Conservative Activism

Further Thoughts on Phil Johnson and the Christian Right

By J. Wesley ⋅ May 7, 2008 ⋅  Email This Post ⋅  Print This Post ⋅ Post a comment

Phil Johnson has now written three wise, thoughtful posts on Christianity and political activism. I have some qualms about these thoughts, and want to raise a few counter-arguments. However, these critiques are written with an understanding that his theological experience and education dwarf mine and that I have more to learn from Phil than he does from me. Also, I believe that most of his major points are sound and deserve consideration by Evangelicals everywhere. It’s hard to disagree with much of what he writes — Evangelicals have focused on politics to the exclusion of evangelism; pastor and politician are separate and conflicting callings; we do often look to legislation to fix problems only Christ can solve; we have become worldly and watered down our doctrines; and we’re sometimes more interested in an Evangelical leader’s politics than his theology or personal morality.

*Note on photo: These guys are dumb.

That said, I can’t help but feel Phil’s a bit anachronistic in his arguments. His thoughts would have been incredibly timely and helpful about fifteen years ago. I well remember the Evangelical élan of the time — we were going to take back America for Christ and win the culture war against the secular humanists lurking under the bed. Christian conservatives were at that time an immature movement with all the bluster and absolutism which characterizes youth.

But Christian conservatives have since come of age. We previously expressed ourselves primarily through explicitly Christian political groups which tied Christ to specific cultural agendas — the Christian Coalition, Moral Majority, etc. Such groups are dying on the vine. The Christian Coalition is a shadow of itself, losing state chapters and falling into debt. The American Family Association lacks its former influence and closed its Center for Law and Policy. The Moral Majority died entirely and was then reborn as a small rump organization. And D. James Kennedy’s Center for Reclaiming America is gone.

In place of these explicitly Christian groups, conservative Christian individuals have begun leavening secular organizations which share common socio-political outlooks with them. This makes sense theologically. What Christian conservatives are really working to preserve is a cultural patrimony given through the common grace of God to all Americans. We can’t establish a “Christian America” through politics, but we can restore a more just and moral government and social order. This can be accomplished without dragooning Christ into questionable political entanglements. Evangelical support for Huckabee was an exception to this trend toward secular involvement, but even this was tentative, divided, and seems more like a last gasp than a precursor to future events.

Much of Phil’s argument centers on the overemphasis on politics by Evangelicals, which I think has greatly declined as well. Current Evangelical activity reflects a much healthier balance of mercy ministries, cultural engagement, evangelism and political activism than we saw in past decades.

The oftentimes categorical nature of his arguments is also troubling. For example:

“But when influential Christians have tried to steer the church into the political process, their testimony has failed, and they have actually lost influence.”

While admittedly not my periods of study, it seems to me that the experiences of Calvin in Geneva, Knox in Scotland, Luther in Germany, Kuyper in Holland and numerous other examples contradict this. In fact, political engagement during the Reformation was precisely the vehicle God used to keep the Reformation from being smothered in its crib. Other examples which spring immediately to mind are the anti-slavery movement and the American Revolution.

“The church as a body has no calling to organize and protest in the political realm.”

What room does this leave for the prophetic role of the church? The church had no calling to organize against slavery, genocide, or the the killing of the unborn?

“Evangelicals have virtually nothing to show for all the time, energy, and resources they have invested in political efforts over the past three and a half decades.”

This is simply incorrect. Phil mentions abortion specifically. We are a single Supreme Court appointment from overturning Roe v Wade, which was originally decided by a 7-2 majority. We have made great strides at curtailing abortion through local activism and state laws. His definition of “progress” also seems too limited. If Phil thinks things are bad now, what would America look like if the New Left had been handed carte blanche to refashion our society? Conservative Christians have been the primary defense against the New Left’s radically immoral and anti-Christian agenda. Does Phil really believe that our cultural declension from 1975 to the present is proceeding at anything like the rate of 1965-1973? That would be a difficult historical case to make.

This is running long, so I’ll save my other thoughts for another day. Let me close by encouraging everyone to read Phil’s posts on this subject. Even if his arguments are somewhat anachronistic on a practical level, they still include theological wisdom which will deepen one’s understanding of the role of the Church in society.