JULY 10, 2006

ELECTIONS 2006
Evangelicals: Divisible after all?

Several high-profile evangelical Christians are criticizing the evangelical movement for its close alliance with the Republican Party. These voices - scholars, clergy and laypeople - say that evangelicals have sacrificed the message of Jesus at the altar of political influence, throwing over their biblically mandated mission to the poor and disadvantaged in favor of trying to affect decisions about gay marriage, abortion and other issues laden with "moral values." Evangelicals, many of these critics contend, have forgotten Christ's admonition to wage peace in favor of waging the culture wars.

Since the 1980s, evangelical Christians have made up a large chunk of the Republican Party. In the 2004 presidential election, 78 percent of evangelical voters backed George W. Bush, according to the report "The American Religious Landscape and the 2004 Presidential Vote." Of course, there have always been dissenting voices within conservative Christianity - no religious movement is monolithic - but recently those voices have grown louder and more high-profile. Examples include:

• A half-dozen books by evangelical authors are calling for major reform. The authors include such evangelical notables as religion historian Randall Balmer, former President Jimmy Carter and theologian Obery Hendricks Jr.
• Baptist bloggers discontented with the conservative alignment of the Southern Baptist Convention were instrumental in the election of Frank Page, a younger and potentially more progressive pastor, as the denomination's new president.
• Recent speeches by Walter B. Shurden and J. Brent Walker, two prominent Southern Baptist leaders, warn against the close alliance of religion and politics.
• A gathering of African-American pastors, led by Dallas pastor Frederick Haynes III, criticized some megachurches and their pastors as being more concerned with politics and wealth than with the poor.
• In May, a group of conservative Southern Baptist pastors signed the "Memphis Declaration," a document that calls for repentance and remorse for "triumphalism" in pursuing Baptist causes and for turning "a blind eye to wickedness" within the denomination.

If there is an anti-political push within evangelicalism, it may reflect a broader and growing unease Americans have with government's involvement in moral values. According to a recent Gallup Poll, the percentage of Americans who believe the federal government should promote "moral values" has fallen 12 points in the last decade, from 60 percent in 1996 to 48 percent in 2006.

Why it matters

Some people's opinions on current political issues - from war and terrorism to abortion and same-sex marriage - are shaped by religious beliefs. Debate over how people's faith should affect their votes can sway elections.

Questions for reporters

This ReligionLink issue highlights evangelicals who are speaking out with concerns about conservative Christians' political alliances, but there are plenty of Christians - both conservatives and liberals - who say it is imperative that people of faith engage in politics and vote according to their religious beliefs. What do clergy and churchgoers in your area say?

Is there discomfort among evangelicals in your community over the political involvement of major evangelical figures and organizations? Or do they believe that political involvement is a necessary way to help make sure the country reflects the values God wants the world to live by?

Are churches in your area planning sermons on public issues leading into November elections? Will they hand out voter guides from any organizations?

Jump to background
View a complete index to ReligionLink tips on covering the 2006 elections

