A God More Powerful Than Yours : American Evangelicals, Politics, and the Internet Age [1 ed.] 9781443882897, 9781443874373

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A God More Powerful Than Yours

A God More Powerful Than Yours American Evangelicals, Politics, and the Internet Age By

Christopher W. Boerl and Katie Donbavand

A God More Powerful Than Yours: American Evangelicals, Politics, and the Internet Age By Christopher W. Boerl and Katie Donbavand This book first published 2015 Cambridge Scholars Publishing Lady Stephenson Library, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2PA, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2015 by Christopher W. Boerl, Katie Donbavand All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-4438-7437-X ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-7437-3

For my sister, “The Slayer of Dreams” You have always been a harbor When I am without a port. Thank you.

TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements .................................................................................... ix Preface ........................................................................................................ xi Chapter One ................................................................................................. 1 The Medium and the Message Chapter Two ...............................................................................................11 End Times in America Chapter Three ............................................................................................ 19 The Birth of a Christian Nation Chapter Four .............................................................................................. 29 Radio, Televangelism, and the Rise of the Christian Right Chapter Five .............................................................................................. 35 An Unholy Union Chapter Six ................................................................................................ 45 W. Chapter Seven............................................................................................ 55 How the Democrats Found God Chapter Eight ............................................................................................. 69 Too Many Preachers Chapter Nine.............................................................................................. 81 The Changing Politics of American Evangelicals Chapter Ten ............................................................................................... 93 Jesus Saves (The Environment) Chapter Eleven ........................................................................................ 109 The End is Near

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Many thanks are owed to Deidre Rocks, who happily endured many drafts of this manuscript. Your advice throughout this process has been truly invaluable. Gratitude is also owed to Sherri Vallie. You are a very fine photographer, indeed.

PREFACE

When her sister moved from Bedford, Pennsylvania to Akron, New York, Pamela decided to follow suit. There, she met Parker, a part-time auto mechanic in his early 40s who’s been proudly sporting a mullet for as long as he can remember. “I guess I’ve always had it,” Parker says of his hairdo. “It’s just something people ‘round here have.” With that, Parker cracks open a can of Molson Ice lager and, before retiring to the front porch, he adds, “See, people think just ‘cause we’re from New York, we’re like all those weirdoes in the city, but that ain’t true. Truth is we’re nothing like those city folk. ‘Round here, people drive Fords and Chevys; they own trucks and guns and go to church, ‘least when it’s not hunting season,” Parker concludes with a wry grin. As the screen door shuts behind him, Parker declares, “This is real America!” “It’s been tough on him,” Pamela explains. “President Barack Hussein Obama was supposed to fix the economy,” Pamela says, placing additional emphasis on the president’s middle name. “But he hasn’t done a darn thing for people like us. Instead he’s been too busy socializing our health care.” I ask if the family has health insurance. “The kids do, thank God,” Pamela says. “They get it through the state, but Parker and I haven’t since he got laid off full-time from the dealership.” I’m tempted to point out the irony in Pamela’s thinking. I want to tell her that it isn’t God that’s insuring her children’s healthcare, but rather socialized medicine. However, I know doing so will likely spark a fight, so I decide against it. And besides, despite our vast cultural and political differences, I like Parker and Pamela and I want them to like me. They’re good, hardworking, moral people. Proud people who, in the face of a rapidly globalizing world, have for better or for worse refused to adopt the cosmopolitan values that are increasingly defining our time. Not that long ago, people like Pamela and Parker might well have been described as “salt of the earth” type folks. Today however, in our hyper-politicized world, uglier and blander terms are all too often used instead. “So going back to the Laymen cell…” I say. “The Laminin cell,” Pamela corrects me. “Right, right, the Laminin cell, you were saying…” “It’s a cell, and it’s the glue that holds the body together.” She explains. “You can go on the website and I’m sure it’s out there, but if you look at

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this cell that’s in our body underneath a microscope, in this cell is the shape of the cross. And it’s proof! That he does exist, and a lot of people don’t see this. A lot of your scientists won’t speak of it,” Pamela says emphasizing the word ‘your’ and deftly drawing the line between us. She concludes, “It’s the makeup of our body and it has the cross.” I contemplate for a moment that last statement. I’d never really thought of it before, but I had to admit, Pamela kind of had a point. While I, for instance, admire the great evolutionary biologists, men such as Charles Darwin and Richard Dawkins, Pamela, by contrast, is most assuredly repulsed by their work. I have similar praise for Michael Mann and the countless other largely nameless scientists toiling to decipher the mysteries of disease and unlocking the true cause of climate change. Pamela undoubtedly sees such work as an elaborate hoax (perhaps a conspiracy perpetrated by some Marxist element in the government). At any rate, I have my worldview and Pamela; well…Pamela believes dinosaurs munched on homosapiens. *** It’s roughly a seven hour drive from Akron, New York to my house in the Boston suburbs. Having family in the Buffalo area, it’s a drive I’m all too familiar with, and aside from the mile markers denoting upcoming towns or rest stations, I can always tell when I’m getting close to home by listening to the radio. Somewhere just east of Albany, the Christian radio stations which seem to occupy nearly every other frequency on the dial begin to fade. But on this particular drive home, I didn’t listen to the radio. Instead, I kept replaying the interview I had just had with Pamela. To be honest, I’m not sure why I did. As a student of American evangelicals, I am quite accustomed to hearing statements which many in the wider public would consider outright crazy.1 But there was something about this 1

Who is an Evangelical? When an individual identifies oneself as a Catholic, there is little doubt as to what they mean. In all likelihood, they are referring to a specific Christian denomination whose believers are led by the Pope and the Holy See. By contrast, when someone says they are ‘evangelical’, they are not affiliating themselves with any particular denomination or formal creed. Over the years, significant scholarly work has attempted to answer the question: What is an evangelical? From a historical perspective, the evangelical movement traces its roots to the works of once radical preachers, such as John Wycliffe (1330-1384) and Jan Hus (1372-1415), as well as other pre-reformation theologians such as Peter Waldo (1140-1218) and Girolamo Savonarola (1452-1498). However, the shape of modern evangelicalism is more appropriately attributed to the work of leaders of the Protestant Reformation.

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last interview that kept pinging back and forth in my mind like a bird trapped in a bedroom, looking for an open window to escape through. Finally, somewhere outside of Syracuse the epiphany hit. I quickly grabbed my iPhone and replayed the last bit. “A lot of your scientists won’t speak of it. It’s the makeup of our body and it has the cross.” “And you heard this from a Christian speaker?” I hear myself say. “It’s on a CD.” Pamela responds. “I don’t know his name,” she continues before letting out a frustrated breath. “My mom would know it ‘casue I wanted to get it so the kids could hear it.” “And this CD,” I ask, “did you get it from the Christian bookstore?” “Oh yeah.” “And this is where you get a lot of your religious material?” According to the Institute for the Study of American Evangelicals at Wheaton College, the term ‘evangelical’ is itself, “A wide-reaching definitional ‘canopy’ that covers a diverse number of Protestant groups.” Noted religious scholar David Bebbington holds that the evangelical adheres to four core tenets. These include Crucientrism, whereby particular focus is placed on the doctrine of substitutional atonement; Biblicism, in which the Bible is placed at the center of corporate worship; Conversionism, a belief which asserts the need for each individual to convert to Christianity in order to achieve eternal salvation; and finally Activism, in which evangelicals openly and actively proclaim the Lord’s “Good News.” Alister McGrath adds another widely accepted tenet, namely Christocentrism, which holds that God’s eternal “Word” became human in the flesh of Jesus Christ who went on to reveal God to all humanity. Collectively, these five tenets are widely regarded as the defining beliefs of the evangelical Christian. In the United States, political scientists have come to view evangelicals as an important voting bloc in their own right. Occasionally referred to as the “evangelical bloc,” or the “evangelical voting bloc,” this segment of the population is more commonly identified as the “Christian Right.” Culturally speaking, the Christian Right is a political movement of conservative, mostly evangelical Christians and Christian organizations which, despite various denominational differences, have gathered around certain political issues, such as opposition to abortion and gay rights, the teaching of evolution in public schools, and, more generally, the perceived secularization of American society. Throughout this book, the terms “Christian Right,” “evangelical bloc,” and “evangelical voting bloc,” are often used when referring to the political activities of the conservative evangelical community. On a final note, the word “evangelical” is often preceded in popular and scholarly literature by the word “white,” as while many African-Americans are technically evangelical; their political voting habits are quite different to those of the rest of the evangelical bloc. As such, when this book uses the term “evangelical”, it is referring more generally to white evangelicals.

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“From there and from family and friends at church.” “So you swap a lot of this stuff, CDs and books and what not?” “Oh yeah. It gets really expensive otherwise.” There’s a brief pause in the recording. In the background you can hear a dog bark and a truck drive by on the gravel road in front of the house. “So, if your minister or a friend from church was to tell you about a certain book, and they said, ‘You have to read it,’ would you?” Pamela contemplates my last question for a moment before answering, “I’d be open to it.” She then explains further. “I would, because I believe the things the minister says, and I trust my family and friends, so if they told me about something, I’d check it out. I’m not saying that I’d believe it—you know, we all have our own opinions, but oh yeah, it’s a starting point. And I think that’s how anything starts anywhere, somebody they have faith and trust in says something, and they decide to investigate it. And I think that investigation is real important. Don’t just leave it as is. Look. Find out” I pause the recording. I realize what Pamela has just described to me is the perfect representation of the confluence of old and new media. The way she goes about gathering data, the means by which her views of the world are constructed and periodically re-formed encompasses the entire media spectrum. It begins with a simple verbal exchange from one person to another. It’s the sort of peer-to-peer exchange which media gurus lust for and, in some instances, are willing to spend millions of dollars on an aggressive ad campaign to achieve. It’s a genuine word-of-mouth promotion, one that comes from a trusted source such as a friend or member of the family—or better yet, a valued authoritative source such as a religious leader. For years now, Christian filmmakers have been eagerly exploiting this very intimate and human dynamic in promoting their own films. For instance, when Mel Gibson released The Passion of the Christ just before Easter 2004, Icon Productions, the studio behind the movie, had only a modest budget to promote the film. While traditional advertisements such as television and radio commercials aired in promotion of the film, Mel Gibson enjoyed his greatest advertising success by holding countless advanced screenings across the country and around the world for respected church leaders. Moved by the film’s graphic imagery, many of these leaders then used their pulpits to encourage their own congregation to see the movie. Even Pope John Paul II got in on the action when he endorsed the film, saying, “It is as it was.”

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But as Pamela notes, while the opinions of her family and friends matter greatly to her, she remains her own person. Before deciding to get a particular book, or Christian CD, Pamela claims that she’ll do her own research first. Exactly how extensive this research is, or what it involves, I do not know, but her past comments hint that this research takes place in the new media environment when Pamela conducts her online searches, and it is precisely this new media component which warrants greater attention. Humans have been exchanging ideas by word-of-mouth for longer than history has been recorded. Older media platforms such as the printed word and, more recently, electronic broadcasts such as radio and television, have impacted nearly every aspect of our life and society more broadly—and in ways difficult to fully comprehend. The Internet, by contrast, is relatively new and its ever evolving nature makes its study considerably more dynamic. Like previous forms of media, the new media environment has greatly altered the way we live our lives and organize society. Much of this has already been documented, yet despite this knowledge, our overall understanding of how the Internet continually re-negotiates our relationship with the wider world remains both under-explored and ever changing. Given the immeasurable influence evangelicals exercise over the American political process, and their deep roots into the very fabric of American culture, a more comprehensive understanding of the ways in which the new media environment is impacting American evangelicals is due. Let us begin…

CHAPTER ONE THE MEDIUM AND THE MESSAGE

When the gods of ancient Egypt quarrelled, the great sun god Ra would turn to his fellow deity Thoth—the half-man, half-ibis god of justice, knowledge, and wisdom—to serve as his cosmic arbitrator. In this capacity, Thoth proved himself to be a competent jurist, and his fairness and impartiality earned him the respect of both gods and mortals alike. One day, as legend goes, Thoth found himself wandering the earth when he happened to cross paths with Thamus, King of the Nile Delta. Well aware of Thoth’s reputation as the supreme purveyor of learned pursuits, King Thamus invited Thoth to share with him his most recent insights. Thoth happily obliged. As Thoth described to the king each of his latest discoveries, which included the development of the sciences and the creation of mathematics, the good king sat in amazement, expressing his sincere pleasure and deepest gratitude. Impressed by all he had seen, King Thamus eagerly awaited Thoth’s final presentation, for surely the wise Thoth had saved the best for last. Yet, as Thoth’s list of cerebral discoveries came to an end, he described for the king his invention of writing, declaring proudly, “Here is an accomplishment, my lord the King, which will improve both the wisdom and memory of the Egyptians.” King Thamus was unable to give his approval. “Most ingenious Thoth,” the king began, “One man has the ability to beget arts, but the ability to judge of the usefulness or harmfulness to their users belongs to another; and now you, who are the father of letters, have been led by your affection to ascribe to them a power the opposite of that which they really possess.” Surprised by the king’s response, Thoth implored Thamus for an explanation. The king continued, “Wise Thoth, do you not see how this invention will produce forgetfulness in the minds of those who learn to use it, for they will not practice their memory? Their trust in writing, produced by external characters which are no part of themselves, will discourage the use of their own memory.” It was a reply Thoth had not expected and one which, in his considerable wisdom, he had failed to foresee. To bring his

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point home, King Thamus concluded by saying, “For this thing that you call writing is an elixir not of memory, but of reminding; and far from offering your pupils true wisdom, you instead offer them the appearance of wisdom, for they will surely read a good many things without receiving proper instruction and will therefore seem to be knowledgeable, when they are for the most part ignorant and hard to get along with, since they are not wise, but only appear wise.”1 To be certain, King Thamus’s critique of writing, though harsh, is not without merit. For who among us would argue that the introduction of the written word, which, as King Thamus correctly observes, is a means to record, has not diminished humanity’s need for memorization? That said, Thamus’s criticism of the written word should not go unscrutinized. As writing has certainly displaced the need for oral recollection and arguably lessened humanity’s cognitive memory, the representation of language as a retrievable textual medium in which signs and symbols are used as a nonsymbolic expression of language, flung open the gates to previously unknown avenues of human knowledge and greatly enhanced our aptitude for compositionality, representation, and commitment; as embedded within written language is the very means to create elaborate civilizations capable of creating enduring representations of ourselves.2 Few innovations can possibly rival the written word in terms of their impact on civilization. With that said, history is chock-full of technological breakthroughs that have dramatically altered humanities within the broader world and altogether changed our historical trajectory. And as if it were an unwritten law governing the invention of new technologies, the most profound of these human innovations are often utilized in a manner completely un-prescribed by their creators. Take for instance the mechanical clock. Invented by Benedictine Monks sometime between the twelfth and thirteenth century, the mechanical clock revolutionized the way in which society perceived and recorded time. Suddenly time possessed a quantifiable quality. In the hands of merchants, tradesmen, and artisans, measurable time proved to be a segmental commercial resource, one as easily bought and sold as any other commodity. The commercial applications of the clock were hardly what the Benedictines had in mind when they first invented them. Instead, the clock was designed to provide “precise regularity” to the routines of Benedictine monasteries, “Which 1

Phaedrus dialogue on rhetoric and writing (274b-277a). For a further reading on the written word and birth of civilization, see John Searle’s, (2010) Making the Social World: The Structure of Human Civilization (New York: Oxford University Press).

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required among other things, seven periods of devotion during the course of the day.” According to Postman, what was needed to signal the passing of canonical hours was a technology that “Could provide precision to the rituals of devotion.”3 The mechanical clock achieved just this. What the Benedictine Monks failed to see, however, was that in addition to keeping track of the hours, the clock could just as easily be used to synchronize and control the actions of individuals. By the middle of the fourteenth century, the mechanical clock had found its way beyond the cloistered walls of monastic communities and had begun filling space in village squares. As public commons became familiar places to find mechanical clocks, and the bells which tolled the hours of these clocks grew louder, measurable regularity gradually strengthened its grip on “life of the workman and merchant.” The clock, while invited to bring humanity closer to God, led us instead to the worship of another. With its precision, the clock has proved to be the ultimate tool in the scheduling of daily life, the regulation of commerce and trade, the accumulation of wealth and property, and, ultimately, in the embrace of Mammon.4 Much like the mechanical clock and the written word before it, the printing press is another technology that has forever and profoundly changed the whole of human existence. Following the arrival of the printing press, Europe became much more than Europe with movable type or Europe absent of scribes. Instead, the introduction of the printing press played a pivotal role in the spread of Luther’s rebellion against the Catholic Church, and is today widely credited as having given rise to the Protestant Reformation. It is similarly easy enough to trace the birth of Protestant Christianity to the advent of the modern nation-state, but that is another book altogether. Broadcast media and, in particular television, is yet another example of a technology that has changed who we are and the way we live. Given the sheer amount of time Americans spend watching television, it is impossible not to consider the massive impact that this form of broadcast media has on both individuals and society at-large. Fortunately, countless studies (dating from the early 1950s, when television was first becoming popular and continuing to present day) have sought to better gauge the effects of television viewing. While many of these studies have proved quite controversial and several results are disputed, among the more widely accepted effects of television viewing include lowered social 3

Neil Postman, (1993) Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology (New York: Vintage Books). 4 Postman, 1993.

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IQs, diminished ability for social empathy, decrease in one’s metabolic rate, reduced physical activity, and higher rates of obesity. Studies have also found a positive correlation between increased television viewership and aggregate diagnoses of Attention Deficit Disorder, to name but a few. A bit later in this book, we will be returning to the subject of broadcast media as it specifically relates to the rise of the American Christian Right, but for the moment, it is important to remember that society today finds itself in the midst of another technological revolution. Indeed, recent advances in computer sciences have dramatically altered the way we live, communicate, and understand the world around us.

The New Media Environment In a lecture for the popular online educational series TED Talks, author and New York University media professor Clay Shirky states, that prior to our current time (what he calls the most recent media revolution), “There [have been] only four periods in the last 500 years where media has changed enough to qualify for the label of ‘revolution.’”5 These revolutionary periods include: the invention of the printing press; the advent of two-way communication and conversational media, first with the telegraph, then with the telephone; the introduction of recorded media other than print, such as photography, sound (records), movie reels; and finally, the broadcast age. Today, however, we are living through what Shirky argues is, “The largest increase in expressive capability in human history.”6 To validate this point, Shirky notes a curious asymmetry of the older media regimes, “The media that is good at creating conversation is no good at creating groups, and the media that is good at creating groups, is no good at creating conversation.”7 The Internet, however, is the first medium in human history that Shirky notes, “has native support for groups and conversations at the same time.”8 A key component of this “native support” is digitalization. Professor Shirky explains, “As all media gets digitized, the Internet also becomes the mode of carriage for all other media. Phone calls migrate to the Internet, magazines migrate to the Internet, movies migrate to the Internet, and that 5 Clay Shriky, (2009) “Clay Shirky: How social media can make history,” TED Talks. Found online at: (Accessed March 10, 2012). 6 Shirky, 2009. 7 Shirky, 2009. 8 Shirky, 2009.

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means that every medium is right next-door to every other medium.”9 As media increasingly finds a home online, the Internet becomes less of a source for information only and increasingly more of a network for coordination as well. To better illustrate this point, it is worth recalling the work of noted social observer Marshall McLuhan. In describing the media environment of the day, he famously used the term “media ecology.” He writes that such ecology is the: “…arranging [of] various media to help each other so they won't cancel each other out, to buttress one medium with another. You might say, for example, that radio is a bigger help to literacy than television, but television might be a very wonderful aid to teaching languages. And so you can do some things on some media that you cannot do on others. And, therefore, if you watch the whole field, you can prevent this waste that comes by one canceling the other out.10

When speaking of the new media environment today, we are referring to the consolidation of McLuhan’s media ecology into one easily accessible and navigable platform: the World Wide Web. In this ecology, McLuhan explains, “What matters here isn’t technical capital, it’s social capital.”11 After all, while most of us are competent computer users— sending e-mails, navigating the net, and updating our blogs—few of us are programmers or otherwise truly understand the technical components that serve as the backbone of our digital lives. As such, new media tools, as Shirky aptly notes, “Don’t get socially interesting until they get technologically boring,”12 When this happens, crucial barriers which might otherwise inhibit widespread adoption of a particular information and communication technology (ICTs) are overcome. McLuhan puts it another way: “It isn’t when the shiny new tools show up that their uses start permeating through society, it’s when everybody is able to take them for granted.”13 Today, new media has largely succeeded in becoming more socially capable and, as a result, we now find ourselves in an environment where, according to Shirky, “Innovation can happen anywhere that people can take for granted the idea that we are all in this together.”14 Indeed, 9

Shirky, 2009. Stephanie McLuhan and David Staines eds., (2004) Understanding Me: Lectures and Interviews by Marshall McLuhan, (Cambridge: MIT Press), pg. 271. 11 Shirky, 2009. 12 Shirky, 2009. 13 Shirky, 2009. 14 Shirky, 2009. 10

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innovation is happening everywhere. Previous distinctions between media consumers and media producers are now not so much blurred, as nonexistent.

New Media and American Evangelicals There is little doubt about it: Media has had, and continues to have, a tremendous influence in shaping American values and defining the American character. One historical example of this is the heavy reliance of the early American patriots on local newspapers and printed pamphlets to help propagate their message of liberty and convince others to join their cause for national independence. For instance, patriot Thomas Paine penned Common Sense, a 79-page pamphlet offering plain arguments for American secession. In the first three months of its publication, it sold more than 120,000 copies in the colonies alone and helped solidify public support for the Revolution. Nearly a quarter of a millennium since the signing of the Declaration of Independence, America has changed in remarkable ways. During this time, the American Republic has grown from being little more than a scattered collection of loosely affiliated state governments to the world’s leading economic and military power. Despite America’s many changes over the years, certain characteristics have undergone relatively little change. In particular, religion, much as it was in 1776, remains today an indelible source of identity for millions of Americans. As the Pew Research Center notes: Religion is much more important to Americans than to people living in other wealthy nations. Six-in-ten (59%) people in the U.S. say religion plays a very important role in their lives. This is roughly twice the percentage of self-avowed religious people in Canada (30%), and an even higher proportion when compared with Japan and Western Europe. Americans’ views are closer to people in developing nations than to the publics of developed nations.15

In any given month, some 63% of American adults claim to attend worship service at a Christian church, while 67% will utilize some form of Christian media such as listening to Christian radio, watching a televangelist on television or reading a Christian book. These statistics 15

Pew Forum Staff Writer, (2002) “U.S. Stands Alone In Its Embrace of Religion among Wealthy Nations,” Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. Found online at: (Accessed August 15, 2014).

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equate to roughly 132 million American adults attending church each month and 141 million interacting with Christian media.16 The Barna Group further notes that an increasing number of Americans are, “Using the Internet for faith exploration and communications.”17 Though religion remains a powerful force in American politics, relatively little work has analyzed the relationship between the new media environment and evangelical political activity. This deficit is perplexing, particularly when one considers the vast literature already exploring the relationship between broadcast media and the rise of the Christian Right. Perhaps more important, however, is the fact that we know so little about how the new media environment is affecting the politics of American evangelicals, and in particular, the Christian Right. It is troubling to say the least, especially given the considerable influence the Christian Right continues to wield within the Republican Party. To that end, this book attempts to shed greater light on the effect of the new media environment on American evangelicals. In utilizing a variety of research methods and historical analyses, this book addresses the present academic void by tracing the impact of the new media environment on American evangelicals and their continued engagement within the political process. Broadcast media, such as radio and television, while identified as mediums with high entrance costs have nonetheless proved adept at unifying core cultural values, religious beliefs, and political principles. By contrast, the Internet, as a many-to-many medium with much lower entrance costs, has created a plural media environment, one far more conducive to the development of diverse opinions, including religious ones. This latter fact is of particular importance since evangelical Christianity often appears homogenous to outside observers but, at its core, is a rich and diverse religious tradition. One reason for this perception of uniformity is due to the fact that broadcast media has enabled a small group of religious leaders to fix down important religious messages and meanings, while simultaneously emphasizing shared cultural values, such as the protection of “unborn life” and so-called “defense of marriage.” In this regard, broadcast media has played an important role in helping those with control of the medium to advance a narrowly defined conservative 16

Barna Group Staff Writer, (2002) “Christian Mass Media Reach More Adults With the Christian Message Than Do Churches,” The Barna Group. Found online at: (Accessed May 22, 2011). 17 Barna Group, 2002.

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agenda, all while effectively dismissing smaller theological squabbles and minor scriptural disputes which have plagued previous evangelical unification efforts. The Internet, however, lowers thresholds for engagement and amplifies the voices of the many—including those on the evangelical periphery. It subverts the centralized nature of broadcast media and instead affords greater decentralized ownership of material and content, while facilitating broader engagement. Put more simply, while broadcast media is uniquely suited to fix meaning and aid the monopolization of messaging, the Internet instead enables a diverse set of users to challenge prevailing ideas and values, thus leading to ever greater fragmentation. As evangelicals increasingly turn to the Internet for purposes of religious devotion, guidance, and education, the amalgamating effects of the broadcast age are weakened, resulting in growing theological splintering. In particular, growing support for evangelical environmentalism (or “Creation Care,” as it is commonly known) and the emerging church movement (social justice evangelicalism) have proven to be sources of considerable religious unrest within the evangelical community. This book focuses on these specific movements. Through their examination, much can be learned about how the confluence of new media technologies and American evangelicals is reshaping both the religious and political landscape in the United States. Elevating issues such as environmental protection, economic inequality, Creation Care, and emerging church movements are reorienting religious dialogues away from the so-called “culture war” issues of the 80s and 90s, and in so doing, are creating new political realities and tensions.18 The past three decades have been an unusually intense period of religious fervor and significant religious political activity—even by American standards. During this time, Evangelical Christianity has 18 The term “culture war” is a metaphor often used to describe the political and social tensions between conservative and progressive Americans. While the term itself has long been used in one form or another, it entered the American popular lexicon in the 1990s and has received considerable lip service since 1992 when Pat Buchanan declared at the Republican National Convention that, “There is a religious war going on in our country for the soul of America. It is a cultural war, as critical to the kind of nation we will one day be as was the Cold War itself.” For a complete transcript of Buchanan’s speech, see Patrick J. Buchanan, (August 17, 1992) “Address to the Republican National Convention,” American Rhetoric. Found online at:

(Accessed July 9, 2011).

