I find it fascinating that a headline could claim the religious right is a growing phenomenon - breathless headlines, fear amongst the non-Christians and non-rightists, the sweaty, speaking-in-tongues hordes are taking over! Just a note to those who tremble in fear at the thought of Christians taking over the world - it ain't gonna happen. Indeed, with the political winds shifting direction, their power and influence here is shrinking even as AlterNet compiles a list of stories on their "growing" influence.
Many on the left often criticize the press and others for having no historical memory whatsoever, yet this article is a wonderful example of this distressingly general American disorder among those who probably should know better. Ironically, the most interesting story concerning evangelical churches has been the growing awareness of environmental consciousness and a shift away from single-issue politics (abortion, same-sex marriage) and cultural conflict to a more nuanced, engaged approach to a variety of issues, such as peace and war, anti-poverty concerns, and global warming. As the previous generation of evangelical leaders has passed and a biblically literate and historically literate generation starts to take the reins of power in evangelical circles, there is a growing awareness that focussing on cultural politics and abortion simply do not exhaust the biblical mandate for concern and care for other persons and creation.
Of course, these stories are "below the radar" because they do not fit with a rising left's narrative of religious folks being backward, thoughtless cretins who only care about who you're sleeping with and what happens as a result of any particular congress. That evangelicals - those, indeed, who have been most biblically literate and at the forefront of a variety of social causes in American history - might actually be moving in a direction that parallels the concerns of the left is unthinkable precisely because the left, at least those who write such silly headlines as those at AlterNet, do not think when group-think takes over. They prefer their reality prepackaged and ideologically sifted, rather than messy, complicated and, (heaven forbid) nuanced.
While many of the big names on the Christian right will not go away any time soon (unless, of course, Jesus calls them home to glory) their influence on the national dialogue will wane fast, as it has done for the past year. The dethroning of Ted Haggard this past fall is only the latest blow, as it robbed the National Association of Evangelicals of a poltically-connected, media-savvy leader. We shall still hear the voices of Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, and the rest, but they shall continue to sink further and further into the background, irrelevant precisely because the political and social context has changed so drastically. They contribute nothing, they have no pull in the evolving political alignment, and shall be voices of protest rather than of power.
The headline, perhaps, shoudl have read something like this:
Top Ten Stories Profiling a Movement in Decline
It might not have received the attention it otherwise did, but it would have been both more honest and reflected an understanding of history that the one in place does not.
