Evangelical Protestantism is the elephant in what passes for sophisticated living rooms in America and around the world. It is a phenomenon of vast dimensions and large implications. Yet it is either not perceived at all, or only in its role in American politics (a relatively small aspect of the phenomenon) is acknowledged, usually ruefully. With the ruing usually comes distortion, such as that illustrated by the widespread presumption that all Evangelicals in the United States are poor, uneducated and live on Tobacco Road. In fact, so pervasive is the antipathy toward and misunderstanding of the Evangelical movement that three accusations against Evangelicals are now widely accepted as fact: that they are theocratic, fundamentalist and anti-modern. All three are false. The truth of the matter is precisely the opposite. Evangelical Protestantism today is the most modern and pluralistic religion in the world.
To show this, it is important to establish some sense of what is meant by the term “Evangelical.” This is not always easy. For one thing, the boundaries of Evangelical Protestantism are not sharply defined. If one knows the names of some of the larger Evangelical groupings, one can find churches in almost any American locality belonging to the Southern Baptist Convention (the largest Protestant denomination in the United States) or the Assemblies of God (the most sedate group within the Pentecostal sub-category of Evangelicals). But Evangelicals can be found within denominations such as the Episcopal Church that, as a whole, are not Evangelical. Some denominations, such as the United Methodist Church, contain often-uneasy combinations of Evangelicals and non-Evangelicals. And on the wilder shores of Evangelicalism, as in some Pentecostal and Holiness groups, there are congregations with no fixed address that meet in homes or storefronts.
Such fluidity immediately begs the question of definition. There is no Evangelical Vatican to provide a binding definition, but the following six characteristics are widely agreed upon: an unapologetically supernaturalist understanding of the Christian Gospel proclaiming a cosmic drama of redemption centered in the person of Jesus Christ; the Bible, both Old and New Testaments, as the authoritative guide for Christian faith and life; a belief in the efficacy of prayer; a personal experience of conversion—being “born again”—as an essential step in becoming a Christian; evangelism—preaching the Gospel to all people—as a Christian duty; and, last but not least, a relatively strict moral code. Pentecostals, who constitute the most rapidly expanding group of Evangelicals outside the United States, exhibit three additional characteristics: An ecstatic form of worship, marked by glossolalia—“speaking in tongues”; the practice of spiritual healing; and, at least in the early stages of Pentecostal communities, a highly charismatic form of leadership.
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