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emerged as both the nation’s dominant religious identification and as an important pillar of Republican political support. Communication technologies have played a crucial role in the success of the evangelical tradition; yet such technologies do not operate in a cultural vacuum and are instead influenced by any number of external social factors. Understanding the historical context within which these technologies emerged will provide us with a clear picture of America’s ever evolving religious and political landscape.

CHAPTER TWO END TIMES IN AMERICA

School children learning the history of the American people are often taught that the Puritans came to the New World in search of religious freedom. This is simply not true. Religious liberty, after all, was a luxury the Puritans had long enjoyed in their adopted Holland. Instead, the real impetus propelling the Puritans from the shores of Europe was their yearning to reform society along strictly biblical lines. Among the Puritans, it was believed that accomplishing this goal would hail the return of Christ and set in motion the beginning of the End Times. For her part, Queen Elizabeth I begrudgingly accepted the Puritans and their increasingly fringe theology. Throughout her reign, Elizabeth I was almost always at war with either the Catholic Church or one of its fiercely loyal allies, the most notable being Spain, who by all metrics was a vastly superior military power. In the Puritans, Elizabeth I found not so much a dependable friend, but rather an equally reliable sect ready to cut their teeth in their hatred for all things Catholic and papal. Moreover, in understanding the precarious nature of her rule, as well as England’s vulnerable military state, Elizabeth I correctly judged that it was a far better thing to remain silent on some of the more radical and ultimately subversive teachings of the Puritan community (such as their belief that all earthly monarchs should be abolished) than to add this deeply devout and ever growing community to her already long list of enemies. When Elizabeth I died and King James I united both the English and Scottish thrones, his tolerance for the Puritans was considerably less. Just one year after assuming the English Crown in 1604, King James I famously expelled the Puritans from Hampton Court. As head of the Anglican Communion, James I similarly oversaw a number of liturgical reforms which brought the Church of England, at least stylistically, ever closer to Catholic Mass. Knowing that these reforms would not go over well within the Puritan community, James I made it a crime to speak out against the Church of England. Those who did risked having their ears chopped off and were subjected to branding, a particularly cruel

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punishment in which hot iron rods were used to sear a permanent image into the flesh of a living human. As persecution escalated in England, several Puritans found their way to the far more tolerant Holland. While the Puritans were able to practice their faith as they saw fit in Holland, life amongst the Dutch was not without its challenges. In particular, the Puritans found themselves barred from several Dutch guilds. Their exclusion from these guilds was a particular economic blow to the Puritans, as guild membership was crucial to economic success in 17th century Holland. Yet as challenging as economic life proved to be in Holland, it was not the reason the Puritans ultimately decided to leave. Economic hardship, after all, had been a daily reality for many of the Puritans prior to leaving England. Instead, the Puritans looked at Holland as a land awash in sin; where personal values and social norms were far too relaxed. Worse still, the Puritans viewed the Dutch as unwilling to change their ways, and thus, unwilling to adopt the strict religious reforms which the Puritans sought. Frustrated, the Puritans increasingly turned inward and became a more insular community. The outside world had turned its back on Christ, and now the Puritans were turning their backs on the world. But isolation, the Puritans knew, would not bring about the second coming of Christ. It would not hail the beginning of the end. It would not bring about God’s heavenly rule here on earth. To achieve this, the Puritans’ society needed a fresh start, somewhere free from the established corruption of Europe. Fortunately for the Puritans, the newly discovered Americas promised just that.

Religion in the New World With the dawning of the age of exploration, the great European powers found themselves embroiled in a near continuous struggle for control of newly discovered lands and the riches held within. At the helm of this great race were the Kingdoms of Spain and Portugal, followed by the lesser naval powers of England, France, and The Netherlands.1 By 1600, the Kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula had laid claim to the ‘good lands’ of South and Central America, where gold and other precious metals were easily found. Unable to compete directly for these riches, England took to looting Spanish and Portuguese fleets whenever they could and focused 1

Giles Milton’s, Big Chief Elizabeth: The Adventures and Fate of the First English Colonies in America (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2000) offers both an informative and enjoyable read on early European colonization of the Americas.

End Times in America

13

much of their colonization efforts in North America. At that time, however, England was considerably inexperienced in the business of colonization (save perhaps for Ireland, Scotland, and Wales). Previous attempts to settle the New World had ended disastrously for the English and, more specifically, those early English settlers who either had to be rescued by subsequent voyages or who perished altogether. As word of these failures spread throughout the British Isles, it became increasingly difficult for the royally chartered London Company to recruit individuals willing to brave the perils of a long and arduous trek across the Atlantic, only to face near certain starvation and endless misery in a distant and foreign land. But just as recruitment levels sank to unsustainable lows, the London Company was approached by two representatives from the Puritan congregation in Leiden, Holland. The congregation, it seemed, was eager to relocate but only under one condition: that they be allowed to govern their colony in accordance with their faith. Having witnessed his nation fall further and further behind in the race to colonize the Americas, King James I had few options but to agree to the Puritans’ request and grant them their much desired land. With their grant secured and the financial backing of the London Company, the Leiden congregation boarded a vessel by the name of Speedwell and departed for the New World. First however, they would rendezvous with another Puritan congregation from Plymouth, England and add the smaller Mayflower to their fleet.2 The Puritans’ first setback occurred while in port. The Speedwell began taking on water and was quickly deemed unseaworthy. It has long been suspected that the Speedwell had fallen victim to saboteurs who were having second thoughts about colonizing the New World. Whatever the case, the original passenger load was cut dramatically to accommodate the smaller Mayflower. In all, some 102 Puritans along with roughly 30 crew departed England late in the summer of 1620. For the next 65 days, the passengers aboard the Mayflower were forced to endure cramped and unsanitary quarters. Strong Atlantic storms battered the tiny Mayflower in the second month of its journey. Yet through all of their hardships, just two lives were lost during the trans-Atlantic voyage (a remarkably low mortality rate for the day) while another, an infant named Oceanus, was born en route.3 On November 9, 1620, the Mayflower landed on Cape Cod, some 400 miles north of its intended destination of modern-day Manhattan. To the 2

Nathaniel Philbrick, Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War (New York: Viking, 2007). 3 See Philbrick, 2007.

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surprise of many, the voyage had been met by incredibly good fortunes. Undoubtedly, the Puritans saw this as divine providence. With winter fast approaching and the maps of North America unreliable at best, the decision was made that any attempt to sail for the Chesapeake would be too dangerous. As such, the Puritans would stay put in Massachusetts. In the months that followed, roughly half of those who survived the voyage across the Atlantic perished, as disease, starvation, and exposure to the elements took their toll. Such a high death toll undoubtedly lowered spirits in the newly founded Plymouth Colony, yet those who survived likely took refuge in their faith and the belief that what they were doing on those cold and desolate shores would one day bring God’s celestial Kingdom to earth. The Puritans continued to endure the ravages of disease, starvation, and exposure to the elements throughout their first year on American soil.4 On the anniversary of their arrival in Massachusetts, the Puritans broke bread and gave thanks that their aspirations could still be fulfilled. And though the years that followed at first proved tough, the Puritans welcomed them with open arms. After all, if humanity was to be rewarded with Christ’s return, it would first have to earn it. As such, the Puritans worked diligently to establish a fundamentalist society which they hoped England (and the rest of the world) would eventually look to as an example of pious living. Plymouth became a city upon a hill in which God’s law reigned supreme.5 As time passed, life in New England became less daunting, while the appeal of the New World grew steadily. As new colonists arrived to North America, existing colonies grew larger and more settlements were founded. With this population growth, the Puritans found it increasingly difficult to enforce their strictly pious ways and narrow biblical worldviews.6 Eventually, the Puritans’ postmillennial belief (that is, the belief that Christ’s second coming would happen only after humanity had lived for a thousand years in accordance with God’s will) gave way to premillennial dispensationalism, an alternative theological persuasion which views Christ’s second coming as imminent.

4

Philbrick, 2007. Philbrick, 2007. 6 David D. Hall, A Reforming People: Puritanism and the Transformation of Public Life in New England (New York: Random House, 2011). 5

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The Imminent Coming of the End No one knows for certain precisely when premillennial beliefs overtook postmillennial views, but in the United States today, roughly two thirds of the population subscribe to some form of premillennial dispensationalism. Moreover, the transition from a postmillennial society to a premillennial society has had profound social implications, as those who subscribe to postmillennialism have a theological interest in the future of humanity, whereas premillennialists (those who believe Christ’s return could occur at any moment) tend to have more short sighted preferences and be less concerned about the long-term future. Moreover, as premillennialism emphasizes Christ’s imminent return, believers often talk of living each day as though it were the last, as for the premillennialist, today just might be that. The premillennialist believes that in order to be accepted by the Lord when the Day of Judgment comes, one must be loyal to God and do God’s duty and service while waiting for the end-times.7 For much of American history, this duty and service to God was largely seen as distinct from public life and separate from political affairs. The late Jerry Falwell, who was himself an avid premillennialist, crystallized this point in 1965 when he declared, “Preachers are not called upon to be politicians, but soul winners.”8 In later years, however, Falwell came to hold quite a different view. He would eventually emerge as one of the nation’s most ardent political campaigners on what has since become known as social issues. From a historical perspective, Falwell’s evolving views on the relationship between religion and politics help to illustrate that while religion has long been a fixture within American society, it is only in the last quarter of the twentieth century that the pursuit of personal salvation has become so intertwined with the political process. For many evangelicals, the transition from spiritual salvationists to political operatives began in earnest in the 1970s and was led by Hal Lindsey, author of the best-selling The Late Great Planet Earth, a popular premillennial account which, according to the New York Times, was the best-selling non-fiction book of the 1970s.9 By the end of that decade, and in large part thanks to his publishing success, Lindsey had become a household name in many evangelical circles. In 1980, Lindsey expanded 7

George McKenna, (2007) The Puritan Origins of American Patriotism (New Haven: Yale University Press). 8 See Christopher W. Boerl, (2010) “Religion, Media, and Culture: Religion and the American Political Sphere,” Americana 6(2). 9 Hal Lindsey, The Late Great Planet Earth (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 1970).

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upon his earlier positions (and his popularity with the Christian Right) with Countdown to Armageddon. In Countdown, Lindsey characterized evangelicals as a marginalized people and called upon Christians to take back their country and to preserve its religious heritage. He argued that with Christ’s return imminent, “Christians should live as if Jesus could come today, and that means that we must actively take on the responsibility of being a citizen and a member of God’s family. We need to get active electing officials who will not only reflect the Bible’s morality in government, but will shape domestic and foreign policies to protect our country and our way of life.”10 Others joined Lindsey in his call to action. Today, men such as Pat Robertson and James Dobson continue where Lindsey left off; using their religious authority to influence the election of public officials and the development of public policy.11 As prominent as both Dobson and Robertson may be, no one has had greater influence over the evolution of the premillennial theology than another of Lindsey’s early disciples, a soft spoken man by the name of Tim LaHaye. For those unfamiliar with LaHaye, he is the co-author (along with Jerry Jenkins) and public face of the best-selling Left Behind novel series: a fictional end-times account, which to date has sold an astonishing 65 million copies in the United States alone, a mark Harry Potter has yet to best.12 The success of the Left Behind series has spawned numerous spinoffs, including the Left Behind Prophecy Conference series which takes place annually in dozens of cities across the country, as well as Left Behind themed vacations, where tourists travel to the Holy Land and the Valley of Megiddo, the supposed site where Jesus will vanquish his enemies and restore God’s Kingdom on earth. While en route, fans can also enjoy the Left Behind movie series and play the Left Behind video game, in which players receive high scores for killing people who “don’t see Christ” as they do.13 10

Lindsey, as quoted by Susan Harding, (1994) “Imagining the Last Days: The Politics of Apocalyptic Language,” Bulletin of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 48(3), pgs. 14-44. 11 Christopher W. Boerl, (2013) “From Monologue to Dialogue: How the Internet is empowering the evangelical periphery,” Information, Communication & Society, 16(8), pgs. 1223-1241. 12 Christopher Boerl & Chris Perkins, (2011) “The Political Pluralisation of American Evangelicals: How old media built a movement and why the Internet is poised to change it,” International Journal for the Study of the Christian Church, 11(1). 13 Boerl and Perkins, 2011.

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Given Left Behind’s immense popularity, it should come as no surprise that the values of so many Americans have been influenced by this franchise and, by extension, its radically conservative authors. The opinions that the franchise has helped shape have been instrumental in forging an electoral coalition in which, all too often, theology and public policy are one and the same. For much of the past thirty years, this coalition has, in effect, dictated what it means to be a Christian, while bringing our Republic closer to theocratic rule than ever before. Surely the late Hal Lindsey would be proud. After all, his call for evangelicals to get political, was not only heard, but has been one of the greatest political mobilization efforts in our nation’s history. Still, we must ask ourselves, when Lindsey implored evangelicals to “take their country back,”14 from what exactly did he want to take America back?

14

Boerl and Perkins, 2011.

CHAPTER THREE THE BIRTH OF A CHRISTIAN NATION

In a century that gave us the cultural and political unrest of the 1960s, it is easy to forget that the 1920s were an equally turbulent time for the American people. After decades of scientific and political advancement during which rationalism gained broad public acceptance and the suffrage movement bestowed hard-fought liberties upon an unprecedented number of American citizens, society began to stall. Not only did the decade kickoff with the passing of the 18th Amendment (which prohibited all nonreligious use of alcohol), but an increase in immigration from Eastern Europe helped revive the Ku Klux Klan, whose ranks swelled to more than 5 million members.1 Moreover, the growth of hate groups such as the Klan contributed significantly to a dramatic rise in racial attacks in the United States and further fanned the flames of religious bigotry, with Catholics and Jews being disproportionately targeted. On the feminist front, the 1920s saw the first defeat of an incumbent Congressman by a woman. Unfortunately, that woman was Alice Robertson of Oklahoma, whose most notable achievement prior to her election was her stint as the president of the Oklahoma Anti-Suffrage Association. Unsurprisingly, Robertson opposed nearly every piece of legislation supported by the Women’s Joint Congressional Committee and proved to be anything but an ally to the Women’s Movement.2 Yet as only the second woman ever elected to Congress, and the only woman serving between the years of 1921-1923, Robertson was, much to the chagrin of more progressive minded women everywhere, a standard bearer for what her male colleagues came to expect a woman serving in congress to be; quite, docile, and quite frigid on matters of gender equality. With such an inauspicious start, it is small wonder that by 1933 only 13 women had 1

David Greenberg, “The Legend of the Scopes Trial: Science Didn’t Really Win,” Slate (2005). Found online at: (Accessed December 1, 2008). 2 Stanley J. Lemons, The Woman Citizen: Feminism in the 1920’s (Charlottesville: The University of Virginia Press, 1990), 103.

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served in the United States House of Representatives. And of them, seven had assumed the seat vacated by their husbands.3 Yet despite the cultural and political tensions of the 1920s, science had served the American public well, and most of the population was in general agreement that continued advances in science would only bolster American economic competitiveness. So supportive was the public of the sciences, that even Darwinism was accepted as a matter-of-fact. As the historian David Greenberg notes, “Although Darwin’s theories had met fierce resistance when first proposed in 1859, in time they secured general approval. Even many Christian leaders, once hostile to evolution, endorsed the theory.” Similarly, William Leuchtenberg, another historian of the early Twentieth Century, writes that “By the time of World War I, an attack on Darwin seemed as unlikely as an attack on Copernicus.”4 All this began to change, however, when in the summer of 1925, a clerk for a little known public advocacy group known as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) read of the obscure Tennessee Butler Act banning the teaching of evolution in public schools. Disturbed by Tennessee’s attempt to undermine the wall separating the state from church influence, the ACLU decided to challenge the law directly. At the time, however, the ACLU was still in its infancy (having been formed only five years prior) and thus lacked legal representation in the state. As such, the ACLU took an ad out in a prominent Tennessee newspaper, promising to defend, “Any teacher who made a ‘friendly challenge’ to the law.”5 Answering this call was a young Dayton man by the name of John Scopes. When word of the ACLU’s challenge reached Williams Jennings Bryan, a three-time Democratic nominee for President and former Secretary of State under Woodrow Wilson, Bryan volunteered his services in defense of the Butler Act. As a devout Christian, Bryan had long been troubled by the public’s growing embrace of certain Darwinian elements. As a scientific application, however, Darwin’s theory on the evolution of species was of little concern to Bryan.6 Instead, what troubled Bryan so greatly was the recent advance of “Social Darwinism,” a theory which argues that human society is merely, “An arena of struggle in which the strongest prevail, the fittest survive, and [where] the poor ‘misfits’ must be

3

Ibid. Greenberg, “Legend of Scopes.” 5 Gary Wills, Under God: The Classic Work on Religion and American Politics (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1990), 97-98. 6 Lemons, pg. 101. 4

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neglected in the name of social progress.”7 Such a belief flew in the face of everything Bryan ever staked a political claim upon, not to mention his Christian faith. Tennessee was more than happy to accept Bryan’s offer of assistance and named him one of the prosecutors for the state. In turn, Scopes accepted the help of Clarence Darrow, an infamous New York defense attorney and self-proclaimed atheist who specialized in stealing headlines and who wanted nothing more than to “show up” Christian Fundamentalists.8 Word spread that the sleepy town of Dayton would soon host the likes of Bryan and Darrow in what the media was billing as a contest pitting science against the Bible. Public interest in the trail grew to near fanatical proportions. Feeding the public’s appetite was an army of reporters and photographers numbering in the hundreds who, with each twist and development in the case, eagerly relayed this information to the nation’s leading papers and news organizations. Yet for many Americans, waiting for the evening edition of their local paper would simply not do. They wanted the latest information as it happened. Fortunately for them, the courthouse was wired with telegraph cables, just for the case. Additionally, Chicago radio’s WGN covered the case as it unfolded in what was the nation’s first ever live radio broadcast of any court proceeding. From the start of the trial, Darrow and his defense team attempted to frame the case as a matter of tolerance and academic freedom. By contrast, the prosecution argued that the case was about state rights and, in particular, the right of states to develop their own school curriculums. As the trial progressed, Darrow sensed that he was losing favor with John Raulston, the presiding Judge over the case, and thus took the unorthodox step of calling Bryan to the stand. Bryan, Darrow argued, had presented himself as an expert on the Bible and should therefore be unafraid to defend its merits. For his part, Bryan took Darrow’s bait and agreed to

7

Ibid. John Fea, “An Analysis of the Treatment of American Fundamentalists in United States History Survey Texts,” The History Teacher 28, no. 2 (1995): 209 of 205216. A good resource on fundamentalism is Akobus M. Vorster, “Perspectives on the Core Characteristics of Religious Fundamentalism Today,” Journal for the Study of Religion and Ideologies 7, no. 21 (2008). Found online at: (Accessed July 8, 2014); see also, Reuven Firestone, “Divine Authority And Mass Violence: Economies Of Aggression In The Emergence Of Religions,” Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies 9, no. 26 (2010): 220-237. 8

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testify under the condition that he would likewise be allowed to crossexamine Darrow. Darrow had no objections.9 As Bryan took to the stand, the court prepared to swear him in, as is customarily done. Darrow, however, objected, saying that there was no need to swear Bryan in. Upon hearing this objection, Bryan said, “I can make affirmation; I can say ‘So help me God, I will tell the truth.’” Darrow famously replied, “No, I take it you will tell the truth, Mr. Bryan.” Once seated, Darrow began peppering Bryan with a line of questioning specifically designed to show the absurdity of a literal interpretation of the Bible. It was a strategy that worked. Darrow began by asking if he believed that, “the Bible should be literally interpreted?” Bryan answered by boldly declaring that yes, “Everything in the Bible should be accepted as it is given,” though with his next breath he offered this caveat: “Some of the Bible is given illustratively.” From there, Darrow focused his attention on the story of Jonah and the Whale, arguing that it was pure fantasy to believe that any man could survive three days in the belly of a giant fish. Bryan, in turn, argued that such a story was not so hard to accept if one believed in miracles. After considerable back-and-forth on the subject, during which Bryan again asserted that he accepted “the Bible absolutely,” Darrow cornered Bryan by asking, “The Bible says Joshua commanded the sun to stand still for the purpose of lengthening the day, doesn’t it, and you believe it?” “I do,” came Bryan. “[And] do you believe at that time the entire sun went around the earth?” asked Darrow. “No, I believe the earth goes around the sun,” replied Bryan. And so this questioning persisted until Bryan finally admitted that the story of Joshua commanding the sun was only “inspired” by God; but again, Bryan declared that he did not “doubt” Joshua’s narrative. Upon hearing this, an exasperated Darrow asked, “Now, Mr. Bryan, have you ever pondered what would have happened to the earth if it had stood still?” “No,” said Bryan. “You have not?” Darrow asked again. “No, sir,” Bryan declared. “The God I believe in could have taken care of that, Mr. Darrow.”

9

Wills, 1990.

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“I see,” said Darrow pacing the courtroom floor. “Have you ever pondered what would naturally happen to the earth if it stood still suddenly?” Again, Bryan declared, “No,” though this time with more adamancy. “Don’t you know it would have been converted into a molten mass of matter?” Darrow replied. Bryan sought to deflect Darrow’s attack with wit and humor, saying, “You testify to that when you get on the stand; I will give you a chance.” Yet Bryan’s response failed to win over the largely urban press who had congregated in the courtroom en masse. For them, Bryan’s testimony was evidence of his “backwards” way of thinking, while the prospect of Christian fundamentalism being allowed to trump science and rationality was a threat to America’s continued prosperity. As Darrow continued his skillful cross examination, Bryan was made to look the fool all the more. When asked how Cain’s wife came into existence and if Eve had come from Adam’s rib, Bryan could offer no satisfactory answer. When challenged about the age of the earth, which fundamentalists believe to be around 6,000 years, Bryan’s answers again fell flat. Again and again Darrow came at Bryan and, each time, Darrow emerged the victor. In addressing the court, Darrow used these examples to demonstrate that the Bible was ill equipped to afford students a scientific understanding of the world and thus should not be used to teach science in the classroom. To drive this point home, Darrow declared in his characteristically flamboyant way, that “You [Bryan] insult every man of science and learning in the world because he does not believe in your fool religion.” Angered, Bryan spat back, “The reason I am answering is not for the benefit of the superior court. It is to keep these gentlemen [Scopes’ defense team] from saying I was afraid to meet them and let them question me, and I want the Christian world to know that any atheist, agnostic, unbeliever, can question me anytime as to my belief in God, and I will answer him.” The exchange was powerful and left an indelible mark on all who witnessed it. After all, it was not every day that a man crawled so deeply under the usually stoic Bryan’s skin. Yet Darrow had succeeded, and as the two men’s tempers flared once more, Judge Raulson finally gaveled his court adjournment. In all, Darrow’s cross examination of Bryan lasted little more than two hours and would have likely continued the following day had Judge Raulson not ruled Bryan’s entire testimony irrelevant to the suit at hand and “expunged” it from the official court record. Raulson’s ruling meant

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that Bryan would never get the chance to question Darrow, nor the opportunity to vindicate his performance. The final day of court proceedings was held outside as it was determined that Dayton’s modest courthouse simply could not hold the sheer number of reporters and spectators. When Judge Raulson abruptly brought the trial to an end, the jury deliberated for a mere eight minutes before reaching a verdict: guilty. As punishment for violating the Butler Act, Scopes was fined the sum of $100; a decision the ACLU immediately appealed at the federal level. Fearing further negative press that an appeal would bring, the Tennessee Supreme Court moved swiftly and threw out the Scopes conviction citing a technicality in the law. Darrow returned to his home in New York City, his notoriety shining brighter than ever. Bryan remained in Tennessee, where he worked to finish the speech he intended to deliver as his closing, which he had been denied on account of the trial ending so suddenly. Bryan never got to finish that speech. He died in his sleep a mere five days after the end of the trial. Officially, Bryan died of fatigue and complications from diabetes. His supporters argue, however, that his true cause of death was the broken heart he suffered following his lampooning in the national papers. In recent years, conservative historians have sought to paint Bryan’s court performance in more glowing terms, and have instead insisted that any perception of Bryan’s ineptitude while on the stand is due to an overzealous press hell-bent on discrediting men of faith. As evidence, these historians often point to the coverage of H.L. Mencken, a reporter with the Baltimore Sun who, in covering the Scopes trial, described fundamentalists as coming from the “lower orders” of humanity, with whom “no man of any education or other human dignity” would dare associate.10 In reality, both Bryan and the State of Tennessee enjoyed considerable support from the press at the onset of the trial and it was only after court proceedings had commenced that the press began to turn. For instance, just a week before the start of the trial, Mencken wrote in The Nation magazine that, “No principle is at stake in Dayton save the principle that school teachers, like plumbers, should stick to the job that is set before them.” In that same article, Mencken went on to argue that the issue before the Dayton court was the right of states to control their school curriculum and not, as supporters of Scopes had argued, a matter of free speech. Yet the fact remains that while Menken came to Dayton in support of the state, something he witnessed while in Tennessee changed his mind in a 10

Wills, 1990; see also Fea, 1995

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profound way because when the journalist left, he was convinced of the dangers posed by the Butler Act and, more broadly, by fundamentalist Christianity.11 As critical as Menken was of fundamentalists, he was hardly the only reporter depicting them in such staunchly negative terms. Throughout the course of the trial, creationists were largely portrayed by the press as backwards thinking and ignorant of scientific theory.12 Faced with this onslaught of public attacks, fundamentalist Christians did what many groups do when fired upon: They dug in and became all the more resolved in the righteousness of their faith and the orthodoxy of their way of life. Following the trial, the people of Tennessee elected the state’s lead prosecutor to the U.S. Senate and rewarded a junior prosecutor with a seat in the U.S. House. Similarly, Governor Peay, who had signed the Butler Act into law, was overwhelmingly re-elected to serve a third term. Elsewhere across the South and the Midwest, the Scopes trial stood as testament that laws forbidding the teaching of evolution could withstand judicial scrutiny. As a result, some fourteen states followed Tennessee’s lead and either passed or seriously considered similar anti-evolution legislation.13 In the years that followed, the publishers of many of the nation’s high school biology textbooks began removing any mention of evolution. Arguably, the most important factor contributing to the censoring of Charles Darwin and his theory is the fact that in America, local educators and superintendents are the ones who approve and buy school textbooks, rather than specialists in the field. Thus, for teachers and school administrators wishing to escape the wrath of angry priests and upset parents, evolution became a strictly hands off topic.14 Naturally, publishers wishing to sell their biology textbooks took notice of public sentiment and adapted their text to meet the mood of the market. Unfortunately, communities that would have preferred their students to learn about evolution had to make do with textbooks that made no mention of Darwin 11

Boerl, 2010. Dan Gilgoff, “Falwell Launched the Modern Christian Right,” USNews, May 16, 2007. Found online at: (Accessed December 1, 2013). 13 Marjorie George, “And Then God Created Kansas? The Evolution/Creationism Debate in America’s Public Schools,” University of Pennsylvania Law Review 149, no. 3 (2001): 843-872. 14 Dorothy Nelkin, “From Dayton to Little Rock: Creationism Evolves,” Science, Technology, and Human Values 7, no. 40 (1982): 47-53. 12

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or his theory, as they were buying from the same publishers who also sold to southern states. And so it was that for roughly the next thirty years American children grew up largely ignorant of one of biology’s most fundamental theories. This began to change in 1957, when Americans began hearing, “An uncharacteristic note in their political discourse—self-doubt.”15 The origin of this doubt was the Soviet satellite Sputnik which, as it lay in orbit around earth, served as a tangible reminder to Americans that they were falling behind the Soviets. In the aftermath of Sputnik’s launch, America recommitted itself to the schooling of its youth. Additional money for education was swiftly made available and, before long, evolution was back in the classroom. Early opposition from religious leaders was scant as many were lured by the prospect of a flush school budget to fight Communism, even if it meant discussing Darwin.16 Gradually, however, outside social forces began to once again move American culture in a new direction. As time would demonstrate, there were limits to how far evangelicals could be pushed, and the historic presidential campaign of John F. Kennedy was the first to test them.

