John Stott vs. Jerry Falwell: Evangelical Diversity and the Conundrum of "Biblicism"

By Brantley Gasaway

The blogosphere is filled with tributes to John Stott, the Anglican minister and international evangelical leader who passed away this past week at the age of 90. There is no need to reinvent the recap of his career on our site: let me recommend this detailed piece at Christianity Today and a brief reflection by Randall Balmer at Religion Dispatches.

But in an op-ed in yesterday's New York Times entitled "Evangelicals Without Blowhards," Nicholas Kristof uses the death of Stott to challenge the popular association of evangelicals with the political conservatism of the Religious Right. Leaders such as Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson--whom Kristof labels "blowhard scolds"--have caused most liberals to pillory the entire evangelical movement as "reactionary, myopic, anti-intellectual and, if anything, immoral." Yet, Kristof argues,

that casual dismissal is profoundly unfair of the movement as a whole. It reflects a kind of reverse intolerance, sometimes a reverse bigotry, directed at tens of millions of people who have actually become increasingly engaged in issues of global poverty and justice.

As evidence, Kristof points to Stott's long-standing commitments to intellectualism and social justice. In addition to authoring over fifty books, Stott consistently encouraged Christians to fight against poverty, racism, the oppression of women, and apathy toward environmental issues. Indeed, at a pivotal moment in the development of global evangelicalism, Stott gave a keynote address at the 1974 International Congress on World Evangelization in Lausanne, Switzerland that insisted Christians must not neglect active work for social justice in their zeal for evangelism. In addition, Stott lent his considerable credibility to the development of evangelical progressivism in America in that period by endorsing the early career of Jim Wallis and becoming a contributing editor to Sojourners.

Kristof lauds Stott for nurturing this "compassionate strain of evangelicalism," and he praises evangelicals who are frequently the ones on the front lines of global battles against "hunger, malaria, prison rape, obstetric fistula, human trafficking or genocide." Because he "stands in awe" of such work, Kristof concludes, "it sickens me to see that faith mocked at New York cocktail parties."

Like most readers of this blog, I suspect, I am rarely--ok, never--invited to New York cocktail parties where such sophisticated conversations occur. But even in my more humble circles, I still encounter the suspicion that most evangelicals are theocratic minions of Falwell and Robertson. Scholars of American religion recognize this view as a caricature, of course. Not only have progressive evangelical leaders such as Wallis been active since the early 1970s, but also studies of "ordinary evangelicals" by Christian Smith and by John C. Green have shown that only 30 to 40 percent support or identify with the Religious Right.

Thus the political engagement of evangelicals--both in the United States and especially worldwide--is not inherently conservative. Evangelical politics are complex, contested, and confusing--confusing perhaps not only to readers of the New York Times but also to evangelicals themselves. Which evangelical leader offers the correct political agenda: John Stott or Jerry Falwell? Jim Wallis or Pat Robertson?

Because evangelicals regard the Bible as their ultimate authority, they would ostensibly answer the question by assessing whether Stott's or Falwell's (or Wallis's or Robertson's) agenda has the best biblical support. The problem is, however, that these and other evangelical leaders all support their conflicting positions with biblical arguments and interpretations--and there is no objective or obvious method for judging better or worse biblical support, for that would be to introduce an authority beyond the Bible itself. Of course Christians have differed in their understanding of scriptures ever since the apostolic age, but this disagreement is especially problematic for modern evangelicals. How much can one rely upon biblical authority--especially when it is one's sole authority--if apparently sincere people cannot agree on what the Bible means? How would an evangelical know that she should emulate Stott rather than Falwell (assuming, of course, that she was unwilling to acquiesce to the New York Time's magisterium)?

