that the deliverer who would come would bring peace." (284) He gives a broad-ranging review of scripture. He shows that the Old Testament prophesied peacemaking as the trademark of the one God would send and that Jesus directly identified himself with that mission. He points to the redemptive power of nonviolent suffering in confronting violence. Stassen reviewed Sermon on the Mount passages to show that Jesus was not teaching passivity but the nonviolent confrontation of violence with the intention to bring change. He also points out that during the Jewish revolt against Rome, beginning in 66 C.E., Jewish Christians did not participate. At the end of this section, he writes, "Jesus fulfilled Isaiah's prophecy that peacemaking would be a key mark of the reign of God." (292)

The Eight Rules of Just War Theory

Just war theory dates back to St. Ambrose and St. Augustine in the fourth century. Quoting Arthur Holmes, Stassen writes, "Just war theory does not try to justify war. Rather it tries to bring war under the control of justice." (292) It is centered in the conviction that to justify killing when we know killing is wrong, there must be a very important reason promoting some greater good or lesser evil. Stassen points to some ethicists who argue that there are times when it is morally incumbent to fight a war out of love for neighbor. In any case, Stassen insists that we not lose sight that our ethics about war must be subject to Jesus' ethic of peacemaking and doing justice. He encourages every Christian to know the eight criteria for evaluating just wars.

A. Justice in Deciding to Go to War (Jus ad Bellum)

1. Just CAUSE - “The causes that can override the Presumption against killing are stopping the massacre of large numbers of people or stopping the systematic and long-term violation of the human rights of life, liberty, and community.” (293)

2. Just AUTHORITY – Only those with just constitutional authority following a constitutional process have the authority to prosecute a war. International consultation consensus should be sought before declaring war, thus increasing the moral authority for the war and possibly averting needless wars. Going back at to John Calvin, it has also been held that lesser authorities have the authority to depose despots.

3. Last RESORT – Since the fourth century it has been held the war should always be a last resort to stop a greater injustice

4. Just INTENTION – Quoting Arthur Holmes, "The only legitimate intention is to secure a just peace for all involved. Neither revenge nor conquest nor economic gain nor ideological supremacy are justified.” (294)

5. Probability of SUCCESS – There must be a reasonable chance of winning the war otherwise lives should not be wasted.

6. PROPORTIONALITY OF COST – The benefits must outweigh the costs.

7. ANNOUNCEMENT – “The government should announce the intention to make war and of the conditions for avoiding it.” (295)

B. Justice in the Means Used in Fighting the War (Jus in Bello)

8. The war must be fought by JUST MEANS – Noncombatants are not legitimate military targets. Militaries should make every legitimate effort to avoid such casualties. “Terrorism is particularly evil, and the term should be used precisely to name exactly the evil it is.” (297)

Stassen considers it unwarranted to conclude that nonviolence was something particular to Jesus' day and ours. He also warns against those who want to call a war just without fully reflecting on the eight criteria. Equally, he affirms that,

It is disingenuous to use just war criteria in such a way that no imaginable set of facts would get through the tests; rightly understood, the criteria are designed to distinguish just wars from unjust wars, and to be useful in limiting injustice and violence, in real decisions for and against wars and in fighting realistically. (297)

He concludes this section by noting,

Once Christians define just war theory as a way to try to decrease violence and injustice, they receive a second benefit: They are affirming nonviolence and justice. (298)

Consistent Nonviolence

Stassen points out that the Christian movement was consistently nonviolent during its first three hundred years. Nonviolence "…takes the way of Jesus and the witness of the New Testament as authoritative for our witness." (299)

Stassen turns to the work of John Howard Yoder that lays out the principles that allow pacifists to support a properly trained and disciplined police force.

• The threat of police violence is applied only to the offending party.
• The police officer's violence is subject to review by higher authorities.
• The authorized force is within a state whose laws the criminal knows apply to himself.
• Safeguards seek to keep police violence from being applied in a wholesale way against the innocent.
• Police power is generally great enough to overwhelm the offender so resistance is pointless.

These criteria are much different than those of just war theory and could not be directly applied internationally.

Stassen cautions against confusing pacifism with passivism. Pacifism as an active connotation of "making peace." Yet pacifism is done out of faithfulness, not effectiveness. War is ineffective over fifty percent of the time, as there is always at least one loser, and sometimes everyone loses.

Finally, Stassen challenges the view of some pacifists that pacifism applies only to Christians. Jesus is Lord of all, and if pacifism applies, it applies to all.

Just Peacemaking Theory

If pacifism is about "making peace," then what principles would apply in just peacemaking? Stassen identifies ten.

1. Support nonviolent direct action – The efforts of Gandhi, M. L. King, Jr., demise of Philippine dictatorship, Poland, East Germany and nations in central Europe are examples, among others, of nonviolent resistance bringing change.
2. Take independent initiatives to reduce threat. – These include the following elements: (1) They are visible and verifiable actions, not promises; (2) are accompanied by an announcement that their purpose is to decrease threat and distrust and to invite reciprocation; (3) do not leave the initiator weak; (4) do not wait for the slow process of negotiations; (5) having a timing announced in advance that is carried out regardless of the other side's bluster; and (6) come in a series: If the other side fails to reciprocate, small initiatives continue in order to keep inviting reciprocation.
3. Use cooperative conflict resolution.
4. Acknowledge responsibility for conflict and injustice; seek repentance and forgiveness.
5. Promote democracy, human rights, and religious liberty.
6. Foster just and sustainable economic development. – Reduction of economic injustice will lessen many of the reasons that generate wars.
7. Work with emerging cooperative forces in the international system. – Both government and non-governmental.
8. Strengthen the United Nations and international efforts for cooperation and human rights.
9. Reduce offensive weapons and weapons trade.
10. Encourage grassroots peacemaking groups and voluntary associations, especially churches.

Stassen closes with this observation,

If just peacemaking fails, is it right to make war, or should we be committed to nonviolence? Everyone needs to answer to that question, because short of the second coming, just peacemaking will not prevent all wars. (306)

Assessment

It has been my privilege over the years to know people committed to complete pacifism, including one gentleman I knew who was an American pacifist during World War II and suffered for it. I have much respect for this kind of courage and conviction. I am of the Just War view, but I would like to see myself as a pacifist (maker of peace) who believes that violence is the least bad way to get to peace in some circumstances.

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Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Chapter 13

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part III – Central Themes for an Evangelical Framework

Chapter 13 – Stewardship.

By R. Scott Rodin, vice president John R. Frank Consulting Group in Seattle, Washington.

The goal of this chapter is to look at six evangelical theological convictions that from a theology of stewardship, namely Christocentric epistemology, the Trinity, the creation of humanity in the imago Dei, the fall and the corruption of all creation by sin, the incarnation and atoning work of Christ, and the call of the Christian to a life of obedience, surrender, and service. (265)

Epistemology

Evangelical theology has based its epistemology on the self-revelation of God in Jesus Christ. (265)

Evangelical theology is at its best when it seeks knowledge of God only through a participation in the life of the Son’s revelation of the Father in the power of the Holy Spirit. (266)

The Trinity

Rodin writes that human community is to be the imago Trinitatas, the image of the Trinity. Inherent in the Trinity is the interconnectedness of relationships. Stewardship happens in community.

Creation and the Imago Dei

The special, privileged work of the steward in God’s Kingdom is to be carried out on all four relational levels in which we were created: our relationship with God, with ourselves, with our neighbor, and with creation. (267-268)

Rodin goes on to conclude that we were created as covenant partners with God, we were created for personal wholeness, we were created for relationship with one another, and we were created as creatures to have dominion over creation. I particularly appreciated his observation that "have dominion" has a dual aspect to it. There is the responsibility for creation working and caring for creation, but there is equally a responsibility to God and his character who granted the dominion.

The Fall and Corruption of All Things by Sin

Rodin sees four consequences of the fall.

1. Humanity lost its status before God. In doing so we lost our very reason for existence.
2. Humanity replaces what was lost by "… with the desire to create, acquire, or take by force those things that would recreate purpose and meaning in life.
3. Prior to the fall there was no concept of an autonomous, independent self. It was incomprehensible to pre-fallen Adam and Eve, so thoroughly in relationship were they with each other and with God. The fall introduced the delusion of autonomous independence and thus marred relationships.
4. Because of the fall, humanity has moved from steward of creation in relationship to autonomous owner of creation.

Rodin points out that it is difficult to maintain an attitude of temporary ownership. Absolute ownership brings power. Money and wealth are what we use to maintain our autonomy and give meaning to our existence. Consequently, creation is valued only as it meets our needs and desires and ceases to have inherent value.

Rodin points out that the temptation is to be a part of the kingdom of God while also building a home for ourselves in this world. This "two kingdom" enterprise ends up with us trying to take absolute ownership in ways that are destructive of the four relationships for which we were made. (i.e., with God, with ourselves, with our neighbor, and with creation.) For example, Rodin writes,

Two kingdom people will begin to own their relationship to God, demanding that worship be done according to their standards and that the church conform to their own preferences. The moment this happens, worship ceases to be a stewardship response and becomes an ownership issue. Worship wars are often battles over ownership, not stewardship. (274)

Whether money, relationships, worship, or natural resources, that which was meant to be "owned" in community with God and others becomes twisted into a tool for maintaining autonomy.

The Restoration of All Things in Christ

We have the promise that one day Christ will restore all things. We must remember that it does not just mean a personal relationship with God but all four types of relationships. Relationship to God through Christ offers back meaning and purpose to our existence and frees us from the compulsion to seek absolute ownership. That freedom also enables the other types of relationship to be restored.

Toward an Evangelical Agenda for Stewardship

Four points for an evangelical agenda regarding stewardship.

The Response to Systems

No earthly economic system can incorporate the ethics of the steward in God’s kingdom. In our fallenness we can only at best construct systems that appropriate the spirit of such an ethic, and even then will constantly be at risk of giving in to our nature as kingdom builders. (277)

Rodin goes on to note that capitalism's strongest and weakest element is that it is based on the premise of ownership. Ownership is what inspires and disciplines many to work and be productive. No other economic system has shown the ability to lift people out of poverty like capitalism. But the ownership drive of capitalism also has contributed to finding our meaning in having instead of being. We cannot not adopt the capitalistic system uncritically.

The Response to Wealth

Rodin warns, "We must also not fall into the false logic that if blessings from God sometimes equal wealth, then wealth always equals God's blessing." (279) Scripture makes us very much aware that wealth is often amassed by the ungodly through ungodly means. Our wealth should be seen as a gift from God and used for God's ends.

The Response to the Environment

Rodin sees environmentalism as a natural extension of evangelical thinking though it has been neglected until as of late. He cautions against the pantheistic tendencies of many environmentalists. Instead, we need to learn how creation works and be concerned about its plight. We must be willing to sacrifice and make lifestyle changes as we work to redeem creation for its ultimate goal.

The Response to the Poor

Rodin highlights the Bible's preoccupation with the poor. He writes that we must have two things in mind. First, our response has to be both individual and corporate. We must address structures but also consider our personal presence and involvement with the poor. One without the other is useless. Second, our response has to be Christlike. I loved his observation that "Caring for the poor is not an activity, it is a lifestyle." (282)

Assessment

I found this chapter to be a gem. Rodin succinctly summarizes some very complex theological implications. I am especially drawn to his analysis of how our rebellion against God has led to the desire for autonomous ownership and delusional efforts to find meaning apart from God. This is an absolutely critical perspective that must be considered in any Christian ethics or public policy dialog.