Tensions Build By itself, the election of the nation’s first Catholic President did not push evangelicals over the edge. The presidency of John F. Kennedy came at a time of immense social and cultural upheaval. In addition to grappling with issues of racial inequality, a second wave of feminist activism was sweeping through America. This time, however, women were not simply insisting on equality at the ballot box, but were instead demanding the right of reproductive autonomy. Adding to these tensions was a series of decisions made by the United States Supreme Court that severely curtailed the role of religion in the public sphere. For instance, in 1962, the Court handed down the Engel decision, which banned ecumenical public schools and served as a precursor to the monumental 1963 Schempp ruling, which effectively outlawed sponsored Bible readings and prayer in public schools. These decisions greatly angered evangelicals and propelled some in the movement to take action. As David Hall notes, “Success might have eluded [evangelicals] had it not been for the turmoil of the ‘60s and the

15

Wills, 1990.. Ibid.

16

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27

division that opened up in the aftermath of the Supreme Court decisions and the ‘cultural revolution.’”17 Long time political operative and Christian conservative, Paul Weyrich argues, however, that despite rapid change, what truly “galvanized the Christian community was not abortion, school prayer or the ERA....What changed their minds was Jimmy Carter’s intervention against the Christian schools, trying to deny them tax exempt status on the basis of so-called de facto segregation.”18 To be certain, no one particular issue so angered the evangelical community as to stir them from their self-imposed political isolation. Instead, the culmination of several events provoked evangelicals to action, and similarly led others who had previously never identified as evangelicals to find solidarity with the Christian Right and to fight for a way of life they felt they were losing. For in rapidly changing times, people are often drawn to organizations that appear to offer some subjective sense of normality. Beginning in the 1960s and extending even to this day, Christian conservative groups and those who affiliate with them “perceive themselves as culturally embattled” and have thus, in the words of one of their own, been “forced to become politically active in the hope that they can salvage some lifeworld protection.”19 Yet to go from being a culturally “embattled” group to a major political force, as American evangelicals have, is no easy task. How evangelicals achieved just this is a remarkable story in its own right.

17

David Hall, “From the Seventies to the Present,” in A Religious History of the American People, 2nd Ed., ed. Sydney E. Ahlstrom (New Haven and London: Yale University of Press, 1999), 1099. 18 Weyrich as quoted in Aaron Haberman, “Into the Wilderness: Ronald Reagan, Bob Jones University, and The Political Education of the Christian Right,” The Historian 67, no. 2 (2005): 239 of 234-253. 19 Mark D. Regnerus, David Sikkink and Christian Smith, (1999) “Voting with the Christian Right: Contextual and Individual Patterns of Electoral Influence,” Social Forces 77(4), pg 1392.

CHAPTER FOUR RADIO, TELEVANGELISM, AND THE RISE OF THE CHRISTIAN RIGHT

For the past 30 years, the Christian Right has enjoyed a position of both cultural and religious hegemony in the United States. Its ultraconservative interpretation of biblical scripture and the Christian gospel has profoundly impacted American politics, long serving as the loudest, and at times seemingly only, religious voice in the country. In an effort to maintain this culturally advantageous position, evangelicals have made effective use of emerging and innovative communication technologies. Such technologies have played a key role in proselytizing new converts to the “Word of God,” maintaining the allegiances of existing members, expanding church networks and infrastructure, and developing organizational resources. Beyond mere institutional growth and maintenance, there is, however, a more prophetic reason why evangelicals have historically embraced new communication technologies. As scholar Jeffery Hadden notes, “[t]he sacred texts of Christianity command the followers of Jesus to preach the Gospel to every living creature on earth (Mark 16:15). Evangelicals take this commandment seriously, and many among them view the development of radio and television as instruments sent by God to help them fulfill this ‘Great Commission.’”1 The fortunes of the evangelical tradition have in many ways been inextricably linked to the development of communication technologies. While evangelicals are busy proselytizing the laws of Abraham’s God, the success of these efforts depends largely upon the laws of the more powerful technology god. Historically speaking, communication has developed along one of two singular paths, either broadcast (one-to-many) or interpersonal (one-toone). In many respects, these platforms complement the sorts of 1

Jeffrey K. Hadden, “The Rise and Fall of American Televangelism,” The Annals of the American Academy of Political Science 30, no. 4 (1996); 113-130.

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communications that have been in existence in churches for years, as they merely replicate the preacher/congregant roles, albeit on a larger scale. However, as a result of the computer age, newer communication technologies have emerged that have both radically changed the nature of communication and expanded upon the organizational potential of other, more antedated technologies. Instead of simply mimicking the broadcast nature of past technologies such as radio and television, computer mediated technologies offer participants a many-to-many means of interaction and make audience penetration less costly. As noted in the previous chapters, with the proliferation of these newer technologies, cultural institutions built upon older communication regimes have been presented with dynamic new challenges. This is certainly the case for evangelical Christians, as today’s rapidly changing media environment has rendered it impossible for a few elites to effectively control the Christian message, while simultaneously dictating the terms of what has long been a one-sided monologue. This, in turn, has placed considerable strain on the established evangelical orthodoxy and is working to reorient the nature of evangelical civic engagement. Before we examine the many ways in which the Internet is rewriting the rules of the game, let us first explore the importance of the broadcast media regime as it relates to the creation of the present day Christian Right.

Televangelism and the Building of the Christian Right In the wake of the Scopes trial, evangelicals retreated from the wider American culture. According to political historian Joel Carpenter, evangelicals “built up their own separatist networks of schools, churches, Bible colleges, and, of course, radio stations.” In doing so, they “laid the foundation for the emergence of neo-evangelism in the 1950s, a movement of intellectually and culturally engaged Christians.”2 These religious institutions served as an invaluable cog in the formation of unified cultural identity and, as the American population grew throughout the first half of the twentieth century, so too did the demand for protestant ministers and trained laity. Meeting this demand were the growing number of Bible institutes, that in addition to their educational activities, often ran publishing houses and organized week-long summer Bible conferences,

2

Joel A. Carpenter, 1980. “Fundamentalist Institutions and the Rise of Evangelical Protestantism, 1929-1942,”‫ ۅ‬Church History 49(1).

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which “supplied staff evangelists for revival meetings and provided churches with guest preachers.”3 Similarly, advertisements for denominational colleges, which had previously appealed largely to adherents of the advertising college’s affiliate denomination, were soon appearing in the periodicals of other denominations. As enrolment to these institutions rose, the various branches of evangelical Christianity increasingly came into contact with one another and forged both shared identities and a dense network of social and religious support. Additionally, Bible colleges were also readily organizing massive revivals that attracted swarms of enthusiastic Christians. These activities helped to overcome long standing denominational divides and brought ever more people to the cause of evangelical ministry. While attending one of these revivals, one reporter was struck by the unity he witnessed, commenting, “A Methodist Bishop, a Baptist evangelist, a Presbyterian professor, a Lutheran pastor, a Christian layman, and a Rescue Mission superintendent could stand on the same platform and preach the common tenets of the Christian faith while multitudes of believers wept and rejoiced together as if some glorious news had for the first time bust upon their ears.”4 As time progressed, these Bible institutes began to focus their considerable attention and resources on another medium through which the masses could be easily reached: radio broadcast. By 1942, a single religious organization, the Moody Bible Institute, was “releasing transcribed [radio] programs to 187 different stations,” and had a radio staff of nearly 300, all of whom busied themselves by visiting churches to raise awareness of Moody’s religious broadcasts.5 Despite the eagerness with which evangelicals greeted the advent of the age of radio, it proved, nonetheless, a difficult medium to tap. However, many of the problems evangelicals ran into were largely selfmade. By 1943, all of the major national radio broadcasters had pulled commercial evangelism from the air. This decision came on the heels of numerous on-air inflammatory remarks made by religious broadcasters. The most notorious of these offenders was Father Charles E. Coughlin. Though unaffiliated with American evangelism (Father Coughlin was a Roman Catholic Priest), Coughlin, more than anyone else, succeeded in scaring early radio broadcasters away from paid religious programming. 3

Ibid. Gary Wills, 1990. Under God: The Classic Work on Religion and American Politics (New York: Simon and Schuster). 5 Matthew C. Moen, 1996. “The Evolving Politics of the Christian Right,”‫ ۅ‬Political Science and Politics 29(3). 4

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“His bellicose attacks on communists, socialists, international bankers, Jews, labor union leaders, and finally, President Franklin Roosevelt led many to fear Coughlin more than Germany’s Hitler.”6 Unsurprisingly, when Coughlin’s contract was up for renewal, the nation’s radio broadcasters chose not to extend his contract, citing the newly established National Association of Broadcasters Code of Ethics which barred controversial speakers. With Father Coughlin off the air, national radio broadcasters decided to hedge their bets and aired the more benign sermons of the National Council of Churches (NCC), an umbrella organization which included most mainline Protestant denominations and which similarly had ties to the Catholic Church and Jewish community. Broadcasters provided this on air, or as they called it, “sustaining time” free of charge, as it earned them credit that could be used as evidence that their stations were providing invaluable public service, which the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) required as a condition for holding a broadcast license. The relationship between the NCC and the nation’s radio broadcasters proved placid enough. As a result, radio evangelists found it increasingly difficult to secure even paid radio time on any of the major networks and were thus forced to turn to smaller regional and local broadcasters abundant in America’s more rural populations. Many evangelical ministries busied themselves with setting up their own radio stations or buying existing ones. Consequently, throughout the 1940s and 1950s, radio evangelists grew quite adept at running and maintaining their own radio stations, while the NCC and other mainline protestant groups increasingly grew dependent upon the charity of the country’s major radio broadcasters. In 1960, the FCC changed course and decided to allow broadcasters the right to claim paid religious broadcasting as part of their public service, thereby negating any incentive broadcasters once had to give away their air time for free. Evangelical ministries, flush with cash and experience, quickly swooped in to the major national markets and outbid the NCC. Today, 1960 is often regarded as a cultural milestone marking the “‘virtual silencing’ of mainline churches in mass media.”7 By 1960, most American households owned a television set. Television had quickly overtaken radio as the country’s preferred form of broadcast. As television came to play an ever greater role in American life, preachers 6

Hadden, 1996; see also, Heather Hendershot, 2007. “God‘s Angriest Man: Carl McIntire, Cold War Fundamentalism, and Right Wing Broadcasting,” The American Studies Association 59(2). 7 Hendershot, 2007.

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naturally looked to tap this market as well. And tapped they did. In less than a generation, the nation’s televangelists saw their audience grow from just 5 million in the late 1960s to 25 million by the mid-1980s. .

*** To better understand how broadcast media can help bridge religious divides, it’s important to consider how radio and television work to create a confluence of attitudes, or what has sometimes been referred to as the mainstreaming effect. Simply put, when otherwise diverse media consumers are exposed to a particular broadcast over an extended period of time, the content of that broadcast often affects the opinions and values of all of those consumers. Evidence of the mainstreaming effect is all around us, from the relatively benign manifestations such as schoolyard children re-enacting a popular cartoon series, to the slightly more alarming, such as the views held by regular FOX News Viewers. In other words, when audiences are repeatedly exposed to the same message, that message begins to shape their opinions of the world around them. As this mainstreaming effect strengthens, audiences have similarly shown a propensity to collect their news and information from sources with which they already agree, while avoiding sources which challenge their views. In the case of American evangelicalism, the advent of radio preachers and later televangelists raised concerns among some in the religious community that electronic ministries might displace the historic importance of the church. Indeed, by the 1960s, many social observers had come to view faith as an increasingly private act. Religious broadcasts, of course figured prominently in such assessments, but so too did America’s changing physical landscape, which in the post-war period saw significant growth in cityscapes while a newly built national infrastructure greatly eased geographic mobility. During this phase of American development, many small neighborhoods and local communities were either abandoned for or altogether absorbed by larger, less personal metropolises. As American cities grew and suburbs expanded, many Americans turned to religion, and in particular local churches, as a means of establishing new community ties. At the same time, religious broadcasts greatly promoted membership to local churches, by both fostering a national dialogue in which local church attendance was deemed important and further embedding its many viewers into the fabric of American evangelicalism. Unsurprisingly, not only are consumers of religious broadcasts significantly more likely to belong to a local church

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than non-consumers, but they are also more likely to be active in the intimate affairs of their church. Beyond the local church, religious broadcasting has similarly played a major role in financing evangelical centers of higher education, such as Liberty Baptist College, CBN University, and Oral Roberts University. In the 1970s and 1980s when American evangelicalism first began its major push into the political realm, religious broadcast again proved crucial to its success. For instance, in 1980 the Reverend Pat Robertson mobilized more than half a million participants to a rally called “Washington for Jesus” through the use of his Christian media empire.8 Christian media also figured prominently in both the formation and growth of nearly all prominent Christian Right organizations. Today, religious broadcasts continue to play a key role in shaping our nation’s political debates and in influencing the opinions of religious voters (though, fortunately, that viewership is dwindling rapidly). Overall, both radio and television have proven uniquely capable of bridging denominational divides by mediating a confluence of attitudes and beliefs. If left unchallenged, as has largely been the case since the 1960s when the nation’s more moderate and progressive religious voices fell silent on America’s airways, what tends to occur is the homogenization of extreme core values which mimic those being broadcast. This mainstreaming, or hive mind effect, created a shock wave of something throughout America.

8

Boerl and Perkins, 2011.

CHAPTER FIVE AN UNHOLY UNION

The 1970s proved an unhealthy decade for American democracy. During these tumultuous years the public’s trust in government collapsed to historic lows. The deep social divisions created by America’s involvement in Vietnam was unquestionably one of the most politically (and arguably militarily) mismanaged events in the nation’s history. Later revelations of President Nixon’s involvement in the Watergate scandal (an unfortunate episode which ultimately sank Nixon’s presidency and sent many senior government officials to prison) compounded matters all the more. Likewise, Ford’s subsequent (and preemptive) pardon of Nixon was received quite bitterly by many Americans and reeked of political nepotism. Ford, of course, never recovered from that pardon, and was roundly defeated in the 1976 election by a little known peanut farmer from Georgia. President Carter fared little better than his immediate predecessor. While today many regard Carter as the epitome of everything an expresident should be, his administration is widely regarded as one of the most incompetent cabinets in modern American history and his presidency, an unmitigated disaster. Irrespective of one’s own feelings about the Carter presidency, it is safe to say that while in office, he failed in connecting with American voters. As a result, Carter lost his bid for reelection in one of the largest electoral landslides of all time; 489 electoral votes to a scant 49 electoral votes. By 1980, however, America’s mood was beginning to change. The nation was growing tired of the prevailing pessimism which seemed to saturate all facets of American life. Throughout the 1980 campaign, Ronald Reagan positioned himself as a transformative candidate capable of healing the nation’s wounds, all while uniting America’s increasingly fractious and culturally divided electorate. Having nearly beat Ford for the GOP nomination four years earlier, Reagan was the odds on favorite to win the Republican primaries in 1980. Despite losing the first two primary contests in Iowa and Puerto Rico to George H.W. Bush (the latter of which Reagan boycotted in order to focus his efforts on New Hampshire),

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Reagan easily breezed through the rest of the primary season, winning 44 of the next 49 primaries. By contrast, Carter found himself in a heated primary battle against not only Senator Edward M. Kennedy, but also against an undeclared Governor Ed Muskie, who was viewed by many Democrats as a compromise candidate between the warring Kennedy/Carter factions. Muskie, as it happens, was also Carter’s serving Secretary of State. Like any good politician, Reagan used the Democratic infighting to his advantage and succeeded in positioning himself as a transformative candidate, one who would not only unite the nation’s fractious and culturally divided electorate, but one who could also help America find its footing again. The 1980 election proved a crucial turning point in American history. Mired by a weak economy, soaring gas prices, rising inflation, as well as an unresolved diplomatic crisis in Iran, Carter pursued what was likely the best campaign strategy available to him, an aggressive, attack-driven campaign against Reagan. Carter attempted to paint the former California Governor and Hollywood movie star as a warmongering, right-wing radical who was desperate to roll back decades worth of progress on both the civil rights and environmental front, as well as one who would deeply cut popular programs such as Medicare and Social Security. By comparison, Reagan’s campaign was considerably more upbeat than his Democratic rival’s and projected to the nation a renewed sense of optimism that had long been absent from public discourse. Indeed, Reagan’s folksy charm and sunny disposition succeeded in disarming both the press and the electorate alike, thus allowing Reagan to avoid detailed and otherwise uncomfortable conversations about his proposed policies and often obliquely stated positions. And so it was that on November 4, 1980, Ronald Reagan was elected the nation’s 40th president. In the immediate aftermath of Reagan’s election, numerous political observers began citing the role evangelicals played in electing the president. In particular, significant attention was paid to what at the time was a startup political organization with close ties to the Christian Right, known as the Moral Majority. How the Moral Majority came into existence, and the role it played in coalescing evangelicals behind the Republican Party is arguably one of the single most important political developments in the last half of the Twentieth Century. ***

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As we’ve learned, from 1925 to roughly the late 1960s/early 1970s, conservative evangelical Protestants largely steered clear of overt political activity. Much of this political aversion had to do with the fact that evangelicals generally viewed political engagement as taking time and energy away from the salvation of their own souls, and that of others. Indeed, it was often said of evangelicals that they were, ‘too heavenly minded to be of any earthly good.’ But this all began to change with the countercultural revolution of the 1960s, which saw both a new wave of feminist activity as well as a budding of the early gay rights movements. For many evangelicals, both the pace and nature of these changes proved too much. Early mobilization efforts aimed at herding conservative evangelicals from the pews to the ranks of the politically engaged Christian Right, proved difficult at best. For starters, ministers had long warned their congregants to keep clear of secular politics and instead focus their energies on their own salvations. As a result, politicking came neither easy nor natural for many evangelical parishioners. Still, the perceived “dangers” unleashed by the feminists and homosexuals were far too threatening to the moral character of the nation, so conservative religious leaders persisted. Eventually, the Christian Right succeeded in convincing the overwhelming majority of American evangelical Christians to, “reject the division of human affairs into the secular and sacred, and insist instead that there is no arena of human activity, including law and politics, which is outside of God’s lordship.”1 And so it was that evangelicals saw themselves challenged with a new task: to remake America in the image of God’s celestial Kingdom. By the late 1970s, most evangelicals had accepted the call of civic engagement, but due to their previous estrangement from the political process, few knew how to play the game. They were novices, eager but green. Helping to bridge this gap was a young conservative activist by the name of Paul Weyrich. Born into a Catholic family, Weyrich was in many respects as unlikely a candidate to lead the Christian Right as most anyone else. Beyond his Catholic affiliation, Weyrich was an experienced Capitol Hill press secretary who had co-founded The Heritage Foundation and helped it gain political influence, which Weyrich believed was necessary to counter what he and other conservatives saw as the liberal Brookings Institute.

1

Esther Kaplan, (2004) With God On Their Side: How Christian Fundamentalists Trampled Science, Policy, and Democracy in George W. Bush’s White House (London: The New Press).

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In May of 1979, Weyrich, along with other secular conservatives met with the popular televangelist, Jerry Falwell, to discuss ways to better organize and promote the Christian Right. While there, Weyrich spoke of a “silent moral majority” (the vast slice of the American electorate which if prodded to the polls would be capable of reclaiming America’s godly character). When Falwell heard this, he immediately interrupted and asked Weyrich to repeat himself. Confused, Weyrich looked at Falwell for a moment before slowly saying that he thought there to be a moral majority who have simply remained silent on the issues. To this Falwell exclaimed, “That’s it. That’s the name of our group; The Moral Majority.”2 Ironically, it is likely that Weyrich never actually believed that a majority of Americans held either his or Falwell’s views, and was instead simply playing Falwell for his own political gain. Evidence for this theory points to the fact that not long after Weyrich’s meeting with Falwell, he famously declared, “I don't want everybody to vote. Elections are not won by a majority of the people. They never have been from the beginning of our country and they are not now. As a matter of fact, our [Republican] leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down.”3 Yet irrespective of either Weyrich’s intentions or views, his early involvement and sage political advice proved crucial in enabling the Moral Majority to emerge as arguably the single most important political organization of the 1980s. Undoubtedly, much of the Moral Majority’s political influence came due to its expansive outlook on politics which framed issues important to secular conservatives along more religious lines. For instance, on the issue of increased military spending, an issue which had long divided American Christians, particularly those of a more fundamentalist persuasion, the Moral Majority came out in favor. In their eyes, a stronger United States military not only kept America free from the godless Commies, but it could also be leveraged to protect other Christian nations threatened by Soviet advances. On the issue of tax cuts and reduced government spending, the Moral Majority again walked in lockstep with their conservative secular counterparts. A smaller government was framed as protecting personal freedoms from an overly intrusive federal government, which seemed to the Christian Right, to be ever perilously close to outlawing religion in the name of tolerance and political correctness.

2

Kaplan, 2004. Kaplan, 2004.

3

An Unholy Union

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Needless to say, as the ranks of the Republican Party began swelling with conservative evangelicals, Republican politicians naturally sought to alter their politics in order to be more reflective of their evangelical constituency, and thus began campaigning to outlaw abortion, protect socalled “traditional marriage,” and to return prayer to the public schools.

Reagan By 1980, it was becoming increasingly clear that conservative evangelical Christians were a political force in their own right. Reagan understood this fact well and relentlessly courted their vote. On August 21st of that year, a mere nine weeks before Election Day, some 15,000 evangelical leaders gathered in Dallas, Texas to hear Reagan speak. The event has since been seen by many as one of the single most important political/religious moments in modern American history. It was a symbolic marriage of sorts between the Republican Party and America’s evangelical community. For much of the rally, prominent religious leaders from across the nation spoke of the importance of maintaining God in school and government. They provided dire warnings of a supposed radical feminist agenda, and spoke of an utterly unfounded plan to turn America’s sons and daughters gay. When Reagan finally took the lectern, he famously told his audience of religious leaders, “I know you can’t endorse me, but I want you to know that I can endorse you and what you are doing.” The crowd erupted with elation, but Reagan was not done yet. He continued by explaining that if America was to be “that shining city upon a hill,” it needed to return to Christ and “that old-time religion.” Reagan also reiterated his belief in the authority of biblical scripture and likewise endorsed the teaching of creationism in the nation’s public schools.4 Reagan’s speech made him an instant favorite with conservative religious voters. In the days that followed for instance, the more than 15,000 evangelical ministers who were present at Reagan’s address, fanned out across the United States as they returned home, and implored their congregations to cast their ballot for the candidate who best represented their Christian values. Most of these preachers made little effort to disguise their own personal support for Reagan and a few even candidly endorsed the former California Governor from the pulpit, this despite the fact that doing so would, at least in theory, jeopardize their 4

Sullivan, 2008.

