Evangelicals Part 4 (Evangelicals and Race)

Here is part four of our series on Evangelicals, which focuses on the relationship between White and Black churches, and why Sunday morning is the most segregated time of the week. I attempt to explain that this is because of a) a historical White hegemony and White ownership of the Evangelical movement and b) a theological system that does not encourage integration, as it is a social issue and therefore not important. Essentially, the church is segregated because Whites do not see race relations are an ecumenical issue. Quotes are taken from "Divided By Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America" by Michael Emerson (not Ben Linus, sadly) and Christian Smith.

The division between Blacks and Whites in American Evangelicalism is perplexing. Why would the two groups, who both follow the same religious tenets (many of which are grounded in a radical egalitarianism), seem to willfully segregate themselves on Sunday morning? After decades of concern for Black souls in the 19^th century, why did White Evangelicals suddenly abandon their former brethren? Historical segregation in the United States obviously played a role, but I do not believe that reason that Blacks and Whites are segregated within the Evangelical church is the result of any malicious work by either group. Instead, I feel that White indifference to the Black community is to blame for the current racial make-up of American churches. Segregation in the Evangelical churched emerged from a unique blend of White ignorance of hegemony and a theological system that emphasizes personal salvation over social reform.

Evangelicalism originated as a White movement, at a time when an all-White hegemony was considered normative, and the Evangelical movement has maintained a White power structure since that inception. This absence of minority voices within either the historical or present day Evangelical church frames Evangelicalism as a White movement. Once this frame is established, there is no impetus for White churches to attempt to integrate, because it is not seen as wrong for churches to be homogenous. This is what I speak of when I refer to White indifference. This frame not only affects White churches, but Black churches as well.

In addition to the historical mindset limiting Evangelical integration, Evangelical theology also provides no imperative for churches to attempt to integrate. Evangelical theology emphasizes personal salvation to such a degree, that it is seen as the solution to all social problems. Once a person has found Jesus, the rest will take care of itself. Black churchgoers have all ostensibly experienced this. Why then, would it be necessary for White Evangelicals to pay any attention to them beyond what is paid to any other church? This plays into White hegemony as well – for, historically, White Evangelicals first dispensed the Christian message on the black community.

One finds evidence of White hegemony in the early proselytization of African slaves. Originally regarded as sub-human or not possessing of immortal souls, Black slaves came to be seen as a special case for evangelism, with slave-owners arranging for preachers to come minister to their slaves, and taking the slaves to church services. (Emerson and Smith).

The hegemonic structure is clear in this instance. The paternal White Christians are gifting the Africans with Christianity -- a gift that, cosmically, can never be repaid. It also establishes White dominion over Evangelicalism; Blacks can never take full ownership of the movement because it came from someone else. By essentially forcing Christianity on slaves, White Evangelicals were establishing a hegemonic and Anglo-normative view of American Christianity that would build into what we find today.

An important aspect of this paternalistic evangelism is that it placed Blacks in an odd place within the Evangelical theological consciousness. Blacks were brothers and sisters in Christ, but far from being equal. This led to a strange view of the moral obligations of White Evangelicals toward Blacks.

It was a moral imperative that slavery be stopped, it was a moral imperative that White Evangelicals provide aid to newly freed slaves during Reconstruction, and it was a moral imperative that preachers convert Black audiences, but it was not a moral imperative that Blacks and Whites co-exist equally.

In some ways, the central issue of American race relations – the inequality between Blacks and Whites – was ignored in favor of a benign benevolence that sought to meet the immediate physical and spiritual needs of the Black community. Once those needs were met, White Evangelicals didn’t really have a need to interact further with Blacks.

Whites were not in favor of integration; many of them wanted the Blacks shipped back to Africa. Without a perceived need to meet and most of the Blacks safely converted, Blacks no longer registered on the Evangelical consciousness.

Emerson and Smith allude to this laissez-faire approach to race relations by saying that the race problem was pushed to the “back-burner” for Whites. In contrast, they point out the work of Gunner Myrdal who wrote that Blacks found the race problem to be “all-important.”

