My Beefs with the Evangelical Left
Part One of A Two-Part Series – Coming Tomorrow: My Beefs with the Religious Right
It seems to me that a lot of younger evangelicals are aligning themselves with what I’d call the “Evangelical Leftâ€, a group of folks more sympathetic to economic—and in some cases, social—liberalism than evangelicals are in general. I’m not terribly enamored with this trend at all; I think that the Evangelical Left can sometimes play a valuable role in drawing our attention to certain issues that may not be on our “radar screenâ€, but I’m not at all keen on most of the solutions offered by this group. I thought I’d post on some of my chief beefs:
Heavy on catch-phrases, light on substance
The New England Patriots defense surrendered over 300 yards passing to Donovan McNabb in Super Bowl XXXIX, and 21 points. Question: what does that fact tell us about the outcome of the game, which is the real question, right (well, unless you play fantasy football…but that’s another issue, and a warped one at that)? I’ve just quoted a perfectly good fact, but taken alone, it tells us exactly nothing about the outcome of the game. The final score of the game is the context in which the above facts are meaningful, and as we all know, the Patriots scored 24 points. My point is that there is no need to react in anguish, if you are a Patriots fan, about such a context-less fact as I have stated, namely the passing yardage and total points scored by the Eagles. Why? Because this fact doesn’t tell the whole story. In fact, it doesn’t tell much of the story, really.
What’s my point? The Evangelical Left—and liberals in general—tend to be great at giving us isolated facts. They’ll tell us that most of President Bush’s tax cuts go to the wealthiest 20 percent of Americans. Ooh…that sounds bad, especially in a culture in which envy is no longer a sin, but rather a good thing, stoked along as it is by liberals in the first place. The fact that the wealthiest Americans pay a huge share of the tax load—a higher percentage than the percentage of tax cuts coming their way—as well as the fact that the rich are taxed at a higher rate—somehow never comes into the equation. Telling some of the truth isn’t sufficient, and dealing in pithy catch-phrases isn’t helpful, unless the goal is to spread more heat than light…
Putting too many eggs in the basket of government
When I read the things that Jim Wallis and Tony Campolo write, I find the tendency to be far too trusting of government to do the “good deeds†that Christians are called to perform, and perhaps even more importantly, to be effective in the doing of them. I’ll use Wallis’ recent critique of President Bush’s proposed 2006 budget to illustrate this. He cites all of the cuts in government programs, programs which ostensibly give aid to the poor and help with education and the like. But what his 
words assume is that government programs are truly helpful, when this is a dubious assumption at best. Marvin Olasky’s The Tragedy of American Compassion illustrates this fallacy well; Olasky, as a committed Christian, analyzes the effect of government programs directed toward the poor taken as a whole. His conclusion? In the area of short-term, “emergency†type help, government help can be good; in the long run, though, the government systems which are designed to “help†the poor have a significant negative impact, creating dependency upon government, stifling initiative, and encouraging irresponsible behavior.
This coincides with my general theory about liberalism, which is that liberalism’s chief characteristic is a lack of accountability. This is seen in many ways; it isn’t the conservative judges who are letting criminals get away with crime, for instance. And when it comes to government aid of the poor, it doesn’t seem to matter to the evangelical left whether or not the program actually works, as long as the money is flowing.
As I said earlier, the Evangelical Left plays an important role in identifying areas of concern that sometimes escape the attention of conservatives. But altogether too often, the knee-jerk response of the left is that government can be trusted to fix the problems. Which leads to a third concern of mine:
Too little emphasis upon the need for inward, individual change
If the mantra of James Carville was, “it’s the economy, stupidâ€, then my words to the evangelical left are, “it’s the gospel…saints!†Folks on both sides of the equation agree that the government can do things to promote the good, but the power to change the hearts and actions of people comes from an encounter with Jesus Christ. I’m not accusing the Evangelical Left of failing to proclaim it (to nearly the degree I would the mainstream left), but I would suggest that there does not seem to exist the needed emphasis upon it, at least from my observation. I appreciate a more holistic approach to the gospel than perhaps is proclaimed by many evangelicals—salvation is about far more than simply the saving of individual, eternal souls—but it seems to me that the gospel proclamation isn’t as strong as it should be. Perhaps this is true because of my final point:
Willingness to draw too wide a net
When I see the groups that are aligning with the Evangelical Left, I get very antsy, because frankly, some of these groups are not themselves evangelical. This serves to compromise the message of the gospel; some of the folks that join with the evangelical left to work together have almost entirely capitulated to the “social gospelâ€, have compromised their theological integrity, and thus have little truly “good news†to share. If we’re not proclaiming Christ, and Him crucified, we’re wide of the mark, even if we get some of the other stuff right.
This phrase comes from the 1978 "Jonestown massacre" in which most members of the Peoples Temple cult, blindly following their leader Jim Jones, committed suicide by drinking cyanide-laced Kool-Aid.
Osborne: A Contrarian's Guide to Knowing God
Schlossberg: Idols For Destruction
3 Responses to “My Beefs with the Evangelical Left”
As a new member of the evangelical left, I think I probably should defend myself here and point out some mischaracterizations. My first observation isn’t so much the author’s dislike of the new evangelical left, but more his distrust of government. It is issues dealing with public policy that seem to draw his ire and not the theology.