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churches’ tax-exempt status. For his part, Jerry Falwell quite literally followed in Reagan’s footsteps, hitting the campaign trail hard as a sort of unofficial campaign surrogate and everywhere he visited, Falwell met with Catholics, old-line Protestants, and, most importantly, evangelical Christians as he set up Moral Majority chapters in state after state. In the waning days of the 1980 presidential campaign and throughout his two terms in office, Reagan continued his courtship of evangelical voters, at least in words. As Amy Sullivan, a contributing editor at Time Magazine and former aide to the now retired Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle notes, “The Great Communicator knew how to speak the evangelicals’ language, even if it wasn’t his native tongue, and he used it to good effect.”5 Yet despite Reagan’s unabashed courtship of evangelical voters, his record, once in office showed him to be considerably more tempered than some of his more religious supporters. For instance when Reagan was presented with his first real opportunity to give back to evangelicals—in July of 1981 with the retirement of Associate Justice Potter Stewart—he disappointed them. Rather than nominate a conservative justice who would have pleased many in the evangelical camp, Reagan instead appointed the more moderate, and decidedly pro-choice, Sandra Day O’Conner. Reagan’s next nominee, Antonin Scalia, was perhaps an effort to ease straining relations with those evangelical voters disappointed by the O’Conner nomination, as Scalia was himself viewed as a more reliable conservative justice. However, when Reagan appointed his final Supreme Court justice, he once more chose a moderate in Anthony M. Kennedy. Far from being the exception, disappointments such as the O’Conner and Kennedy appointments emerged as a regular theme throughout Reagan’s presidency. For instance, in 1982, Reagan, “half heartedly honored his promise to support a constitutional amendment allowing school prayer, [by] refraining from putting enough political muscle behind it to bulldoze it through the Senate.”6 Worse still for the Moral Majority, in the mid 1980s Surgeon General C. Everett Koop issued an early warning about the AIDS epidemic. In a special report Dr. Koop, “Advocated sex education, including teaching about homosexual behavior, as an essential tool in stopping the spread of the disease, and even promoted the use of condoms for sex outside of marriage as a means of protection.”7 5

Paul Unger, (2007) The Fall of the House of Bush (New York and London: Scribner). 6 Ibid. 7 Ibid.

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With these actions before them, evangelicals learned the painful political lesson that, “Having a sympathetic president like Ronald Reagan did not guarantee that their political expectations would be satisfied. When push came to shove, Reagan abandoned conservative Christians.”8 By the end of Reagan’s time in office, the political aspirations of the Christian Right remained largely unfulfilled. Some in the Christian Right placed much of the blame squarely at Reagan’s feet. They believed the president had failed to campaign hard enough for the causes they believed in. Others, however, looked instead at Congress (and in particular, the Democrats who ran it) and begrudgingly admitted that under its makeup, there was only ever so much Reagan could achieve. Yet irrespective of where one ultimately placed blame, going into the 1988 general election, the Christian Right knew that if their dreams of a Christian Nation were to ever be actualized, they would need to refine their political strategy. As such, “Conservative Christians at the end of the 1980s refocused their energies on forming a robust grassroots political movement.”9 The movement strengthened the groundwork laid by what had since become the defunct Moral Majority, thereby enabling new conservative Christian organizations to take root across America’s political landscape. One of these newly minted organizations was Reverend Pat Robertson’s Christian Coalition. From the beginning the Christian Coalition was, “Supposed to fill the vacuum left by the demise a few years earlier of the Moral Majority.”10 To help in this effort, Robertson tapped a savvy, albeit young political operative to lead this coalition; 28-year-old Ralph Reed. Together, these men began programs that trained, “Conservative Christians to run for office and to manage other people's campaigns. [In turn] these trainees became active in state and local Republican parties throughout the nation. [And] they ran for municipal offices and school boards.”11 To better appreciate the extent to which these efforts ultimately paid dividends, it is worth considering that in 1988, Christian Right sympathizers controlled a handful of state GOP committees and all of these were found in the South. By 2002, however, Campaign and Elections, a highly respected political science journal, published a report in which it found, 8

Haberman, Aaron, (2005) “Into the Wilderness: Ronald Reagan, Bob Jones University, and The Political Education of the Christian Right,” The Historian 67(2). 9 Ibid. 10 Charles Oliver, (1996). “Coalition Politics,” Found online at: (Accessed February 2, 2014). 11 Ibid.

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“In 44 states, Christian conservatives controlled at least a quarter of the GOP’s state committees, up from thirty-one states just six years earlier.”12 In 18 of these states, Christian conservatives completely dominated the state’s GOP committee altogether.

Bush In spite of the fact that Reagan failed to deliver many of the Christian Right’s most desired pieces of legislation, evangelical voters had nevertheless shown themselves to be a powerful force in American politics, and particularly within the Republican Party. By 1988, the prospect of a George H.W. Bush presidency loomed large. And a Bush presidency, the Christian Right knew, would be one driven less by pure ideology or theological creed, and much more so by the pragmatism which had served Bush so well throughout his career in government (first as a congressman from Texas, then as the U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., followed by his time as both the Chair of the National Republican Party and later as the Director of the CIA, and finally as Reagan’s vicepresident). For his part, Bush knew heading into the GOP primary that even though he was the early front-runner, he’d nonetheless face obstacles on the road to the White House. The biggest of these (save perhaps whoever the Democrats nominated for the general election) was supposed to be Kansas Senator Bob Dole who, thanks to his Midwest background, polled strongly in Iowa and was similarly well liked in independent minded New Hampshire. By all accounts, the flamboyant televangelist Pat Robertson was never expected to pose any serious danger to the Vice President. After all, Robertson had never before held elected office and was therefore an untested quantity in a party less taken to electing their leaders as they were to anointing them. For this reason, Robertson’s candidacy was initially viewed by his Republican rivals as but a political sideshow. Likewise, many Washington insiders and media pundits alike, dismissed Robertson’s campaign as a non-factor during the early days of the race. Evangelicals, on the other-hand, did not. Flushed with cash and an army of fervent supporters, Robertson managed a strong second place finish in the Iowa caucuses, besting the sitting vice-president by significant margins. Indeed, 12

Kaplan, Esther, With God On Their Side: How Christian Fundamentalists Trampled Science, Policy, and Democracy in George W. Bush’s White House (London: The New Press, 2004).

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Robertson’s unexpectedly strong showing in the Iowa caucuses forced many to view Robertson as a legitimate candidate. Having finished a disappointing third in the Iowa caucuses, Bush knew he needed a strong showing in New Hampshire. To achieve this, the Bush campaign quickly cut an ad attacking Senator Dole for supporting tax hikes and similarly bought enough air time to ensure it was played on a near continuous loop in the days leading up to the primary. Surprisingly, Dole never responded to these attacks until after the New Hampshire primary. His failure to do so greatly tarnished the Senator’s image as a reliable fiscal conservative and is seen as a significant factor contributing to Bush’s eventual nomination. But after Iowa, Dole was only half the battle. To mitigate the threat posed by the insurgent Robertson, Bush stepped up his attacks on the televangelist preacher by highlighting a series of bizarre statements Robertson had made while on the campaign trail; the biggest of which was Robertson’s assertion that he had known the whereabouts of the American hostages in Lebanon. On this claim, even the Reagan White House chimed in, asking, “Why didn’t he tell us where they were?” Throughout most of the early primary contests, Robertson continued to post strong numbers. However, by the time Super Tuesday rolled around, the organizational strength of the Bush campaign proved too great a feat for Robertson to overcome. Faced with the inevitability of defeat, Robertson ended his White House bid well before the last primary vote was cast. At that summer’s Republican convention, Robertson was honored with a prime-time speaking slot, which he used to encourage his supporters to vote for his former rival. Despite Robertson’s passionate endorsement of the Vice President, many evangelicals remained leery of Bush. He was, after all, an establishment Republican: a blue-blooded moderate New Englander equipped with an Ivy League education and an Anglican upbringing. Put quite simply, Bush wasn’t one of them and this fact troubled evangelicals greatly. To broaden his appeal with evangelical voters, Bush turned to his eldest son, George W. Bush, who had undergone his own religious conversion a few years prior, to act as a surrogate on his father’s behalf. Despite his family’s long political lineage, by the time his father’s presidential campaign rolled around, W. had yet to prove his own personal political mantle. To compensate for this, Bush reached out to his longtime advisor and close family friend, Doug Wead, to work closely with his son. To succeed in this task, however, both W. and Wead were keenly aware that overt religious gestures on behalf of the Vice President would likely be seen as insincere gamesmanship. Instead, W. and Wead agreed that the

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best path forward was to amplify the religious shortcomings of their Democratic rival, Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis; a fact that was greatly aided by Dukakis’s own secular admissions. By the campaign’s end, Bush roundly defeated Dukakis and in so doing extended the GOP’s occupancy of the White House by another four years. Wead would go on to serve as a special advisor to his good friend, the President, while W. returned to Texas and bought a minority share of the Texas Rangers. Yet as history would have it, Bush’s stake in major league baseball proved quite short, for the allure of politics was much too great.

CHAPTER SIX W.

On an early Sunday morning in the spring of 1999, George W. Bush was attending service at Park Methodist Church in Dallas with his mother Barbara. Bush was more than a year into his second term as governor of Texas that sunny morning when Pastor Mark Craig took the pulpit and delivered a sermon telling of Moses’ reluctance to lead his people. The sermon apparently stirred the Governor to action. Following church that day, Bush reportedly called his friend, conservative Southern Baptist televangelist James Robinson, and said, “I’ve heard the call. I believe God wants me to run for president.”1 Upon hearing this, Robinson showed initial reluctance and cautioned the Texas Governor to consider this major, life-altering decision. But Bush would not be deterred. From there, the governor began to assemble an experienced team of political strategists and pollsters, led by Karl Rove. *** To ensure Bush’s nomination went smoothly, Rove busied himself securing endorsements from key Republican officials and orchestrating “A campaign to woo powerhouse pastors and Christian Right leaders.”1 Rove correctly surmised that this majorly untapped constituency held the success of his candidate in the balance. Yet courting evangelicals posed sizable risks for Governor Bush. Making too concentrated a push for the group would risk alienating moderate Americans, who, while largely church goers themselves, were nonetheless made uneasy by some of the more extreme positions of the Christian Right. This became the central dilemma of the Bush campaign as they struggled to navigate the political waters between Christian conservatives and more moderate and secular voters. To address this problem, Bush’s presidential campaign relied heavily on the art of narrowcasting. This newly developed media theory involves 1

Kaplan, With God, 70.

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tweaking political messages to suit the audience one is addressing. In putting theory to practice, Bush continued to speak openly about his faith, but toned down his remarks at nearly every major campaign event. To casual observers, Bush’s rather benign religious statements were seen as political ploys aimed at reminding the electorate of the ethical shortcomings of President Bill Clinton. While these spiritual remarks certainly provided that counterpoint, they also had deeper meanings that were easily accessible to those who knew what to listen for. When the time came for Bush to focus more ardently on religious voters, he purposely chose more narrowly targeted press outlets such as Christianity Today and World Magazine. These outlets were widely read by evangelical Christians as well as largely ignored by the mainstream press. In addition to these efforts, the Bush campaign, with help from the Republican National Committee (RNC), was also busy courting Catholic votes. In 1998, for instance, the RNC launched a Catholic Task Force to drum-up support for the party in the upcoming presidential election. Concentrating initially on Rust Belt states, the RNC hoped this task force would lure back those Reagan Democrats whom the party believed had soft support for the current Democrats. They began by deploying staff members to make contact with Catholic congregations and compile a list of Catholic voters. By 2000, the party’s Catholic outreach had, “Expanded into such states as Florida, New Jersey, and Louisiana,”2 By the end of the 2000 election cycle, the RNC, “Had a list of 3 million church-attending Catholics who were the targets of a $2.5 million direct-mail and outreach effort.”3 In addition to these mailings, Catholics on the RNC’s new list received a minimum of two campaign phone calls and were often asked to identify other voters on behalf of the Bush campaign. Despite extensive outreach efforts, and the aura of inevitability which the Bush campaign worked tirelessly to construct, Arizona Senator John McCain managed an insurgent candidacy that caught the Bush camp by surprise. When McCain scored an impressive victory in the 2000 New Hampshire Republican Primary, “Rove immediately dispatched his candidate to speak at Bob Jones University, a fundamentalist Christian college based in South Carolina.”4 For moderates, this act, while questionable, was largely dismissed as necessary courting for an electoral 2

Sullivan, Party Faithful, 146. Ibid. 4 Kaplan, With God, 71. 3

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base Bush desperately needed in that state’s conservative primary. By moving more towards the right, a tactic Bush often used whenever he found himself in political trouble, his campaign managed to score a decisive victory in the South Carolina primary. McCain rallied with an unexpected win in Michigan (an open Republican primary in which more non-Republicans voted than Republicans) and in his home state of Arizona. These victories proved short lived after Senator McCain attacked evangelical leaders as, “Agents of intolerance.”5 Following those remarks, McCain found himself lacking the necessary support to further challenge Bush as several closed primaries loomed large.6 By the end of the night on Super Tuesday, Bush emerged the clear frontrunner and party favorite to challenge sitting Vice President Albert Gore.7 As history would have it, the 2000 presidential race would be one of the closest in our nation’s history. While Bush ultimately emerged the victor, he did so lacking a clear mandate. To help heal the fractures of a bitterly divided country, Bush gave numerous assurances that he would govern from the middle. While the press made much over Bush’s sliver thin margin of victory—a mere five electoral votes and the loss of the popular vote by more than half a million—another more troublesome story had developed for Democrats. While Democrats had long acknowledged that the party had lost sizable ground with religious voters, many were shocked to learn just how deep those losses actually were. Among weekly churchgoers, Bush had beaten Gore by 30 points and had won two-thirds of those voters who “described the nation’s moral climate as off in the wrong direction.”8 In addition, Bush bested even Reagan amongst white evangelical voters, capturing 75% of that voting bloc.9 Furthermore, in what has become a testament to the power of Christian Right organizations to mobilize their base, one poll showed that a whopping 79% of evangelicals 5

Brian Knowlton, “Republican Says Bush Panders to ‘Agents of Intolerance’: McCain Takes Aim at Religious Right,” The New York Times, February 29, 2000. Found online at: (Accessed June 5, 2011). 6 Closed Primaries are primaries open only to members of a particular political party. 7 “Super Tuesday” generally refers to the Tuesday in February or March when the greatest number of states hold primary elections in the lead up to the party conventions. 8 Kaplan, With God, 75. 9 Ibid.

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who voted for Bush did so after being contacted, “At least once by a religious right organization.”10 Equally problematic for Gore was his net capture of just 50% of Catholic voters, down four points from what Clinton had received in 1996.11 As startling as these numbers were, the so-called “God Gap” only deepened in 2004 when Bush’s re-election effort succeeded in mobilizing the full weight of the evangelical vote.

2004 For a brief flash on November 2, 2004, it appeared Massachusetts Senator John Kerry would be elected the nation’s 44th president. Nearly every poll prior to the election showed an extremely tight race and early exit polling data on the morning of the election indicated a Democratic victory. On paper, it would have made sense if Kerry won the election. Incumbent President Bush was contending with two mammoth obstacles: a sagging economy and what was becoming, day by day, an increasingly unpopular war in Iraq. When Kerry lost the 2004 election, many were stunned to learn that cultural values had been the single most important issue for the electorate.12 One man was not surprised by this revelation. This was precisely what Karl Rove had been predicting and pushing the Bush campaign toward. Following the tightly contested 2000 presidential election, Rove estimated that some, “Four million evangelical Christians had stayed at home,”13 rather than vote on election-day. Rove recognized that the key to Bush’s re-election was to mobilize these voters to the polls the next time around. To achieve this task, the President and his team undertook one of the most extensive religious courtships in American history. It began in Bush’s first full week in office; more specifically on January 22, 2001, the 28th anniversary of Roe V. Wade. By executive order, Bush reinstated Ronald Reagan’s global gag rule, effectively forbidding any foreign health agency receiving American aid to 10

Ibid. Sullivan, Party Faithful, 221. 12 Paul Harris, “How Bush Tapped into a Well of Faith,” The Guardian, November 7, 2004. Found online at:

(Accessed March 12, 2008). 13 Ibid. 11

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provide abortion services or even abortion information. Months later, and after several meetings with religious groups, President Bush announced that he would also forbid the use of federal dollars to fund future research into embryonic stem cells. This decision further solidified the support of America’s most listened to evangelical, the Reverend James Dobson of Focus on the Family, who noted, “Needless to say, I was elated to learn, that contrary to our fears, Mr. Bush was planning to act on behalf of unborn life.”14 As important as these pro-life actions were to the base of American evangelicals, Bush made his largest religious gains on two other issues. One of these, Bush’s Faith-Based Initiatives, had been long in development and even served as the centerpiece of the 2000 campaign. The other, gay marriage, came courtesy of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, and caught many by surprise. The reinstatement of the global gag order and the prohibition of federal funding for the research of new embryonic stem cell lines made Bush considerable friends among evangelicals. Once instituted, these executive orders were then paraded before the Christian Right in hopes of luring those four million evangelicals Rove so often talked about to the polls. While energizing his religious base, Bush also managed to mobilize substantial opposition among many in the medical profession and in the ranks of various women’s groups. In addition to angering these constituencies, Bush’s pandering to the right also succeeded in raising serious suspicions among America’s more moderate electorate, a group who had largely voted for him on the presumption that, like them, Bush too was a moderate at heart. In an effort to counter growing questions and sagging approval ratings, the Bush White House sought to make inroads where few Republicans dared, namely among African Americans and Hispanic Americans. Going into the 2004 election, the Bush camp knew that winning the support of racial minorities was no easy task, particularly the support of black voters. Bush had, after all, spent considerable time and resources campaigning to this constituency in the 2000 general election only to be rewarded with less than 10% national support. The key to improving these numbers was to show that he cared about African Americans and so, through his Faith-Based and Community Initiatives program, Bush lavished conservative black preachers and their churches with sizable sums of federal money. This was possible because the Faith-Based and Community Initiatives program serves as a federal partnership between 14

As quoted by Kaplan, With God, 125.

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government (i.e. government money) and those providers most capable of meeting the needs of the poor, namely churches in local communities.15 Tracking the exact sum of federal grant money distributed through Bush’s faith-based program has proved notoriously difficult, as this money was divided up between various federal departments and agencies, as well as each state being provided a lump sum. In March of 2005, however, “Bush proudly told a conference of religious leaders that the federal government gave $2 billion in grants to faith-based groups the year before.”16 By 2004, some $300 million dollars went to promoting healthy marriages and another $75 million for responsible fatherhood, two issues that disproportionately affect the African American community.17 To further assist/court the black community, the White House regularly organized a series of seminars throughout black neighborhoods that taught community and religious leaders how to apply for and receive federal faith-based money. Although government grants to religious charities are by no means new, President Bush took this practice in unparalleled directions. As the self-avowed evangelical Amy Sullivan noted in a 2004 Washington Monthly article, “The policy of funding the work of faith-based organizations has, in the face of slashed social service budgets, devolved into a small pork-barrel program that offers token grants to the religious constituencies in Karl Rove’s electoral plan for 2004 while making almost no effort to monitor their effectiveness.”18 John DiIulio, a former head of Bush’s faith-based programs agrees, noting, “There is no precedent in the modern White House for what is going on in this one: a complete lack of a policy apparatus....What you’ve got is everything—and I mean everything—being run by the political arm. It’s the reign of the Mayberry Machiavellis.”19 From a governing perspective, what has taken place in the White House’s faith-based program can be considered abhorrent. But from a political perspective, Bush’s faith-based program was a resounding success. It may very well have made the difference between victory and defeat. 15

White House Staff Writer, “White House Office on Faith Based and Community Initiative,” 2008. Found online at: (Accessed June 3, 2008). 16 Michelle Goldberg, Kingdom Coming: The Rise of Christian Nationalism (New York, New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2006), 108. 17 Kaplan, With God. 18 As quoted by Goldberg, Kingdom Coming, 109. 19 As quoted by Goldberg, Kingdom Coming, 121.

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In courting African American voters, Bush knew he would never win the demographic outright, but in tight elections you do not need to win every demographic. Sometimes you just need to improve your initial standing, and through his faith-based grants Bush succeeded in wooing, “Black leaders, many of them evangelical clergy who lead large congregations.”20 On election night, it became evident that John Kerry’s bid for the White House hinged on his ability to carry the state of Ohio, where the election itself was decided by the slimmest of margins. In Ohio, Bush showed an improved standing among black voters, a jump of 7 percentage points. It was a hill that proved too steep for Kerry to climb. Ultimately, it appears Bush’s gamble on winning over just enough black voters paid off. Nationally, as well as in Ohio, this group proved to be a determining factor between a second Bush presidency and a Kerry victory.21 In American politics there are arguably few things more important than a well-prepared plan. When it came to religious voters that is exactly what Bush had, and exactly what Kerry lacked: a plan. By expanding his courtship to conservative black churchgoers, and by building upon the already impressive religious support generated four years earlier, Bush left nothing to chance. To further assist in its religious outreach efforts, the Bush campaign hired a darling of the Christian Right to oversee its efforts: former executive director of the Christian Coalition and adept political operative, Ralph Reed. “One of the first things Reed did was to appoint chairpersons in each of the eighteen battleground states. In Florida alone, the campaign employed a state chairwoman for evangelical outreach who brought on board outreach chairs in each of Florida’s sixty-seven counties. Every county chair, in turn, recruited between thirty and fifty volunteers to contact and register their evangelical neighbors.”22 By contrast, John Kerry had only one staff member responsible for religious outreach, Mara Vanderslice. She received scant party assistance and, unlike the well-connected Ralph Reed, had no pre-existing database 20

Paul Wallsten, “Latino and Black Voters Reassessing Ties to GOP,” Religion and Social Policy, October 24, 2006. Found online at:

(Accessed March 12, 2008). 21 Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies Staff Writer, “The Black Vote in 2004,” Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, January 1, 2005. Found online at: (Accessed June 3, 2008). 22 Sullivan, Party Faithful, 116-117.

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of reliable religious allies from which to work. As bad as all this was for Vanderslice, things got significantly worse when Archbishop Raymond Burke declared that John Kerry should be denied the Eucharist because of his support for abortion rights. Whipped into a frenzy, the media launched into what became known as “Wafer Watch” and the public quickly began debating the use of the Holy Eucharist as a political tool. Immediately, Vanderslice developed a strategy to combat this controversy, which included “Talking points that went on the offensive” and the promotion of “Kerry’s commitment to his Catholic faith.”23 In addition, Vanderslice sought out high-level, pro-choice Catholic politicians who were ready to make the media rounds. Surprisingly, for the most part, senior Kerry advisors chose to ignore the issue, believing that it would simply die down. When questions concerning Kerry’s Catholic credentials did not go away, the campaign finally decided to make one of its few religious appeals. The idea was to organize a national community service day with people of faith just weeks before the general election. The event was called “People of Faith for Kerry,” and it was supposed to be covered by the major news outlets in hopes of generating positive press coverage for the candidate. But the press never got the memo and, “Not a single reporter or photographer showed up to cover the (campaign’s) endeavours.”24 This media failure was a direct result of the Kerry communications office, which insisted on controlling all press outreach and refused to allow the volunteers, “Many of whom had relationships with local publications,”25 from contacting the press whatsoever. When the communications office forgot about the event, the public was left in the dark. Ultimately, there was little the Kerry campaign could do to prevent the Senator’s faith from materializing into a major political issue. The failure of the campaign to effectively control this story is an example of poor managerial judgment and a badly executed plan. Campaigns need to expect the unexpected and be prepared to roll with unforeseen developments. Kerry and his team were unsuccessful in doing that, whereas the Bush campaign proved exceptionally adept. For the Bush team, their moment of political genius came in their response to an issue few saw coming. In the early days of the 2004 presidential campaign, few political observers foresaw gay marriage playing any significant role. In fact, it was 23

Ibid., 125. Ibid., 136. 25 Ibid., 137. 24

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not until the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, on February 3rd of that year, ruled in a split decision to expand the state’s definition of marriage to include homosexual couples that the issue even began to register as an election year topic. Yet as viable as gay marriage would ultimately prove to be for Bush, his team of senior advisors was initially hesitant to take this issue head-on, as a reported 60% of voters said that, “They supported same-sex marriage or civil unions.”26 The problem, the Bush camp knew, lay with differentiating support for civil unions and that of same-sex marriage. By coming out too strongly against the court’s decision, Bush ran the risk of offending a substantial portion of the American electorate who, when faced with the new topic, might ultimately decide to stand in support of gay couples. By remaining quiet, however, Bush would come off as insincere and unsupportive of the efforts of the Christian Right, an act that could undermine all the work his campaign had done to lure ever more Christian conservatives to his cause. For these reasons, it was not at all surprising that “Bush was slow to endorse a constitutional amendment to define marriage as between a man and a woman.”27 As calls from Christian leaders came pouring in and gay couples began lining up outside city hall in San Francisco and Portland, Oregon, Bush publicly declared his support for a federal amendment banning same-sex marriages. On July 14, the United States Senate rejected such an amendment, thereby leaving little recourse for opponents of samesex marriage outside the states. Although Hawaii and Vermont had already recognized civil unions some years before and a handful of other states already had amendments or laws banning same-sex marriage, most states had yet to address the issue of gay marriage in any meaningful way. Michigan was one of the few states that had, and how things played out there is telling. In 2003, Michigan State Senator Alan Cropsey introduced a bill banning same-sex marriage. Anticipating a bitter and emotionally charged fight, Cropsey counted on strong support from his state party. To his surprise, however, it was not the Michigan Republican Party that came to his aide, but rather the Roman Catholic Church, which spent nearly a 26

Kenneth Sherrill, “Same-Sex Marriage, Civil Unions, and The 2004 Presidential Election,” The Task Force Action Fund, 2005. Found online at: (Accessed March 2, 2008). 27 Alan Copperman and Thomas B. Edsall, “Evangelicals Say They Led Charge for the GOP,” The Washington Post, November 8, 2004. Found online at: (Accessed March 12, 2008).