It is this fundamental difference in perception that, I believe, prevents Black churches from being considered a true part of the Evangelical movement. Though both groups share many beliefs, this key difference makes them incompatible. The Civil Rights movement illustrates just how different the two groups became after a period of separation.

Unlike earlier social movements that had been grounded in race, the civil rights movement did not emerge from White paternalism. Instead, it was an organic, grassroots, Black movement, which was largely championed by Black Christian activists. It stressed a communal approach to solving a social injustice. And it did all of this as a discrete entity, largely without the aid of White Evangelicals.

The disconnect between Black Christianity and White Evangelicalism is striking. The fact that one side saw civil rights as the moral issue, while the other did not identify it as a moral issue at all shows just how completely White Evangelicalism had separated itself from the Black Church. Emerson and Smith even highlight an instance when Christianity Today refused to report on civil rights marches “for fear of giving the impression that civil rights should be a part of the Christian agenda.”

Fifty years after the start of the civil rights movement, Evangelical churches remain largely segregated. And the ones that aren’t still cater to White privilege. Edwards points out that interracial churches largely cater to White attitudes and White expectations of what a Church service should be. I believe this to be the result of White America’s unconscious belief that they are the true inheritors of Evangelical Christianity.

Historical and recent evidence shows that there is a clear blind spot in the White Evangelicalism in regards to race relations. I have attempted to show that this is because of a long-standing normative idea about what Evangelical church should be, and a theological framework that does not challenge that idea. I believe that Evangelicalism developing from an exclusively White background has caused Whites to take a subconscious ownership of the movement, an ownership that excludes Black engagement in positions of influence and leadership. It may also help to explain why a subculture that spends a decent amount of time discussing the roles of women and LGBT within the church is largely silent on the issue of race.

Evangelicals Part 3 (Evangelicals and Science)

In this essay, I continue my exploration American Evangelical identity and its relation to society. The key points in this essay are 1) Evangelicalism and Scientific Naturalism (or Materialism or Positivism) both arise from the same Modernist worldview, 2) the Modernist worldview assumes that with enough knowledge anything can be known, 3) the Modernist worldview assumes that when anything can be known, then the right thing can be known, 4) both Scientism and Evangelicalism retain this normative view of knowledge, 5) it is because of this dependence on normativity that both Scientism and Evangelicalism are becoming less important in the popular discourse.

In today’s popular discourse, the Evangelical and scientific communities are often pitted against one another (this is, of course, an oversimplification, as Evangelicalism and science are not binaries), however, this has not always been the case. Both communities emerged from the same historical foundations, and though animosity exists between the groups today, they still utilize many of the same tools, and, in fact share a very fundamental worldview. Both the Evangelical and scientific communities rely on a 20^th century Modernist worldview that emphasized progress and the triumph of empirical knowledge above all else. It is because of this shared belief system that the two groups oppose each other so vehemently, and, ultimately, why both may be forced to adapt or risk falling out of the public consciousness.

A predominant belief during the nascent Modern era was that science was a magic bullet. Not only could it be used to explain the natural world, but also the assumption was that science could be used to fix societal and moral problems, and bolster the claims of religion. Noll points out that preachers (Wesley, Witherspoon, and Whitefield) and academics (Timothy Dwight) held this view. It also calls to mind the work of Max Mueller, a devoted scholar of Eastern religion, who assumed that Modern science would ultimately prove that Christianity was the “correct” religion.

As time passed, and scientific knowledge grew, European ideas began to filter into the American consciousness, ideas that emphasized strict naturalism, dismissing the concept of revelation entirely. Darwin’s Origin of Species greatly challenged the Christian view of history. Many Evangelicals struggled to reconcile these new developments with existing ways of thinking about science and religion (particularly the weight and authority of the Bible).

As the mainstream scientific community drifted further from Christian orthodoxy, many Evangelicals reacted by turning the tools of scientific inquiry inward, attempting to use them to determine precisely what the Bible says about any given topic or to mold observations about the natural world into the history given by the Bible.