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Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Chapter 12

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part III – Central Themes for an Evangelical Framework

Chapter 12 – Family Integrity.

By Tom Minnery, vice president for Focus on the Family; Glenn T. Stanton, social research analyst for marriage and sexuality at Focus on the Family.

Minnery and Stanton begin their essay by acknowledging that there has never been a golden age of the family. Still, we haven't "done family" as well in recent generations as in the past. Some advocates want to define marriage as something it has never been defined as in any other civilization. Marriage as,

A moldable union between any coupling of consenting adults, regardless of gender, driven by adult desire rather than an obligation to the next generation. (And it is curious that for all the great social justice theorists from whom our world has benefited, none of them has ever hinted that marriage being confined to opposite-sex coupling was a hindrance to human equality. The question has only been raised in the last millisecond of human history by a very small handful of advocates.) (246)

Some advocate that marriage should be abolished.

Meanwhile, research on the effects of family structures on societal health has been coming to a conclusion.

Researchers are finding that when we move away from the family ideal where male and female commit themselves to each other exclusively in marriage and cooperatively raise their common children, men, women, and children suffer substantial declines in every important  measure of well-being: mental and physical health, shorter life spans, lowered educational performance and attainment, increases in criminal and antisocial behavior, greater sexual dysfunction, alcoholism, suicide and domestic violence, and sexual abuse. (247)

Minnery and Stanton note that at the same time, there are activists advocating radical change in (or abolition of) marriage. Still, more resources are available than ever to help affect healthy marriages and families. Indeed, there seems to be a trend by a sizable number of young adults to recover what most would identify as the traditional family.

Establishing Ideals and Motivation

• Why does family matter?
• What is the essential nature of family?
• What is the family's relationship to the state and public life?

…we are interested in answering these questions in light of a larger metanarrative, that of Christian tradition, given to us in the sacred Scriptures. This story contains important points that help us understand how the family reflects the very nature of God. (249-250)

Why Does the Family Matter? A Theology of Family

Minnery and Stanton find the basis for the family rooted in the creation account of men and women being created in the image of God.

He gave Adam someone who was like him in his image-bearing humanity, but unlike him in her co-image-reflecting femininity. God established humanity and human culture upon marriage – the sexual, emotional, and domestic union of male and female – and family – the bringing forth of new life through sexual union and cooperative parenting. (250)

Therefore, marriage and family are inherently trinitarian. For it is the closest earthly model we have of this eternal heavenly reality. Man and woman, though separate beings both representing their unique parts of humanity, are joined together before God and become one flesh. Their relationship, in the ideal, is of love, intimacy, creativity and procreation, communication, exclusiveness and permanence. They are a mystery, uniquely proclaiming the nature of God and his character in creation. …To fail to care for the family is, in a very real way, to fail to care for the very image of God on earth. (251)

The authors also emphasize that God chose to communicate the nature of his work in history by talking about the church as family. There are many metaphors in the New Testament, but none stands out like the family metaphor.

The Incarnation and Family

The Christian manger is an earthly trinity: a man, a woman, and a child. This family is the stage through which God transcended eternity and entered our realm. This is deeply significant, for it is an incredible stamp of approval upon the whole family enterprise: the relationships, the work, the struggles, the hardships, the love, and the comfort of family. (253)

The authors also note that Jesus was born into a family and stayed connected with his family all of his life.

This is one of many ways Christ stands in stark contrast to the founders of other world religions who forsook their families as a sign of spiritual enlightenment in favor of an ascetic life. (253)

You cannot understand or explain Christianity or the kingdom of God without understanding family. (254)

The Essential Nature of Family

Minnery and Stanton believe that marriage (Matthew 19:4-6), sexuality (Genesis 2:24-25), and parenthood (Genesis 1:28) are the three essential elements of family. Regarding parenthood, it is not that each marriage must produce children but that the institution of marriage as the communal norm that provides for children is inevitably created through male/female sexual union.

Anthropologists tell us marriage is common to and essential in all human societies in the form of permanent, socially approved male/female pair bonding. … No societies – advanced or primitive – until very recently, have tolerated casual sexual or domestic liaisons or same-sex domestic pair bonding. (255)

Areas of Harmony and Disagreement

All Christians should resist in terms of public policy and cultural engagement: (256)

• Affirming easy divorce, same sex-marriage and parenting (which rejects the image of God in humanity by rejecting the necessity of male and female coupling), or transforming marriage into merely a self-satisfying adult relationship.
• Policies, like tax codes or employment benefits, that either penalize the married mother-father-child triad or those that elevate other lesser domestic relationships to equal status with marriage by virtue of benefits offered. This would include both hetero- and homosexual civil unions.
• Accepting other domestic situations – cohabitation and single parenting by choice – as normal or tolerable parts of community family life.
• Policies that tend to normalize the great social divorce between human sexuality and the emotionally and physically protective confines of marriage.
• Affirming situations in which children are abandoned or separated from their biological mothers and fathers due to divorce, same-sex parenting, or unwed childbearing.
• The move by some leading family law theorists, along with the American Law Institute, seeking to remove all legal marriage and family categories in favor of recognizing all close personal domestic relationships equally.

Additionally, all Christians should support efforts that: (256)

• Strengthen healthy, cooperative marital unions of mutual respect where husband and wife are seeking to serve the other in love and grace.
• Help young people and adults make healthy choices by confining sexuality to marriage where couples have committed exclusively to each other, physically, spiritually, and emotionally.
• Help parents lovingly and creatively raise their children together to grow to become healthy, well-adjusted, confident, intelligent, creative human beings.
• Help families and the individuals in them learn to love and serve God and others in the fullness of domestic and public life.

The Relationship between the Family and the Polis

Minnery and Stanton give a brief overview of how Plato and Aristotle understood the role of the family. Both philosophers believed that the family existed to serve the state. The authors then turn to the writings of Abraham Kuyper.

Kuyper believed the family to have been established by God before the fall. It is an organic institution. Government is something that would have emerged even without the fall as part of humankind's activity in exercising dominion over creation. After the fall, it took on the role of protecting the family. It is a mechanical device God placed over or alongside the family for its protection and benefit.

Althusius and the Natural Origin of Community

The authors briefly present the views of German scholar Johannes Althusius (1557-1638). Describing his views, they write,

Like spokes from a wheel, the rest of the polis radiates from the primary association of husband, wife and children. The public associations grow out of this and therefore should seek to preserve the source. (261)

Conclusion

The final paragraph of the essay says,

As witnesses, we must help people make the connection between God’s rule for family life and the way it corresponds with human and societal well-being. Our Lord’s two great commandments – love God and love neighbor – demand we concern ourselves for the health of the family, at home and in the public square. God created family to uniquely reflect his nature and the glory of his church in the world; and our neighbor’s well-being is deeply rooted in the health of their family. (262)

Appraisal

I confess that whenever I see the name "Focus on the Family," I cringe in anticipation. However, I thought these two authors did well in laying out their case. Their final paragraph does seem to me to be the heart of the matter. I thought the last few pages of the essay were the most critical, and I wish they had weighted more of their discussion in that direction. (I also would like to see more emphasis on divorce's ravages and what to do about it.) We need the Christian underpinnings, but to affect public policy, we need to form a broad cultural consensus about the importance of family.

There is a tendency for power to seek more power. Part of the genius of Western democratic societies is honoring multiple institutions that place checks and balances on each other. The primacy of the family as an enviable institution is essential to freedom. It is the only organic human institution that keeps individuals from being laid bare before the raw power of the state. If marriage is reinterpreted as a partnership between any two or more consenting adults, then it ceases to be an enviable institution. There will no longer be families; only individuals in partnerships deemed useful to the state. "Marriage" becomes another business contract the government regulates and chooses to allow as it best serves government purposes. Individuals are at the state's mercy, and no kinship ties can protect them.

Furthermore, possibly the single biggest determining factor affecting whether or not a child grows up in poverty is whether or not they are raised in a two-parent family. Marriage and family are public goods with substantial positive social consequences. The general welfare of society is tied to strong families. Those who advocate change in the marriage laws and want marriage to be a private good between consenting adults are disproportionately affluent and distant from the impact marriage has on less affluent people, particularly children. It is the empowerment of narcissism over the public good, especially for children.

Many advocates of revising marriage laws trivialize the traditionalists as bigoted enemies of freedom. When this passion springs from compassion over the plight of gay persons, I can appreciate the sentiment that wants to aid people who have been trivialized and demonized by society. Nevertheless, whether intended or not, the marriage revisionists undercut the family; the single greatest obstacle to totalitarianism and the chief promoter of the public good.

(Note: If the issues surrounding family, public policy, and culture interest you, I highly recommend William" Beau" Weston's blog, The Gruntled Center: Family and Faith for Centrists.)

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Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Chapter 11

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part III – Central Themes for an Evangelical Framework

Chapter 11 – Caring for the Vulnerable.

By Clive Calver, president of World Relief; Galen Carey, director of Advocacy and Policy for World Relief.

Introduction

While the Bible doesn't explicitly use the word "vulnerable," it is a concept present throughout scripture. To be vulnerable is to be without protection from emotional and physical harm. While we are all vulnerable to one degree or another, some groups of people are more vulnerable than others. The authors list eleven groups of people that are often at risk.

• The Poor
• Women
• Children
• Immigrants
• Refugees
• The Sick
• Persons with disabilities
• The Persecuted
• Minorities
• The Addicted
• Prisoners

Christians and the Vulnerable

The authors briefly recounted evangelical social action until the middle of the Twentieth Century when evangelicals began to retreat from social action in response to what they saw as the ill effects of the "social gospel."

What Does it Mean to Care for the Vulnerable?

Calver and Carey suggest that caring for the vulnerable means meeting immediate needs by offering relief from threatening circumstances. But it also writes that it extends much beyond this. True caring is about transforming people's lives and social structures so that people are less threatened.

Shalom: A Guiding Vision

Calver and Carey offer shalom as the guiding vision for what God has in mind for humanity. They note that shalom is translated in various ways in the NIV Bible: peace, all right, safe, safely, prosperity, success, good health, treaty friendship, peace, and prosperity. They write, "In a society characterized by shalom, people may be vulnerable, but they will have access to the protective resources of the community." (235) From here, they explore the role of three core social institutions in reducing vulnerability and increasing shalom.

What is the Role of the Church?

• Evangelism and discipleship
• Comfort
• Community
• Forgiveness
• Prophetic voice

What is the Role of Christian Families and Individuals?

• Generosity
• Simplicity
• Hospitality
• Citizenship

What is the Role of Government?

• Law
• Security
• Trade
• Infrastructure
• Risk management
• Social Safety Net
• Education

Common Pitfalls Encountered in Caring for the Vulnerable

1. Paternalism – Caregivers can become overly prescriptive and rob the vulnerable of opportunities to care for themselves.
2. Entitlement Mentality – Recipients of care come to view aid as a right and fail to learn how to take initiative.
3. Fraud – Bureaucracies tend to develop that can deny aid to the truly needy while benefiting others who simply know how to work the system.
4. Futility – The magnitude of the problems can lead to immobilization and cynicism by caregivers.
5. Displaced initiative – Care can train some people to suppress their own initiative and just wait to be rescued.

