In an interview with NPR’s Rachel Martin, Ed Stetzer, head of the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College, explicates on the conundrum facing American Evangelicals these days, namely not being gullible:
Should ministers on Sunday mornings be delivering messages about how to sort fact from fiction and discouraging their parishioners from seeking truth in these darkest corners of the Internet peddling lies?
Absolutely, absolutely. Mark Noll wrote years ago a book called The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind,and he was talking about the lack of intellectual engagement in some corners of evangelicalism.
I think the scandal of the evangelical mind today is the gullibility that so many have been brought into — conspiracy theories, false reports and more — and so I think the Christian responsibility is we need to engage in what we call in the Christian tradition, discipleship. Jesus says, “I am the way, the truth and the life.” So Jesus literally identifies himself as the truth; therefore, if there ever should be a people who care about the truth, it should be people who call themselves followers of Jesus.
But we have failed, and I think pulpits and colleges and universities and parachurch ministries and more need to ask the question: How are we going to disciple our people so that they engage the world around them in robust and Christ-like ways? — and I think part of the evangelical reckoning is we haven’t done that well.
I have no wish to be brutal, but I think Stetzer and his like-minded allies in the Evangelical movement have an uphill battle, with issues rooted in the very bedrock of their belief system.
First, they believe in God, a belief for which there does not appear to be any objective evidence. This faith, definitionally despite a lack of evidence, makes them open to other such evidence-free beliefs – such as QAnon.
Second, they believe they have a personal relationship with God. This is, again definitionally, private, subjective knowledge. To accept that others are having valid communications with God, even though they cannot access and verify that alleged fact themselves, is to be inclined to accept that anyone claiming to have such knowledge is telling the truth.
Third, there are a number of pastors of large, influential megachurches that claim to have such communications. They claim that God has selected Donald Trump to do important things, that just happen to play to the legitimate concerns and the illegitimate prejudices of the evangelicals. While other pastors call out these leaders as grifters and con-men, this is hardly enough to nullify these malignant pastors.
Fourth, much of the evangelical movement is found in prosperity churches. Trump himself grew up in a church run by Norman Vincent Peale, an advocate of the prosperity gospel. This blasphemous variant on Christianity provides an easy proxy for determining who is the favored of God: wealth. Trump claims to be excessively wealthy and the evangelicals flock to him on the assumption that he’s selected by God; they conveniently forget the behavioral expectations set by the Bible, because those are much harder to accept and execute: prudence, moderation, caring for the poor. It’s much more comfortable to chase wealth and be wealthy.
Fifth, the evangelicals are human, and many have that human love of drama. “End Times” are the ultimate drama for the evangelical, when there will be literal rivers of blood, battles of the righteous against evil, etc etc. Series of novels written around that theme have been popular for decades in the evangelical movement. Wanting to believe that they are at the center of the greatest drama humanity will ever witness is only, well, human. And, as a story junkie myself, it’s addictive. It gets the pulse pounding, and brings a little more color to the world.
None of these are new observations. The Catholics are well aware of the problem, although frankly their standards for accepting someone as a saint, or the need for an exorcism, are suspect. But how could they not be? Those who are responsible for making those determinations are themselves subject to most or all of the above weaknesses.
But these characteristics of evangelicals, who smugly and arrogantly believe they are the select of God, if only they keep trying to spread the word, makes Stetzer’s task that much more difficult. He uses the word gullible, and it’s so very, very accurate, and, quite frankly, I have no idea if those evangelicals can be rescued from their error.
Or if we’ll have to wait for them to die of old age.
Last I heard, the evangelical movement is having a problem with attracting the younger generation, and, as I’ve said before, I suspect it’s because they’re getting an eyeful of the results of being an evangelical.
And they’re not liking it.