The most glaring schism between science and Evangelicalism occurred at the Scopes Monkey Trial, where science (as it has come to be understood today, as empirical naturalism) and its proponents made Evangelicals and their beliefs look ignorant and antiquated.

Since then, Evangelical thought has been largely marginalized within the scientific community. In turn, Evangelicals often cast aspersions on science, seeing it as a threat to their belief system, morality, and society in general. This is not to say that Evangelicals are anti-science, they are just dedicated to a very particular science – a science dedicated to reinforcing their worldview.

Noll ends this chapter with a rather lengthy discussion on the most prominent split between Evangelicals and the scientific community – the debate over evolution and creation. By doing away with the creation narrative (technically, narratives) found in Genesis, evolution is seen by some Evangelicals as a threat to the integrity and authority of the Bible. The pushback by these Evangelicals against evolution has a profound impact on the way that large swaths of the American public view secular science. In addition to the many attempts to impede the teaching of evolution in public schools, as well as attempts to promulgate the idea of creation or intelligent design, conservative Evangelicals have painted scientists in general as untrustworthy, and attempted to whitewash history by ascribing Evangelical ideals to key historical scientists.

In turn, some empiricists go to great lengths to disparage Evangelicals (and the religious in general). Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins are at the forefront of a sort of evangelical Atheism, dedicated to tearing down religious beliefs. Dawkins takes great delight in exposing the way that Evangelicals often misinterpret the ostensibly religious writings of notable scientists.

Now, this tension makes some sense from a societal level. The academic community has rightly challenged evangelical meddling in school textbooks and curriculum. Evangelicals have every right to attempt to use science to prove their beliefs, and rejection of secular science may be a part of that. However, the animosity coming from anti-theists seems nonsensical. Why would they consider Evangelicals threatening enough to devote thousands of pages of literature to discrediting them?

The tension between the communities makes sense when one considers their shared origin. The Modernist ideal carries a normative charge. It assumes that with enough data or enough evidence, one can be proved “right.” For Josh McDowell, his collected evidence proves that Christianity is “right.” For Stephen Hawking, his collected evidence proves that secularism is “right.”

Even non-science minded Evangelicals have “proof” that their beliefs are right, the experiential nature of Evangelical piety. Of course, a strict empiricist would reject personal feeling as convincing evidence, so arguing with an Evangelical is likely a maddening experience.

The Modernist focus on “rightness” means that the chasm between the Evangelical and the empiricist is largely impassable in our current climate, but that may be changing. In the 12 years since the publication of this work, I believe that there has been a significant development in American thought that has further altered the relationship between science and Evangelicalism, and this development has made the squabble between the camps less consequential.

That development I speak of is the rise of Post-modern thought. The dream of the Modern age seems impossible. Humanity’s progress was illusory; science did not provide the solution that everyone thought it would.

The 20^th century was the bloodiest in human history. Science failed to answer our deepest questions, and it failed to make us more moral. Modernism led to Hitler’s Europe, the development of the atomic bomb, and efficient subjugation of wage-slaves all over the world.

The very foundations of the naturalist worldview have been challenged. Quantum physics are forcing us to reassess Newton’s simplest laws, while the work of philosophers like Frank Jackson questions whether or not the experiential can be quickly disregarded by the empiricist.

So now, in the Post-modern era, the scientist and the Evangelical are once more entwined, as they were at the start of the Modern era. The naturalist attempts to use science to prove that God is an illusion, and that science can account for everything. The Evangelical attempts to use science to prove her orthodoxy. Each clings to antiquated notions, and the belief that any one thing can be objectively true. In the end, science (as it is popularly understood) and Evangelicalism are allies, united (either implicitly or explicitly) against the encroaching Post-modern era. The idea that nothing can ever really be known or really be true is a threat to both camps, and I believe that this is why both camps fight so vociferously for their respective turf.