Areas of Consensus

The authors believe there is broad consensus among evangelicals on the following:

1. Responsibility – Christians are personally and collectively responsible for the vulnerable. Voluntary contributions, advocacy, and appropriate government-sponsored initiatives are appropriate.
2. Dignity – All people are created in God's image and should be treated as such.
3. Sustainability – Business can't solve everything but "Where possible, sustainable, market-based solutions to poverty and vulnerability are preferable to those solutions that require continual subsidies, whether private or public." (241)
4. Faith-based initiatives – A level playing field for partnership between faith-based services and government.

Policy Proposals

Calver and Carey recommend four policy proposals to drive the evangelical agenda related to vulnerability.

1. Establish as a national goal the elimination of absolute poverty in the U.S.A. (241)
2. Extend the same rights and protections to vulnerable immigrants and refugees as citizens.
3. Integrate vulnerable individuals as fully as possible into the economic and cultural life of the community.
4. Support the Millennium Development Goals, particularly the goal of achieving a 50 percent reduction in world poverty by 2015.

All in all, I thought they gave a pretty good summary. As with many of the essays, this really needed to be a book.

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Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Chapter 10

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part III – Central Themes for an Evangelical Framework

Chapter 10 – The Sanctity of Life in the Twenty-first Century: An Agenda for Homo Sapiens in the image of God.

By Nigel M. de S. Cameron, Research of bioethics at Chicago-Kent College of Law (Illinois Institute of Technology) and president of the Institute on Biotechnology and the Human Future.

Cameron observes that life is becoming increasingly complex and technology is challenging us to reflect on moral questions we have never had to face. We try to deal with an array of problems one by one, but he believes these issues eventually come down to one question: What does it mean to be human?

At the fulcrum of every human culture lies a set of assumptions about human nature – what it means to be a member of the tribe. (214)

The difficulty is precisely that they are ubiquitous assumptions and not reasoned values. Change challenges our assumptions, forcing us to consciously address what it means to be a part of the tribe.

Biblical Foundations

Cameron believes that an appropriate Biblical anthropology has its roots in two biblical doctrines: creation and incarnation. He believes that Christians need to rediscover the worldview that maintains human beings have human dignity because they are in the image of God. He also maintains that Christ incarnate came in the form of a blastocyst, an early embryo, and sanctified human nature at all stages of its development.

The Bioethics Agenda

Cameron briefly describes the evolution of bioethics from medical ethics. Medical ethics largely addresses the ethics of medical practitioners. Bioethics is a multi-disciplinary enterprise that integrates thinking from a variety of perspectives. However, he writes that contemporary bioethics has largely ignored medical ethics and,

The focus of contemporary bioethics is largely on the development of procedures to enable people to make private decisions – there is little interest in forging a consensus on the basis of commonly held truth. Moreover, the field operates through articles and papers, conferences, and ad hoc centers and has produced few monographs and academic departments. It carries little baggage, historical or institutional, and that absence profoundly conditions the character of its discussions. (216)

He goes on to note that while mainline Protestants have engaged in bioethics, they have, in general, "accepted the broad terms of the secular writers who lead the field." (217) Roman Catholic scholars are all over the map. However, evangelicals are largely absent from the discussion.

From here, he turns to three categories of medical ethics.

Bioethics 1: Abortion, Euthanasia, and Experimentation

Cameron notes that while abortion sparked a belated political response among evangelicals, it has not translated into substantive discourse about the underlying bioethics issues at evangelical colleges and seminaries. Issues like embryonic cell research have largely been cast as a subset of the abortion debate focusing on questions of viability. The larger context is missing. He suggests that the debate has moved from whether or not an unborn life is human life to whether or not life is sacred.

Cameron interacts with the thinking of "radical philosopher" Peter Singer, who says "…seeks a basis for the preservation of the lives of (most) born persons" other than the sanctity of human life. (218) Cameron observes that historical evils like slavery emerged in tension with the idea of imago Dei, the image of God. He doesn't elaborate here, but slavery in Europe was de facto abolished by about 1000 C.E. The Roman Church had baptized slaves and banned enslavement of Christians through a series of edicts. Slavery re-emerged with Spain's early 15th Century conquest of the Canary Islands. It expanded with the conquest of the Americas and Africa by Spain and other European powers. The Europeans defined the natives as sub-human, and therefore slavery was acceptable. The rediscovery of imago Dei for enslaved people was slavery's undoing.

Singer's strategy is to define what makes one distinctively human and use that as the standard for arbitrating what is human. He includes characteristics like rationality, the capacity to communicate, and self-consciousness. Cameron observes that "We may celebrate these features of human maturity; it is something quite else to regard their denial as evidence of human absence." (219) Also,

His [Singer's] exclusion of other features and experiences that are typically human, and indeed morally relevant, such as infancy and age with their dependence, and handicap and sickness with their challenge to the caring community, destroys the credibility of a case that depends on reducing the human race to a selected group. (219)

Furthermore, Singer maintains that arguing intrinsic significance for humans is "speciesism."

Cameron responds:

Moreover, it is in fact Singer whose method closely parallels the racist. For the racist takes human beings – the human race – and on grounds that he or she considers “morally relevant” (skin pigmentation; ethnicity) determines that some member of this species shall be treated with human dignity while others shall not. The racist divides the human race down the middle, according to his or her own extrinsic criteria. That is exactly Singer’s method. (220)

Cameron ends by again pointing to the growing complexities and the narrow engagement by evangelicals.

Bioethics 2: Cloning and Genetics

Cameron sees this category as dealing with manipulating and manufacturing human life. It is "…focused on the use of technology to control, design, and perhaps improve human being at the fundamental level of genetics." (222)

Human beings creating human beings results in a great irony.

This act is stupefying in its scope. Humankind simultaneously claims the role of God while being reduced to playing the part of a mere thing, the dust of the earth out of which we were made and to which we foolish creatures choose to return ourselves; to become, in President Bush’s recent phrase, commodity rather than creation. (221)

Quoting C. S. Lewis, Cameron notes that what appears to be "man's triumph over nature" is, in fact, "nature's triumph over man." Cameron writes,

“…there is emerging a fresh paradigm in which it is recognized that taking a human life made in God’s image may not in fact be as serious, in his eyes, as making a human being in our own.” (222)

Bioethics 3: A Posthuman Future?

Cameron offers one paragraph about this third category dealing with the emergence of cybernetic technology, merging machines with the human organism. Here he is mostly descriptive as he warns about the ethical challenges it will bring.

The Challenge to Evangelicals

Until now the depth of our imaginative depravity had to be content with new forms of killing, the legacy of Cain and Abel. We confront now a new kind of sin, a fresh fulfillment of our conflicted fallen nature, the descendant of the Tower of Babel. This is our best opportunity to begin to frame public policy for biotechnology around an issue of high profile that has resonated with the public conscience. (223)

Our theological rationale is clear. Human beings are made in God’s image. The technological imperative that we read out of the “dominion mandate” in Genesis 1 lies in the context of the kind of being that God has made his human creatures to be. (224)

Cameron closes the chapter with George Bush's statement, "The Sanctity of Life in a Brave New World: A Manifesto on Biotechnology and Human Dignity."

I thought Cameron did a good job of presenting his perspective on a massively complex issue. I would have loved for him to probe more in any number of directions, but that was not the essay's objective. I agree most readily with his observations that evangelicals and a much broader spectrum of Christianity have yet to come to grips with these issues.

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Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Chapter 9

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part II – Toward an Evangelical Methodology

Chapter 9 – Citizenship, Civil Society, and the Church.

By Joseph Loconte, William E. Simon in Religion and a Free Society at the Heritage Foundation, commentator for National Public Radio, and author.

I found this essay more polemic than most in the book. It focuses on the importance of religion to maintain a healthy democracy. Loconte believes the most distinctive contribution America has made to democracy is "…freedom of religion as the brick and mortar of civic and political life." (195) He writes that the two sides of Christian activism are "the believer as prophet (challenging social and political evils) and Good Samaritan (caring for those in need)." (195)

Loconte believes that "widespread historical amnesia" has hit Americans and we must recover our roots. He is concerned that ideals of virtue, service, justice, and love have been abandoned for one of two responses: "To withdraw into a completely privatized faith" or "to publicly condemn sin without performing acts of mercy." (196)

Madison's Religious Revolution

Loconte gives a brief account of James Madison's role in forming the US Constitution and in shaping early attitudes toward the free exercise of religion. Among other things, Loconte notes that "…Madison saw cultural and economic progress as the fruit of religious liberty." (197)

A Virtuous Education

Loconte shows that public education began as Sunday schools in churches in the early nineteenth century. They strove to teach basic literacy and give moral instruction. The idea of non-religious education was unimaginable. After the Civil War, the mission of the schools began to erode as "Humanistic" ideas and morality supplanted Christian theology. "Today the idea that democratic education ought to be anchored in religious values is considered subversive." (199) There is a belief that,

The greater the influence of religion over children and families, the less interested they are in public education or in promoting the public goals of civility and citizenship. (199)

Loconte maintains that all the evidence points to the contrary. He shows that evangelical Christians are disproportionately involved in both public and private education, from PTA to tutoring programs. Private religious institutions turn out graduates with a high measure of civic responsibility and a better understanding of the role of religion in the nation's history.

The Armies of Compassion

Loconte gives an overview of how evangelical Christians, past and present, have been central to providing the social safety net in America. He recounts a history of movements and accomplishments over the nation's history. He closes by noting that scholars affirm that religious institutions are by far the most effective at transforming people's lives.

Prophets and Politics

Loconte gives a history of American Christians speaking and acting prophetically against several injustices, including dispossession of land owned by American Indians, slavery, women denied the right to vote, child exploitation, and denial of Civil Rights.

Standing in the Breach

Loconte believes that too much time and energy is wasted by Christians today in pursuit of peripheral issues.

“Why, for example, are some so intent on hanging the Ten Commandments in government buildings, reintroducing formal prayers in public schools, or slipping Nativity scenes onto public property? These are the trappings of faith, not the substance. … Preserving the phrase “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance may be worth a fight, but what about reintroducing students to America’s religious history in the public school curriculum?” (208)

Of liberal Christianity, he writes,

They confuse the separation of church and state with the separation of faith from life. Liberalism treats traditional religion not as civic virtue, but as a civic virus – a source of oppression and social strife. (208-209)

Loconte reiterates that involving Christians in the "public square" is necessary for a healthy American democracy.

(This is the end of "Part II – Toward an Evangelical Methodology." Next, we turn to "Part III - Central Themes for an Evangelical Framework.")

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Toward an Evangelcial Public Policy: Chapter 8

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part II – Toward an Evangelical Methodology

Chapter 8 – Justice, Human Rights, and Government: Toward an Evangelical Perspective.

By Ronald J. Sider, professor of theology, holistic ministry, and public policy at Palmer Theological Seminary; director of the Sider Center on Ministry and Public Policy; and president of Evangelicals for Social Action.

This essay is not only one of the most important but also one of the longest in the book. Fortunately, Sider closes his essay with nineteen conclusions. Therefore, I will not give as detailed a recap as earlier essays but will instead draw your attention to the conclusions.

Sider begins his essay by asking, "What is the ultimate source of justice, human rights, and governmental authority?" (163)

Justice and Human Rights

Sider argues that the ultimate foundation for justice and human rights is God. He identifies four types of justice.