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National sources

• Randall Balmer is a professor of American religion at Barnard College, Columbia University, and the author of several books on evangelicalism and American religious history. In his most recent book, Thy Kingdom Come: How the Religious Right Distorts the Faith and Threatens America - An Evangelical's Lament (Basic Books, 2006), he criticizes his fellow evangelicals for abandoning their progressive past, when they fought against slavery and for universal suffrage, in favor of conservative issues such as abortion and intelligent design. Contact 212-854-3292, rb281@columbia.edu.
• Gregory Boyd is senior pastor of Woodland Hills Church in St. Paul, Minn. Just before the 2004 election, he delivered a series of sermons about the harms of mixing politics and religion - and lost 20 percent, about 1,000 people, of his congregation. He has written a book based on those sermons, The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the Quest for Political Power is Destroying the Church (Zondervan, 2006). Contact 651-470-1812.
• Jimmy Carter is a former president of the United States and a Southern Baptist. In his most recent book, Our Endangered Values: America's Moral Crisis (Simon & Schuster, 2005), he writes of an "unapologetic crusade underway to merge fundamentalist Christians with the right wing of the Republican Party." Contact via Simon & Schuster publicity, 212-698-7541, or through the Carter Presidential Library, Tony Clark, 404-865-7109, Tony.Clark@NARA.gov.
• Richard Cizik is vice president for government affairs at the National Association of Evangelicals, which includes 43,000 congregations from 50 member denominations, individual congregations from an additional 27 denominations, and 250 parachurch ministries and educational institutions. Contact 202-789-1011, rcizik@nae.net.
• John C. Danforth is a former U.S. Republican senator from Missouri and former ambassador to the United Nations for the Bush administration. He is the author of the forthcoming Faith and Politics: How the "Moral Values" Debate Divides America and How to Move Forward Together (Viking, 2006). Danforth, an Episcopal minister, has criticized the Republican Party for becoming the "political arm" of conservative Christianity. Contact via Laura Tisdel, Viking Penguin publicity, 212-366-2226, laura.tisdel@us.penguingroup.com.
• John Green is a senior fellow in religion and American politics at the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. He is also professor of political science and director of the Ray C. Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron in Ohio. Green is a leading expert on trends in religion and politics. Contact 330-972-5182, green@uakron.edu.
• Obery Hendricks Jr. is professor of biblical interpretation at the New York Theological Seminary and an ordained elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Church. He is the author of the forthcoming The Politics of Jesus: Rediscovering the True Revolutionary Nature of Jesus' Teachings and How They Have Been Corrupted (Doubleday, 2006). Contact OMHendricks@cs.com.
• Richard Kyle is a professor of history and religion at Tabor College in Hillsboro, Kan. He is the author of Evangelicalism: An Americanized Christianity (Transaction, 2006), in which he both praises and criticizes evangelicals for their embrace of secular culture, and shows how their ideas about sin, women and private enterprise support the Republican Party platform. Contact 620-947-3121 ext. 1064, richardk@tabor.edu.
• Richard J. Mouw is a well-known writer and commentator on evangelical Christianity and is president of the Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, Calif., a leading evangelical institution. He says there is a withdrawal of support for politics from the Religious Right, partly because of embarrassment at the comments of prominent evangelicals such as Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell. But he also says disillusionment with President Bush is leading some evangelicals to re-evaluate their alliances. Contact 626-584-5201, rjmouw@fuller.edu.
• Frank S. Page is the newly elected president of the 16 million-member Southern Baptist Convention. He is the pastor of First Baptist Church in Taylors, S.C. Upon his election, which was largely brought about by younger, more progressive Baptists, he said, "I do not want anyone to think I am out to undo a conservative movement . … [But for] too long Baptists have been known for what we are against. Please let us tell you what we are for." Contact 864-678-8818, pastor@taylorsfbc.org.
• Kevin Phillips is the author of American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil and Borrowed Money in the 21st Century (Viking, 2006), in which he describes the Republican Party as "the first American religious Party" in America. Contact via Laura Tisdel, Viking Penguin publicity, 212-366-2226, laura.tisdel@us.penguingroup.com.
• The Rev. Al Sharpton, at a June meeting of African-American clergy, criticized conservative megachurches for paying more attention to the "bedroom morality" of gay marriage and abortion rather than what he called the immorality of the war, attacks on voting rights and the erosion of affirmative action. Contact 212-603-3708 (fax only).
• Walter B. Shurden is a professor of Christianity and executive director of the Center for Baptist Studies at Mercer University in Macon, Ga. In June 2006, he delivered an address before the Religious Liberty Council Luncheon at the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship General Assembly in which he outlined ways in which he thinks some American Christians have mistakenly gone about tearing down the wall of separation between church and state. Contact shurden_wb@mercer.edu.
• J. Brent Walker is executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty. In May, he delivered a lecture at Hardin-Simmons University in Abilene, Texas, in which he outlined "five commandments and 10 lies" of political life for religious Americans who would enter political discussions. Among his advice: "Thou shalt not involve thy church in electoral politics." Contact 202-544-4226, bjc@BJConline.org.
• Garry Wills is an adjunct professor of history at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., and the author of What Jesus Meant (Viking, 2006). In the book, he criticizes the use of the question "What Would Jesus Do?" by Christians and others with political objectives. Contact 847-467-2504, g-wills@northwestern.edu.

Background

• Read GetReligion.org’s Dec. 1, 2006, post about the Rev. Joel Hunter and the Rev. Rick Warren, which asks whether evangelical leaders are still on the same team and posts links to several news stories.

ARTICLES
• Read "Jesus is Not a Republican," an essay by Randall Balmer that appeared in the June 23, 2006, edition of The Chronicle of Higher Education.
• Read "Rift opens among evangelicals on AIDS funding," a June 1, 2006, Religion News Service story posted by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.
• Read a May 3, 2006, Associated Baptist Press story about the Memphis Declaration.
• Read an April 28, 2006, story by Marv Knox in the Baptist Standard about J. Brent Walker's speech on "five commandments and 10 lies."
• Read an April 16, 2006, New York Times story posted by the Roundtable on Religion and Social Welfare Policy about divisions within the evangelical movement.

POLLS
• Read "Will White Evangelicals Desert the GOP?", a May 2, 2006, poll analysis from the Pew Research Center.
• Read "Religion a strength and weakness for both parties," the 2005 annual survey of religion and politics by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life and the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press.
• Read the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life’s survey "The American Religious Landscape and the 2004 Presidential Vote: Increased Polarization."
• In 2004, Religion & Ethics Newsweekly released a wide-ranging poll during a four-part series on evangelicals. See the poll results and episodes.