Back in June a magazine asked whether the presidential candidates were more "Pat Robertson" Christians or "Rick Warren" Christians.
After California passed Proposition 8, protesters went to Rick Warren's church.
Has the political presence of the "Christian Right" finally seen its leadership passed to those who are actually leading trends of thought among most American Evangelicals?
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3 comments:
I'm not certain what you're asking, David.
Ah, that's because I'm out of date.
I didn't know Rick Warren had turned to politics as much as he has.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Warren
What I was trying to write was that most Evangelicals I know care about discipleship and church health more than the "hot" religious/political issues, but I've never seen this acknowledged in the political arena.
I expect I'm actually completely wrong. I tend to spend time with other ministers. I expect their flocks have many people who watch Pat Robertson's station CBN but have never read Rick Warren's books.
Ah. I live down here, so the politicking of the mega-churches is *heavily* apparent "behind the Orange Curtain" of Orange County.
You had written, "Has the political presence of the "Christian Right" finally seen its leadership passed to those who are actually leading trends of thought among most American Evangelicals?"
I'm glad to hear the the evangelicals *you* run into are into the work that Christians are "called to" for nourishment of their communities as well as the people in communities around them. Unfortunately, Rick Warren has become a rallying cry for many of the "evangelicalism by legislation" crowd. Rather than "change the hearts of men, and the laws will follow," there are a significant number of people who are working towards "legislate morality and then people will have to abide by it."
I believe this approach is dangerous, regardless what your personal politics or religion.
In my opinion, the "separation of church and state" was intended to be a bar so that the government could not legislate your religion. I think it's become the reverse in some arguements, that "religion cannot legistlate our government." Both are extremist: There are many instances where the values of faith make sense in the values of secular government. No one seems to think we should stop prosecuting murder, theft, or rape. You can be secular or religious (from almost any faith) and believe that murder, theft, and rape are wrong.
Then again, there's no such thing as "most Evangelicals believe this politic thing XYZ" because just like most faiths, there's as much in-fighting and differences between various Evangelical congregations as between any individual and their pastor's opinions.
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