• Commutative justice requires fairness in agreements and exchanges between private parties. Weights and measures should be the same for everyone. Contracts should be kept.
• Retributive justice defines what is due to persons when they have done wrong. It defines what is appropriate punishment for someone who has broken the law.
• Procedural justice defines the procedures and processes that must be fair if justice is to prevail. Procedural justice requires a transport legal framework, unbiased courts, the rule of law, freedom of speech, assembly and the vote, honest elections, and so on.
• Distributive justice refers to how the numerous goods of society are divided.

The Biblical Story

Sider centers the foundation of justice and human rights in the creation of humanity in God's image. He observes that each person is in God's image and, therefore, each person has value. However, he also notes that human beings were created for community. Therefore,

Both the radical individualism of contemporary Western liberal democracies and the totalitarian communalism of twentieth-century Fascist and Communist societies are one-sided perversions of a profound biblical balance. … Political and economic systems dare not either sacrifice individuals and personal freedom on the altar of some abstract common good nor absolutize individual freedom of choice without regard to the impact on the well-being of everyone. (167-168)

The Hebrew Words for Justice and Righteousness

Sider reviews the Hebrew words mishpat (justice) and tzedakah (righteousness), showing they are central to what God requires of his people. He also concludes that "Active promotion of economic justice is clearly a central component of the prophets' understanding of mishpat and tzedakah." (170) He also believes that justice is both procedural and distributive. He discusses four aspects of biblical teaching that he believes strengthen this teaching.

Love and justice together. Far from being antithetical, Scripture, at times, uses the terms interchangeably.

Justice's dynamic, restorative character. "Justice does not merely help victims cope with oppression; it removes it." (171)

God's special concern for the poor.

1. "Repeatedly the Bible says that the Sovereign of history works to lift up the poor and oppressed." (171)

2. "Sometimes, the Lord of history tears down rich and powerful people." (171)

3. "God identifies with the poor so strongly that caring for them is almost like helping God." (172)

4. "Finally, God demands that his people share God's special concern for the poor." (173)

God does not love the poor any more than the rich. God has an equal concern for the well-being for every single person. Most rich and powerful people, however, are genuinely biased; they care a lot more about themselves than about their poor neighbors. By contrast with the genuine bias of most people, God’s lack of bias makes God appear biased. God cares equally for everyone. (173)

Justice as restoration to community. "Community membership means the ability to share fully within one's capacity and potential in each essential aspect of community." (175) In this section, Sider points out that the Law supported the idea of private property, but it was not unlimited ownership. "The common good of the community outweighed  unrestricted economic freedom." (176) He goes on to note that the prophets did not "denounce the acquisition of land as illegal. … He [the prophet] appeals to social justice above the technicalities of the law." (176-177)

The Content of Distributive Justice

Justice as adequate access to productive resources. "History shows that full equality of economic results is not compatible with human freedom and responsibility." (177) Sider begins building his case that everyone should have access to the basic means of production.

Capital in an agricultural society. Looking at Old Testament law, Sider concludes,

…that every family had an equality of economic opportunity  up to the point that they had the resources to earn a living that would enable them not only to meet minimal needs of food, clothing, and housing, but also to be respected participants in the community. Possessing their own land enabled them to acquire the necessities for a decent life through responsible work. (178)

The Year of Jubilee. Leviticus 25 and the Jubilee Code play a central role in Sider's economic ethics (and I think rightly so.) Unlike many who are often identified with the Christian left who distort this passage as a mandate for 21st Century debt cancellation (e.g., Jim Wallis, Jubilee Research), Sider shows that adherence to the Jubilee code would have prevented destitution and ensured each family group had sufficient land to provide for their needs. God gave the jubilee,

To give people the freedom to participate in shaping history. And to prevent the centralization of power – and the oppression and totalitarianism that almost always accompany centralized ownership of land or capital by either the state or small elites. (179)

The sabbatical year. Continuing with the Jubilee passages, Sider examines these laws' impact on limiting debt and slavery. He points out that these specific provisions are not for today. Rather, they teach us that

Justice demands that every person or family has access to the productive resources (land, money, knowledge) so they have the opportunity to earn a generous sufficiency of material necessities and be dignified participating members of their communities. (181) (Emphasis is Sider’s)

Generous care for those who cannot care for themselves. Sider goes on to emphasize the observations above. He suggests that the primary assistance to able-bodied people in need was no-interest loans. Provisions that ensured those who could not provide for themselves, like tithes, gleaning, and zero-interest loans were built into the Law.

Summary

Sider acknowledges the danger of "trading freedom for bread" thinking of totalitarian contexts. We need societies that treasure both material and political freedom. Citing Catholic scholar David Hollenbach, Sider notes three emphases:

1. The needs of the poor take priority over the wants of the rich.
2. The freedom of the dominated takes priority over the liberty of the powerful.
3. The participation of marginalized groups takes priority over the preservation of an order which excludes them. (185)

Society and Government

Sider cautions against the temptation to equate society with the state. "The government is only one of many important institutions." (185) Sider rejects "social contract theory" and argues that it is God who establishes government. Like Wolterstroff in the previous essay, Sider believes that the state exists not only to prevent evil but to promote good. He makes a case for limited government and protection of other societal institutions as a corrective to the tendency of political power to corrupt. Sider writes,

Emil Brunner is probably correct in suggesting that the more healthy a society; the more nongovernmental institutions will be able to handle problems without government intervention. On the other hand, the greater the moral decay, the more government must act. (191)

Conclusion (192-193)

1. The principles that shape evangelical political thought and engagement should flow from both normative framework rooted in biblical revelation and also careful socioeconomic, historical examination of human experience.
2. The ultimate foundation of government, justice, and human rights is the Creator who is just.
3. Justice defines what is due persons and institutions. What is due them is based in the order of creation established by God.
4. God demands commutative, retributive, procedural, and distributive justice.
5. The biblical story tells us many things relevant to political engagement including that: a). persons are created by God to create wealth and shape history. b). all human rights and responsibilities flow from the fact that every person is created in the image of God and treasured immeasurably by the Creator; and c). persons are body-soul unities made for community.
6. The biblical words for justice show that justice requires both fair, honest legal systems and also fair economic structures.
7. Biblical justice includes a call to correct oppression and restore justice to the needy.
8. Precisely because God is not biased and loves the rich and poor equally, God acts in history to lift up those who are oppressed by the powerful or who lack access to the necessities of physical life.
9. Hundreds of biblical texts demonstrate that God and God's faithful people exhibit a special concern to empower the poor.
10. The biblical understanding of justice requires that: a). the able-bodied have access to the productive resources so that if the act responsibly, they can earn a decent livelihood and be dignified members of their community; and b). those unable to care for themselves receive a generous sufficiency from society.
11. As we integrate biblical norms and careful study of history, we see that God demands that people enjoy certain benefits – both civil/political benefits (e.g., fair courts, freedom of speech, religion) and socioeconomic benefits (e.g., access to food, shelter, health care) – and we dare not sacrifice on to the other, although evangeclicals disagree about whether not only the first but also the second area should be designated "rights" that governments must enforce.
12. We recognize a certain tension between different rights and believe that the needs of the poor take priority over the wants of the rich.
13. Society is much larger than the state and contains many crucial non-governmental institutions (family, church, business, unions, etc.) that must be largely independent of government.
14. Government is ordained by God, derives its authority from God, and is obligated to reflect God's justice.
15. The purpose of government is both to restrain evil and to promote the good.
16. Both biblical truths and historical experience demonstrate that good government is limited government.
17. Social problems should be solved at as local a level as can handle them properly and effectively.
18. Non governmental institutions (e.g., family, church) are often better places to solve social problems than government, and when government right intervenes, it should do so in a way that strengthens, rather than undermines, nongovernmental institutions.
19. The biblical understanding of justice and role of government teaches that government rightly plays a role in solving social problems and promoting economic justice, helping the poor gain access to productive resources, and guaranteeing that those unable to care for themselves a generous sufficiency.

I think this is one of the most important chapters in the book. I like Sider's identification of polarities that must be managed as we consider public policy issues. I agree with almost everything said in this article. The devil is in the details. The application of these concepts often leads to difficult judgment calls about which policies are truly beneficial and which ones aren't. It is at this level that I, at times, find myself in disagreement with the Evangelicals for Social Action community.

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Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Chapter 7

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part II – Toward an Evangelical  Methodology

Chapter 7 – Theological Foundations for an Evangelical Political Philosophy.

By Nicholas Wolterstorff, Noah Porter Professor Emeritus of Philosophical Theology and fellow Berkeley College at Yale University.

Wolterstorff begins his essay with a brief look at biblical passages he deems critical to building a philosophy. The headings are those of the author.

Paul's Advice to the Roman Christians Concerning the State

It was not obvious to the early Christians what stance they should take toward the institutions of Hellenistic society. The radical quality of Jesus’ teaching, combined with the fact that he apparently never addressed the issue with full generality, made it problematic for them how they should relate to extant domestic, economic, and political institutions. (141)

Wolterstorff says something profound here. God has not given us instructions for a "build it yourself" world. God has given us a narrative account of what God has been doing in the world, gives us a glimpse of future realities, and gives us God's presence. The very way God has chosen to reveal God's self says that God intends for us to be participants in the unfolding process God is working in history. Otherwise, we would have been given a manual to implement. Wolterstorff returns to the implications later in the essay, but I don't think his observation here can be stressed enough.

Wolterstorff turns to two New Testament passages that he believes are central. First is the Haustafeln, or "house tables, in 1 Peter 2:13-3:7. These tables advise on how to conduct household affairs. From this 1 Peter passage, he concludes,

With the exception, of course, of religious institutions, they [Christians] are to participate side by side with non-Christians in the institutions of their society: marriage, family, economy, and polity. (142)

The second passage he cites is Romans 12:19-13:7. Believing these two passages to be talking about the same thing, he refers back to 1 Peter observing that God established government "to punish those who do wrong and to praise those who do right" This is its purpose. Furthermore, "Government must not be thought of as some purely human artifact, nor must I be thought of as a work of the devil." (143)

The Old Testament Background to Paul's Advice

Wolterstorff turns to Old Testament roots for Paul's view of government. He introduces the ideas of corrective justice and primary justice. Corrective justice seeks to undo or compensate for wrongs that have been committed. Primary justice is the basic requirement that we expect everyone to live by.

Continuing with an analysis of other passages, particularly in the first two chapters of Amos, Wolterstorff draws two conclusions: The nations surrounding Israel, even without the Torah, knew what God's justice required, and "… God's rendering of judgment is in good measure mediated by human beings and human institutions." (147)

Government as Part of the Creation Order

Taking the whole of scripture, Wolterstorff concludes,

There would have been government even had there been no sin. Government represents a blend of God’s providential care of his creation as created, and of God’s providential care of his creation as fallen. (150) (Wolterstorff's emphasis)

Referring back to Calvin's analysis, he affirms that "…the task of government is to serve the common good – the shalom, the flourishing, of the people." (150)

The Two Rules

The Christian lives under two rules: as a citizen, under the rule of some state; and as a member of the church, under the rule of Christ. (150-151)

Christ is the head of both state and the Church, so we are actually serving Christ in both contexts. The struggle comes in that humanity is fallen and, therefore, so is the state. This is the challenge for the Christian.