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million dollars in an effort that secured the passage of his bill.28 One year later, a similar story played out, though this time across 13 different states (11 on election day). In these contests, the untold story of the 2004 election “is that evangelical Christian groups were often more aggressive and sometimes better organized on the ground than the Bush campaign....[I]n many respects, Christian activists led the charge that GOP operatives followed and capitalized upon.”29 In many instances, scores of clergy members went as far as to attend “legal sessions explaining how they could talk about the election from the pulpit.”30 Similarly, countless churches launched voter registration drives and issued countless voter guides instructing congregants on how to vote, with the Christian Coalition alone mailing a reported 30 million voter guides in 2004.31 As such, states with gay marriage ballot propositions provided Bush with just the issue needed to drive evangelicals to the polls. Furthermore, evidence seems to suggest that while gay marriage mobilized Christian conservatives behind Bush, it had an opposite, demobilizing effect on secular voters, a demographic with which Democrats enjoy sizable support, thus damping secular turnout and Kerry support.32 On the single issue of gay marriage, evangelicals mobilized in ways never before seen in the whole of American history. While Kerry supporters were busy phone banking and knocking on doors, Bush increasingly came to rely on the strength of the Christian Right. As would be the case, Bush’s re-election efforts were not particularly stealthy, as some Democrats have surmised. His efforts were simply taking place where most secular Americans never dared venture: on the grounds of the nation’s numerous evangelical churches.33

28

Ibid. Ibid. 30 Ibid. 31 Sullivan, Party Faithful, 145. 32 David E. Campbell and J. Quinn Monson, “The Religion Card Gay Marriage and the 2004 Presidential Election,” Public Opinion Quarterly 72, no. 3 (2008): 399419. 33 Goldberg, Kingdom Coming. 29

CHAPTER SEVEN HOW THE DEMOCRATS FOUND GOD

With the 2008 presidential election less than two months away, then Senator Barack Obama took the podium at a high school in Norfolk, Virginia. He was there to deliver a speech on education, but he knew his remarks on the state of our nation’s schools would not be covered very closely by the press. After all, a day earlier, while addressing the issue of the rapidly deteriorating global economy, Obama had made the argument that the McCain/Palin economic policy was a near replica of Bush’s. To drive this point home, Obama borrowed a common, if not dated colloquialism when he said, “You can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig.”1 Within minutes of his saying this, the McCain campaign issued a statement insisting that Obama’s characterization had been little more than a misogynistic swipe at the Alaskan governor, and thus set off one of the more memorable moments of the 2008 presidential campaign. Flabbergasted by what he labeled “the phony outrage” of the McCain campaign, Obama lambasted his Republican rival for manufacturing a controversy in the hopes of distracting the public from the real issues of the campaign. “Enough!” Obama declared. “I don’t care what they say about me, but I love this country too much to let them take over another election with lies and phony outrage and swift boat politics. Enough is enough.” 2 Obama’s remarks proved a turning point in the campaign. They helped to refocus the media and electorate’s attention on the issues that mattered, while highlighting the distractionary gamesmanship so often deployed by the right wing. His statement also served as an expression of the collective 1

As quoted by Lee Speigel, “Obama Says McCain Is Offering Fake Change: ‘You Can Put Lipstick on a Pig, But It’s Still a Pig,” ABC News, September 9, 2008. Found online at: (Accessed February 8, 2011). 2 As quoted by Nedra Pickler, “Obama Accuses McCain Camp of Lies, Phony Outrage,” USA Today, September 10, 2008. Found online at:

(Accessed February 8, 2011)

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frustrations so many in America had. The past eight years had been rough. Really rough. There had been too many lies, too many distortions, too many half-truths and diversions from what really mattered. Ultimately, the American people had had enough. By 2008, a growing number of evangelical Christians had also had enough. In the eyes of many evangelicals (though as we shall see, by no means all of them), the Christian Right had been allowed to pervert the gospel message in the name of political expedience for far too long. Fed up with the manipulation of the Christian Right, these individuals were determined to speak up.

No Faith but the Patriotized Faith When Sam was 18, she left the small rural town where she had spent much of her life to attend college in a large metropolitan city. The fact that Sam even attended college sets her apart from most of her hometown peers. Of the 24 students in Sam’s graduating class, only four attended college of any sort, and only two did so at a four year university. Eight years after first coming to attend school, Sam continues to live and work in the same city as her alma mater. About once a month, she makes the threehour drive home to see her family and to occasionally visit with high school friends. But back in her childhood home, Sam has become a sort of cultural outsider—the small town girl who has swapped her conservative upbringing in favor of cosmopolitan values. Like many of her childhood peers, Sam grew up as an evangelical. Today, when Sam speaks of her experience in both the Pentecostal and Baptist church, there is clear disdain in her voice. When asked why she left the evangelical church, Sam responds with a laugh, “Because they’re crazy.”3 When probed more deeply, Sam begins to open up. “It was church all the time,” Sam claims. “When we were on road trips with my grandparents, my grandmother would read the Bible out loud. When we went to bed, she was reading us Bible stories about Moses and Jesus.”4 Surprisingly, however, it was not the religious overkill which eventually led Sam away from the faith of her elders. As she claims, “[Conservative Christianity was] the only thing I ever knew, so I thought that all Christians felt the same way that evangelicals felt.” And it was this 3

Personal Interview with ‘Sam’ on growing up evangelical, November 11, 2010. Please note that ‘Sam’ has asked that her real name not be used. 4 Ibid.

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fact that greatly troubled Sam, because for her, evangelicals were “kind of about themselves,” while evangelical Christianity was about living your life in accordance with the Bible; which, in Sam’s experience meant, “Gays were wrong, and that as a woman I had to submit to my father, and one day my husband—and not just listen to your husband, but obey him.” As if this theology were not problematic enough for her, Sam admits to being further disturbed by what she sees as an overly politicized evangelical body. As a child, for instance, Sam can recall hearing many sermons where the minister would say, “Hey, this is who I’m voting for because he believes Jesus Christ is their personal savior, and I want you—God wants you—to vote for him.” And so today, whenever Sam hears a minister saying anything that even approaches a political endorsement, she admits she’s all the more inclined to vote for the other guy, even if, as she says, they like to “bite the heads [off] of bats or worship Satan.” Because as Sam sees it, there are a lot of socially acceptable practices within the evangelical community that are otherwise completely repugnant in wider society. To illustrate this point, Sam ponders, “If it were socially acceptable to kill puppies, would people still be like, ‘oh, he’s a God fearing puppy killer.’” And this really worries Sam, because in her view, “As long you put God behind it, you can do just about whatever you want.”5 The fact that as a child Sam was unaware of more progressive forms of Christianity comes as little surprise, as conservative evangelical churches dominate rural America; a fact that was by no means left to chance, as throughout the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, the theological tensions which engulfed mainline Protestantism and were centered largely on the role of women in the church and the sanctity of unborn life, were purposely exploited by various evangelical leaders in order to swell the ranks of their own church. By all reasonable measurements these efforts largely succeeded, as during this time many mainline Protestants found their way into evangelical pews; and much of this growth occurred in more conservative communities, such as small rural towns.6 To say that evangelical leaders simply exploited theological tensions within mainline Protestantism neglects some of the more nuanced details that made this development possible. For instance, in framing their agenda for the American people, Christian Right leaders used rhetoric aimed at 5

Ibid. Oliver Thomas, “Where have all the Protestants Gone?,” USA Today, May 10, 2010. Found online at:

(Accessed November 14, 2010). 6

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drawing broad public support, which helped to broaden their religious appeal as well. Core values were regularly identified as: “Christian values,” “national conscience,” “patriotism,” “morality,” “safe- neighbourhoods,” “strong families,” “tradition,” and “individual responsibility.” This rhetoric was quickly adopted by community preachers and disseminated to their congregants. It continued to pour out from there. Men spoke at their men’s groups, women at their Bible studies, friends-to-friends, neighbors-toneighbors, and colleagues-to-colleagues. In reporting on the Christian Right, media outlets and scholars alike similarly picked-up these terms and repeated them in telling their story. Far too few, however, ever contested the meanings behind these terms. In failing to do so, both pundits and scholars alike helped legitimize the Christian Right’s perceived ownership of these important cultural issues.7 By the end of the twentieth century, it was clear that the Christian Right had, in the words of Hopson and Smith, “Achieved an important degree of authority in the struggle over proprietorship of important symbols within American culture.”8 Among these, was ownership of what it meant to be a Christian in America. And in claiming ownership over this terrain, the Christian Right was then well positioned to advance its own “unambiguous responses”9 to what were otherwise “highly complex social issues.”10 This in turn led to a “manageable system of explanations, beliefs and actions,”11 where right is right, wrong is wrong, and where ultimately, there is little room for shades of gray. In offering simple, and what often seemed like pragmatic solutions to America’s social ills, the Christian Right, and the narrow interpretation of the Christian gospel that it represents, succeeded in capturing the loyalty of many millions of Americans. At the same time its insistence on legislating morality and other matters of personal conduct similarly succeeded in securing the scorn of many millions of Americans, Sam among them. Joining her is Layne, a software developer and Star Wars enthusiast. Like Sam, Layne grew up attending a conservative evangelical church, though his experience differs in some ways. As Layne recalls:

7 Ronald E. Hopson and Donald R. Smith, “Changing Fortunes: An Analysis of Christian Right Ascendance within American Political Discourse,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 38, no. 1 (1999): 1-13. 8 Ibid., 10. 9 Ibid., 7. 10 Ibid. 11 Ibid.

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I started going to that church when I was six, it started as an outreach for that church into my neighborhood.12 Neither of my parents were religious, my mom thought that I should be exposed to religion, so I started going at 6 and went every weekend, or almost every weekend until I was 15. As my brothers came of age they joined me as well, so three of us were going every week to that church, and that particular church used a system of a bus where they would go around and pick up your kids to attend Sunday school and then drop you off, so it made it very convenient to parents who want to send their children.

Layne admits to really enjoying his experience with church for much of this time. Yet as he grew older and as he moved beyond what he describes as the “superficial” nature of his Sunday school education, he began critically evaluating the message of the church. By the age of 15, Layne began to “vilely disagree”13 with many of the church’s messages. These messages, he believed were, “Very conservative and very centered on a closed-mindedness to what Christianity was.” And this, Layne admits, led him to become disenchanted with the church. “[I was] very angry with religion in general and Christianity specifically, just because I felt a sense of betrayal—I don’t know if that’s the right way of framing it—but a sense of being used and not really being able to critically ask questions.” Although Layne cannot recall specific examples today, he does remember asking questions about how certain subjects were taught as well as the framing of various social issues. But these questions did not sit well with church leaders, who, as Layne says, reacted as though “I was betraying their gift of religion to me.” This reaction turned Layne off from religion for many years. Since leaving the evangelical church Layne has relocated to Washington State. He is married and is the father of a small boy. He admits that he would very much like to expose his son to religion, and has even sampled various churches in his area, but so far he has not found any Christian tradition he is comfortable enough with. And while Layne is open to trying different religious traditions, he sees American evangelicalism as having become more conservative than it was even when he was a child. For this reason, a return to the evangelical church seems unlikely. But just because the conservative drift has turned him off (and Layne suspects, many others like him), he understands how this development is attractive to others. “I 12

The church in question is a prominent Baptist church located in Billings, Montana. 13 Personal Interview with Layne Berg on growing up evangelical, November 22, 2010.

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think for a certain subset of people this actually has quite a bit of an appeal,” he explains. “For those individuals who want to be a part of a larger group, who want that safety that they feel a big group provides, it works very well for them.” However, in order for religion to work, Layne concedes it needs to reach more than just conservative individuals. “I think there is a large portion of the American populace who, if given the right setting, would very much like to have their spirituality represented.” But unlike Sam, who would like to see a complete decoupling of religion and politics, Layne is not of the opinion that religion necessarily needs to exclude any mention of politics; instead, he thinks churches, particularly those on the left, need to get more vocal about their politics: There’s essentially a lot of folks who have grown up in a Christian institution, but the problem is that, all in all, really there are only moderate political groups from a church perspective, and there aren’t really any far left leaning groups and I think that’s a real problem because there’s no ability to merge the political with the religious [for these people]. And I know that a lot of people feel that those are strictly separated, but throughout our history there has always been an intermingling of religion and politics, and evangelicals and the right wing are very good at drawing from that base; but I don’t feel that on the whole folks on the left side of the spectrum are as good at getting that synergy going—they feel that there needs to be a real divide and I think that’s exactly the wrong strategy. I think they would actually draw more people in who are more independent and liberal if they could get that message together.14

It is possible, particularly given the success of the Christian Right, that a renewed political focus by mainline Protestants could rejuvenate their otherwise dwindling and aging churches. Indeed, there are few ways by which the public face of Christianity could be better altered than with the emergence of a strong religious left. To be certain, many Americans share the opinions of Layne and Sam, and believe the evangelical tradition to be too conservative and too political. With that said, however, there are others within the faith who take the opposite view, and believe that in its attempt to broaden its overall appeal, the evangelical tradition has grown too soft and accommodating.

14

Ibid.

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“Christianity-Lite” Sitting atop 40 acres of carefully manicured land in California’s affluent Orange County is Crystal Cathedral, named after the 10,664 large rectangular windows that largely comprise the edifice. Considered to be America’s first modern mega-church15 (mega-churches are generally defined as having a congregational size of 2,000 members or more), its sanctuary is capable of seating some 2,736 worshipers16, though in recent years many of these seats have sat empty as average weekly attendance has dipped to below 1,000.17 Despite its declining church membership and a rating slump for its famed Hour of Power television broadcast (which similarly impacted Crystal Cathedral’s cash flow), the church nonetheless recently financed a number of large construction projects to the tune of $55 million. It is difficult to know what, if any, reservations the banks financing these renovations may have had, but ultimately Crystal Cathedral was loaned the money. And why not? After all this was Crystal Cathedral, one of America’s most recognized churches. Surely this of all churches would be able to meet their financial obligations, right? Wrong. In October of 2010, Crystal Cathedral admitted that it would be unable to pay its creditors and thus filed for bankruptcy protection.18 News of the bankruptcy took the evangelical community by storm as many pondered how such troubles could befall what was once viewed as the iconic example of successful church growth. Indeed, Crystal Cathedral’s founding pastor, the Rev. Robert Schuller, helped make popular the controversial Church Growth Movement, a fierce cultivation model which aims to maximize church attendance by “using proven business marketing strategies.”19

15

Laurie Goodstein, “Dispute Over Succession Clouds Megachurch,” The New York Times, October 23, 2010. Found online at: (accessed November 24, 2010). 16 Crystal Cathedral Staff Writer, “Architecture,” Crystal Cathedral Website, 2010. Found online at: (Accessed November 24, 2010). 17 See Goodstein, “Dispute Clouds Megachurch.” 18 Cathcart, Rebecca, “California’s Crystal Cathedral Files for Bankruptcy,” The New York Times, October 18, 2010. Found online at: (Accessed November 24, 2010). 19 Ken Silva, “Redefining the Church: The Church Growth Movement’s Unbiblical Definition of the Church,” Apprising Ministries, October 3, 2010. Found online at:

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The strategy was so wildly successful that many churches were inspired by the Crystal Cathedral and adopted the Church Growth Movement for their own ministries. For instance, when the Rev. Bill Hybels started his own church, he wanted to be sure that his ministries would be geared to the desires of the worshiping public. To ensure this, Hybels reportedly, “Went door-to-door asking residents what they disliked about church and what they would want in a church.” Armed with the data from his neighbourhood surveys, Hybels then “constructed a ‘user friendly’ worship service with sermons oriented to practical life and devoid of appeals for money, religious jargon and ‘heavy guilt trips.’”20 Today, Hybels’s Willow Creek Community Church—with its laid-back worship style, its conservative Christian message, along with its bookstore, food court and coffee shop—is one of America’s largest and most prosperous churches. Over the years, other religious leaders and church congregations have similarly joined the Church Growth Movement, and many have seen rising church attendance as a result. As successful as the Church Growth Movement has proven to be, it is not without considerable critics. Some, such as Columbia University’s Randall Balmer liken megachurches to large retail chains like Walmart. Also like Walmart, megachurches have developed an effect of putting smaller churches out of business.21 Still other critics hold that in its attempt to reach the masses, megachurch Christianity has, in effect, lost its very soul. As Pastor Andy Holt, author of the popular Sometimes Preacher blog, writes: We Christians are, in large part, intellectually and artistically vacuous because we have followed popular culture down the spiraling whirlpool of eros-replacing-agape, emotional sentimentalism, self-defining reality, and the victory of style over substance. We have elevated product over process (Accessed November 24, 2010). 20 Scott Thumma, “Exploring the Megachurch Phenomena: Their Characteristics and Cultural Context,” Hartford Institute for Religious Research, 2007. Found online at (Accessed November 24, 2010); see also, Scott Thumma and Dave Travis, Beyond Megachurch Myths: What We Can Learn From America’s Largest Churches (San Francisco: Wiley Imprint, 2007). 21 Cheryl Burton, “The Mega Church Movement,” ABC News, November 8, 2005. Found online at:

(Accessed November 24, 2010).

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and justified the means by the ends, which we have devastatingly misinterpreted. Though we set out to transform popular culture, we have been transformed by it. We have turned our pastors into celebrities, elevating them to god-like status while they produce to our liking, but then discarding them with the Paris Hiltons and Brittany Spearses of the popular culture machine when we are done with them. We have exchanged discipleship for consumerism, true community for celebrity-association, and transformation for trendsetting. We have turned the deep and vibrant faith of Augustine and Aquinas and Luther and Lewis into mindless, soulless, spiritually delusional entertainment.22

Yet one need not troll the blogs of devout religious practitioners to find concern over the watering-down of the Christian gospel. All you really have to do is step into any evangelical church and odds are someone in the congregation will have an opinion on the matter. The Sellwood Baptist Church in Portland’s quiet Westmoreland neighbourhood, is such a church. As a conservative evangelical church, Sellwood Baptist is in many ways a neighborhood oddity. The congregation, which has been meeting for almost a century, is tucked in one of Portland’s most liberal boroughs: in an unremarkable building across the street from the popular New Seasons grocery market. The building itself is a large complex that could easily accommodate, as it once did, many hundreds of worshipers. Today, however, weekly attendance hovers around 40 regular attendees. Like many evangelical churches, the worship hall of Sellwood Baptist looks to make good use of multimedia technologies, such as widescreen projectors and an advanced sound system, but as the church’s pastor (Pastor Mike as he is known to his congregation) admits, incorporating new technologies, such as a video projector and projection screen, can often be difficult in churches built before such technology existed. Still, at the front of the sanctuary suspended high from the rafters is a projection screen larger than most living room walls. When visitors arrive, the church usher, a middle-aged man who speaks with a thick eastern European accent, greets them. Indeed, many of the congregants at Sellwood Baptist are recent immigrants. After an exchange of pleasantries, visitors are led to the sanctuary where they inevitably have choice seating among the church’s many empty pews. As the service gets set to begin, images of the English countryside flash across the projection screen, while a narrator recites familiar scripture accompanied by soothing 22

The Sometimes Preacher, “Christianity-Lite,” The Sometimes Preacher, 2010. Found online at: (Accessed November 23, 2010); see also, Dick Staub, The Culturally Savvy Christian (San Francisco: Wiley Imprint, 2007).

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hymns. In the front of the sanctuary is an American flag. The flag is displayed almost as prominently as the cross itself. Like nearly all churches, Sellwood Baptist uses a decidedly old technology, print, in the form of a Sunday bulletin, to keep their congregation informed of upcoming events and important news. During election season, included on the back page of the bulletin amongst the usual weekly announcements for bake sales and potlucks, is a large space with a headline asking, “Are You Registered to Vote?” in bold lettering. Below it, the text reads: As Christian citizens it is our privilege and duty to vote—to vote wisely, prayerfully, and biblically. Today is your opportunity to register, or to reregister if you have recently moved or changed your name. The election is just around the corner and we need to let our voices and votes be heard. Voter Registration cards are on the Red Carpet table in the foyer and someone will be there to assist you. We will even send it in for you! Please get signed up today. “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and unto God the things that are God’s.”23

Political announcements such as these are commonplace in evangelical churches as they succeed in promoting a form of political engagement rooted in biblical principles, while falling short of officially endorsing a particular candidate or issue which, by law, churches are prohibited from doing since they exist as non-profits. More recently, however, a growing number of preachers are flaunting IRS regulations by making direct endorsements of candidates and ballot measures. To date, the IRS has yet to crack-down on this blatantly illegal practice. To be certain, however, not all preachers are violating the law. Indeed, most are not. But while federal law prohibits preachers from making political endorsements at the pulpit, or risk losing their church’s tax-exempt status, they are, however, free as private citizens to speak as much politics as they like. For his part, Pastor Mike steers clear of overt political rhetoric while at the pulpit or on official church business, but this does not mean that he is without strong opinions on matters of politics and other pressing social issues. Indeed, one of the more important issues for Pastor Mike, and a theme touched upon regularly in his sermons, is the need to rescue Christianity from what he sees as its watering-down. As Pastor Mike sees it:

23 Sellwood Baptist Church Pamphlet, October 3, 2010. Scripture comes from Mark 12:17.

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[The term “evangelical Christianity” has] become a catch-all for a lot of groups that, at one time, did not consider themselves evangelical, but the term has been eroded somewhat so that you can just about be anything and call yourself an evangelical. That’s one of the issues, you know, what are we talking about, because this is now a very large arc, and there are a whole lot of weird beasts in it. At one time, the term really meant those who emphasize the message of personal salvation in Christ through faith alone, apart from works. It was a narrower definition. And now, the term seems to have embraced a lot of things and a lot of movements that I’m not comfortable with personally.24

Consequently, Pastor Mike admits he rarely if ever identifies with the evangelical label, preferring instead to be known as a “conservative Christian” who happens to come from the Baptist tradition. When asked what he means when he says Christianity has “become a catch-all” umbrella, he responds by asserting that there are a lot of evangelicals and born-again Christians, who simply do not follow the literal word of the Bible: You can believe virtually anything and call yourself a born-again Christian, but surveys that have been done of the population from one coast to the other, you find people who call themselves born-again evangelical Christians. They don’t believe in the existence of Satan, for instance. They say, “Oh no, that’s a construct of evil, but there is no personal devil.” They’ll say they don’t believe in a literal hell.…People who call themselves evangelicals have moved toward annihilationism. That, for years, has been considered a heresy in Christianity. That’s not orthodox Christianity.25

And when asked what accounts for the broadening of the evangelical label, Pastor Mike responds: Cause you can be anything, just about, and believe just about anything, and there’s a lot of warm fuzzy. What you have are some churches that have grown up—and there’s some very large ones—Lakewood church, where Joel Osteen is the pastor, would be a good example of a church where you can believe just about anything.26

But this warm and fuzzy Christianity is, in the opinion of Pastor Mike, little more than a form of “cultural Christianity,” because in America 24

Personal Interview with Pastor Mike on evangelical Christianity, October 7, 2010. 25 Ibid. 26 Ibid.

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individuals are expected to be Christian. But as Pastor Mike argues, it is one thing to claim the faith and quite another to practice it. Not all, however, are in agreement with Pastor Mike’s assessment that evangelical Christianity has been watered down in order to make it less abrasive to the fickle American religious consumer. Janessa for instance, is a young seminarian studying to be an ordained minister at Drew University. She is unabashedly proud of her main line roots, the main line’s progressive theology and its commitment to the social gospel. Yet Janessa contends that far from a watered down theology, evangelicals have simply gotten better at repackaging it. As Janessa admits, “I want to say they’re becoming better in doing the same things, so I think they’re less obviously evangelical sometimes; they’re less obviously conservative, they’re less obviously exclusive, they’re less obviously racist. But when you’re actually in those churches, I think they’re saying a lot of the same things.” Instead, Janessa asserts that evangelical “propaganda is getting better.”27 Whether Janessa is correct in her assessment that the evangelical message remains as intolerant today as it once was is a question of personal opinion. What is less ambiguous, however, is the fact that the consumer driven approach adopted by many evangelical churches and ministries has shown itself to be widely successful. Yet this success has not prevented critics from labeling it as little more than vanilla Christianity. For instance, Russ Breimeier, a popular religious writer and author notes: This brand of faith tastes great but is less filling, and wherever it prevails, it is a source of impoverishment of faith and culture. Christianity, when it takes on these characteristics, is an impostor. People are seeking the way home to God, but pop Christianity cannot provide it. Yet for many today, Christianity-Lite is all they know, and the consequences are serious for both the religious and the irreligious.28

Given the past success of “Christianity-Lite,” it is clear that many within the evangelical tradition are perfectly content with this watered down religious experience. However, recent evangelical declines are also an indication that consumer tastes are changing. Perhaps the American 27

Personal Interview with Janessa on Evangelical Christianity, the Emergent Church and the Social Gospel, October 21, 2010. Please note that Janessa has asked that her last name not be used. 28 Russ Breimeier, “Light of the World?,” Christianity Today, May 16, 2007. Found online at: (Accessed November 23, 2010).

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religious buyer has simply grown tired of their religious Olive Garden staple and is instead seeking more authentic nourishment. The rise of the emerging church movement, with its emphasis on the social gospel and its commitment to communities beyond the wall of the physical church, suggest as much. Yet this and other movements, such as creation care, are only just beginning to register with the American mainstream. The public remains largely unaware of their existence. That said, evidence suggests that religion in America would greatly benefit if the public were served a greater diversity of religious traditions. But before we explore why such diversity might ultimately benefit the overall health of religion in America, let us first consider why it is that new forms of religious articulation are just recently enjoying greater appeal with the American public.

