Culture,  Evangelicalism,  Politics,  Uncategorized

An Evangelical Manifesto

An Evangelical Manifesto was released today at the National Press Club. If you are unfamiliar with this document and its purpose then take a moment and check it out. The purpose of the manifesto is “to clarify the confusions that surround the term Evangelical in the United States, and to explain where we stand on issues that cause consternation over Evangelicals in public life.” I believe this could be a very helpful document but I will save my comments for a future post.

Justin Taylor has put together a nice summary of the manifesto. Justin also posted an interview with Os Guiness, who was on the Steering Committee for this document. Dan Wallace had a few words about the manifesto just prior to its release. I’m sure we’ll see many more posts and comments to come in the next few days.

As you get a chance to read it, I would love to hear what you think. I’ll share some more thoughts on this manifesto soon…so stay tuned.

3 Comments

  • mike rucker

    i think i had some hesitations and misgivings before reading the document, but was actually quite impressed and invigorated after taking in the whole of what it addressed.

    i am glad they chose not to say that creationism and inerrancy were non-negotiables. for the first, there’s very little biblical justification anymore behind whatever latest flavor of anti-natural selection is being put forward; for the latter, somehow we can admit that we can’t prove the existence of God, but goshdarnit we have a golden egg this unprovable God laid right here. kind of stupid when you think about it … not that thinking is a pre-requisite of course in any of these endeavors.

    more than anything, i was motivated and energized by the very positive nature of the piece – that it wasn’t yet another “here’s everything we’re against” rant but an effort to make the gospel again a message of good news. American Christianity has lost this defining characteristic ever since it embraced the neo-con’s Jesus bobble-head doll.

    perhaps one unintended benefit of the proposal is a clear opportunity to take this EM (Evangelical Manifesto) and align it with the other EM (Emergent Manifesto) and finally get all our EM & EMs in a row without demonizing the other side.

    we can only hope…

    mike rucker
    fairburn, georgia, usa
    mikerucker.wordpress.com

  • Erik

    Interestingly, James Dobson, one of the older, prominent faces of the evangelical right since the early 80’s [along with (the late) Jerry Falwell, (the late) D. James Kennedy, Pat Robertson, etc] did NOT sign the evangelical manifesto due to the fact that there were no African-American pastor or theologians on the 70 person committee. He had other issues with it. Any one know any of these ‘other’ issues?

  • mikerucker

    erik – is that just an easy alibi for Dobson – i.e., to garner tolerance points and say he’s not signing it because of the white-bread group that drafted it?

    or do you think it runs deeper, and he wouldn’t have signed it anyway if the group looked like a reborn rainbow coalition?

    mike rucker

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