Yoder's Alternative

Wolterstorff turns his attention to the alternative Anabaptist teaching of John Howard Yoder. Written over thirty years ago, Yoder's "Politics of Jesus" still significantly influences many. Yoder writes about the "powers."

The powers, Yoder says, are the intellectual, ethical, religious, political, and social structures that give order and stability to human existence. Though supra-individual, we need not think of them in personal or angelic terms.  (153)

Wolterstorff characterizes Yoder's position as believing the state is evil but necessary for human existence in the present era. Describing Yoder's position, he writes,

We are not to obey the state because it issues legitimate commands that place us under obligation; we are simply to subject ourselves to it, in the way the Russians subjected themselves to Stalin. (154)

Wolterstorff is critical of Yoder's position, as am I. He cites Paul's argument in Romans that the rulers "are not a terror to good conduct but to bad." He is critical of the idea that government is intrinsically evil.

An analogue would be the view that the fall of humankind consisted not in human beings acting wrongly under the influence of powers, but themselves becoming intrinsically evil powers. (155) (Wolterstorff's emphasis)

I agree with Wolterstorff, but I would add a critique. I think Yoder's conceptualization views "culture" and its institutions as static objects disassociated from individual participants. The dynamic actions of individuals form cultures and institutions even as those cultures and institutions form individuals. It is an organic reality that cannot be so easily divided.

The Application to Us

Wolterstorff began by observing that we have been given no instruction manual for relating to cultural institutions. Over the centuries since the formation of the Church, we have been struggling with these issues. Given the fact that we are not merely subjects of the state in our democratic societies, he believes that Paul would affirm,

“…that it is your and my calling as citizens rather than mere subjects to encourage the state to live up to its task of promoting justice and serving the general welfare.” (156)

The author then lists positive contributions to government from Christian roots. (157-159)

1. "…the idea of government as the rule of law… The idea of law as opposed to sovereign will is omnipresent in the Old Testament."
2. The rise of constitutionalism and "...its sharp differentiation of persons from offices.." they may hold.
3. The balance of power by a division of powers into legislative, judicial, and executive powers in anticipation of human sinfulness and the tendency to abuse power.
4. The value of the individual as created in the image of God.
5. "…natural human rights as protection against tyrannical government."
6. "the requirement that the state not absorb into itself the manifold institutions of civil society" and thus become totalitarian.

Wolterstorff turns from these observations to note topics that should be considered but were not within the parameters of his essay. He concludes by citing thirteen theses that should be part of an evangelical political philosophy.

Basic Theses (160-161)

1. Government is not a merely human creation, nor is it a work of the devil. Government is instituted by God as part of God's providential care for his creatures.
2. The task assigned by God to government is twofold: to promote justice, both primary and corrective, and in its coordinating activities to enhance the common good.
3. Government, thus understood, belongs both to God's providential care for us as creatures and to God's providential care for us as fallen.
4. When government acts as it ought to act, it acts with genuine authority. That authority is to be understood as not merely human but a mediating Christ's authority.
5. The corollary of the exercise by government of genuine authority is that it subjects are obligated to obey that authority.
6. Among the things that governments are authorized to do is apply retributive punishment to wrongdoers – provided that the punishment is itself of a just sort.
7. Though government, along with such other institutions as marriage, family, and economy, is instituted by God as part of his providential care for human beings as creatures and as fallen, government, along with these other institutions, is itself fallen. That is to say, government and other social institutions never fully carry out the tasks assigned them by God.
8. Though not every failing on the part of government – or any other social institution – justifies disobedience, all too often governments do fail to such a degree that disobedience is required. The starkest examples of such obligatory disobedience are those cases in which the government demands that something other than God be worshiped.
9. The Christian may serve in the offices of government; in doing so, he is mediating the rule over the state of that very same Christ who is ruler of the Church.
10. When the Christian occupies some governmental office, he or she must not be guided by customary practice but by the God-assigned task of government: to promote justice and the common good.
11. It is the duty of the Christian always to call his or her government to its proper task. Especially is this true for those of us who have some degree of voice in our governments.
12. Such calling of government to its proper task will ordinarily include proclamation. But whenever possible, it will also include the promotion of governmental structures that make it less likely that the government will fail in, or violate, its task.
13. Christians will honor and respect government; they will not talk or act as if government has no right to exist. And they will support government by paying taxes. They will not talk and as if government, in assessing taxes, is forcefully taking from its subjects "their money." Financial support is owed the government.

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Toward an Evangelcial Public Policy: Chapter 6

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part II – Toward an Evangelical  Methodology

Chapter 6 – Toward an Evangelical Ethical Methodology.

By David P. Gushee distinguished professor of political science and director of the Ray C. Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron; and Dennis P. Hollinger, president and professor of Christian ethics at Evangelical School of Theology.

The authors open the essay by observing that it is not clear that there is, or should be, an evangelical approach to doing ethics. Much depends on how you define the terms. Here is their take. (Headings are the authors.)

What is evangelicalism?

Gushee and Hollinger give a quick synopsis of the evangelical ethical influences and then note:

Notice that evangelicalism as seen in these varying movements had little explicit shared moral content, other than whatever might be derived from a return to biblical authority and careful biblical exegesis, as well as the motivation provided by vibrant personal faith. (118)

Fundamentalism emerged as a pessimistic response to the twentieth century's radical intellectual and social changes. As for evangelicalism in the twentieth century,

…the contemporary American evangelical movement can be understood more immediately as a mid-twentieth-century reaction to the rigidity, separatism, and anti-intellectualism of fundamentalism as it emerged in the early twentieth-century American religion. (118)

The authors repeat more of the evangelical history we have seen in earlier essays, noting that up through the 1960s, "evangelical" ethics tended to be highly individualistic and politically conservative. They point to the rise of Evangelicals for Social Action led by Ron Sider and the emergence of the "consistent life ethic" as a major turning point in evangelical engagement of ethical issues. The coming years would see groups like the Moral Majority and the Christian Coalition emerge. (The authors suggest that these fundamentalist-led movements made a successful play to co-opt "evangelical" and "born-again" labels to give greater political clout to their conservative agendas.) Despite institutional and theological commonalities, the result has been a diversity of evangelical ethics.

The authors conclude that what holds evangelicalism together is:

A commitment to the authority of Scripture that motivates a reformist agenda whenever biblical truth is believed to be compromised or endangered. …Thus we believe it is best to understand evangelicalism as renewal movement within Christianity that continually calls the churches back to deeply committed biblical faith and practice. (120) (Emphasis in the original.)

So should there be a unique evangelical approach to doing ethics? The authors say no. Evangelicalism is about scriptural authority and not a specific ethical application. Finally, the authors write:

Everybody else – everyone who breaks with the classic orthodox model of consensual Christianity grounded in the authoritative Scriptures – should simply be viewed as unorthodox, rather than labeling orthodox or reformist Christians as evangelicals. (121)

What is Ethics?

Gushee and Hollinger describe three connotations to the term "social ethics." First is simply the moral/ethical aspect of Christian thought throughout the centuries. Second is the academic movement that began in the late nineteenth century as seminaries and universities took up studies of issues related to the Social Gospel movement's critique of industrial capitalism. Third is the founding of the Society of Christian Ethics (founded 1959) and the emergence of Christian ethics as a bona fide academic discipline. The authors note that evangelicals (with notable exceptions) have been largely absent from the latter two forms of Christian ethics. Yet the authors believe that over the last twenty years or more, evangelical and orthodox ethicists have had influence in excess of their numbers.

Varieties of Evangelical Ethics

To flesh out the various approaches to Christian ethics, the authors identify some sample strands of evangelical ethical thinking and highlight thinkers indicative of those strands.

Mainstream Evangelicalism: Carl F. Henry

Henry saw ethics as doing the will of God and ethics as grounded in love. It is dependent on God's self-disclosure and needs transcendent, dynamic empowerment. His ethic was very individualistic and only secondarily addressed the social order.

The Reformed Strand: Richard Mouw

Mouw believes "…Christian ethics is ultimately the command of God." (127) But the command of God is more than just grammatical imperatives. The Bible gives us a story that answers critical questions like: "Who am I? What's wrong? What is the remedy?" (128) By entering into each part of the biblical drama, we can discern ethical imperatives. The "fall" narrative shows that changed hearts alone will not change society. "Christians are called to show forth the rule of God in all spheres of human activity, not only in the church or personal life." (129) Of course, this leads to the delicate issue of addressing Christian ethics in a pluralistic society. There is a need to avoid succumbing to the pluralism of the age while remaining civil and respectful of others.

The Anabaptist Strand: John Howard Yoder

The Anabaptist Christian is grounded in being a "countercommunity," especially in the "refusal to control history through the use of violence." (130) The church addresses the conscience of society regarding the political and economic order. Quoting Richard Mouw and John Howard Yoder, "The church serves in turn as a paradigmatic society – an eschatological sign of God's communal designs for the New Christian." (132) Gushee and Hollinger note that this tradition is often accused of being dualist and sectarian but suggest that this is a misread of the transformative power the countercommunity can have.

The Wesleyan Strand: Stephen Mott

John Wesley said that "The gospel of Christ knows of no religion but social; no holiness but social holiness." (132) Gushee and Hollinger note that while Mott rarely uses the word holiness, it is holiness he is talking about. Quoting Mott, they write,

The essential thesis of Mott’s work is that “the heart of biblical thought mandates efforts to correct economic and social injustices in our communities” and that “the use of political authority to achieve justice should complement the stress upon the witness of the church as counter-community which is found in many recent writings.” (133)

The authors say that Mott grounds his ethics in the Scriptures the way most evangelicals do, but he is more attuned to transcendent ideas. Quoting Mott again,

The transcendent ideas [in scripture] are addressed to concrete situations of another time. This fact affirms the importance of history but also creates difficulties in understanding both their transcendent character and their application to a different age. (133-134)

Identifying and applying transcendent ideas in our present context as a response to God's love and justice appears to be the focus of Mott's ethic.

The Anglican Strand: Oliver O’Donovan

Gushee and Hollinger characterize the Anglican strand as grounded in the gospel of Jesus Christ, specifically the resurrection. Morality is our participation in the created order out of a response to the gospel.

Love therefore can only be understood within the framework of an evangelical ethic in which the resurrection of Christ vindicates the order of reality from creation, points us toward the fulfillment of that order in the eschaton, and allow us to participate in the Christ who himself makes love intelligible. (135-136) [I love this quote.]

Other Voices and Strands

The others note the absence of Karl Barth from their discussion. They note that his neo-orthodox approach raises questions in many evangelical circles. They go on to catalog other traditions that contribute without discussing specific content: Baptist, Lutheran, African American, and Pentecostal/Charismatic.

Common Themes in Evangelical Ethics

The central commonality the authors find is "a commitment to biblical authority and a consequent willingness to develop ethical norms within the parameters established by biblical teaching." (137) This brings the authors full circle to their opening observation that an evangelical Christian ethic is essentially an orthodox Christian ethic. They catalog nine implications of this orthodox ethic but biblical authority through the Spirit is at the core.