Reflecting on the difference between John Stott and Jerry Falwell brought to mind a new book that I wanted to highlight here: Christian Smith's The Bible Made Impossible: Why Biblicism Is Not a Truly Evangelical Reading of the Bible. One of the country's leading sociologists of religion, Smith analyzes the popular evangelical theory about the Bible, which he labels "biblicism," that "emphasizes together its exclusive authority, infallibility, perspicuity, self-sufficiency, internal consistency, self-evident meaning, and universal applicability.” Because of "pervasive interpretive pluralism"--the fact that the "Bible gives rise to a host of many divergent teachings on important matters--Smith concludes that "it becomes beside the point to assert a text to be solely authoritative or inerrant." While evangelical theologians and historians such as Mark Noll have also identified this problem, Smith's work attempts to offer an accessible, focused critique of biblicism for non-specialists. **

Thus the limits of biblicism represent a conundrum for evangelicals, even for leaders like Stott who embrace a much more complex understanding of biblical authority. "Pervasive interpretive pluralism" guarantees evangelical diversity and division. Evangelical leaders will continue to remain at odds over political, social, and theological issues; laity will often remain confused as they hear competing biblical arguments offered for incompatible positions. Ultimately, the radically different forms of "biblical" public engagement promoted by Stott and Falwell should give all of us--even evangelicals--pause when we hear the Bible invoked to support a particular political stance. After only a minimal search, one can likely find an advocate claiming biblical justification for the exact opposite position.

** Brief note for the interested: Smith does offer a constructive alternative to biblicism that deserves a different post. His own concerns about this issue contributed to his recent conversion to Roman Catholicism, which he describes, not coincidentally, in another newly released work: How to Go from Being a Good Evangelical to a Committed Catholic in Ninety-Five Difficult Steps.

Jim Wallis, Sojourners, the LGBT Ad, and the Trials of Progressive Christianity

Hey, it's a good week here at the blog. Please welcome our new contributor Brantley Gasaway! Brantley is an assistant professor in the Department of Religion at Bucknell University. His book on the history of the progressive evangelical movement since 1965 is under contract with UNC Press and should appear in 2012. Brantley's post below concerns the recent controversy over a progressive Christian stalwart and the LGBT community. Welcome to Brantley! We look forward to many more posts from him.

Why Jim Wallis and Sojourners Rejected the LGBT Ad

Jim Wallis is no stranger to controversy. As head of

the progressive Christian organization Sojourners, Wallis has been the leading representative of evangelical progressivism over the past four decades. Throughout his career, Wallis has insisted that his "biblical" and "prophetic" political engagement is neither conservative nor liberal--a position captured in the title of his 2005 best-selling God's Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It. Nevertheless, his more liberal politics and refusal to prioritize culture war issues such as abortion and same-sex marriage have long drawn the ire of the Religious Right. Because Wallis has attempted to promote an evangelical alternative to their movement, his most sustained and strident opposition has come from Christian conservatives.

But not this week.

Wallis and Sojourners are facing a hailstorm of criticism from religious and secular liberals for refusing to run a video ad from Believe Out Loud, a group describing itself as "a trans-denominational movement that promotes LGBT-inclusion in the Christian church." In the video, a lesbian couple and their son enter a church but face silent hostility from the congregation as they search for a seat. Yet the minister at the front of the sanctuary greets them with a warm "Welcome--everyone" and helps seat the family. The ad concludes with the words: "Open Your Heart. Break the silence." In a written statement explaining their rejection, Sojourners stated: “I’m afraid we’ll have to decline. Sojourners position is to avoid taking sides on this issue. In that care [sic], the decision to accept advertising may give the appearance of taking sides.” Religious and political progressives are responding with incredulity, disillusionment, and outrage (see the coverage here and here at Religion Dispatches). Many have charged Wallis and Sojourners with hypocrisy for claiming to represent progressive causes and to promote justice but refusing to take a stand for LGBT rights.

Yet even prior to this present controversy, Sojourners' responses to homosexuality (and abortion--but that requires separate treatment) have made them uncomfortable and on occasion unwelcome partners with more liberal Christians who otherwise share their vision for social justice. Sojourners magazine did not address homosexuality as a matter of either Christian ethics or public policy until 1982, over a decade after its inception as the Post-American. In an editorial entitled “A Matter of Justice,” publisher Joe Roos outlined the magazine’s interpretation of homosexuality as a civil right but religious wrong. “While we do not believe that Scripture condones a homosexual lifestyle,” Roos explained, “we do believe that homosexuals, like anyone else, deserve full human rights” that are not “conditional upon agreement over sexual morality.” Churches can privilege heterosexuality within their own communities, he argued, and thus Sojourners welcomed but did not affirm gay and lesbian Christians. But within “the public arena,” Roos insisted that “the first Christian duty is to love”—an act that need not entail approval but “must always include justice.” And justice, he concluded, required Christians to defend the full civil rights of gays and lesbians.

