2.04.2005 | Time, for a change

Evangelicals have been noticed by the mainstream media -- yet again. Since a genuine born-again has won the White House, again, it's become de rigueur for left-leaning publications to show that, sure, they get it. "It" being the fact that faith is the first priority for many, many Christians who vote.

In this instance, it's the February 7, 2005 issue of Time magazine, and their cover story is...the suspense is building..."Evangelicals in America." The summary is straightforward:

American Evangelicalism seems to defy unity, let alone hierarchy. Yet its members share basic commitments. TIME's list focuses on those whose influence is on the rise or who have carved out a singular role

Well, they certainly got that part right -- evangelicalism does very much seem to defy unity. That is, if all one sees are the doctrinal tussles that have marked Protestant Christianity, virtually from Day 1 (Hey, Brother Martin, shouldn't you have first sent a messenger over before your start hammering your theses on the Cathedral door...).

What is much, much, more important is the faith shared by all evangelicals. And, surprisingly, in its selection of "The 25 Most Influential Evangelicals in America", the commentary is, for the most part, respectful. For the most part.

Time, of course, simply can't resist laying on some of its bias, as in this in the short essay on Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention:

Land, who helped engineer his 16-million-member convention's 1979 shift from moderacy to hard-line conservativism...

Must've been that pesky citation Colossians 3:18. It's odd that those who share Time's secular liberalism don't object to a literal reading of Scripture when it comes to Jesus' favoring of the poor...But hey, we Baptists are "hard-line" conservaives, I suppose. Time said it; must be true.

Those selected as the 25 most influential? They vary all over the evangelical map, and even include Fr. Richard Neuhaus, founder and guiding spirit behind the essential journal First Things. Of course, it also includes Tim LaHaye, who, among other things, inflicted the Left Behind series on us. But he's forgiven for this, naturally.

The true purpose for this article, however, appears to be sort of a National Geographic travelogue for Democrats -- down among the fierce aboriginal inhabitants of Jesusland with gun and camera. Oh, wait. I forgot. Democrats and other liberals don't use guns, do they?

Take a look at the article. Then, as atonement for reading anything out of Time, you could perhaps check out the latest article from Fr. Neuhaus.

| technorati tag | evangelism|