Conclusion

The Christian moral life begins with God’s grace in Jesus Christ. But it continues with the grateful response of a church that loves its Savior, a response of obedience that is directed and empowered by the Holy Spirit. (138)

I found this to be a helpful essay. I have read Mouw, Yoder, and Mott, and while I haven't read O'Donovan, I have read others who seem strongly influenced by his strand. Of the strands the authors highlight, I see strong influences in my thinking from the Reformed, Wesleyan, and Anglican strands and, to a lesser degree, the Anabaptist strand. I suspect some of the tension I have with some pockets in the Emerging Church conversation is the Anabaptist thinking (Yoder often explicitly championed) that is articulated. I have been around Anabaptists of one variety or another much of my life, but I have never agreed with their level of disengagement (or maybe their alternative engagement) with social institutions. Anyway, lots to think about here.

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Toward an Evangelcial Public Policy: Chapter 5

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part I – Learning from the Past

Chapter 5 – Insights from Catholic Social Ethics and Political Participation.

By Kristen E. Heyer, assistant professor of Christian ethics in the department of theological studies at Loyola Marymount University.

Heyer references the two Kingdoms model in her introductory remarks, observing that Catholics believe they are to be citizens of the City of God and of the earthly city. She acknowledges concern and confusion about how religion is to relate to culture. Nevertheless, "The Roman Catholic stance essentially holds that in spite of the risks and tensions that exist for a pilgrim people, discipleship requires faithful citizenship." (101)

Background: A Roman Catholic Perspective on Public Engagement

Broadly understood, Catholic social thought and action are grounded in a theology of the fundamental goodness of creation, the mediation of the divine through the human (incarnation, sacramental principle), and the Catholic insistence on the universality of God’s concern. (102)

Heyer shows that Catholic social teaching is always connected to the Church's social teaching throughout the centuries while still being cognizant of the "signs of the times." She notes that the Church has emphasized the "citizens of two cities" approach to social teaching over the past century. There is always an unavoidable tension between otherworldliness and practical engagement. Additionally, there is an ongoing tension between personal piety and the need to advocate for justice at the structural level, especially concerning the most vulnerable. "…The political order is not merely remedial of sin; it serves to achieve the common good." (104) But this is not to be understood as an abrogation of personal responsibility. Heyer also points out that Catholic social teaching is significantly influenced by the fact that it is a world Church with connections to institutions like hospitals, schools, charities, and universities. There is a deep institutional connection between discipleship and citizenship.

Insights from Catholic Social Ethics and Political Participation

I thought this section was one of the more intriguing portions of the essay. Heyer writes,

Catholic posture helps guard against risks such as an engagement that verges on co-optation; too optimistic or too pessimistic a view of the wider world; or disproportionate reliance upon a particular theological “canon within the canon. (105)

Then,

In fact, Ernst Troeltsch noted that the genius of the Catholic Church was the way it incorporated both “church” and “sect” types, co-opting the sectarian impulse into religious orders as a “sect” within the wider “church. (106)

Heyer describes a multilayered approach to Church authority. She identifies three layers:

1. "thus saith the Lord" (for example, moral absolutes such as intentionally attacking noncombatants is absolutely forbidden.)
2. "this is the official Catholic teaching," and
3. "this is our prudential judgment, and it depends upon our careful reading of the social realities and the best experts we have consulted, but reasonable people may disagree." (107)

She did not fully flesh this out, but it would be interesting to see how she applies this to a handful of presently controversial issues.

Heyer says that Catholic teaching involves both public theology and natural law. Public theology has at its center the imago Dei and the need to champion those most vulnerable among those God has created in his image. At the same time, the Church looks to natural law as a way to build relationships in common cause with others of goodwill outside the Catholic Church. Consequently, many Catholic positions have a combination of theological and secular warrants. This has the twin advantage of educating and motivating the faithful while building bridges of commonality with the culture. Heyer notes that Catholic social teaching also recognizes a tension between having policy specific enough to influence action but broad enough to leave room for considerable disagreement about application.

Heyer writes, "… Jesus' primary message calls for repentance and interior conversion yet working to bring about a more just society also depends upon changing structures." (111) She also notes that, according to social teaching, we must be at work with individuals and with structures at the local, national, and international levels, as well as the intermediate levels in between. This refers back to the earlier observation about the size and presence of the Catholic Church and its institutions, engaged with the public in so many different capacities, making it well equipped to address a variety of issues at many levels.

Another aspect Heyer notes is the attempt to address a comprehensive range of issues and avoid single-issue politics. She cites the consistent life ethic espoused by Joseph Cardinal Bernardin as an example. Not everyone agrees on all the applications of this ethic, but the key is that it is a multi-issue interrelated ethic focused on realizing it.

Conclusions: Ongoing Challenges for a Christian Public Ethic

Heyer points to the recent sex abuse scandal as evidence of the need for the Church to "…both embody and advocate the values it advances." (114) She commends the "both-and" of Catholic thinking that keeps many seemingly antithetical values together (e.g.. Church and sect, theology and philosophy, charity and advocacy.) She also stresses the strength of the Catholic model in finding balance between co-optation and withdrawal.

It strikes me that the Roman Catholics may have the most sound social policy approach compared to the Evangelical and mainline traditions.

(This essay completes Part I of the book "Learning from the Past." Next week, the four chapters from Part II, titled "Toward an Evangelical Methodology," will begin with Chapter 6. We are one-third of the way through the book!)

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Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Chapter 4

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part I – Learning from the Past

Chapter 4 – The Mainline Protestant Tradition in the Twentieth Century: Positive Lessons and Cautionary Tales.

By Max L. Stackhouse and Raymond R. Roberts. Stackhouse is the Rimmer and Ruth de Vries Professor of Reformed Theology and Public Life at Princeton Theological Seminary and director of the Kuyper Center for Public Theology. Roberts is an author and pastor.

The authors start their discussion of public policy in mainline Protestantism during the Twentieth Century by noting the cultural upheaval at the beginning of the period. There was rapid economic change, increased immigration, and increased urbanization. Reform movements were addressing slums, corporate business practices, and crime. A split began to emerge within the Protestant ranks. Evangelists like Dwight Moody and Billy Sunday held revivals to achieve individual conversions and thereby save society. Many mainline Protestants also participated in these movements, but there was a growing sense that personal conversion was not enough. Systemic issues needed to be addressed.

Led by thinkers like Washington Gladden, Richard T. Ely, Walter Rauschenbusch, and Shailer Matthews, mainline Protestants began to throw their energies into efforts to "Christianize the social order." They created para-ecclesial organizations like the YMCA and YWCA, settlement houses, and mission societies. The strategy eventually became what is referred to as the "Social Gospel."

The Federal Council of Churches was formed in 1908 consisting of the American Baptist Churches, the Disciples of Christ, the Episcopal Church (USA), the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the Presbyterian Church (USA), the Reformed Churches in America, the Congregational Christian Churches who joined with the Evangelical and Reformed Church to become the United Church of Christ, and the United Methodist Church, along with several African-American denominations. This group generally became synonymous with mainline Protestantism. Their first public policy statement, which addressed the need for several social and economic reforms, was called the "Social Creed."

The authors point out that the mainline Denominations were generally optimistic about their efforts to make the Twentieth Century the "Christian Century" until at least the civil rights movement in the 1960s. The authors write,

This movement had its triumphs, but many in the leadership of mainline Protestantism, those in the seminaries and those in the church bureaucracies, became more and more alienated from American society and sometimes even contemptuous of piety and patriotism of most church members. The “New Left” movements against the Vietnam War, with which many mainline clergy identified, alienated many politically; the common view of these same clergy that capitalism was the source of selfishness and poverty while socialism had the message of community and sharing alienated many economically; and the development of “situation ethics” and “contextualism” in morality alienated many culturally. (79)

Stackhouse and Roberts note that the mainline Denominations have declined in membership by about one-third over the last third of the century. Meanwhile, evangelical churches have been growing.

The authors then turn their attention to the mainline Protestants' cultural engagement to determine what can be learned from the mainline experience. The following headings are those of the authors.

A Century of Engagement

Stackhouse and Roberts point out that cultural engagement in the early Twentieth century continued a tradition extending back to the Puritans. However, in the Twentieth Century, mainline Protestants began to believe that those denominations that would later become known as the fundamentalists and evangelicals too narrowly defined the church in terms of personal conversion and personal piety. As the mainliners pursued their agenda of greater cultural engagement, they increasingly became exposed to international issues, and there was a growing integration of activity and thought with other fellowships on a global scale. With this in mind, the authors turn to four topics for analysis.

I. Economy

The early Twentieth Century economic engagement by mainliners was influenced by the thinking in Max Weber's highly influential "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism." The basic thesis was that the Reformation heritage had instilled values of disciplined investment, industry, and thrift in its adherents. Therefore, capitalism was a by-product of Reformation Christianity. (I might add that this thesis is rejected by scholars today.) The mainliners believed industrialization was the best way to a prosperous economy but wanted to soften the raw edges.

As things progressed toward the middle third of the century, the thinking of scholars like Reinhold Niebuhr and "Christian Realism" began to have influence. Joined by theologians like Paul Tillich and Karl Barth on both sides of the Atlantic, this school of thought held that selective use of Marxist analysis could yield important critiques of capitalism. Nevertheless, they were aware that much of socialism,

…was driven by utopian illusions, a false anthropology, and a militant contempt for profound religion and its social meanings. … Still, they conveyed a suspicion of capitalism to their students, even if it was capitalism constrained by growing bodies of law and by democratic policies that gave unions and government power to check the abuses of a free market, and that provided a safety net for widows, orphans, the ill, the elderly, and handicapped citizenry. (83)

The civil rights movements and the "War on Poverty" refocused much of the mainline agenda in the 1960s and 1970s. Meanwhile, liberation theology, which embraced a more explicit Marxist analysis, became the perspective adopted by developing and poor nations. Many seminaries and bureaucracies in mainline Protestant denominations embraced this theology to the point that the authors claim it became the "unofficial orthodoxy in the activist wings." Liberation theology was widely rejected by the rank and file in the mainline denominations, and the radical commitment to this view only served to alienate and isolate denominational leaders from their members. Many in scholarly fields also opposed the exploitation of the poor but believed that democratic capitalism was still the appropriate response. The authors suggest that these folks were "pilloried" by colleagues and mainline leaders.

Some began to turn to "Secularization Theory," which taught that modernization, urbanization, and technological development inevitably led to secularization, a theory widely disputed by scholars today. Nevertheless, this thinking held considerable sway among seminarians and church leaders, alienating them from people in their pews.

The Reagan-Thatcher elections changed and reversed much of the ideology of past economic thinking. Countries around the world are now struggling to throw off statist governments and become free-market democracies. As globalization spreads, there is a widening gap between the richest and the poorest, but there is also a rapidly expanding middle class across the globe. Mainline traditions are wrestling with responsibly shaping capitalism in a global society.

II. Politics

Stackhouse and Roberts note that at the beginning of the Twentieth Century, mainliners were focused on domestic issues and largely isolationist. They feared that involvement in international politics would corrupt politics in the United States. The "Christian Realists" emerged in the middle third of the century, emphasizing human sinfulness and the tendency toward corruption. They tended to defend democracy as they challenged fascism and communism.

The Federal Council of Churches issued a statement in 1942 called "The Six Pillars of Peace" that outlined a post-World War II strategy for peace. However, the advent of nuclear weaponry challenged conventional thinking, and "just war" thinking re-emerged as the dominant paradigm for thinking about these issues. Just war theory contained the ideal of not targeting non-combatants. Applying just war theory in a nuclear age seemed problematic as time passed, and most mainline denominations adopted a de facto pacifist position.

