The Heresies of American Evangelicalism, Part I: Introduction
Part I: Introduction
I confess to being a little hard on evangelicals on this blog, but that is only because I grew up as one. To paraphrase Paul:
Are they Christians? So am I. Are they evangelicals? So am I. Are they descendents of the radical Reformation? So am I. Are they servants of Christ? (I am out of my mind to talk like this.) I am more. I have worked much harder, argued more frequently, been ridiculed more severely, and been exposed to the ideas of Catholics, mainline Protestants, and liberal politics again and again. ... I have labored and toiled and have often gone without finishing my homework ... Besides everything else, I face daily the pressure of my concern for all the churches.And as Paul also states:
But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from conservative American evangelicalism, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith.It is in light of my own evangelical heritage that I feel a sense of responsibility to speak prophetically against the current state of evangelicalism in America today. The word "evangelical" once meant exactly what the word means: "according to the teaching of the gospel." The German word for evangelical is what identifies Protestants, whereas "evangelical" in the United States designates a subgroup of Protestants. In fact, nowadays it designates its own subculture and a powerful voting bloc that pursues governmental control more actively with each passing day. We are a long ways from the Reformation here in America. In fact, to be more precise, we are a long ways from the gospel.
What I wish to do in this post is outline the major heresies of contemporary American evangelicalism. Many of these have been documented by other scholars and online commentators, but I have not seen all of them addressed at one time. I will address them in the following order:
- A less-than-fully triune doctrine of God—often modalistic or binitarian;
- a docetic christology;
- a pelagian soteriology;
- a docetic-dictated-propositional Bible;
- a gnostic eschatology;
- and a Constantinian doctrine of church-state relations
Comments
I will put a link up as soon as i get home!
*sits back to watch the fireworks
I think your critiques would be more productive if you would interact with a more robust definition of evangelicalism, such as that offered by David Bebbington,
Can you find anything docetic, gnostic or pelagian about conversionism, activism, biblicism, or crucicentrism? That would be more interesting to read. Critiquing the Jim Dobson style of evangelicalism is a little bit like playing basketball against a retarded kid: you might beat him, but there really isn't any point.
shane
"Dr. Henry’s erudition and wit were perhaps best illustrated at a program honoring Karl Barth. When Dr. Henry publicly introduced himself as the editor of Christianity Today, Barth cracked, “Christianity Today, or Christianity Yesterday?” Henry replied, “Yesterday, today, and forever.”"
But calling it a heresy isn't right - because, well, there was no ancient heresy called Constaninism.
I think you should treat this gripe in a separate post - one dealing with grave flaws, but not heresies.
Of course, you are right. But I also think that the church today should still be able to call something a heresy if it contradicts the gospel. Granted, heresies were denounced in conciliar fashion -- and I am no council -- but these posts are not official church statements either. If I call "theocracy" or Constantinianism a heresy, it's because I think the church should denounce it as such.
I think that the American church wrestles with a massive double-bind, on the one hand dogmatically insisting on the separation of church and state, and on the other hand tenaciously holding on to some notion of America as a 'Christian nation'. There is a great deal more to be said about this, but I just want to raise this to encourage you to push further in how you characterise this (which will, in turn, shape your critique).
BTW, I like this series of posts and am linking to them on my own blog.
Good point. Indeed it is a very complex subject, and I admit to being a little simplistic here. Read my post, "What Exactly Belongs to Caesar, Or, the Heresy of Modern Evangelicalism." That pretty much sums up what I will say. I'll try to nuance my thoughts when I get to that point in the series.
One of the things I intend to discuss is the differences between historical Anabaptist theology and present-day American evangelicalism. At times there are similarities, and at other times there are grave differences. Extremes on either end are dangerous. But I'll get to this subject in due course.
A 'heresy' is a 'splitting' (haieresis) of the body of Christ. Saying the Christ was just a human being is a heresy. Singing the wrong kind of songs on Easter is a liturgical faux pas.
It would be nice for you to have a more substantial peg to hang your criticisms of evangelicalism on than your pastor's (lack of) liturgical imagination.
What is it about seeing the cross as the heart of the matter (crucicentrism) that implies one does not believe in the humanity of Jesus?
shane
The overemphasis on high Christology in Evangelical circles corresponds to this "crucimonism" (to use O'Donovan's term). They (er... we) need only a divine being to make the atoning deposit. Bringing his humanity into the equation doesn't destroy this crucimonism - but it sure complicates it.
O, that we return to the Easter message to untangle our lovely knots.