Satan Part 3 (Satan in the Early New Testament)

I just realized that I never concluded my Satan essay from last Spring. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to do a full exegetical analysis, but I do have the final section of the essay here. Please enjoy.

The satanic mythos is greatly expanded in the first century by Christian writers, particularly in the gospels, where Jesus encounters Satan several times.

In Matthew 4, Jesus is said have been led into the wilderness by the Spirit to be tempted by the devil. After fasting for forty days and nights, The tempter comes to Jesus and tries to get him to perform all manner of miraculous deeds in order to comfort or glorify himself. In verse 10, Jesus says to him, “Away with you, Satan!” This is the first instance of the name Satan being directly linked to the devil. Unfortunately, the word “devil,” does not appear in the Hebrew Bible, so one must glean an understanding of his character by consulting the Christian New Testament. The temptation of Christ shows a version of Satan that has been heretofore unseen. This is the first instance of him dialoguing with a human. In all other accounts, he functions more supernaturally, by inciting David or bringing ruin to Job. The temptation of Christ does have certain parallels with Job, in that Satan functions as a unique entity who is free to roam around the Earth. Interestingly, Matthew says that Jesus was led into the wilderness specifically to be tempted. The purposeful temptation could indicate that, in Matthew, Satan is beholden to God in the same way that he is in Job.

Jesus himself references Satan in Matthew 12. He casts a demon out of someone and the Pharisees claim that it is only by Beelzebul, the ruler of the demons, that Jesus has the power to cast out demons. Jesus rebukes the Pharisees, and in the process, relates Satan to Beelzebul. This is the first explicit reference to Satan as the ruler of the demons.

The one who sows the good seed is the Son of Man; the field is the world, and the good seed are the children of the kingdom; the weeds are the children of the evil one, and the enemy who sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are angels. Just as the weeds are collected and burned up with fire, so will it be at the end of the age. The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will collect out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all evildoers, and they will throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” (Matt 13:37-42). The devil (who we have now explicitly linked to Satan) stands in direct contrast to the Son of Man (Jesus) by spreading weeds in opposition to Jesus good seed. Jesus' interpretation of the parable seems to parallel parts of the Book of Enoch, particularly the fate of the evildoers, who are to be cast into the fire. Jesus' parable also insinuates that Satan is (at least) partly responsible for the evil actions of man, just as the fallen angels in Enoch taught humankind to sin.

Jesus further elucidates the character of the devil in Matthew 13. He tells the parable of the weeds. In the parable, a planter sows some wheat, and while he is sleeping, an enemy comes and spreads weeds all over his field. The enemy hopes that when the planter pulls up the weeds he also pulls up the wheat. Jesus then interprets the parable. He says, “

All of the instances of Satan in in Mark parallel his appearances in Matthew. Luke, however, provides us with more depth and dimension to the character of Satan. In this account, Jesus is tempted by the devil (in Greek, “he”) over the course of the forty days and nights, rather than at the end. Also, although Jesus is “full of the Spirit,” there is not indication that his sojourn into the desert was for the purpose of being tempted, in contrast to the other synoptic gospels. When Jesus is tempted, the devil shows Jesus all of the kingdoms of the Earth and says to him, “To you I will give their glory and all this authority; for it has been given over to me, and I give it to anyone I please. If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” (Luke 4:5-7). Luke's version of the temptation indicates that, rather than being entirely beholden to God for any free act, Satan has an agency over the kingdoms of the world. The agency Satan ascribes to himself in this passage could contribute to the eschatological belief of many Christians today that Satan has authority over this age, until Jesus comes again.

Luke 10 and Luke 22 also offer up more detail on the character of Satan. In Luke 10, Jesus states that he, “Watched Satan fall from heaven like a flash of lightning.” Jesus words here seem to lend credence to the idea that Satan is a fallen angel. In chapter 22, Satan is said to enter into Judas Iscariot before he offered to betray Jesus. In verse 31 of the same chapter, there is an interesting linguistic tick. The verse reads, “Simon, Simon, listen! Satan has demanded to sift all of you like wheat...” What's interesting about this, is that the word “demanded” can also be translated as “obtained permission.” It appears as if even has the agency that he claims, he still must get permission from an authority (ostensibly God) to commit his nefarious acts. Satan's impotence again reflects the description of him in Job.