As noted in the economics section, there was a shift to Marxist critique in the 1960s and 1970s. The nature of political engagement changed.

“Many defined political engagement  less as building coalitions to advance policies called for by clear theological principles, and more as using the techniques of the protest demonstration to oppose policies or practices in operation.” (88)

Also underway in the later decades of the Twentieth Century was a deconstruction of America as a Christian nation. Stackhouse and Roberts conclude this section by noting:

“Many have given up efforts at Christianizing society by means of overtly advocating biblically and theologically based principles in public life, in favor of intentional “inclusivity” and “diversity” couched in liberal political terms. This has left many mainline Protestants searching for new ways to faithfully engage a pluralistic and fallen society.” (89)

III. Family and Cultural Institutions

Stackhouse and Roberts write that mainline Protestants carried forward Victorian-era ideas of family well into the Twentieth Century. With the rapid change in technology and the advent of World War II, many opportunities opened up to women that had not previously been available. There was a tremendous change within the family, and many mainline leaders were reluctant about "imposing their values" in a time of redefinition. In keeping with the trend to look to science and experts for guidance, mainliners "…offered pastoral care ministry that tended to be strong on 'therapeutic' care and weak on normative guidance about the conduct of life." (90)

With radical changes in values in the 1960s, a virtually secular view of marriage as a private temporary contract replaced the classic sacramental and covenantal views. Feminist theologies emerged that criticized traditional forms of marriage as patriarchal. Support for gay rights led many denominational leaders to "…mute their support for traditional heterosexual marriage." (91). The authors note that, to date, mainline denominations have made little concerted effort to address the dissolution of the family.

Stackhouse and Roberts note a couple of other trends that emerged. Starting in the 1960s, the mainline Protestants largely abandoned the radio and television airwaves to fundamentalists and evangelicals. Particularly confounding to the authors was the abandonment of higher education, divesting themselves of institutions founded to train future leaders for church and society. The authors suggest that in their preoccupation with addressing economic and political realms, mainliners lost sight of the importance of civil society institutions, including the growing influence of the corporation.

IV. Sources of Authority

Stackhouse and Roberts use the "quadrilateral" idea of authority (i.e., our authority for faith and life is based on Scripture, tradition, reason, and experience) in their analysis of sources of authority. This is usually associated with Methodism, but the authors believe it reflects most of Twentieth Century Christianity. The conflict has been over the emphases.

Mainliners embraced natural and social sciences to the point that the authors describe the social sciences as the handmaidens of the Social Gospel. Reason and science would help purge Christianity of pre-modern superstition. Evangelicals tended to distrust science, human reason, and higher criticism, resorting to either anti-intellectualism or rationalist apologetics to keep the Bible as the center of authority. The authors note that the impact of the influential Karl Barth tended to be skepticism toward "natural reason" and toward reliance on experience, leading to an array of responses from nondisclosure of what influenced one's ethics to a postmodern rejection of correspondence between words and the world. They also note, "Toward the end of the century, liberation and feminist voices claimed that the experience of oppression conveys authoritative knowledge." (97). This led to a tendency to rely on experience alone to judge other sources of knowledge. In recent years, there has been much debate and conversation about the mainline and evangelical sources of authority, and attempts are being made to reconcile authority issues.

Positive Lessons

1. Theological Guidance – Mainliners use of biblical themes and understandings in an endless attempt to be the Church “reformed and always being reformed.”

2. Common Cause – Mainliners have had an inclination  toward ecumenical partnership in achieving witness and ministry.

Cautionary Tales

1. Speaking without a base – The tendency to “speak the truth to power” without an underlying base of support, thus alienating leaders from the grassroots of the church. Evangelicalism has had a much better sense of the need to “…build grassroots communities of commitment willing to shape life not from the top down or from the bottom up, but from the center out, in civil societies where it is lived.” (99)

2. Doing without Transformation – “…The propensity for many mainline Protestants to think that God calls the church to do, rather than to be.” (99) This tends to lead to a trivialization of personal piety and the need for individual transformation.

3. Neglect of Institutions – Mainliners have favored movements instead of institutions. They have been more preoccupied with protesting institutions rather than incarnating them.

Overall, I think the authors have captured the major themes well. I generally share their final assessment.

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Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Chapter 3

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part I – Learning from the Past

Chapter 3 – Evangelical Denominations at the Foundations of Modern American and British Social-Political Structures and Policies: A Philosopher's Perspective.

By Paul de Vries, founder and president of New York Evangelical Seminary Fund; author.

Our purpose is to develop a working comprehension of the key eighteenth and nineteenth-century American and British Protestant evangelical denominations and their perspectives and influences on modern social political thought, structures, and issues. (64)

De Vries writes that in the two centuries before the twentieth century, the vast majority of Protestants were evangelical, "trusting the Bible as the final authority for behavior and belief." (64) Their beliefs have had a profound impact in the US and UK for both good and bad. He identifies four major families of denominations and each family's particular relationship with social policy issues. Lutherans, Calvinists (Presbyterian and Reformed), Baptists/Anabaptists, and Methodists are his four families.

He believes each grouping has had to resist three marked tendencies.

“First, they have to resist the temptation to separate from society and develop a socio-political ethic just for themselves.” (65)

“Second, they have to resist the temptation to oversimplify the gospel by concentrating on ‘saving souls.’” (65)

“Third, they have to resist the temptation simply to repeat earlier formulations of Christian ethics that were formed for another time and place.” (65)

Here is a summary of his thoughts about each family.

Lutheran

The "two kingdoms" perspective is identified as the driving force in Lutheran social-political thought. Since Jesus' kingdom is not of this world, the church should not get entangled in matters of state. De Vries maintains this has led Lutherans to be both less critical and less transformative of societal structures, though they have tended toward instilling strong personal pietism.

Calvinists (Presbyterian and Reformed)

In contrast to Lutherans, Calvinists have seen themselves as reformers with a "desire to reshape the social world so that it would no longer be alienated from God." (67) I like de Vries' observation,

While Lutherans believe that we should obey the Lord in our daily occupations, Calvinists believe that we should seek to obey God through our daily occupations, because we cannot blindly assume that our occupations actually serve the common good. (67)

Also mentioned is the idea of "sphere sovereignty," that God is sovereign over the various "spheres" of life (church, state, economics, and education), with none of the spheres being superior to another. Each sphere has its own authority and is answerable to God.

Anabaptists and Baptists

De Vries identifies a distinct separatist tendency among these folks. They have sought to establish holy communities away from government control. There has also been a tendency toward non-violent resistance to the state when it has acted unjustly. They have been champions of religious liberty.

Methodists

The Methodist movement began as an evangelical movement within the Church of England. They have tended to focus more on social justice, caring for the outcasts, and expecting Biblical ethical perfection. Their emphasis on justice and ethical behavior has often placed them at the leading edge of justice and civil rights causes.

Conclusion

From all this, de Vries concludes that there are strengths and shortcomings of each family, but working in unison as members of one body, each has important contributions to make to an evangelical engagement of public policy.

This summary of de Vries' essay distills what he admits is a discussion of generalities, not hard and fast divisions between families. Considering that, his essay gives some helpful "hues" regarding public policy.

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Toward an Evangelcial Public Policy: Chapter 2

Toward an Evangelical Public Policy

Part I – Learning from the Past

Chapter 2 – A History of the Public Policy Resolutions of the National Association of Evangelicals.

By Richard Cizik, vice president for governmental affairs of the National Association of Evangelicals.

Cizik gives a thirty-page chronological overview of public policy resolutions adopted by the National Association of Evangelicals over the last sixty years. This chapter is important because it sets the stage for the present and shows the movement trajectory within the NAE. I apologize in advance for the length of this summary, but I think it is important background. The following headings are the headings Cizik uses in his essay.

Spirit of St. Louis, 1942-1943

Cizik begins his discussion by highlighting a speech in St. Louis by Harold John Ockenga, pastor of Boston's Park Street Church, titled The Unvoiced Multitudes. It was delivered four months after the Pearl Harbor attack. Ockenga compared the state of Evangelicals to the small European countries trampled by Germany. He called for united action against secularism and unbelief. Cizik notes that "Mindful of the absolutist tendencies associated with fundamentalism, evangelicalism's new leaders promised to 'shun fall forms of bigotry, intolerance, misrepresentation, hate, jealousy, false judgment, and hypocrisy.'" (36) Ockenga's speech led to the foundation of the National Association of Evangelicals United for Action, which was eventually shortened to the National Association of Evangelicals. The NAE came to see itself as an alternative to the Federal Council of Churches (changed to the National Council of Churches in 1950), which the NAE believed had a virtual monopoly in American Protestantism and was dominated by theological liberals.

Cizik also relates an interesting story about Charles E. Fuller, founder of The Old Fashioned Revival Hour. The leader of the American Musicians Union threatened to unionize Fuller's musicians even though they were unpaid volunteers. Elwin Wright was dispatched to Washington to meet with a senior senator who was antagonistic toward the labor leader and threatened Senate investigation if the labor leader didn't back off. It was a successful move. However, the bigger political issue that seemed to animate the political work was the threat from broadcast networks to exclude conservative broadcasters from their networks.

Concerning the Federal Council of Church's response to the formation of the NAE, Cizik writes, "They [FCC] immediately attacked it 'as giving sectarianism a new lease on life and as encouraging the reactionary and dissident wings of the great Protestant denominations in the Federal Council.'" (38)

Crusader Decades, 1943-1956

Reverend Clyde W. Taylor, a missionary and a Gordon College of Theology and Missions faculty member, became the first head of the new Washington Office of the NAE. "Citizens of heaven and earth" emerged as a theme for the NAE. Cizik quotes Carl F. Henry's The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism (1947), wherein Henry wrote,

Fundamentalism is the modern priest and Levite, by-passing suffering humanity. The picture is clear when one brings into focus such admitted evils as aggressive warfare, racial hatred and intolerance, the liquor traffic, and exploitation of labor by management, whichever it may be. (38)

Cizik also notes that during this period, the NAE saw themselves as watchdogs of church and state issues. They perceived three major threats to the Constitutional separation of church and state. First, there was concern about Roman Catholics using their size and influence to secure federal funding for parochial schools and hospital buildings. (There was, without a doubt, a bit of anti-Catholicism mixed in here.) Second, there was concern about atheists and agnostics who wanted to remove religion from government and about government ownership of resources, industry, and property. Third, there was concern about religious minorities that restricted the right of others to exercise their religion. (e.g., Jewish groups that opposed the distribution of Bibles as sectarian books.) There were other issues that the NAE issued resolutions on, like Communism, support for public schools, and opposition to pornography and liquor, but these three issues seem to have been the driving force during the era. Also, throughout this time and into the 1960s, there was support for a constitutional amendment declaring America a Christian nation.

A big moment for the NAE was when President Eisenhower invited leaders to the White House in 1953. This gave them a new level of respectability. Life magazine wrote a feature article in 1958 that Evangelicalism was becoming the third wing of Christianity in addition to Mainline denominations and Roman Catholics. Cizik points out that while many politicians saw Evangelicals as potential voting blocks, most were leery of being too closely identified with Evangelicals because of the propensity of many leading Evangelicals to alienate other core constituencies.

