McKnight begins a chapter-by-chapter review of Bonnie Kristian's book defending evangelicalism against its cultural critics, focusing on its introduction and its definition of evangelicalism. He disputes her view that critics wrongly equate evangelicalism with Trump-supporting white evangelicals, her inclusion of the Black church, her claim of fuzzy boundaries, and her dismissal of abusive figures as fringe. He argues that evangelical gatekeepers do police belonging, that evangelical leaders should publicly criticize Trump, and that good churches and corrupted, abusive pastors both exist.
Reviewed
Teaches1
Positions the Doxa Score counts against.- 1
- Rejects· Bonnie Kristian
Critics falsely conflate the whole evangelical tradition with the white evangelical Trump voting bloc.
The overwhelming majority of evangelicals who vote back Trump, and very few criticize him except in private; those who do are themselves criticized.
- Rejects· Bonnie Kristian
Mainstream critiques of evangelicalism wildly miss the mark and are contradictory, ungenerous, ignorant, manipulative, or unjust.
Criticism of evangelicalism began intensifying well before 2015, more likely in the early 2000s with the rise of blogs, though a sociologist with good evidence would be needed to say for sure.
- Rejects· Bonnie Kristian
Evangelicalism has fuzzy boundaries and no authority deciding who is in or out.
- Rejects· Bonnie Kristian
The best question is not whether someone is evangelical but whether they are more or less evangelical.
- Adopts· Bonnie Kristian
Evangelicalism is a matter of both belief and practice, so churchgoing is a key feature of it.
- Rejects· Bonnie Kristian
The Black church in America is part of evangelicalism.
Since Reagan, evangelicalism has aligned with the Republican party, while Black Christians, though theologically close to the quadrilateral, differ widely from evangelicals socially, politically, and in activism, and most Black Christian leaders do not identify with evangelicalism.
Evangelical leaders who vote Republican should publicly say what they dislike about Trump; complicity and bystanding undermines their witness from the inside, and those who stay silent are aligned with him.
- TeachesVoting as complicityExplicit
Personal experience of good evangelical churches is too narrow a basis for judging the movement, and the response to Du Mez's book shows it identified a real and significant demographic of masculinist evangelicalism.
- Endorses a source· Raphael Warnock
Raphael Warnock's book is very important for understanding Black Christianity and its relation to evangelicalism.
There are good churches, Christians, and pastors across the country, but too many corrupted pastors abuse their spiritual power and need to be exposed; both things are true.
- Adopts· Bonnie Kristian
The widespread "monstering" of evangelicalism does not fit the ordinary faithfulness seen in churches each Sunday.
Calling abusive or corrupt evangelicals "freaks and fringes" diminishes them for the sake of the good, and evangelicals cannot delete embarrassing figures like Douglas Wilson from their family.
Evangelical gatekeepers, such as Christianity Today and the SBC, function as an unofficial institution that polices who belongs and punishes dissenters by banning, shunning, and firing, and so decide who counts as more or less evangelical.
- Endorses a source· Christian Smith, Bradley Wright, Ryan Burge, and Robert Jones
Christian Smith and his teams, Bradley Wright, Ryan Burge, and Robert Jones are trustworthy sociologists for polling on evangelicals.
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