A deceptive W0kist ploy that targets Wh!te Evangelicalism as a political entity.
Readership: All
Theme: (Christian) Community / Free Speech
Length: 1,300 words
Reading Time: 7 minutes
Intro
18 “If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you. 19 If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.
John 15:18-19 (NKJV)
22 Blessed are you when men hate you,
And when they exclude you,
And revile you, and cast out your name as evil,
For the Son of Man’s sake.26 Woe to you when all men speak well of you,
Luke 6:22,26 (NKJV)
For so did their fathers to the false prophets.
After citing the above passages, Oscar posed an insightful question.
“Which pastors and churches do unbelievers hate and slander the most? Which pastors and churches do unbelievers speak well of the most?”
He left this open for readers to ponder.
Farther down, Malcolm Reynolds said,
“The equality religion is not based on the bible, it’s because ‘Evangelical’ is not a religious identity. It’s a political one.
To which Oscar replied,
“Thank you for (unintentionally) helping to answer my questions.”
I have to intercede here, because I don’t believe MR’s statement is very explanatory nor precise, and it didn’t answer Oscar’s questions.
So let’s examine Oscar’s question in earnest.
Is Evangelicalism a Religious or Political Identity?
Evangelicalism IS a religious identity that stretches back to the American Protestant revivals of the late 19th century if not earlier, but it has also become a political identity since the 1980s.
In the religious context, the word ‘Evangelical” specifically refers to Protestant churches and individuals who espouse two doctrinal concepts in particular — Free Will and The Great Commission (Matthew 28:16-20), as opposed to the 5 TULIPs of Calvinism. They are best known for their verse-by-verse knowledge of the Bible, their vast hymnody, their enthusiastic support for community outreach, their domestic and foreign missions activities, and their crisp sharp appearance.
Over the past century, the sociopolitical identity of Evangelicals has been predominantly middle to upper-middle class conservative Republicans. As the middle class has shrunk in recent years, so have the numbers of Evangelicals, which suggests that Evangelicalism is a lifestyle as much as it is a sect of Protestantism.
Evangelicalism is further described in an article MR shared.
The Atlantic: The Experiment Podcast: ‘Evangelical’ Is Not a Religious Identity. It’s a Political One. (2021/5/13).
Of course, I disagree that ‘Evangelical’ is NOT ONLY a religious identity, but I do agree that it is also a political one.
This article offers a pretty good summary of the rise of Evangelicalism as a political identity. One part of this article tells the story of how Evangelicalism got its start as a political identity. It reads,
“One man — a political operative from Georgia named Ralph Reed — devised a plan to harness the energy of young Christians and turn them into America’s most powerful voting bloc, one church mailing list at a time.”
It goes on to say,
“But Reed’s victory had a cost. Many, many Christians have come to feel that their church cares more about politics than Jesus.”
This is certainly true for some individuals and high-ranking leaders, and there has been an increased attrition from churches, but I wouldn’t say churches in general are like this.
Polluting Religion with R@ce Politics
It is my belief that Christians and churches should not shy away from addressing social causes. One mark of a good sermon is that the preacher has “a bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other”, meaning that he applies scripture to people’s daily lives and current events. That includes politics and other sweeping social issues. In general, I think it is good for Christians to be involved with social events and to be influencers and pillars within their communities, but not if it involves worshipping pagan religions (like supporting abortion, Gyn0centr!sm, R@!nb0w fluff, W0k!sm, etc.).
The more outspoken Christians are about social issues, and the more churches participate in opposing anti-Christian social causes, the more of a headache they become for TPTB.
Obviously, the Atlantic article was written to deconstruct political Evangelicalism as an attack on the religious Evangelical community. Further evidence of this effort to undermine the church with W0ke propaganda appears in a follow-up article containing the story of an Evangelical black man who was disturbed by…
“…r@ce and the hypocrisy he saw among Christians, who he felt paid lip service to d!vers!ty but didn’t form substantive relationships with other communities. When he saw how strongly the evangelical world was going to champion Donald Trump, he decided to speak out. He lost money and fans, friends and mentors. And he almost lost his faith.”
The Atlantic: The Experiment Podcast: How the Evangelical World Turned on Itself (2021/5/20)
It is not clear what is meant by the word ‘communities’, or the extent of ‘d!vers!ty’, whether this implies only black communities or if it includes other groups, e.g. Musl!ms, polygenderists, polysexuals, et al. But coming from The Atlantic, and given the fear-laced tone of these articles, the arguments may very well be extended to others.
The author goes on to conclude,
“Wh!te evangelicals have arguably never been more powerful as a political force in America than they are now, but political victory has a human cost. People of all kinds of backgrounds have felt gutted by Christian support for Trump. Among Christians, the Trump era’s legacy might be fracture, not unity.”
I’m pretty sure writings like this are attempting to polarize the church around the r@ce card and hijack the meaning of ‘Evangelicalism’ to mean strictly a Wh!te sociopolitical identity.
Watch now. Their next move will be to use this argument against political Evangelicalism to condemn religious Wh!te Evangelicals for not bowing to W0ke / D I E ideology. It’s probably already happened since this article was written.
Conclusions
Ideally, a church should be a community of souls having the same beliefs and values. Less ‘d!vers!ty’ is more conducive to having an authentic heart-and-soul community, while more ‘d!vers!ty’ tends to weaken social capital.
Cultural destroyers / M@rx!sts target the weakest areas of social cohesion, which are (1) socio-economic / political differences, (2) r@cial issues, (3) religion, and (4) women. The D I E rhetoric is a ploy to exacerbate these differences and destroy the social cohesion within authentic communities. The larger, healthier, more conspicuous, more influential, and most lively communities are targeted most intensely, i.e. Evangelicals. Remember, before C R T and W0kism hit the scene, r@ce relations in the U.S. had never been better.
Image Source: After Babel (Jon Haidt): Why the Mental Health of Liberal Girls Sank First and Fastest (2023/3/9)* In this case, we see that the dissension is not actually about ‘Evangelicalism’, or factions in the church arising from r@ce or doctrine, but is a concerted play to condemn and destroy Evangelicalism by associating it with ‘deplorable’ Wh!tes and r@c!@l discrimination.
Once you see this, it couldn’t be much more obvious.
So we have an answer to Oscar’s question,
“Which pastors and churches do unbelievers hate and slander the most?
Evangelicals.
Why?
Around the Christian Manosphere, we recognize that the REAL problem with Evangelicalism is its convergence with Feminist / Liberal / Progressive / W0ke beliefs — and also that Evangelicals are standing by while the sanctuary is being invaded and desecrated by the advanced infiltration of these beliefs. However, humanist / liberal / progressive pagans perceive the problem with Evangelicalism is that it has NOT converged enough with their debased ideologies.
We can fully expect to see more headlines about the problems and weaknesses among Evangelicals. They’re just too good looking, happy, healthy, and wealthy for debased progressive ressentimentalists to ignore.
* H/T: Rob Henderson, Oscar
Related
- Σ Frame: The Beta Factory (2023/7/24)
- Σ Frame: Tweaking Complementarianism for Mass Consumption (2023/7/26)
- Σ Frame: The Effect of Theology on Relationships (2023/10/25)
