Musings: Notes From My Daybook

The term "evangelical" has had quite a ride over the past 50 years.  From its roots in the Old and New Testament, through its reemergence in the Reformation, its use in American Christianity on the frontier, and then its connections mainly through Billy Graham in the 1950's and on, the term has been stretched like a rubber band.  Most concerning has been the  word's use in political circles.

In fact, in recent years, the word has come to mean in American contexts, more about a particular political vision and less about a theological center.  It is that shift that a number of leading American Evangelicals have sought to address in a document called the Evangelical Manifesto.   Announced last week at the National Press Club, this document, seeks to act as a corrective to a politicizing of theological framework.

 For the most part, I think that the framers have done well--though it does strike me as odd that a document seeking to assert a theological vision and create a healthy distance between polictics and church is announced in Washington, D.C.

 More later.