Moving into the Mainstream, 1957-1967

The NAE commended Bill Graham in 1957, for his New York City Crusade. This began a long association between the NAE and the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, as they united in their opposition to the influences of secularism. Cizik believes Graham's greatest achievement was bringing Evangelicals into mainstream Christianity. He helped build on platforms of the NAE and eventually enabled them to skirt the anti-Catholicism that was evidenced by Evangelicals in the 1960 election. (The NAE issued statements expressing their doubts that a Roman Catholic president could fully separate himself from the influence of Rome.)

The political issues that seemed to generate the most concern were the 1962 Supreme Court rulings of Engle v. Vitale (ruled against school prayers) and Abington School District v. Schemp (ruled against daily Bible readings.) The NAE described this as practical atheism. On civil rights, Cizik notes that the NAE spoke at House Judiciary Committee meetings in 1956 and 1963 and affirmed a call for churches to integrate in both spirit and practice in 1964. However, the NAE issued no statements about the 1963 Civil Rights Act or the 1964 Voting Rights Act, although they issued a statement in 1965, saying that they were anguished about those who had been denied civil rights. They also did not issue a statement about the Vietnam War but instead issued statements about the need to confront the Communist Threat.

A Changing Mind-Set, 1968-1980

Evangelicals in the late 1960s were averse to political involvement. Prominent Fundamentalist ministers and Billy Graham routinely held to the strategy of saving the lost instead of social reform. By the late 1970s, Evangelicals had done a 180-degree turn. What happened? Social change and the emergence of counter-cultural movements happened. Evangelicals determined that they were called to defend and restore traditional morality.

Statements in this era decried moral decay. Three years before Roe v. Wade, the NAE had declared that abortion, except for certain extreme circumstances, was wrong. As federal control over public schools increased, the NAE reversed its position on government support of Christian schools, suggesting that tax credits might be a good thing. They issued statements in the early 1970s that supported environmental protection, but it wasn't until 2004 that they began mobilizing for action. Cizik cites a litany of issues that Evangelicals issued statements on during this era, the majority dealing with personal morality matters. However, beginning in the 1970s, the NAE passed resolutions condemning racism and discrimination. (Cizik writes that statements were issued in 1971, 1975, 1977, 1986, 1990, 1994, 1995, 1996, and 1999.) Internationally the NAE supported Taiwan and Israel.

Two other issues affected the Evangelical world in this era. First, changes in Federal Communication Commission rules contributed to the rise of contribution-funded televangelist broadcasting and the rise of the National Religious Broadcasters. Second, Newsweek declared 1976 the year of the Evangelical, and Jimmy Carter was elected as a "born-again" president. However, support soured for Carter with his support of the Equal Rights Amendment, homosexual rights, and unwillingness to halt federally funded abortions.

Political Insiders, 1980-1992

Attempts by the IRS to impose controversial restrictions on religious organizations galvanized what became known as the "religious Right," the most high-profile organization of which was Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority. The NAE issued a resolution called "The Christian and His Government" that called on Christians to pray for their government and be politically active. That fall, 61% of "born-again" white Protestants voted for Ronald Reagan. The following year, Francis Schaeffer's book A Christian Manifesto was published as a treatise against secular humanism. The NAE issued two major resolutions on responding to secular humanism in 1982. Quoting from one of the resolutions, Cizik says the NAE believed that secular humanism led to "...unrestricted abortion, free love and homosexual practices, permissiveness in divorce, genetic engineering or cloning to help mankind evolve into brave new men." (51)

Another Supreme Court case, Bob Jones v. United States, created a dilemma for the NAE as concerns over racial equality versus religious liberty were brought into play. The NAE reluctantly filed a friend of the court brief for Bob Jones, fearing government intrusion in religion in other areas. Cizik writes that this also led to a statement of official opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment by the NAE.

Ronald Reagan made his "Evil Empire" speech in 1983 at the NAE annual Orlando, Florida meeting. The following year, 81% of Evangelicals voted for Reagan. Cizik writes, "The NAE staff members were increasingly consulted about administration appointments and policy, and they seized the opportunity to influence government." It was also in 1984 that the NAE published a well-received policy series called "Peace, Freedom and Security Studies."

The NAE condemned South African apartheid in 1986 and called for religious freedom in Nicaragua in 1987. Also, in 1987, they published a resolution entitled "Peace, Freedom and Human Rights" that called on Christians to be peacemakers and to support human rights regardless of the political orientation of the governments involved. Cizik writes that this foreshadowed initiatives on religious persecution, sexual trafficking, and peace in Sudan that would come later.

Although Pat Robertson ran for president in 1988, polls of NAE leaders placed Robertson fourth in their list of preferred candidates. Bush won with 82% of the Evangelical vote in 1988. However, Bush's favorability began to wane as gay-rights activists were invited to the White House for bill-signing ceremonies, and Bush took no action against the National Endowment for the Arts for funding pornographic art. NAE and Southern Baptist leaders began to feel they were being taken for granted and asked for a meeting with Bush. They received no apology from him as he pointed to other policies he had accomplished on their behalf. The "no new taxes" flip-flop further strained relationships. Bush and Billy Graham spoke at the fiftieth anniversary of the NAE, and Bush reiterated his support for family values. However, with the economy having soured, Bush lost the election to Bill Clinton, and the NAE began to rethink its connection with Republicans and the "religious Right."

Evaluating Partisan Politics, 1992-2000

Cizik writes,

President Clinton’s capacity for outmaneuvering Republicans on Capitol Hill, referred to as “triangulation,” or winning of votes from conservatives to pass innovative legislative efforts such as welfare reform that liberals opposed, meant that he would assiduously court certain religious conservatives. The end result was that there was always an open door for the NAE staff members at the White House. (55)

NAE President Don Argue called for evangelicals to distance themselves from GOP partisanship. That didn't stop the NAE from passing resolutions opposing homosexuals in the military or opposing Clinton's healthcare reform. However, they found a partnership with Clinton on the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993, even though the law was eventually ruled unconstitutional. They also supported Clinton's efforts to open trade relations with China. Cizik notes that Argue and he, along with a rabbi and an archbishop, were invited to go to China in 1998 to talk to President Jiang Zemin about religious persecution. The National Council of Churches lobbied Clinton to have a representative present but to no avail. Clearly, there was a shift underway in religious and political influence.

Cizik writes that Evangelicals began to distance themselves from Clinton after the sex scandal. By 1999, many on the religious Right were urging retreat from politics, but the NAE was firmly committed to political involvement. Cizik cites a study that showed,

In 1990, 75 percent [NAE leaders] believed ‘changing individuals’ one by one through evangelistic means was the best way to change society; by the year 2000, a nearly identical number of leaders (64 percent) had concluded that ‘changing both individuals and the institutions of society’ was the preferable and most effective way to translate biblical values into a  secular society.” (57-58)

A study I read in 2004 about an NAE member denomination called Fundamentalism in the Church of the Nazarene showed a similar shift from 1996 to 2004, indicating that something significant happened in the last decade.

New Internationalism and Faith-Based Initiatives, 1996-2004

Cizik mentions Nicholas Kristof's May 2002 New York Times column "The New Internationalists." Kristof wrote that a new breed of Evangelical activists replacing the likes of Robertson and Falwell were influencing US foreign policy. They were focused on a broad range of human rights and religious freedom issues. Cizik refers to "A Conference on the Global Persecution of Christians" on January 23, 1996. It was a joint event by the NAE, the Institute on Religion and Democracy, and Freedom House. Cizik writes,

“Released that day was a document entitled The National Association of Evangelical's Statement of Conscience on Worldwide Religious Persecution and helped launch a movement that would rattle diplomats in foreign capitals. After two-year battle that included opposition by the Clinton administration, the State Department, the business lobby, and the National Council of Churches, the International Religious Freedom Act was passed unanimously by both houses of Congress in 1998 and signed by President Clinton.” (59)

Cizik goes on to highlight several other international policy achievements.

On the domestic front, the NAE has been a big backer of Bush's "Faith-Based and Community Initiatives." They have actively explored how best to have a Christian-Muslim dialog in the wake of 9/11. They have also supported Bush's Partial Abortion Ban Act and the federal marriage amendment.

The influence of the NAE continues to grow. In March 2005, the NAE issued a document called For the Health of the Nation: An Evangelical Call to Civic Responsibility to draw other people into the discussion about addressing what Mark Noll called "the scandal of Evangelical thinking." That was the purpose of this book as well.

(If you are interested in NAE policy statements or some of the statements mentioned in this summary, many can be found at the NAE website under the "Governmental Affairs" link in the Resolutions/Documents section.)

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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 and 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 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 and Evangelical camps. He identifies three Evangelical streams that emerged. First, some denominations emerged in direct response to modernizing events in the mainline churches. These denominations 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 politics during the first half of this period 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 involvement 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, the more separatist and strictly fundamentalist wing formed organizations like the American Council of Christian Churches (ACCC) in 1941 and the International Council of Christian Churches in 1948, led by Carl McIntire. Second was 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 against 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 broader 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 a 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 and divided Evangelical movement. Some of the trends he noted were, '… 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 nation's direction.

It was also during the 1970s that the "Christian Right" was born. Responding to events they saw as threatening to traditional family values (e.g., abortion, sexual permissiveness, no-fault divorce, pornography, and homosexuality), some Evangelicals began to mobilize to stem the tide. Secular humanism came to be seen as the primary problem as popularized by Francis Schaeffer's Christian Manifesto (1981). Jerry Falwell founded the Moral Majority around 1980, and 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 little of the Christian Right's agenda was accomplished after all this political action. By the late 1990s, former leaders like Cal Thomas and Ed Dobson had become disillusioned with politics. They 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 left and right positions. Center for Public Justice was another such organization. Also significant 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 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 losing 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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"Toward an Evangelical Public Policy" Book Discussion

I wrote a post earlier this week to see if others would be interested in reading through Toward an Evangelical Public Policy together. A sufficient number have said they would be interested, so I plan to start next week.

I will briefly summarize each essay as an individual post. I figure we can do two or three a week. I will begin on Tuesday, the 21st, with Chapter 1. Hopefully, you have a copy and can read along. If not, I hope my summary and the comments of others will be enough to give you an idea of what the essay is about so you can join in. Hope to see you then.

Public Policy Book Discussion Idea

One of my favorite blogs is Jesus Creed by Scot McKnight, a professor at North Park University in Chicago. I find it helps me bridge a great cavernous divide within our culture. No, I am not referring to the fact that he is at an Evangelical Covenant University, and I am Presbyterian. It has more to do with the fact that he is a Cubs fan, and I have been following the Cardinals since I was seven years old.

One of the things I particularly like about McKnight's site is the book studies he does. He will go through a book, writing a brief blog entry on each chapter. The discussion goes on from there. I have enjoyed the two or three I have participated in, and I am getting started in his new discussion about N. T. Wright's book on Paul.

This has inspired me to try a book discussion here. Last year Baker Books published a collection of essays on public policy edited by Diane Knippers and Ronald J. Sider titled, Toward an Evangelical Public Policy: Political Strategies for the Health of the Nation. I would propose doing two posts a week, say on Tuesday and Friday, completing the book over eight weeks. I am not particularly interested in a one-way information dump from me. I would like to have a conversation. Is anyone reading this blog interested in reading these sixteen essays with me? I would like to know that at least three or four others would like such a conversation. We could start as early as next week. Please let me know if you are interested.