The Gospel of John emphasizes Jesus' foreknowledge of Satan's acts. Early on in his ministry, in chapter 6, Jesus declares that one of his followers is “a devil.” “A devil” appears to be distinct from “the devil,” as in chapter 8, Jesus says, “You are from your father the devil, and you choose to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks according to his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies.” Here, Jesus draws a distinction between one who acts like the devil (a devil), and the actual devil, or Satan, who incites men to do evil. In the passage in chapter 8, Jesus also expands on the traits of the devil, calling him a murder and a liar. With this in mind, it's possible that the devil was lying when he claimed that he had authority over all of the kingdoms of the Earth.

Satan appears one more time in the gospels in John 13. John 13:2 states that “the devil had already put it into the heart of Judas to betray him.” Again, we see an instance of Satan being responsible for mankind's sin. Later in the chapter, in verse 27, Satan enters into Judas, and Jesus, knowing this, says, “Do quickly what you are going to do.” John's emphasis on Jesus constant awareness of what Satan is doing is probably used to tell the reader more about Jesus than about Satan. Although, again, it seems to limit Satan's effectiveness and agency since Jesus (and, one assumes, God) are always aware of what he is trying to do.

Over a relatively short period of the first century, Jesus and the writers of the Gospels provide us with a more detailed picture of Satan than the entirety of Jewish scripture up to that point. The depth of knowledge by the Gospel writer about Satan seems to be unprecedented, and doesn't make a lot of sense. Therefore, we can only conclude that it is revelation.

Who Are American Evangelicals? (A Lazy Essay)

Dear readers,

I must confess that I did put my full effort into this essay, and it shows. The key points that I try to hit on are 1) Evangelicalism is both an ethos and a discrete movement within American Protestantism, 2) emotionalism and feeling are the most important things to an Evangelical, 3) Evangelicals (as a discrete group) are unique in their desire to be seen, 4) conflating Conservatism with Evangelicalism in general is inaccurate, 5) many conservative Evangelicals can more properly be understood as neo-fundamentalists.

I hope you enjoy this essay.

Defining American Evangelicals is an exercise in categorization. Evangelicalism is too complex an idea to fully explore without first laying down some definitions. Chief among these definitions is the distinction between Evangelicalism as an ethos and Evangelicalism as a discrete group. Many American Protestants practice certain behaviors and hold certain beliefs that can be identified as distinctly Evangelical. These behaviors and beliefs are not exclusive to any one group, and are represented across a wide spectrum of Protestant sects. There also exists a group of American Protestants who self-identify as Evangelicals.

There is a huge cultural construct erected around Evangelicalism as a sect. A quick Google search will reveal Evangelical publishers, studios, record labels, corporations, political groups, and all manner of Evangelical websites. It is this second group of self-styled Evangelicals that one is likely to encounter in the popular discourse, and, I believe, this is exactly what Evangelicals want.

In Defining Fundamentalism and Evangelicalism, George Marsden identifies five characteristics of Evangelicals. (1) Belief in the final authority of the Bible, (2) the real historical character of God’s saving work recorded in scripture, (3) salvation to eternal life based on the redemptive work of Christ, (4) the importance of Evangelism and missions, and (5) the importance of a spiritually transformed life.

It is in the final three of Marsden’s characteristics that I believe one finds the true essence of American Evangelicalism. Some of the more vocal Evangelical groups (the Moral Majority, the Acts 29 Network) may place a special emphasis on the authority of the Bible and God’s work in history, but, there are liberal Evangelical groups (Sojourners, the Emerging Church movement) that would probably resent having their Evangelical bonafides determined by such notions.

