After Evangelicalism

Before I review what I believe to be a useful and insightful book, I must make it clear that I have never been an Evangelical Christian. I was raised Broad- to High- Church Episcopalean, and have been a Celtic Catholic (with emphasis on the “Catholic”) for forty years. I am not Gushee's target audience, and I have spent my life looking at Evangelicals from outside, not always liking what I saw of their theology and politics. So I write this as a fellow Christian but definitely an outsider.

The author, on the other hand, is most definitely writing as an insider, to people like himself. He is not writing, “Please don't go!”, but rather “Welcome to the big world outside the Evangelical tent! Where can you do now that you are out here?”

Rather than just jumping into the here-and-now, Gushee provides the outsider (and, I suppose, most lifelong Evangelicals) with a necessary tour of the history of the movement, starting way back before it was a department of the Republican party (!), back when it was not unusual for Evangelicals to be what would now be called progressive on social issues. In line with his general attitude toward Tradition and history—it matters a lot, but the future matters even more—he does not stop there, but he spends the rest of the book offering practical ways forward by helping the reader think differently about what authentic Christianity can be and can look like.

He offers Christian Humanism as a framework upon which to build a vibrant post-Evangelical Christianity in which the Christian can feel at home by maintaining core moral values. It is these moral values, which are often at odds with the limited morality taught by Evangelicalism, which Gushee sees as the impelling force driving intelligent, loving people out of their former church hones. Values like belief in Truth as represented by science (i.e., the real world), compassion for LGBTQ+ people, hatred of systemic racism, and others.

Gushee elevates compassion and real-world concerns over rigid traditions of biblical interpretation. As the keystone of this, he suggest that no theological statement should be made which could not be made in the presence of a child being burned to death at Auschwitz. I would add: or a black man being lynched by a white mob, or a gay teen dying on the street after his Christian parents disowned him.

Gushee spends the third and final part of his book dealing with specific theological issues relating to sex, politics, and race. These discussions are, it seems to me, perhaps an addendum to the book. Having talked about his own experience and that of others, and having offered the outlines of a way forward with new ways of thinking about the meaning of the Bible and the Christian Faith, he has actually ended his thesis. “But wait! There's more!”

As a gift to the reader he offers the detailed discussions of sex, politics, and race. To the poor ex-Evangelical who has an inkling of right from wrong but no idea of how to process that idea within a Christian context—to this sad person who has fled what he or she now sees as a repressive and unrealistic, even immoral, system of thought—he says: “Look! It is possible to think about and act on these issues from a genuinely Christian perspective without rigidity, moralism, superiority, or fear of the real world.” I think his handling of these touchy matters works well. I think he would convince me, were I the one to whom he writes. I hope it is as convincing for those who need this book.

If you are an ex-Evangelical, I highly recommend After Evangelicalism, especially if you are willing to read through a bit of academic writing (the author is a professor of Christian ethics, and, sadly, it shows.) Not having been in your shoes I can not vouch for the helpfulness of his arguments, but I hope they will prove useful.