CHAPTER EIGHT TOO MANY PREACHERS

By 1969, Harvard economist Thomas Schelling was already enjoying considerable notoriety for his work on the strategy of conflict, when his attention turned to the dynamics of segregation. Convinced that most Americans were not racists at heart, Schelling remained, nonetheless, troubled by the persistently high rates of racial segregation which continued to plague American neighborhoods. Perplexed by these inconsistencies, Schelling set out to perform a simple experiment that he hoped would explain “the relationship between collective results and individual intents.”1 What Schelling did next was to create virtual communities consisting of 9 black households, represented by the symbol “+” and 10 white households which were represented by the symbol “0.” Schelling then arranged these homes randomly into virtual neighborhoods, so that these communities looked something like this: 00+++000+00++0++00+ +00++000+0+++000++0 Schelling then postulated that in a fully integrated community, such as those shown above, residents would have a natural tendency to want to live near neighbors of their own race. Working from this, Schelling began rearranging these neighborhoods along the premise that if fewer than half of any resident’s nearest four neighbors were of the same race, then that resident would move to the nearest location consistent with those preferences. What he discovered was that his once racially integrated neighborhoods quickly broke-down and in their place racially segregated neighborhoods appeared: 00000+++++++++00000

1 Henry Wasserman and Gary Yohe, “Segregation and the Provision of Spatially Defined Local Public Goods,” American Economist 45, no. 2 (2001): 13-24.

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From this simple experiment, Schelling was able to conclude that, “the interplay of individual choices, where unorganized segregation is concerned, is a complex system with collective results that bear no close relation to individual intent.”2 In other words, the end-result of individual preferences, such as the desire to be in a community of like people, can often have unforeseen and often times unintended consequences such as racially segregated neighborhoods. Years later, Mark Buchanan would build upon Schelling’s thesis using what is known as “small-worlds” theory, a theory which stipulates that unseen social and mechanical patterns often prove pivotal in understanding how information is exchanged within a given network. As Buchanan writes, “social realities are fashioned not only by the desires of people but also by the action of blind and more or less mechanical forces...forces that can amplify slight and seemingly harmless personal preferences into dramatic and troubling consequences.”3 Buchanan similarly notes that the networks to which we belong; indeed the very communities that have shaped not only what we know, but how we know it, are perpetually on the edge of “instability and tumultuous upheaval[,]”4 for these networks exist within an ever globalized world where the familiarity of locality is increasingly displaced by the regularity of prevailing foreign forces. In instances where communal life is disrupted, such as when we move for school or work, we often attempt to replicate the comfort of locality by seeking out those who remind us of home. But even at home we find the forces of globalization at work. The influx of immigration, for instance, has already changed the demographics of many communities and neighborhoods, altering once established cultural patterns and social values. Understandably, there has been considerable pushback against the forces of globalization, particularly among those whom globalization has left behind. Sadly, however, this pushback all too often takes the form of hostilities towards the immigrant classes, and xenophobic public policy. But try as some might, the world has become too small, too interconnected for us to turn back now. Globalization is here to stay. And so it should, for while there are certainly negative aspects of globalization, it has, nevertheless, delivered unparalleled opportunities. Perhaps most notable of these many opportunities is the ability to make new acquaintances and forge new relationships. Such an opportunity has greatly enhanced our 2 Thomas Schelling, “Models of Segregation,” American Economic Review, Paper and Proceedings 59, no. 2 (1969): 488 of 488-493. 3 Mark Buchanan, Nexus: Small Worlds and the Groundbreaking Science of Networks (New York: Norton, 2002), 186. 4 Buchanan, 20.

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understanding of our fellow man and has exposed us to customs and cultures which previous generations were completely ignorant of. That said, the expansion of one’s community, or perhaps more accurately, the expansion of one’s community beyond a given point, inevitably comes at the expense of past bonds and prior kinships. This is so as any relationship, whether new or old, demands continued attention and regular cultivation. This is not to say that meaningful relationships cannot be maintained from a great distance. Indeed such relationships routinely are. But most of us do not have a great number of very close, long distance friends, as sustaining such relationships is much more difficult than it is with those in our immediate proximity. This is not to say, however, that relationships once made are easily forgotten, even when one or both parties are separated at great distance. Indeed, social media such as Facebook and LinkedIn, has made it much easier for us to stay in touch with old friends, familiar acquaintances and professional colleagues. Moreover, the networking potential such sites afford their users is considerable and can be easily leveraged for a variety of purposes, such as securing future financial gains, or simply to reunite with a past lover. For his part, Buchanan’s work on small-worlds theory helps to illustrate the interconnectedness of the broader global community, particularly his analysis demonstrating that the ‘degrees of separation’ between any one person on this earth and another is negligible at best. Yet regardless of our global interconnectedness, Buchanan asserts that in order for a community to function properly, its members must trust that their fellow members will abide by commonly accepted norms and mores. Drastic differences in values, world-views, ideologies and the like, often work to undermine mutual trust and understanding. Since the dawn of the Internet, countless individuals have viewed the World Wide Web as the catalyst through which peace and democracy will reign supreme. As Michael and Ronda Hauben write: We are seeing a revitalization of society. The frameworks are being redesigned from the bottom up. A new more democratic world is becoming possible...The Net seems to open a new lease on life for people, social connections that were never before possible, or relatively hard to achieve, are now facilitated by the Net.5

5 Michael Hauben and Ronda Hauben, Netizens: On the History and Impact of Usenet and the Internet (Los Alamitos, CA: IEEE Computer Society Press, 1997), 3.

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Even past U.S. presidents have held remarkably compatible views. In 1989, for instance, Ronald Reagan, famously declared that “the Goliath of totalitarianism will be brought down by the David of the microchip[,]”6 while George W. Bush, similarly pondered, “Imagine if the Internet took hold in China. Imagine how freedom would spread.”7 Although populist claims such as those above may in part be true,8 Internet technology, as we know, is not without its pitfalls. For instance, with the abundance of choice afforded by the new media environment, like-minded individuals and groups have quickly coalesced into small niche clusters. This relatively recent social development is the result of a technological progression which Nicholas Carr describes as the “electrification” of America’s mass culture, whereby the Internet, with its near endless and ever-expanding content, is steadily displacing the unifying effects of popular television shows, radio programs, movies, books, newspapers and magazines by affording its audience highly specialized markets which suit deep personal desires.9 As net users cluster around narrowly focused topics and interests, these clusters, if insulated and unexposed to outside views and opinions, have a tendency to create an echo-chamber effect, in which agreeable views are reinforced and amplified, the results of which can prove disastrous for deliberative democracy.10 As Paul Starr observes, prior to cable television and the Internet, American presidents relied on broadcast networks and newsprint to reach the public. This dependency gave networks and major newspapers considerable power as they controlled access to the channels of public persuasion. This power was, however, balanced by a White House that could “exercise plenty of leverage in its media relations by selectively leaking news and granting exclusive interviews,” and a press corps that “operated 6 Sheila Rule, “Reagan Gets A Red Carpet From British,” The New York Times, June 14, 1989. Found online at: (Accessed July 10, 2011). 7 Evgeny Morozov, “Texting Toward Utopia: Does the Internet Spread Democracy?,” Boston Review, March/April, 2009. Found online at: (Accessed February 27, 2010). 8 For instance, Yongnian Zheng argues that the Internet is in fact leading to the democratization of China. Yongnian Zheng, Technological Empowerment: The Internet, State and Society in China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2008). 9 Nicholas Carr, The Big Switch: Rewiring the World, F rom Edison to Google (New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 2008). 10 Cass Sunstein, Republic.com (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002).

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more or less according to standards of professional journalism.”11 Today, however, traditional media is facing new challenges and a changed media landscape in which “neither the broadcast networks nor the newspapers have the reach they once did.”12 As a result, the unified public once assembled by traditional media is rapidly fading. And in this new Internet age, a basic rule of communication seems confirmed: abundance brings scarcity. As we have seen, news outlets are increasingly abandoning past standards of professional journalism in favor of a new business model, one that helps breed social polarization and audience fragmentation.13 Much like political authority, religious authority depends upon a unified audience. As has already been discussed, broadcast media proved instrumental in unifying a diverse evangelical tradition behind core cultural and political values. This in turn led to a consolidation of power and the ability to focus evangelical energies on a narrow set of social priorities. However, as media has grown to include abundant communicative platforms, new theological movements have taken root within the evangelical community that frays their collective energies while challenging traditional power structures.

The Fragmentation of the Evangelical Tradition Like radio before it, televangelism helped bridge long held denominational divides, the result of which was the homogenization of American evangelicals. This result has been dubbed the mainstreaming effect, whereby regular television viewing works to create a confluence of ideas and “a coming-together of attitudes.”14 When viewed regularly and by divergent groups, what often results is the adoption of more extreme political ideas and social values by audience members. In the case of televangelism, mainstreaming effectively brought the values of its viewers into closer political proximity with those of televangelists themselves, thereby moving viewers to the more conservative end of the political spectrum15. Moreover, once an individual is caught up in the mainstreaming 11

Paul Starr, “Governing in the Age of Fox News,” The Atlantic, January/February (2010). Found online at: (Accessed December 16, 2010). 12 Ibid. 13 Ibid. 14 Watson, Media Communication, 67. 15 Ibid; see also, Cass Sunstein, Going to Extremes: How Like Minds Unite and Divide (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009).

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effect, there is a natural tendency to seek out viewpoints with which they already agree. This works to further reinforce pre-existing biases and often moves both the viewer and broadcaster to ever-greater extremes.16 Thus, by appealing to individuals who felt unnerved by the social upheavals of the 1960s, televangelists worked to foster a community of conservative Christians whose numbers grew as the public increasingly gained access to cable television. Meanwhile, as evangelical Christianity found itself caught in the mainstreaming effect, both the message of televangelists and the viewers themselves gradually crept towards the conservative right.17 The Internet does not necessarily negate this mainstreaming effect. In fact, it could be argued that the Internet exacerbates the problem, as when individuals are afforded an abundance of choice they often visit sites that appeal to selected interests and which reinforce pre-existing biases. Similarly, the newly actualized transcendence of local space that ICTs afford requires us to reconsider political engagement as “a series of places embodying reconstructed models of citizenship and new forms of political activism.”18 Embedded within this new realm of civic activity are networks of wired activists who are rapidly rewriting the rules of civic engagement and political activity to include such things as online petitions, virtual boycotts, the development of public awareness websites, and to mobilize vast numbers through simple tweets and wall posts, to name but a few.19 Activities such as these have not only changed the nature of political participation, but also demonstrate why a new conceptualization of civic engagement is needed. As a growing number of individuals find their way online, and as regular daily habits change because of it,20 challenging new questions arise concerning the complexities of contemporary social relations, civic engagement and contested political activity. For instance, the widely adopted practice of conscience-driven consumption, such as the purchasing of “fair-trade” goods, certified “organic” produce and “conflict-free” diamonds, illustrates the difficulties in measuring contemporary civic engagement, as this sort of activity is nearly impossible to quantify. The Internet aids in this practice by empowering citizens to quickly and easily find information that would otherwise require a significant investment of 16

Leon Festinger, A Theory of Dissonance. (US: Row Pearson, 1957). See Festinger, Theory; see also Watson, Media Communication. 18 Richard Kahn and Douglas Kellner, “New Media and Internet Activism: From the ‘Battle of Seattle’ to Blogging,” New Media and Society 6, no. 1 (2004): 91 of 87-95. 19 See McCaughey and Ayers, Cyberactivism. 20 Refer to Bimber, “Internet and Political Transformation;” and Information. 17

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time. As a result, thresholds for civic engagement are lowered and political power is exercised in new and novel ways.21 In addition to this, the Internet is similarly fostering new networks and repertoires for citizenship by enabling connections between far flung individuals and groups with shared and similar interests. Serving as a vehicle through which bottom-up grassroots activity is more easily achieved, the Internet has evolved into an effective medium through which the power of individuals is greatly enhanced and better positioned to serve larger collective goods. For his part, University of California Professor Bruce Bimber asserts that the Internet has led America down the path of what he calls ‘accelerated pluralism,’22 where interest-based group politics are shifting towards more fluid issue-based group politics, consequently resulting in declining institutional coherence.23 In many cases, “access to the Internet provides the opportunity to participate in networks and interestcommunities that would be unavailable otherwise.”24 For older, more established regimes such as trade unions, political parties, and even religious coalitions, the shift from interest-based group politics in favor of issue-based group politics poses serious challenges to consolidated positions of power. Arguably, the first significant cleavage which developed within the evangelical tradition, and which can be strongly linked to our changed media landscape is the rise of so called evangelical environmentalism, or what is often referred to as ‘creation care.’ While later chapters will explore evangelical environmentalism in much greater depth, let us take a moment to consider the polarizing force of the movement itself. To understand just how passionate the issue of environmental protection is within the evangelical community, we need travel no further than the world’s large common, Facebook. There we find a group which calls itself “Christians and the Environment: Stop the Creation Care Agenda!” According to Christians and the Environment: Creation Care is a radical new liberal political agenda sweeping through America....More importantly, the movement encourages Christians to start voting for Democrats who generally favor radical environmental agendas. It also supports radical environmental legislation like “Cap and Trade,” which would do nothing more than impose a huge carbon tax on Americans in order to redistribute wealth to Africa and the United Nations.

21

Bimber, “Internet and Political Transformation.” Ibid. 23 See Uslaner, “Trust.” 24 Pierce and Lovrich Jr., “Internet Technology Transfer,” 53. 22

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Chapter Eight Imagine the cost of a gallon of gas after being taxed an additional 60 cents per gallon because someone wants to send American money to the United Nations! They got popular American pastors to buy into the Creation Care. These are pastors like Rob Bell and Rick Warren who have gone along with this agenda without fully knowing the implications. Remember no one wants unclean water, but the “Creation Care” movement has nothing to do with helping the environment.

In the end, Creation Care is a movement that tries to trick wellintentioned Christians into voting for liberal Democrats and their antifamily agendas that attack Christianity.25 *** In viewing creation care as a political battle waged by subversive cultural outsiders, rather than as a legitimate theological discussion occurring within a larger religious body, important communal connections that unify large and diverse communities, such as the American evangelical tradition are lost, and this inevitably leads to feelings of distrust, increased animosity and, at an extreme, even enmity. Yet tensions between conservative evangelicals and the growing creation care movement are not limited to a few Facebook groups. Barrett Duke, for instance, Vice-President of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Council which serves as the political arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, America’s largest Protestant denomination, offered this comment during an interview: I don’t think it’s the creation care movement that many evangelicals have a concern with per-se. The Bible instructs us to care for the environment and so it isn’t that many evangelicals have objections to the creation care movement. I think many evangelicals are deeply concerned about the ideology that drives some of the creation care interests, pantheistic ideologies, and naturalistic ideologies that tend to equate all life on the planet, are of great concern to us. It’s not the creation care movement that concern[s] many evangelicals, it’s the ideology of particular individuals or

25

Christians and the Environment: Stop the Creation Care Movement!, Facebook group page. Found online at: (Accessed March 8, 2010).

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particular groups, possibly promoting their ideology through [the] creation care message.26

To be clear, there is no evidence suggesting that evangelical environmentalism is anything but a growing religious movement of devoted Christians. At the same time, however, Duke, like the Facebook group Christians and the Environment, is correct in noting that evangelical environmentalism is well positioned to siphon support away from the GOP. This concern reflects important new realities for the Christian Right, namely that the social and political priorities of a new generation of American evangelicals are dramatically different from those of previous generations, and that the growth of the creation care movement (as well as the emerging church), stands as a testament to the Christian Right’s shattered religious monologue. Today, the vanguard of the Christian Right finds its historic religious supremacy challenged, and predictably, there has been considerable conservative backlash against many of these newer evangelical movements. “Resisting the Green Dragon,” a product of the Cornwall Alliance, a Christian think-tank whose members include evangelical heavyweights such as James Dobson, Tony Perkins, Charles Colson, Michael Farris and D. James Kennedy, is one such example. “Billed as a ‘Biblical response to one of the greatest deceptions of our day,’”27 “Resisting the Green Dragon” is a twelve week video series that claims “[t]he entire climate change movement is a ‘false religion,’ a nefarious conspiracy to empower eugenicists and create a ‘global government.’”28 Individuals interested in learning more about “Resisting the Green Dragon,” can order this “one-of-a-kind DVD series” online, complete with a discussion guide and a book “presenting a Christian response to radical environmentalism.”29 Online visitors can also view the documentary trailer, which begins amidst the backdrop of ominous music and Orwellian imagery, while a narrator speaks:

26

Personal Interview with Barrett Duke on creation care, Emergent Village and the future of the evangelical 27 Lee Fang, “Exclusive: The Oily Operators Behind The Religious Climate Change Denial Front Group, Cornwall Alliance,” The Wonk Room, June 25, 2010. Found online at: (Accessed January 13, 2010). 28 Ibid. 29 Cornwall Alliance, Resisting the Green Dragon Video Trailer, 2010. Found online at: (Accessed June 14, 2011).

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Chapter Eight In what has become one of the greatest deceptions of our day, radical environmentalism is striving to put America and the world under its constructive control. This so-called green dragon is seducing your children in our classrooms and popular culture. Its lust for political power now extends to the highest global levels, and its twisted view of the world elevates nature above the needs of people, even the poorest and most helpless. With millions falling prey to its spiritual deception, the time is now to stand and resist. Around the world, environmentalism has become a radical movement, something we call ‘the green dragon,’ and it is deadly. Deadly to human prosperity, deadly to human life, deadly to human freedom, and deadly to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Make no mistake about it, environmentalism is no longer your friend, it is your enemy.30

At a price of $71.90, the entire Green Dragon DVD series and related printed material is prohibitively expensive for many evangelicals. The Cornwall Alliance likely knows this, and if they were so inclined, they could potentially provide this series at a steeply discounted price, having so many financial backers.31 Yet the Cornwall Alliance most assuredly knows that the “Resisting the Green Dragon” series is likely to be seen by many more people than just the individuals who buy it. As we shall see in the following chapter, religious material such as printed books, audio books and DVDs are often shared among family and friends, and are commonly shown in adult Sunday School classrooms and as part of worship services, a feat which could not be achieved absent high levels of social capital. In addition to being shown in churches, the Resisting the Green Dragon campaign also enjoys considerable buzz on several Christian broadcast outlets, such as talk radio, a medium still largely dominated by the Christian Right, and one to which many evangelicals continue to listen. For instance, evangelist Jan Markell devoted two days of airtime exclusively to promoting the Cornwall Alliance agenda on her radio program, Understanding the Times. As she notes, “the environmental movement has an agenda…and Christians are playing into it and Christians are spreading it.”32 She goes on to say, “the place I like to turn

30

Ibid. Lee, “Oily Operators.” 32 Jan Markell, “Resisting the Green Dragon: Part1,” Understanding the Times, August 18, 2010. Found online at: (Accessed January 13, 2011). 31

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to for the truth is the Cornwall Alliance.”33 Even Glenn Beck has gotten in on the act. In an interview of E. Calvin Beisner, founder of the Cornwall Alliance, and David Barton of Wall Builders, an Alliance supporter, on his Fox News television show he makes it quite clear where he stands. In one exchange during a discussion of ‘Let There Be Stuff,’ an environmental publication by the Tides Foundation aimed at religious teens, Beisner reads a sentence from his book. “When we drink,” Beisner reads, “we owe a debt.” “What, to God?” Beisner asks. “To the earth’s great water?” he concludes. To which Beck replies, “That’s American Native—I guess you could go there. It’s paganism!”34 And statements such as these are increasingly common rhetorical tools used by the Christian Right to depict emerging theological movements, such as evangelical environmentalism, as enemies of God.

33

Ibid. Glenn Beck and E. Calvin Beisner, “Glenn Beck,” Fox News, October 16, 2010. Found online at: (Accessed January 13, 2011). 34

CHAPTER NINE THE CHANGING POLITICS OF AMERICAN EVANGELICALS

In promoting his award-winning documentary, The Ordinary Radicals, director Jamie Moffett asks a simple, yet profound question: The Christian faith, it is claimed, is one founded on love of God and neighbor. Why then is Christianity viewed in America as unforgiving, hypocritical, homophobic, consumerist, anti-Semitic, and bigoted? Admittedly, Moffett’s question is meant to be somewhat of a rhetorical one, but considering the ways in which many Christian Right leaders have presented the faith, is it any wonder why so many Americans have such a poor opinion of Christianity? Homosexuals have been the subject of particular evangelical scorn: Ɣ “The homosexuals are on the march in this country. Please remember, homosexuals do not reproduce! They recruit! And, many of them are after my children and your children.”1 Ɣ “[Homosexuals] want to come into churches and disrupt church services and throw blood all around and try to give people AIDS and spit in the face of ministers.”2 Much like the gay community, Jews have faced a barrage of insensitive and often times, bizarre statements by the Christian Right:

1

Jerry Falwell, as quoted in Hans Johnson and William Eskridge, “The Legacy of Falwell’s Bully Pulpit,” The Washington Post, May 19, 2007. Found online at: (Accessed January 4, 2011). 2 Pat Robertson, as quoted in Dagmar Herzog, Sex in Crisis: The New Sexual Revolution and the Future of American Politics, 76.

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Ɣ “The Jews are returning to their land of unbelief. They are spiritually blind and desperately in need of their Messiah and Savior.”3 Ɣ “How did [the Holocaust] happen? Because God allowed it to happen…because God said, ‘My top priority for the Jewish people is to get them to come back to the land of Israel.’”4 Following the 2010 earthquake in Haiti which destroyed the capital Port-au-Prince, and killed tens of thousands of Haitians, Pat Robertson had this to say: Ɣ “It may be a blessing in disguise...Something happened a long time ago in Haiti, and people might not want to talk about it. Haitians were originally under the heel of the French. You know, Napoleon the third, or whatever. And they got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said we will serve you if you will get us free from the French. True story. And so, the devil said, okay it's a deal. Ever since they have been cursed by one thing after the other.”5 And while discussing the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson offered this gem to the nation: Ɣ Jerry Falwell: “And, I know that I'll hear from them for this. But, throwing God out successfully with the help of the federal court system, throwing God out of the public square, out of the schools. The abortionists have got to bear some burden for this because God will not be mocked. And when we destroy 40 million little innocent babies, we make God mad. I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who 3

Jerry Falwell, as quoted in Michael Lienesch, Redeeming America: Piety and Politics in the New Christian Right, 231. 4 John Hagee, as quoted in Bruce Wilson, “Audio Recording of McCain's Political Endorser John Hagee Preaching Jews Are Cursed and Subhuman,” Talk to Action, May 15, 2008. Found online at: (Accessed January 4, 2011). 5 Drew Magary, “Haiti Quake Moves Limbaugh, Robertson to Nonsense,” NBC Connecticut, January 14, 2010. Found online at: (Accessed January 12, 2011).

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are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People For the American Way - all of them who have tried to secularize America - I point the finger in their face and say, ‘You helped this happen.’” Ɣ Pat Robertson “Well, I totally concur, and the problem is we have adopted that agenda at the highest levels of our government. And so we're responsible as a free society for what the top people do. And, the top people, of course, is the court system.”6 *** Like many Christians, however, Moffett is deeply disturbed by the negative stereotypes attributed to his faith and has sought to change its image. The Ordinary Radicals was in part Moffett’s attempt to do just that. In the film, Moffett follows Shane Claiborne, an unassuming evangelical leader whose long dread-locked hair and hemp-fibered clothing would seemingly make him a better aesthetic fit for a local Berkley co-op much more so than the American evangelical community. As the film progresses, we find Claiborne leading “a rag-tag group of ‘ordinary radicals’” to the most economically depressed and neglected areas, which Moffett describes as the “margins of the United States.” There, Claiborne and his cohort seek to do “small things with great love,” by providing much needed assistance to the communities they visit, while simultaneously examining “the current state of American politics” and its many failures from the perspective of the much maligned social gospel.7 Within evangelical circles, Claiborne is perhaps best known as the author of Jesus for President: Politics for Ordinary Radicals, which he cowrote with Chris Haw. As the authors note, Jesus for President “is not a set of political suggestions for the world; this is about invoking and embodying the alternative. All of this is an invitation to join a peculiar people- those with no king but God, who practice jubilee economics and make the world new. This is not the old-time religion of going to heaven; this is about bringing heaven to the world.”8 In presenting this alternative 6

Partial transcript of comments from September 13, 2001 telecast of the 700 Club. Found online at (Accessed January 12, 2011). 7 Jamie Moffett, “The Ordinary Radicals,” Jamie Moffett Media Design and Production, 2008. Found online at: (Accessed June 14, 2011). 8 Claiborne and Haw, Jesus for President: Politics for Ordinary Radicals (Zondervan, 2008), 108.

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take on the Christian faith, Claiborne has earned high praise among evangelical Christians more intently focused on living the social gospel, while positioning himself as the antithesis of the older Christian Right vanguard.

God is Pro-War? In January of 2004, the now late Jerry Falwell authored a much talked about editorial entitled “God is pro-war.”9 In this provocative piece, Falwell declares that while Christians are called to “be people of peace,”10 there are a number of biblical scriptures that he claims justify war. Extrapolating from these passages, Falwell proceeds to make the argument that America’s 2003 invasion of Iraq was not only warranted, but also sanctioned by God. As Falwell writes: Today, America continues to face the horrible realities of our fallen world. Suicide bombings and terrorist actions are beamed live into our homes daily. This serves as a constant reminder of the frailty of our flesh. It is apparent that our God-authored freedoms must be defended. Throughout the book of Judges, God calls the Israelites to go to war against the Midianites and Philistines. Why? Because these nations were trying to conquer Israel, and God's people were called to defend themselves. President Bush declared war in Iraq to defend innocent people. This is a worthy pursuit. In fact, Proverbs 21:15 tells us: ‘It is joy to the just to do judgment: but destruction shall be to the workers of iniquity.’ One of the primary purposes of the church is to stop the spread of evil, even at the cost of human lives. If we do not stop the spread of evil, many innocent lives will be lost and the kingdom of God suffers.”11

For many readers, both secular and religious alike, Falwell’s piece typifies much of what is wrong with religion, namely that it leads believers down the path of violence and vengeance. And while many were quick to condemn Falwell’s editorial, among the Christian Right, Falwell was hardly alone in vocalizing his support for the invasion of Iraq. For instance, former Nixon aide and founder of the Prison Fellowship, Charles Colson, argued that the “Just War Theory” ought to be “stretched” to 9 Jerry Falwell, “God is pro-war,” WorldNetDaily, January 31, 2004. Found online at: (Accessed January 4, 2011). 10 Ibid. 11 Ibid.