First, the issue related to isolated facts and tax cuts in particular. The Right does that as well. Ask anyone who supports abstinence only education and they will quickly point to the number of people taking pledges and don’t comment on the studies that show most of these programs don’t work. As for the tax cuts, sure the wealth pay a bigger percentage and therefore a larger amount, but the government does more for them. The government upholds property (both physical and intellectual) laws that disproportionately help wealth individuals. The recent rejection of the Kyoto Treaty on climate change was done at the request of the wealthy ownership class of America, who either own means of production or have shares/financial interests in them, because it would cost that class a lot of money to comply. So please, let’s tell the whole story.
The next issue is too much reliance on government programs and the idea that people become dependent. The evangelical left puts a lot of faith in government programs because only the government has enough resources and infrastructure to tackle many of the problems in society. For instance, drug abuse has many issues..border controls, international relations with source countries, local law enforcement, penal institutions and health care related treatment centers. The fragmented church is not set up to deal with that many and those complex issues. However, I think people are selfish and lazy. They become dependent on the government because the government is there. Paul tells us in 2 Thessalonians 3:10 that those that don’t work shall not eat. Clearly people were dependent on the Church in the first century. However, most on the evangelical left are looking to fulfill Jesus’ commandment of when I was naked did you clothe me, when I was hungry did you feed me, etc. Dependency should be looked at and dealt with, but shouldn’t be used as a reason to NOT help people.
I don’t agree with the last two points either. I have heard both Tony Campolo and Jim Wallis give very impassioned sermons/talks about becoming a disciple of Jesus. However, those of us on the Left believe that a strong wall between Church and State is necessary and are willing to work toward political goals with groups that may not share our spiritual beliefs. I don’t believe it compromises Jesus’ message of loving God and loving our neighbors. People don’t care how much you know, until they know how much you care.
Mike ~ Feb 16, 2005 at 10:22 am
Boy, do I wish I had time for a lengthier reply, but as you can see from another post I made, I’m catching a plane to Cancun soon. That said, I think that you’d make a good guy to back-and-forth with on this, Mike, and perhaps in a week-and-a-half, when I get back, we can have a little fun.
I’ll agree wholeheartedly about the theology thing, at least insofar as the fact that I concur with the Evangelical Left about the need to take care of “the least of these”. Our disagreement comes when it gets down to the specifics. I don’t find any compelling case to be made Scripturally (nor constitutionally, by the way) for the government to be involved in doing what it does for the poor; you base your case, it seems to me, on pragmatics (“only the government has enough resources and infrastructure to tackle many of the problems in society”). I’d argue, conversely, that this is true because of the government’s usurpation of these things, its unduly burdensome tax policies, and the like. The government has these resources in part because of the progressive tax structure, which places higher taxes upon those who make a lot of money (not me, by the way!), which I find no Scriptural warrant for (the O.T. tithe sounds an awful lot like a flat tax, right?).
Further, Marvin Olasky’s book is wonderful in demonstrating the massive inefficiency of government to actually effectively promote the general well-being of people, that the way government goes about its business, doling out money with no real compassion (“here’s a check, don’t ask for anything more”) and with no real accountability is the exact prescription for the dependency that you and I agree is a bad thing. The government has policies in place that assist in the destuction of the family unit and the severing of those first-line-of-defense bonds that should take care of people in need (the church would be second on my list). I think that the rub is right here; the Evangelical Left puts a lot of trust in the effectiveness of government, whereas I don’t trust the government of the U.S. to do anything well–and that’s why, by the way, I’m more a libertarian than a Republican.
I’m certainly on board with you, by the way, when it comes to the government not giving the rich unfair advantages; we’re in agreement there. Corporate welfare is at least as bad as any other kind, and probably worse.
And you’re right: people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you (not the government
) care…
Maybe we can continue this conversation when I get back. Thanks for posting, Mike!!!
Byron ~ Feb 16, 2005 at 12:38 pm
Let us continue this, but it will come down to some basic pragmatism and beliefs that aren’t necessarily rooted in theology or the scriptures. We will have our facts and figures to back up each side. You’ll say government wastes lots (look at 9 BILLION lost in Iraq) and I’ll say that not always (cost of administering social security is less than 1% of total income-way cheaper than the private sector).
As for dependency and the church taking care of everyone, I agree that the Church should, but unfortunately it doesn’t have the scope and/or resources that the state and local governments do (see illegal drug case above), but the major problem is that people are selfish and sinful and the Church is full of those people!
People can be compelled by fear or love. Love is perferable, but tougher. The Church should be motivating by love, as per Jesus’ example, but the State is able to motivate through fear (courts, IRS, law enforcement, etc) and it works better. So it is great to say that the Church SHOULD be doing the welfare stuff, but because of the inherent problem of getting the workforce/resources to do it out of love, the Church fails. Individual cases certainly disprove this idea, but universally the Church is too fragmented and full of sinners to do the job that governments (under a strong oversite by its citizens) can do.
Also, pure numbers give me, the pragmatist, stronger ammunition. Even if you concede 50% of American’s are Christians, the Church can only marshal that many. The government gets 100%. 100% of the taxes, 100% of the talents, 100% of the time, etc.
Enjoy Cancun and let’s continue this when you’ve got a nice tan.
Mike ~ Feb 17, 2005 at 7:20 am