Salvation, evangelism, and a spiritual life appeal to the Evangelical because Evangelicalism is, above all, experiential. The authority and historicity of the Bible are matters of the mind, to be studied by theologians and academics, but spirituality is personal and unassailable. Bart Ehrman may be able to expose inconsistencies in scripture, but no amount of scholarship can change what a believer feels to be true in his or her heart.

This emphasis on the heart is an important part of Evangelical theology (or the lack thereof). Evangelical piety is an experiential piety, where true faith is not known so much as it is felt. Divorced from the hierarchal structure of Catholicism and the complicated theologies of mainstream Protestantism, Evangelicals are forced to feel their way in day-to-day religious expression – to work out their salvation with fear and trembling, as it were.

This lack of an anchoring point likely leads to the Evangelical reliance on the Bible as a guide for religious expression. This creates problems because the Bible is a more complicated book than some Evangelicals give it credit for. It’s difficult to develop a hermeneutic when the very concept of a hermeneutic is antithetical to the feeling based (anti)theology of the Evangelical. Biblical ambiguity could explain how both John Piper and Brian McLaren claim the Evangelical mantle.

Unfortunately for our purposes, Marsden’s exploration of the Evangelical identity (beyond his five characteristics) is tied mostly to a believer’s relationship with Billy Graham. Graham is an important figure in Evangelical Christianity, but his influence has been diminished in recent years due to his age, and a marked move in Evangelicalism toward Conservatism.

Before we attempt to explain the trending toward Conservatism amongst the larger Evangelical community, it is necessary to explore the Evangelical attitude toward community engagement. Outside of experiential piety, the Evangelical relationship with society at large is probably the most defining characteristic of the movement.

The one thing that all Evangelicals share, regardless of political or theological leanings, is a pronounced outspokenness. All Evangelicals believe that the gospel is alive and has a purpose in the community. Different stripes of Evangelicalism can be delineated by what they believe the purpose of the gospel to be. Oftentimes, this manifests itself through political or social action. Conservative Evangelicals tend to focus on moral issues related to “family values.” Abortion and gay marriage are the two most prominent conservative Evangelical causes. Liberal Evangelicals tend to emphasize moral issues at the societal level, focusing on social justice, environmentalism, and institutional violence.

In this sense, Evangelicals are almost defined more by their relationship with society as a whole than by any belief that they may have. Certain beliefs may precipitate certain actions, but for one to be an Evangelical in the sense we are trying to capture, one must be seen.

The confluence of these factors leads me to define an American Evangelical as – an American Protestant who believes that the Christian gospel has a role in dictating social policy and acts on that belief in a manner that is visible to society at large.

This is what separates Evangelicalism as an ethos from Evangelicalism as an identity – visibility. Your local Black church or Mennonite congregation may share an Evangelical ethos with the parishioners at Saddleback Church, but only one of those churches is pastored by a best-selling author.

When one shifts the Evangelical frame from what they believe to what they do, the phenomenon of conservative Evangelicalism becomes easier to deal with. Rather than viewing this as an Evangelical movement, one should view it as a movement within Evangelicalism. By separating conservatism from Evangelicalism, the scholar can evaluate conservative Evangelicalism on its own, perhaps assigned it its own category, as this author is inclined to do, preferring to refer to conservative Evangelicals as Neo-Fundamentalists – as they occupy the same cultural niche as their Fundamentalist forefathers.

By simplifying and reframing the question, tackling the issue of the identity of American Evangelicals ceases to be a monstrous and loathsome task, and instead becomes an exercise in categorizing. The scholar can then observe each phenomenon in turn, and apply whatever criticism she or he deems relevant.

Evangelicals (A Series)

This semester, I am taking a class on Evangelicalism with Prof. Chad Seales.

Prof. Seales was educated at the world-class University of North Carolina, and he specializes in American religious history.

The readings from the class are taken largely from Mark Noll's American Evangelical Christianity.

Each week, I'm required to write an essay on the relationship between Evangelicals and some other societal factor. Rather than keep these to myself, I have decided to share them with the world.

Enjoy