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include pre-emptive strikes against suspected terrorist organizations and countries that harbor terrorists.12 Similarly, Richard Land, former President of the Southern Baptist Convention, came to Bush’s defense arguing that Saddam Hussein was developing weapons of mass destruction at “breakneck speed” which he planned on using against “America and her allies.”13 Land would go on to incorrectly argue that Iraq was directly involved with the attacks of September 11, 2001. Meanwhile, James Dobson asserted that Saddam Hussein was but “another brutal tyrant” who, in his words, “must be stopped.”14 Similarly, Charles Stanley of the First Baptist Church of Atlanta, whose televised sermons are seen by millions of viewers each week, preached, “[w]e should offer to serve the war effort in any way possible.”15 Adding, “God battles with people who oppose him, who fight against him and his followers.”16 Tim LaHaye likewise welcomed the war in Iraq and even saw it as “a focal point of end-time events.”17 Unsurprisingly, statements such as these proved pivotal in drumming up evangelical support for the Iraq war. As Charles Marsh reported, “[w]ar sermons rallied evangelical congregations behind the invasion of Iraq,” and as a result, “an astonishing 87 percent of white evangelical Christians in the United States supported the President’s decision in April 2003.”18 However, in the years that have followed, public support for the Iraq war has fallen considerably and to a large extent evangelical support has mirrored this trend, though the war remains more popular among evangelicals than with the general American populous.19 Jim Rice and Jeannie Choi note one reason for this declining support is that many evangelicals, and in particular younger evangelicals, are

12 Doug Bandow, “Who Would Jesus Kill?,” Anti-War.com, May 18, 2007. Found online at: (Accessed January 6, 2011). 13 Ibid. 14 Ibid. 15 Charles Marsh, “Wayward Christian Soldiers,” The New York Times, January 20, 2006. Found online at: (Accessed January 6, 2011). 16 Ibid. 17 Ibid. 18 Ibid. 19 Tony Carnes, “Disappointed but Holding,” Christianity Today, February 1, 2006. Found Online at: (Accessed January 6, 2011).

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discovering a “deeper understanding of what it means to be pro-life.”20 This new understanding extends the simple abortion debate to include issues of environmental protection, poverty relief and even American military engagements.21 As conditions on the ground deteriorated and support for the Iraq war waned, many evangelical leaders found themselves in a precarious situation. As Ed Stoddard noted just days before the 2006 mid-term elections, many of these leaders had little choice but to support an unpopular war, an unpopular president and an unpopular political party as they had so “demonized” the Democrats that they had “nowhere else to go.”22 This sort of politicization within the evangelical tradition is nothing new, though increasingly it appears to be driving a wedge between factions within the evangelical community. Take for instance, Justin McMurdie. McMurdie is a self-described conservative evangelical pastor in his midthirties who oversees a thriving Church of God congregation in rural Oregon. For McMurdie, “[t]here are whole segments of the evangelical world that have become almost completely politicized. A good example,” McMurdie contends, “is Jerry Falwell and the Religious Right—or Ralph Reed,” two whom he calls the “starlets of the Religious Right.” As McMurdie sees it, “Most evangelicals have been taught, ‘Republican is right, Democrat is evil.’” McMurdie confessed during his interview that: From my own personal perspective, I was caught up in that. I go back to the 2000 election with Gore and Bush, and the recount and all that mess. I remember listening to talk radio and being very angry. And you hear all the vehemence on the part of the religious right. After 2004, after Bush won and to see where he went with his presidency, I just lost hope in the political process. I felt that right or left, there’s a lot of corruption and I don’t know if, right or left, we are accomplishing anything.23

20

Jim Rice and Jeannie Choi, “The Meaning of Life,” Sojourners, 2008. Found online at: (Accessed February 3, 2011). 21 Amy Sullivan, “Are Evangelicals Really Sold on Palin?,” Time Magazine, September 6, 2008. Found online at: (Accessed February 3, 2011). 22 Ed Stoddard, “U.S. Evangelical Support for Iraq War Slipping,” Information Liberation, October 28, 2006. Found online at: (Accessed February 3, 2011). 23 Personal Interview with Rev. Justin McMurdie on the current state of the evangelical church, May 18, 2009.

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Yet despite these feelings, McMurdie believes it is important for evangelicals to remain engaged politically, though today he is unwilling to call himself either a Republican or a Democrat. He also admits that in the past, “evangelicals have gone way too far [in] identifying with the Republican Party”, an identification McMurdie feels needs to end.24 Fortunately for McMurdie and others who share his opinion, the next generation of evangelical leaders is charting a vastly different political course than that of the Christian Right.

Lord of Peace and Other Progressive Causes In stark contrast to men like Falwell, Colson and Land, Shane Claiborne contests that the very idea that there can be such a thing as a just war is pure absurdity. To illustrate his point Claiborne draws upon on a popular Gospel account: Peter had the best case for “just war” there ever was. As the soldiers are coming to get Jesus, and here he is very innocently—just picks up his sword and cuts off one of their ears—first of all, not a great shot—but Jesus looks at him and he scolds him and says, “he who picks up the sword, dies by the sword. I could have called down legions of angels, [but] that’s not how my revolution happens.” And after that, he [Jesus] picks up the ear and heals the wounded persecutor. Right—and there’s so much power in that. And the early Christians said, “when Jesus disarmed Peter, he disarmed every Christian.”25

Beyond this criticism of war, Claiborne has similarly been promoting what some in the Christian Right would undoubtedly see as heretical. Case in point is a liturgical reading Claiborne leads while the cameras of Moffett’s documentary were rolling. Standing on stage in front of hundreds of gathered worshipers, Claiborne proclaims, “With governments that kill…” “We will not comply,” comes the congregational response: Shane Claiborne: “With the theology of empire…” Congregation Response: “We will not comply.” Shane Claiborne: “With the business of militarism…” Congregation Response: “We will not comply.”

24

Ibid. Shane Claiborne, “Such a Thing as ‘Just War?’ Shane Claiborne,” Video Interview, 2009. Found online at: (Accessed January 6, 2011). 25

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Chapter Nine Shane Claiborne: “With the hoarding of riches…” Congregation Response: “We will not comply.” Shane Claiborne: “With the dissemination of fear…” Congregation Response: “We will not comply.”26

Increasingly, the message of nonviolence and social justice which Claiborne has spent a lifetime preaching seems to be catching among other evangelical Christians. Among those deeply committed to the tenets of the social gospel is Jerry Maneker, who hosts a website called, Radical Christianity. On it, Maneker declares: Jesus was a radical and, hence, countercultural and, as Christians, we are to be radical and countercultural as well! We are never to be satisfied with a status quo that allows assorted social ills such as poverty, corruption in institutions, discrimination of any kind, or the creation of out-groups that are then demonized and discriminated against ‘in the name of God,’ to go unchallenged.27

By seeking to draw attention to not only the poor, but an economic system which allows poverty to persist, Maneker is working to highlight the cause of so-called “radical Christianity,” or what is at other times referred to as “new-monasticism.” Briefly, radical Christianity is the belief that Christians are called to rise above petty partisan political squabbles and instead live in service to one another. And far from being a fringe movement on the evangelical periphery, new-monasticism is a movement catching on among younger evangelicals. As Claiborne states, “young evangelicals have done something really dangerous. We picked up our Bibles and we read them.” In doing so, Claiborne claims that this action has put younger evangelicals “at odds with the evangelical establishment.” Adding, “when we looked at the Moral Majority [and other Christian Right groups], we saw the inconsistency of the church.”28 As Claiborne sees it, past political dichotomies of “left” and “right” are not all that important to younger evangelicals. Instead, for younger evangelicals, the distinction that matters the most is between “nice” and 26

Jamie Moffett, “Movie Trailer for The Ordinary Radicals,” Jamie Moffett Media Design and Production, 2008. Found online at: (Accessed June 14, 2011). 27 Jerry Maneker, “Radical Christianity,” Radical Christianity, 2010. Found online at: (Accessed January 6, 2011). 28 Pam Chamberlain, “Younger Evangelicals: Where will they take the Christian Right?” The Public Eye Magazine 24, no. 1 (2009). Found online at: (Accessed September 2, 2010).

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“mean.” Unsurprisingly, Claiborne sees himself and others like him as “political misfits,” a label he eagerly embraces, as he continues traveling the country preaching a message of inclusion and love.29 Ben Corey is another self-described “misfit.” Born and raised a Baptist, Corey found a new home among the emergent Christian community in Boston after being “pushed out” of his previous church for having expressed favorable views towards the work of Rob Bell, another emergent Christian and author of the popular book, Velvet Elvis.30 As Corey recounts, “my wife and I really became devastated in a way that a whole social network had kind of collapsed because people thought I was a messenger of Satan because I like Rob Bell. The whole thing was absurd, but we lost a lot of friends.”31 Still, Corey and his wife were determined to make the best of a bad situation. Without ties holding them back, they decided to move to Boston where they attended graduate school. During that first week in Boston Corey bumped into some fellow evangelicals who, like him, were “disgruntled about the evangelical movement” and “felt like outcasts.”32 One of these individuals told Corey about Emergent Village. As Corey recalls: When they described things to me, I was like, ‘Holy shit, I’m Emergent,’ and so I called Jeff [Gentry], the founder of the Emergent Village cohort, and I had coffee with him and we just started talking and I realized that I wasn’t an outcast but that there was actually a whole movement for people just like me. And I finally found a place where I could be accepted and be myself and not worry about people not being your friend because you might have a different theological perspective than them. It was really life changing for me.”33

For Corey, Emergent Village is much more than a theological home where he can find other religious “misfits” like himself.34 Crucially, with its recognition that issues of social and economic justice are the core of the Gospel message, it enables him to do the good work he sees as defining him as a Christian. As Corey sees it, the best way to address these issues is by “putting your words into action in the here and now, and not just talking about it at church on Sunday.”35 As Corey further states, “A lot of 29

Ibid. Personal Interview with Ben Corey on Emergent Village, July 7, 2009. 31 Ibid. 32 Ibid. 33 Ibid. 34 Ibid. 35 Ibid. 30

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people I’ve talked to in the Emergent conversation, just didn’t think evangelicals were doing enough good, and they found other people who were far more involved.”36 In many ways Corey Beals shares Ben Corey’s passion for doing more. Yet Beals is not a member of Emergent Village, nor does he describe himself as an emerging Christian. Instead, Beals is a respected advocate for creation care and a board member with Restoring Eden. As we shall see in later chapters, Beals views the creation care movement as much more than environmental protection. It is instead a part of the larger prolife movement that rests on the belief that Christians are called to be in service to one another. Knowing this helps explain Beals’s passion in tackling issues such as social justice and poverty, a passion he shares with his many students at George Fox University, a prestigious evangelical university located in the Pacific Northwest. As Beals noted over coffee: And I say to my students, the Bible doesn’t tell us to love everyone, that’s easy to do, ‘cause loving everyone means that I don’t really have to love anyone. But the Bible tells us to love anyone. You know, I think the root of the Good Samaritan isn’t “who is my neighbor;” the point is not “Do I love the whole world?” Every beauty pageant person loves the whole world and wants world peace, right? We all want that. But it’s easy for me to love the whole world; it’s just particular persons I can’t stand. So what we’re trying to do [is love] particular persons. That’s where it becomes hard. Whether it’s your roommate, or the person down the street who’s being ignored—it’s not some glorious poverty like in India, but it’s poverty, and it’s real needs. So some of these people we can’t ignore. We can’t choose who our neighbors are.37

And it seems Beals’s message of committing oneself to the less fortunate is having a real impact on his students. As Beals further notes: I had one student who chose to intentionally live in the poorest part of Newburg, [with] neighbors who were fatherless, and just sort of had reached out to them. Through their living, they just rented this house in the poorest part of Newburg and were able to love their neighbor. Part of it is putting yourself in your neighbor’s way, putting yourself with people who have needs. I get really discouraged when I look at a lot of things in this world. It gets really easy to think, “man, you know, where are we going and why are we in this kind of basket?” I’ll look at these students, and they take them and they’ll go and run ahead of me, and in their very doing that, they challenge me with the very things I’ve taught them to go further. It’s

36

Ibid. Personal Interview with Corey Beals on Creation Care, May 21, 2009.

37

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very inspiring and it’s in those kinds of people where we’re going to find hope, because they’re deeply committed, they get it and they’re not caught up in the dichotomous politics.38

*** In 1969, economist Thomas Schelling demonstrated that despite the fact that Americans were largely supportive of the civil rights movement, most would prefer to live in neighborhoods where racial integration was limited. In analyzing his findings, Schelling concluded that unorganized segregation often bears no close relation to individual intent, but is rather the result of a complex system of collective activity. In later years, Mark Buchanan, building upon Thomas Schelling’s thesis on systems of collective activity, argued that social realities are often fashioned not by individual desire, but rather by blind and mechanical forces. Like other forms of media, it is important to view the Internet as one of these forces and despite early claims from technological utopists, it has led many like-minded individuals and organizations to converge into increasingly specialized niche clusters. As the Internet continues to reorient society away from large collective gatherings, it is, as Nicholas Carr notes, steadily displacing the unifying effects of broadcast media by offering audiences specially tailored markets that often appeal to deep personal desires. Evangelical Christianity has shown little immunity to the social effects of the new media environment. Indeed, over the past few years, the creation care movement, which has flourished in the Internet age, has incurred considerable scorn from several evangelical leaders and organizations, many of whom view evangelical environmentalism as a subversive liberal plot aimed at undermining the cultural values and political hegemony of the Christian Right. As attacks on creation care groups and individuals have intensified, the evangelical community has witnessed a deterioration of important collective bonds, which allows internal feelings of distrust and animosity to fester. A similar story has unfolded on the emerging church front. However unlike the creation care movement, which continues to enjoy considerable support within the evangelical mainstream, the emerging church movement increasingly finds itself operating outside the broader evangelical apparatus. Not only do many emergent gatherings take place in non-traditional places of worship, such as cafes, bars and even private residences, but the cultural orientation of the emerging church places it in 38

Ibid.

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direct conflict with the values of the Christian Right. This is because many emerging Christians view past political conflicts which pitted liberal against conservative, left versus right, as overly simplistic and missing the bigger biblical message; namely that Christians are called to be in service to one another. In another respect, emerging Christianity has little choice but to serve as the religious refuge for disgruntled and/or excommunicated evangelicals. Ben Corey’s statements attesting to his own excommunication experience stand as a testament to the appeal an organization such as Emergent Village holds, particularly to individuals whose probing of deep theological and philosophical questions can be unwelcome in more conservative churches. In such situations, the rejection from one religious community opens the door to acceptance within another, albeit one that seemingly has fewer and fewer reasons to remain connected to the old evangelical order. The loss of this connectivity, coupled with a reorientation of social and cultural values, is dramatically reshaping the evangelical political agenda. Undoubtedly, much of this cultural reorientation can be attributed to changing times and demographics. For instance, many younger evangelicals are significantly more likely to have an openly gay friend than their parents or grandparents and this makes them more likely to be empathetic to the struggles of the gay rights movement. At the same time, a growing awareness of environmental concerns among respected evangelical organizations and church leaders, as well as the influence of dissident religious elements stressing the social gospel message of economic justice and opposition to war and militarism, is working to moderate many evangelical political views. The Internet and Evangelicals survey has shown in particular that individuals aligned with the affiliate organizations of the selected case studies are more politically moderate than that of the broader evangelical community. Already, the acceptance of the creation care and emerging church movement by many evangelicals has had profound repercussions for America’s religious and political landscape. Among these repercussions is a change in cultural attitudes, which is significantly expanding the political and social concerns of American evangelicals. By embracing such issues as environmental protection, economic justice, and combating human trafficking, coupled with a growing propensity to vote for Democratic candidates, recent changes in the evangelical community demand a recalculation of the American political landscape. Nowhere is this more evident than with regards to the environment and the creation care movement.

CHAPTER TEN JESUS SAVES (THE ENVIRONMENT)

Unlike Catholics, whose theology has for centuries been profoundly influenced by environmentalists such as Saint Francis of Assisi (the patron saint of animals and the environment), and mainline Protestants, who for a variety of reasons have been more willing to embrace the discoveries of modern environmental science, evangelicals are relative newcomers to environmental activism. Several factors account for this delay. Part of it has to do with a general mistrust of science ingrained in the evangelical psyche following the infamous Scopes Monkey Trial, while other reasons relate more directly to their literal interpretations of scripture and eschatological beliefs themselves.1 For instance, the most dire warnings issued by climatologists often deal with the flooding of coastal cities and regions. For many of us such warnings are perfectly logical, as the water from melting arctic ice has to go somewhere. Yet the evangelical mindset is steeped in foundationalism, according to which the Bible is the ultimate source of authority and truth. Thus, when this perspective is combined with a working knowledge of biblical scripture, it becomes easier to understand why such large parts of the evangelical population would remain skeptical of scientists who claim that flood or drought will soon be upon us. In the eighth chapter of the Book of Genesis, after the flood, God promises Noah that humanity will never again know such a terrible fate. The rainbow is to act as a continued reminder of this covenant. Similarly, many American evangelicals subscribe to “premillennial dispensationalism,” a strand of end-times eschatology that found its way into the evangelical mainstream thanks to the published works of Hal Lindsey and Tim LaHaye.2 For pre-millennial dispensationalists, environmental matters have historically been of little concern, as the effects of ecological destruction are not expected to be felt until after the second coming of Christ. Armed with this understanding, evangelicals have taken 1

See Hendershot, “God’s Angriest Man;” see also, Moen, “Evolving Politics;” and Carpenter, “Fundamentalist Institutions.” 2 See Lindsey and Carlson, 1970; see also, LaHaye and Jenkins, 1996.

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Christ’s imminent return as a cue to focus on issues more pressing than the environment and have accordingly devoted themselves to the moral and spiritual purification of one’s soul and society at large.3 As we’ve also seen, when evangelicals first rose to political prominence during the 1970s and 1980s, available media technologies similarly empowered religious leaders such as Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson to largely direct the collective energies of American evangelism, which they did in their crusade for an American Theocracy. As a result, concern about environmental degradation was greatly neglected, as environmentalism itself was framed as a liberal issue. It was not until 1967 that environmentalism even began to register in the evangelical movement, and not in a positive way. Environmentalism was introduced to evangelicals via the publication of Lynn White Jr.’s essay “The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis.”4 White made a simple yet effective argument, proposing that although it was the industrial revolution of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries that gave humanity the means to destroy nature on a large scale, the mentality which permitted such destruction was set in place centuries before, thanks to Christianity’s emphasis on so-called “dominion theology.” In short, dominion theology is the belief that God gave humans dominion over all manner of life on earth, and that while “man” may be made of clay (earth), “he” is not simply a part of nature, but rather made in the image of God. Such a belief, White argued, “not only established a dualism of man and nature but also insisted that it is God’s will that man exploit nature for his proper ends.”5 White’s analysis, of course, was seen by evangelicals as an attack on the faith, and it therefore served to further increase the distrust of science which many evangelicals already held. For the next three decades, insofar as evangelicals were concerned, environmental matters were largely seen as the prerogative of the political and secular left.

The Historical Roots of Evangelical Environmental Activism In 1996, however, a remarkable and quite unexpected shift began to occur in the evangelical body, which was evidenced when congressional 3

See Brian McCammack, “Hot Damned America: Evangelicalism and the Climate Change Policy Debate,” American Quarterly 59, no. 3 (2007): 645-668. 4 Lynn White, Jr., “The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis,” Science 155, no. 3767 (1067): 1203-7. 5 Ibid., 1205.

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Republicans opposed the Endangered Species Act. Leading the campaign against the act was Representative Richard Pombo, a California Republican who was also Chair of the House Resource Committee. From the outset he expected a fight from America’s many environmental groups, but did not expect to be “damned by a group of self-styled conservative Christians” who viewed his efforts as an affront to God’s creation.6 One group of evangelicals supporting the Endangered Species Act was the Evangelical Environmental Network (EEN). In response, a spokesman from Pombo’s office released a statement asserting that the environmental Christians who were opposing his efforts were in reality “a front group for Clinton/Gore,” and that “[t]he Evangelical Environmental Network [was] directly linked to the Environmental Information Center, which is staffed by Democrats and funded by some of the largest left-wing foundations in the country.”7 Yet Pombo’s attacks only added to the determination of the EEN and other evangelical environmentalists. As a result, media buys and lobbying efforts by evangelicals were stepped up. In a recent interview, Peter Illyn, formerly of the EEN and now president of Restoring Eden, recalled his own encounter with Pombo: I went by his office and I told his staff, that I just wanted the congressman to know that I’m one of those Christian environmentalists, and I’m a Four Square pastor, and I certainly hope the congressman doesn’t think the Four Square church is liberal, because we’re not, we’re conservative. And then I left and was out the door and not more than ten feet down the hall when I hear, “Sir. Sir, the congressman would like to meet with you.” And I went in and met with the congressman, and the congressman is sitting there and trying to explain to me why the endangered species list isn’t really working. And I remember looking at him and saying, “but congressman, driving species to extinction is sin.” And I watched him, not blanch, but not know how to respond to this message. And it was very emboldening for me to realize that you could make a difference politically. That sure money was involved; but that at the end of the day, money doesn’t mean a thing if they don’t have the support of the voters.8

Faced with a growing and increasingly public dispute with evangelicals, coupled with low public support, congressional Republicans had few options but to abandon their opposition to the Endangered Species Act. In doing so, Republicans handed a significant victory to environmentalists 6

Gayle M. B. Hanson, “To Green Fundamentalists; Earth is a Close Second,” Insight on the News, September 2, 1996. Found online at: (Accessed January 16, 2010). 7 Ibid. 8 Illyn interview.

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and, more importantly, ceded important political ground to an upstart evangelical movement that did not conform to the established contours of America’s religious body. In the years that followed, the EEN built on these efforts, which some openly referred to as the saving of humanity’s modern day Noah’s Ark, and went on to establish creation care as a legitimate concern of the evangelical project.9 In 2002 the EEN conducted the “What Would Jesus Drive?” campaign for more fuel-efficient cars. Armed with fact sheets, bumper stickers and a pool of eager volunteers, the EEN published books and took the message on the road. While traveling the country, EEN members took full advantage of the dense religious networks of the evangelical community and sought to leverage this social capital to further their religious and political ends. While speaking before their fellow evangelicals, the EEN sought to educate these congregations on what they believed to be the Bible’s mandated stewardship of God’s creation. In 2006, the EEN was a major supporter of the Evangelical Climate Initiative (ECI), a statement which called for “federal legislation that would require reductions in carbon dioxide emissions.”10 Among the eighty-six evangelical leaders who signed the ECI, thirty-nine were presidents from evangelical colleges, while several others were pastors at some of the largest churches in the country, including Rick Warren of Saddleback, the author of The PurposeDriven Life, one of America’s all-time best-selling books, which to date has sold in excess of 30 million copies. While it is difficult to quantify the effects of the ECI, it is important to bear in mind that evangelicals have historically been greatly influenced by trusted religious leaders and opinion makers.11

Creation Care and Evangelical Tensions As a result of these highly publicized campaigns, the EEN found itself under considerable attack from influential evangelical leaders, with both Pat Robertson and Terry Watkins crying “blasphemy.” In a more focused 9

Peter Steinfels, “Evangelical Group Defends Laws Protecting Endangered Species as a Modern Noah’s Ark,” The New York Times, January 31, 1996. Found online at: (Accessed July 8, 2011). 10 Laurie Goodstein, “Evangelical Leaders Join Global Warming Initiative,” The New York Times, February 8, 2006. Found online at: (Accessed July 8, 2011). 11 Rick Warren, The Purpose-Driven Life: What on Earth am I Here For? (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2002).

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effort to curb what they saw as evangelical environmentalism gone too far, Charles Colson, with the help of Richard Land (president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, which serves as the political arm of America’s largest protestant denomination), James Dobson (founder of Focus on the Family), and the Southern Baptist Convention, launched the Interfaith Stewardship Alliance and the We Get It! campaign. Together, these efforts sought to restrain the creation care movement by portraying it as harmful to those living in the developing world, as well as to the broader ambitions of the evangelical community. Although the Interfaith Stewardship Alliance and the We Get It! campaign remain actively engaged in the evangelical environmental debate, creation care proponents are skeptical that either effort will find much favor among younger evangelicals. This is because such efforts rely on a dualism which younger evangelicals are quick to reject. As Corey Beals, professor of Philosophy and Religion at evangelical George Fox University, explains: [The environmental question has] been framed in a very dualistic way in terms of pitting humans versus animals, or humans versus the earth. So evangelicals have answered that question the best they know how: “If I have to choose between a whale and a baby, I’m going to choose a baby.” And so, because the question has been framed that way, evangelicals have been thinking they’ve been choosing life by defending humans over nature. Today’s students reject that dualism; they see it as a false dichotomy. You’ll say “babies or whales?” and they’ll say “yes!”12

Thus by reframing the issue as a matter of theological importance, the creation care movement has largely been successful in unloading environmental activism of much of its political baggage. When otherwise conservative leaders such as Rick Warren champion environmental causes, they are tearing down the political dichotomies of the left and right and instead making the matter of protecting the environment an issue of doing God’s will. As a result, the voices of evangelical opposition to creation care are beginning to thin as increasing numbers are joining the ranks of Cizik and Illyn. For instance, just two years after the success of the What Would Jesus Drive? campaign, a poll commissioned for PBS’s “Religion and Ethics Newsweekly” found that 45% of evangelicals believed that combating the effects of climate change was an extremely or very important issue,13 while a more recent 2009 poll conducted by Pew Forum found that 58% of white evangelicals believed there to be solid evidence 12

Beals interview. See McCammack, 2007.

