Matthew Avery Sutton’s argues for “Redefining the History and Historiography of American Evangelicalism.” Specifically, Sutton says: “Post–World War II evangelicalism is best defined as a white, patriarchal, nationalist religious movement made up of Christians who seek power to transform American culture through conservative-leaning politics and free-market economics.”
Since 2016 or so, the majority of non-evangelical Americans will read that and think, “Well, no duh, professor.” But the stark phrasing lands differently for those still within evangelicalism, some of whom are not, personally, patriarchal, nationalist, advocates of right-wing politics and laissez-faire capitalism. (And some of whom prefer not to regard themselves as such even if that shoe fits rather perfectly.)
So we’re bound to see some protestation and push-back against Sutton’s definition in the usual reactive form of hashtag-not-all arguments. It’s an emotional, personal reaction similar to the reply guy who jumps in to say “Well, actually, if a woman met me in the woods, I would be much safer than a bear!” That may well be true, but it’s an exercise in missing the point. (And this willingness/determination to miss the point may also be an indicator that it may well not be as true as the reply guy says.)
One irony of this #NOTALL objection to Sutton’s argument is that his critics are suddenly reaffirming the evangelical status and legitimacy of “progressive evangelicals” — the dissident factions who have long insisted that they, too, are evangelicals even though they are not patriarchal, nationalist, conservative, capitalist, etc. Such affirmation is an unusual experience for those dissidents, who have otherwise spent exhausting amounts of time and energy having to defend their continuing — but always contested and contingent — membership in evangelicalism.
Are they really evangelicals too? Yes. Yes they are … For now. Sort of. Provided they continue to defend that status vigilantly and provided they continue to pass the pop-quiz catechisms and snap-inspections imposed on them tomorrow and the day after that and the day after that by an army of self-appointed gatekeepers.
So doesn’t their existence as evangelicals disprove Sutton’s definition?
No. White evangelicalism is “a white, patriarchal, nationalist religious movement made up of Christians who seek power to transform American culture through conservative-leaning politics and free-market economics.” The existence within white evangelicalism of a minority faction of dissenters from one or more of those descriptors does not alter the accuracy of the description for the group itself. And the contingent, probationary, perpetually challenged and questioned status of that minority faction only reinforces the accuracy of Sutton’s characterization.
No group or individual’s status within evangelicalism is suspect because they may be too white or too patriarchal or too nationalist or too conservative. But any member of the group who is perceived as insufficiently white or insufficiently patriarchal or insufficiently nationalist or insufficiently conservative is deemed “controversial,” and their status and legitimacy within the group is never a settled question.
We discussed this defining aspect of American evangelicalism during an earlier go-round in the “evangelical definition wars.” This was back in 2013. Here’s some of what I wrote then in a post on “Evangelical gatekeepers and conservative holiness.”
White evangelicals scrupulously police their left-wing boundary, but the right-wing boundary is unmonitored. Because there is no right-wing boundary.
Consider, for example, the ongoing “debate” over the full
humanityequality of women in the church and in society. Some evangelicals are “complementarians” — meaning they believe women must be subservient to men and that the church must maintain strict gender roles while supporting policies that enforce those roles in the larger society. Other evangelicals are “egalitarian” — the term used within the subculture to denote those who believe men and women should be equals under the law, in the church and in families. This side of the debate has been designated the “liberal” side, and is therefore inherently a bit suspect.“Egalitarianism” is still tenuously in-bounds, yet it’s also possible to get in trouble for being too egalitarian. It’s permissible, but only up to a point. That point isn’t clearly defined, but if any given evangelical gets a bit too enthusiastic in endorsing an egalitarian “stance” — or, even worse, acting on it — “controversy” will ensue, serving to remind them to settle down and get back in line lest their membership in the tribe be revoked and their speaking engagements and donor-streams start to disappear.
To understand this only-up-to-a-point dynamic, just look at that word itself: “egalitarianism.” We could save several syllables if we just said “feminism,” instead, but that’s not quite the same thing. That’s pretty much the definition of “egalitarianism”: not-quite feminism. Feminism is out-of-bounds. The word egalitarianism is basically evangelicalese for “as close to feminism as one is permitted to get while still remaining within the tribe.”
Whenever egalitarianism strays too far, too close to feminism, the gatekeepers who patrol the boundaries of the evangelical tribe will step in to enforce those boundaries. But there is no corresponding response for when “complementarianism” strays too far because complementarianism is never regarded as straying. Anyone regarded as too egalitarian will be labeled as “extreme” and “controversial,” and ultimately as a “former” evangelical. But no such labels will be assigned to anyone who is too complementarian because it is not possible to be too complementarian.
The tribe only has “liberal” boundaries. Conservatism is unbounded.
Witness, for example, Mark Driscoll, whose reckless anti-feminism exceeds the cautious not-quite feminism of his egalitarian counterparts. Or consider Douglas Wilson of the Gospel Coalition — he of the screeds about male authority and female submission, endorsing sex as conquest and not as “an egalitarian pleasure party.” Yet the Gospel Coalition is not characterized as “extreme” because the tribe has no category of “extreme complementarianism.” The popular pastors and authors of that coalition are never implicitly or explicitly forced to distance themselves from people like Wilson.
Wilson, by the way, is also a Neo-Confederate slavery apologist. His views on the antebellum South, President Lincoln’s big-government “tyranny,” and the post-war amendments are not substantially different from those of Jack Hunter, a.k.a. “Southern Avenger.” Hunter was recently forced to step down as a staffer for Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul because his right-wing views were regarded as too extreme for Paul’s tea-party supporters and other Kentucky Republicans.
But those same views are not too extreme for the Gospel Coalition, or for the larger white evangelical tribe in which the Gospel Coalition is regarded as a respectable part of the mainstream establishment.
That’s not to say that most white evangelicals are comfortable with Wilson’s Neo-Confederate nonsense. They’re not. But the subculture lacks any useful vocabulary for speaking or thinking of something as too conservative.
“Conservative” occupies the same space in the evangelical imagination as “sexual purity” does. To say someone was “too conservative” — theologically, politically, socially — would be like their saying a bride was too much of a virgin.
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