In 1985, Sojourners reiterated this position. Despite confusion that stemmed from empathetic relationships with gays and lesbians, the editors remained convinced that “a clear biblical word” did “not condone homosexual practice.” Yet they rejected any "attempt to deny them their God-given humanity and their civil rights.” The editors endorsed an accompanying article by popular evangelical author Richard Foster in which he wrote that the Bible clearly "views heterosexual union as God’s intention for sexuality and sees homosexuality as a distortion of this God-given pattern.” While Foster acknowledged the reality of a homosexual orientation, he compared such orientation to “clubfootedness”—a “distortion of God’s intention” that deserved empathy rather than condemnation from Christians.

A backlash, similar to the current one, immediately ensued. In addition to self-identified gays and lesbians who felt “betrayed,” a significant protest came from a group more liberal Christian leaders who not only supported Sojourners' comprehensive commitment to justice but also regularly contributed to the magazine. Among those jointly signing a critical response were prominent Catholic peace activist Daniel Berrigan; celebrated social justice advocate William Sloane Coffin, Jr.; theologian Walter Wink; and leading evangelical feminist Virginia Mollenkott. In a lengthy letter, the group challenged the relevance of biblical condemnations of homosexuality; argued for left-handedness rather than clubfootedness as an analogy for homosexual orientation; and appealed to “the reality of deep and abiding love between two gay persons” as evidence that God also intended homosexuals to express their particular “gift of sexuality.” To these authors, affirmation of homosexuality represented a basic “question of justice.”

While Sojourners responded to these criticisms by reiterating a commitment to defending the civil rights of gays and lesbians but regarding homosexual practice as unacceptable for Christians, Wallis and other editors seemed chastened. The intensity of this criticism from ecumenical Christian supporters clearly shaped the magazine’s subsequent coverage. Rather than promoting its controversial welcoming but not affirming position for Christians, Sojourners declared itself committed to a "dialogue" on the issue while unequivocally supporting LGBT civil rights. Thus, for example, the July 1991 issue of Sojourners carried a forum dedicated to "The Need for a Better Dialogue in the Churches on Gay and Lesbian Sexuality" but only included authors who "share a commitment to justice and human rights for all, regardless of sexual orientation." Likewise, in 1999 Sojourners published " a dialogue on the church and homosexuality" between Tony Campolo (who believes "that the Bible does not allow for same-gender sexual intercourse or marriage") and his wife Peggy Campolo (who "believes that within the framework of evangelical Christianity, monogamous gay marriages are permissible"). Most important, Sojourners muted its coverage of LGBT issues in comparison to the urgency or frequency with which it addressed issues of poverty, peace, racial and gender justice, or environmental stewardship.

The current controversy reflects this background. While the video ad itself seems only to advocate a welcoming position, Believe Out Loud promotes "LGBT equality in the church and in broader society" that includes both ordination and marriage equality for LBGT individuals. Sojourners likely believed that accepting this ad without any "dialogue" around these issues would imply endorsement--a concern that Wallis expressed in a 2008 interview with Christianity Today after feeling remorse for accepting ads from Human Rights Campaign, another organization promoting LGBT rights. Indeed, both the blog post from Sojourners' communication director and Wallis's own statement on "Sojourners' Mission and LGBTQ Issues" emphasize Sojourners' history of supporting LGBT civil rights and their commitment to promoting dialogue among Christians who disagree theologically on affirming same-sex practice. Wallis admitted that Sojourners' "core mission concerns" are focused on "matters of poverty, racial justice, stewardship of the creation, and the defense of life and peace" and not debates about justice for LGBT individuals.

Thus, the disillusionment of religious and political liberals among Sojourners' supporters is understandable. Many who define full equality for LGBT individuals as vital to social justice are angered. Few find credible Wallis's and Sojourners' desire to promote social justice but allow for different standards within the church. And many would even question Wallis's ostensible commitment to LGBT civil rights since he supports civil unions rather than same-sex marriage.

Ultimately, this controversy illustrates why the progressive evangelical movement has remained small over the past four decades. Leaders like Wallis, Ron Sider, and Tony Campolo have been too politically progressive for most evangelicals but too theologically conservative for most political liberals. Wallis may consider his political positions "prophetic," but he no doubt wishes they would remain more popular.