13

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that the earth is indeed warming.14 Even the once hostile Pat Robertson now regularly discusses the importance of environmental stewardship on his Christian Broadcasting Network show The 700 Club and has made an appearance in a national environmental advertising campaign with the decidedly liberal Al Sharpton. Moreover, when one considers the demographics of American evangelicals, as well as on-going shifts in the evangelical body, it should come as little surprise that efforts such as the We Get It! campaign likely pose little threat to the creation care movement. Peter Illyn remarks that such attacks fail “because it [is] the far right yelling things to the far right.”15 And while admittedly men such as Colson and Dobson have historically garnered tremendous social and political clout, and for that matter continue to do so today, followers of their ministries, like the men themselves, are aging. While more than two thousand stations nationwide carry Dobson’s daily radio message, it is difficult to imagine many college-age evangelicals tuning in to hear the thoughts and views of the seventy-three-year-old Dobson. Today’s reality is that the evangelical vanguard that came to define the culture wars of the 1980s and 1990s is being culturally displaced by younger, more politically-open evangelical leaders. These new leaders have increasingly taken the reins of the evangelical project and are refocusing evangelical priorities on what many view as the Bible’s social gospel.

The Political Sophistication of Evangelical Environmentalism In an effort to convert this growing theological support for environmental protection into public policy, some creation care organizations are becoming more assertive in their activism and are showing signs of greater political sophistication. For example, although Restoring Eden has an established history of campaigning against mountaintop mining—whereby the summits of mountains are removed in order to gain access to the deposits inside (usually coal)—they have found past efforts, which typically involved lobbying members of Congress and sending small groups of activists to protest at the mining sites themselves, to be insufficient. Recently, therefore, Restoring Eden has been inviting church 14

Pew Forum Staff Writer, “Religious Groups’ Views on Global Warming,” Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, 2009. Found online at: (Accessed January 16, 2010). 15 Illyn interview.

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leaders and youth groups from influential churches in key congressional districts across the country to join them in “camping expeditions” in the Appalachian region where most US coal deposits are located. While there, these churchgoers witness firsthand the environmental impact of mountaintop mining and are encouraged to spread the word to their own families, congregations, and local communities, as well as to petition their members of Congress and to contact local media outlets.16 In adopting this approach, Restoring Eden is not only helping to ensure that future evangelical generations grow up with strong environmental values, but they are also engaging in more effective and calculated political actions by building important bridges between their organization and members of the evangelical community who might otherwise never be exposed to the creation care message. In this way, Restoring Eden is quite cleverly strengthening the values of their organization by leveraging the social capital of influential church leaders from geographically and politically significant areas. Similarly, Renewal, arguably the nation’s largest gathering of collegeage evangelical environmentalists, not so long ago concluded their 2009 “Green Awakening Campus Tour,” which took Renewal speakers and activists to forty-six university campuses, where local environmental issues were highlighted and students afforded the opportunity to engage in the political process at the local level. In addition to reaching tens of thousands of college-age evangelicals, Renewal’s “Green Awakening Campus Tour” also garnered the attention of several of the most prominent evangelical media outlets, including “Christianity Today,” the Christian Broadcasting Network, Crosswalk.com and the “Prime Time America” radio address of the Moody Bible Institute.17 Likewise, secular environmental groups have added a further dynamic to the creation care movement, as some are now reaching out to form important working relationships with their Christian counterparts. Sustain Lane, a popular online environmental community, recognized the importance of having evangelicals on the side of the environment after the election of President Obama. Cris Bisch, who manages the creation care forum for sustainlane.com, says the following about the origins of this partnership:

16

Ibid. Renewal Staff Writer, “Green Awakening Tour Report,” Caring for Creation, 2009. Found online at: (Accessed January 16, 2010). 17

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Chapter Ten So when James [the Sustainlane.com Managing Director] contacted me, he said, “You know, we’ve got a new [US] president coming in. He’s opening the doors to environmental change in our country. There’s been a lot of division going on in our country, and we want to be a place where the left and the right can come together and be able to dialogue and be able to hear what each has to say and not be fragmented.” He [James] had a vision to see where this new president wanted to take the country and how important the roles of organizations like Sustain Lane are in bringing about this transformation. Because we are in transition in our country and hopefully it’s going to be in the right direction, and when we are dialoguing, we are talking together and we are laying down our differences.18

Several recent projects focused on climate change have also looked at strengthening relations between the scientific and evangelical communities. In 2007, for instance, the University of Akron hosted the “Friendship Project,” a gathering of twenty-five scientists and evangelical ministers in an effort to “stop global warming and address other major environmental issues such as massive species losses.”19 Dr. Stephen Weeks, a professor of biology at the University’s Integrated Bioscience Program, spoke to the important role that such forums play in bridging social divides, so that scientists and evangelicals can “band together to stem the loss of ‘the creation.’”20 Similarly, expeditions that take teams of environmental scientists and evangelical leaders to view the effects of climate change, such as melting glaciers, are becoming commonplace. Such joint ventures are likely to go a long way in addressing many of the historical antagonisms separating science and faith. As Richard Cizik has commented, “we are on the verge of an evangelical awakening to the global environmental crisis. But an even more significant accomplishment will occur when the worlds of religion and science come together in a spirit of reconciliation.”21 He adds that while evangelicals and scientists may disagree on how the world came into existence, there is “no 18

Personal Interview with Cris Bisch on Sustain Lane and the creation care movement, May 16, 2009. 19 University of Akron News Staff Writer, “University Hosts Global Warming/Environmental Friendship Group,” University of Akron News, August 31, 2007. Found online at: (Accessed January 16, 2010). 20 Ibid. 21 Richard Cizik, “Warming Up to Creation Care,” Prairie F ire, February 2008. Found online at: (Accessed January 16, 2010).

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disagreement about whether that world deserves protection.”22

From Evangelical Interest Groups to an Evangelical Interest To presume that creation care remains a minor theological movement relegated to the fringes of the evangelical community is to ignore not only polling data illustrating just the opposite, but a flood of empirical evidence. For instance, across the United States, a number of evangelical congregations have already emerged around themes of “creation stewardship” or are otherwise re-envisioning their mission outreach to include just that. For evidence of this, one need look no further than in the most conservative of conservative states, Idaho, where Boise Vineyard not only enjoys a thriving evangelical congregation of several thousand, but also a position of prominent leadership within the community. Similarly, Ann Arbor, Michigan’s own Vineyard Church, has shown itself to be equally committed to the cause of evangelical environmentalism as that of their Boise brethren. Yet of all the numerous examples of the greening of evangelical denominations, few stories speak as powerfully as the tale of students at George Fox University.

The Riverbend Dump Expansion Nestled in the heart of the Willamette Valley is the bedroom community of Newburg, Oregon, home to the state’s first Quaker community and George Fox University, one of the nation’s more prominent evangelical colleges. By almost every account, there is little which distinguishes Newburg from the thousands of other exurb communities just like it. In the center of town and under the ever-present banner of the Stars and Stripes, small ma and pa shops continue to dot Main Street, though more recognizable franchises have begun their encroachment. Clustered around these shops is an eclectic collection of student housing and well-to-do craftsmen homes. Further away from town, though still within city limits, one can find the hallmarks of the American suburbs, Taco Bell, McDonalds, Fred Meyers. Beyond this point, Newburg quickly disappears and you instead find yourself in a sparsely populated landscape used predominantly by poultry farmers and others affiliated with the meat industry.

22

Ibid.

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Politically speaking, Newburg is a moderately conservative town. In 2008 the county of Yamhill, of which Newburg is the county seat, favored McCain over Obama 50% to 48%.23 Undoubtedly, much of this political conservatism can be directly attributed to the area’s large evangelical population, though Newburg’s proximity to Portland, one of America’s more liberal bastions, does bring some balance. Yet given Newburg’s conservative leanings, it was unsurprising when in late 2009 the Yamhill County Commission voted 2-0 in favor of expanding the Riverbend Landfill, a move which clearly favored industry over the environment. Equally unsurprising was the reaction from a number of environmentalists and other environmental groups, which argued quite correctly that any expansion of the present site, which would subsequently receive the bulk of its waste from neighboring Washington County, risked further damage to the local environment and more specifically the south fork of the Yamhill River, which is already heavily polluted due in part to runoff and seepage from the present Riverbend site.24 Moreover, as the Commission’s decision to expand the current dump site required the rezoning of land previously designated exclusively for the use of farming, a number of other groups unaffiliated with the environmental movement, such as the Yamhill County Farm Bureau and the Willamette Valley Wineries Association, joined in opposition.25 Any county commission could have easily seen these political tensions coming. What few in the community saw coming, however, was vocal opposition to the Riverbend expansion from the students of George Fox University. George Fox, after all is an evangelical university with reliably solid conservative leanings. For the students at George Fox, environmental protection is not a matter of conservative vs. liberal, left vs. right, Republican vs. Democrat. Instead, environmental protection, or “creation care,” is a biblical commandment and thus a matter of theological importance. Their story 23 For complete Oregon County election results see: (Accessed February 16, 2010). 24 It should be noted that the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality rates water quality in the south fork of the Yamhill River as “poor” in the autumn, winter and spring and as “fair” in summer. Much of this pollution is due to high phosphates counts, commonly found in rivers near areas of heavy animal farming. A full ODEQ report can be found online at: (Accessed February 16, 2010). 25 Scott Learn, “Riverbend Landfill Opponents Appeal Yamhill County’s Expansion Vote,” The Oregonian, January 5, 2010. Found online at: (Accessed February 16, 2010).

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begins during the 2008/2009 academic school year when George Fox philosophy professor Corey Beals, like many local residents of Newburg, became aware of Waste Management’s desire to expand the existing Riverbend dump site. Stirred into action, Beals invited “Waste Not” a leading opponent of the expansion to speak to his class about the landfill and how “political fights such as this might impact ethics in the context of philosophy.”26 “Waste Not” sent Ramsey Phillips, a local farmer and selfdescribed “gay, tree-loving greenie” to address the students of George Fox. In all, Phillips spoke to just two classes, but that was more than enough for the Riverbend issue to be taken up at the next meeting of “Quaere Verum” (Latin for “seek the truth”), a student led group at the university. It was at this point that Quaere Verum decided to draft a statement opposing the Riverbend expansion. Throughout the course of the 13 hour county commission meeting on the Riverbend expansion, tempers flared. Yet when the students of George Fox began addressing the assembled crowd, the atmosphere in the room shifted dramatically. As Beals notes: The spokesperson for the group (Quaere Verum) went up and read their statement, and it was a really contentious environment, everyone was there from the trash folks, to those who thought this was going to be threatening jobs, [and they] were on one side, and those who were for the environment were on the other, and it was an embattled sort of atmosphere. But they (Quaere Verum) came up and said, “you know, we really think this is a big problem, this trash. And we really need to find some solution to it, but we also realize that we are a part of that problem, because we all make trash, and probably more than we should. And they were the only people to take any blame for the problem, and it sort of changed the whole tone of the discussion and it was beautiful to see it, and some of the folks (environmentalists) who were advocating for this, but who weren’t Christian emailed me afterwards and told me that “that was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard, what your students said.” And it was just so refreshing because they get it. They get it in a deep way and were able to come at it with an attitude of humility. There’s a lot of self righteousness in this discussion and I’ve been guilty of that, but they even challenged me, and challenged others by example, saying “let’s step-up here.” And the conversation after that, the testimony started saying, “you know, however this turns out we really should be able to come together and figure out a

26 E-mail Interview with Ramsey McPhillips on The Riverbend Landfill expansion and the students of George Fox University, January 13, 2010.

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Chapter Ten solution to this, whether the commission approves this or not, we need to come up with something better than what’s on the table.”27

Phillips similarly shared: I have been devastated by the loss of my family's 150 year old family farm to this unnecessary destruction of our resources by the landfill and yet, the one bright moment that I always return to is that night, with those kids when they finished reading their letter in front of the two Commissioners. You could hear a pin drop. One of our group leaned over to me at this moment and said, “Ramsey, this may very well be your highest accomplishment in this fight.” I was very, very proud to be in their company and was for a fleeting moment, “born again.”28

For its part, the Quaere Verum statement read: We are students at George Fox University, committed to growing in word and deed. We meet weekly to educate ourselves about life and the challenges it contains, striving in all things to seek the Truth. When we became aware of the present issue involving the people of Yamhill County, Waste Management, Riverbend Landfill and the Yamhill River, we were compelled to become a part of this constructive dialogue about our community and the place in which we live. We hold in high regard God's creation, and are held responsible to cultivate life within it, and as young people, we see within ourselves the desire to change our lifestyles for the betterment of our environment and our neighbors. With these convictions in mind, we are greatly concerned with the plan to expand Waste Management’s facility. Its encroachment upon the banks of the river would only encourage our unsustainable life practices that promote a “throw-away” society, ignorant of the fundamental connection between the environment and the community. Because of this, we are lead to question its rightness and its efficacy within our community in Yamhill County. The local environment should be able to be enjoyed for years to come, not used until it loses its intrinsic value. In considering the importance of caring for the environment, we understand that the river, the sky, and the land have no divisions, and that to be responsible for the environment is also to be responsible for our neighbors who share our resources. To reject this idea both devalues the neighbor and their property. The call to live in community, making peace with our neighbors is equally valued. Our politics too often stagnate in pools of apathy and hyper-individualism, fostering decisions that are ill-made and further isolating. What excites and draws us to this issue is the energized focus of 27

Beals interview. McPhillips interview.

28

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the community. It would be unfortunate to suspend this energy by coming too promptly to a conclusion without fully engaging the issue and considering all options. We do not envy the position of Waste Management. Expanding their facility is a sure option for the sustained success of their business. But what of the sustainability of our community? We have become aware that there are alternatives to expanding the Riverbend Landfill, and we can research and support companies that are working on lessening our need for landfills in the first place. As members of the Yamhill community, and as Oregonians, we are willing to share the burden of uncertainty along with Waste Management. We are willing to recognize that we who throw away trash are just as responsible for environmental damage as those who store it. Above all, we desire to continue learning together through dialogue the best way for us to live together. In keeping with this conviction, we advocate for an alternative solution that allows for mutual creativity in the future, rather than a hasty and singular decision at the present moment.29

In many important respects, creation care represents an historic and politically important shift among American evangelical Christians and one which in a relatively short period of time, has seemingly garnered a majority of support within the evangelical community.30 For instance, while a number of evangelical environmental groups already exist— groups such as the Evangelical Environmental Network, Restoring Eden and Renewal—by its very nature Quaere Verum is not one of them. Instead, the students of Quaere Verum are interested in pressing social and religious issues more broadly. The fact that they would see fit to include creation care as one of these priorities speaks not only to the favored status environmental protection now receives among many evangelicals, and in particular younger evangelicals, but it also bodes well for future environmental efforts. Increasingly, evangelical Christianity is picking up on this change. At George Fox University, for instance, some 7% of the student body is majoring in engineering, where much attention is given to sustainable engineering, with courses taught on environmental engineering and renewable energy.31 Similarly, several seminaries across the United States 29 Quare Verum’s “Statement Regarding Yamhill County - Riverbend Landfill Expansion,” (2009). Provided by Ramsey McPhillips. 30 Pew Forum Staff Writer, “Religious Groups’ Views on Global Warming,” Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, April 16, 2009. Found online at: (Accessed July 8, 2011). 31 E-mail Interview with GFU Staff Member Mandee Spotts on George Fox University and student majors, February 25, 2010.

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have adopted courses on the environment. Among these seminaries are Denver Seminary, Mars Hill and a glut of mainline seminaries, such as Duke, Emory, and Boston University, where many evangelicals train all the same.

The Political Impacts of Evangelical Environmental Activism Although there remain Christians who are not at all interested in combating climate change, and even some who label the creation care movement as heretical, evangelical environmentalism continues to leave its mark on Washington. As recent polls show, evangelicals are warming to the idea of environmental ministries, and in the United States, where religion and politics so often go hand-in-hand, theological shifts such as this have important political ramifications. Meanwhile, there is an abundance of evidence to suggest that congressional Republicans and even conservative Democrats are waking to this new reality. For instance, one of the most vocal congressional opponents of creation care is the Republican Senator James Inhofe from Oklahoma, former chair of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, and himself an evangelical. When Inhofe was once asked what he thought of Cizik’s ministry, he replied that it was “something very strange,” adding, “you can always find in Scriptures a passage to misquote for almost anything.”32 Yet more recently Inhofe, who has in the past called global warming a hoax and compared the Environmental Protection Agency to the Gestapo, surprised many on Capitol Hill by joining the likes of Senators John Kerry and Barbara Boxer, two prominent Democrats, to support legislation requiring the Environmental Protection Agency to assess options for cleaning up black carbon emissions.33 Certainly such a move is uncharacteristic for Inhofe, yet, as has been pointed out to the Republican Party, “evangelicals make up a hundred million Americans. They are from forty to fifty percent of the conservative base of the GOP” and although evangelicals were apparently willing to give George W. Bush a pass with regards to the environment, “a new 32 Michael Janofsky, “When Cleaner Air Is a Biblical Obligation,” The New York Times, November 7, 2005. Found online at: (Accessed July 8, 2011). 33 Laurie Goodstein, “Evangelical Leaders Swing Influence Behind Effort to Combat Global Warming,” The New York Times, March 10, 2005. Found online at:

(Accessed September 6, 2011).

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generation of evangelicals may desert the Grand Old Party for its lack of facing up to the environmental future.”34 It is likely, for these reasons, that Inhofe and other Republican senators have recently and quite publicly called for greater environmental protection. For instance, the staunchly conservative Senator Sam Brownback of Kansas recently spoke of the role religious leaders are playing in forging a middle ground in the environmental debate. Although Brownback is not fully convinced that humanity is responsible for climate change, he welcomes “‘prudent’ steps recommended by some religious leaders to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.”35 Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, another favorite among many evangelicals, went one step further when he chose to announce his support for the Senate climate bill he was co-authoring with Senator John Kerry by writing an op-ed piece in the New York Times.36 Democrats, long concerned by the defection of evangelical voters to the Republican Party, have sought to cultivate relationships within the evangelical community and have done so quite successfully via creation care. This is so as on this issue, Democrats are by-and-large in much greater agreement with creation care than are their Republican counterparts. It is for this reason that groups such as Restoring Eden and Renewal have found themselves in continuous contact with the Obama White House. And in what appears to be a gesture to their creation care allies, the Obama administration has tackled some of these groups’ highest environmental priorities, as demonstrated by its recent EPA announcement issuing new guidelines to protect Appalachian communities from the harmful effects of mountaintop removal. Furthermore, the budding relationship between evangelical environmentalists and the Democratic Party provides both groups with mutual benefits. On the creation care front, leaders such as Peter Illyn and Ben Lowe, who in past years have had their agenda ignored by the evangelical community and Republicans alike, now find themselves with a seat at the table, while Democrats by contrast, have found that the creation care movement not only provides political cover to push through various aspects of their environmental 34

Cizik, “Warming Up to Creation Care.” Brian Winter, “Religious Groups Active in Climate Debate,” USA Today, December 15, 2009. Found online at: (Accessed January 16, 2010). 36 John Kerry and Lindsey Graham, “Yes We Can (Pass Climate Change Legislation),” The New York Times, October 10, 2009. Found online at:

(Accessed July 8, 2011). 35

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agenda, but similarly provides Democrats a crucial opening to a key Republican base.

CHAPTER ELEVEN THE END IS NEAR

Several centuries’ worth of invention and innovation in media has facilitated the transformation of America’s religious and political landscape, from the pivotal role played by the pamphleteers in the American Revolution, to the platform broadcast media has provided for evangelicals to advance their ultra-conservative agenda in recent decades. The latest evolutionary leap from broadcast media to the internet has prompted a comprehensive recalibration of values within the American evangelical community, resulting in its increasing fragmentation. Evangelical Christians have been the cornerstone of Republican electoral support for the past three decades, yet evangelical fragmentation and the shifting theological attitudes which accompany it have provided Democrats with an opportunity to reconnect with evangelical voters. In recent years Democrats have attempted to capitalize on this fragmentation in order to close the infamous God Gap and redress the imbalance of power. How successful their endeavours in this area will be remains to be seen and is, for the most part, beyond their control as evangelical fragmentation has been the catalyst for, rather than a consequence of, Democratic faith outreach. Indeed it is a rapidly changing media environment, in which the internet and other ICTs have emerged alongside broadcast as the dominant forms of electronic media, which is primarily responsible for instigating evangelical fragmentation. As discussed in previous chapters, the rise of broadcast media and televangelism ushered in the age of political homogeneity in the American evangelical community. During the broadcast age the airwaves were dominated by commentators expressing staunchly conservative views, whilst those advocating a more liberal political agenda were pushed to the periphery, creating a mainstreaming effect which prompted audiences to adopt the conservative beliefs they were so regularly being exposed to. One of the ramifications of this was the strengthening of social ties within the evangelical community and the broadening of its social capital, as it established a core group of supporters behind conservative causes and candidates. Conversely, the advent of new media, specifically the internet,

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has broadened the horizons of the modern media consumer exponentially. Gone are the days when only a select few had the opportunity to share their message with the masses, as the highly accessible and easily navigated internet has opened the floor to all those who have traditionally held fringe views, as well as affording media consumers an abundance of choice. Consequently, the internet has proved to be fertile ground for the growth and development of dissident religious groups, empowering them, amplifying their voices, and transforming them from peripheral actors to mainstream movements. The major implication of this for American evangelicals has been the breaking of the old guard evangelicals’ stranglehold on the entire evangelical community’s political agenda, as new and previously neglected theological agendas such as evangelical environmentalism and the social gospel come to the fore. Furthermore, the growing popularity of creation care and the emerging church movement has created opportunities for American evangelicals to go beyond the borders of their church and collaborate with those outside the evangelical tradition. The continued growth of new media and the increasing levels of influence it wields over corporate and personal worship are precipitating the erosion of the Christian Right’s ideological hegemony. As the multifaceted medium of the internet encourages greater religious and political dialogue and presents the public with a plethora of diverse views, the ultra-conservative beliefs of the Christian Right, informed by literal interpretations of the Bible, are gradually being watered down and replaced by more liberal values. The growing trend towards liberalism within the American evangelical community is evidenced by the dedication of groups like that led by Shane Claiborne, to actively living the social gospel, and the rise of environmentalist movements such as Restoring Eden. The increasing influence of these movements signifies a reconfiguration of the evangelical theological agenda, as traditional prowar and anti-creation care stances are abandoned in favour of pacifism, protection of the environment, and the pursuit of social and economic justice. The internet has completely redrawn the global landscape within the space of a generation, creating a much more interconnected world and fostering virtual communities where online users are able to engage in debate and faith exploration, freely exchange ideas, and even form new organizations, interest groups and religious communities. Therefore the American mainstream’s awareness and acceptance of these new theologies and expressions of faith has increased, leading to profound changes in the way Americans conceptualize their religious identity.

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Beyond exploring new media’s impact on the traditionally conservative agenda of the Christian Right, and the extensive role the internet has played in the reconceptualization of religious identities within the American evangelical community, this writing has also examined the cognitive effects of electronic media. More specifically it has analysed the relative cognitive effects of print-based versus image-based media, presenting arguments which contend that society’s shift from a predominantly print-based culture to an image-based culture has had a considerable influence on the nature of the church. Whereas the analytical, objective left-hemisphere of the brain has a tendency to respond more readily to print-based materials, the more emotive and intuitive righthemisphere is stimulated by rich visual imagery. This helps to explain the paradigm shift in the evangelical community, as the historical tendency of the church to rely heavily on a print-based culture and view faith as primarily abstract, individual, and doctrinaire, has given way to the use of electronic visual imagery and the idea that faith is something altogether more community based and concerned with serving others. Shane Hipps, the Michigan based pastor and author of several books charting the impact of modern technology and electronic media on religious faith, traces this shift back to the broadcast age, asserting that new expressions of faith and worship are rooted there, rather than originating in the online age as typically thought. Furthermore, Hipps argues that the internet’s melding of text and visual imagery is striking a much needed balance between left and right hemisphere thinking, something evident in the emerging church movement’s communitarian approach to worship, and commitment to missional living.1 Having undoubtedly shattered the communicative monopoly of broadcasters and subsequently cultivated countless dissident religious communities, the internet has revolutionized the role of electronic media within the evangelical church, as the evidence presented in these pages attests. In addition to creating these groups by providing a forum for farflung individuals connected with the evangelical tradition to discuss and debate matters of faith, the internet has also begun to disassemble older, previously established communities as smaller niche groups have formed at their expense. The emerging church movement for instance, has drawn numerous Christians to its ranks by rejecting many of the more archaic, ultra-conservative political and theological values espoused by the broader evangelical community, and in particular the Christian Right. In their place 1

Personal Interview Shane Hipps on the effects of media on the evangelical church, September 17, 2009.

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Chapter Eleven

the emerging church preaches a much more compassionate, contemporary interpretation of the Bible, adopting a theological and political position which embraces egalitarianism, and promotes the idea of the church as a fellowship of worshipers. As demonstrated in earlier chapters, the influence of the internet is primarily responsible for the growth of this and other dissident religious movements, such as the Evangelical Environmental Network, and as such has proved itself to be a powerful tool in shaping the American evangelical community, and both its collective identity and the individual identities of its members. However, in order to gain a more comprehensive understanding of the internet’s precise role in the fragmentation of the American evangelical community, it is necessary to investigate the practical usage of the internet for faith exploration and outreach, and examine the ways in which various religious communities have employed this technology to amplify their voices. Future work in this area should focus on such phenomena.