ONE of the leading commentators on religion and politics in the United States is Robert P. Jones, CEO of the Public Religion Research Institute. His recent books on the churches and racism have rightly attracted high praise for their depth of research, the range of statistics which he draws on, and the bodies that he consults (e.g., Pew Foundation, etc.).
Best of all is his unimpeachable clarity: the boldness and frankness of his prescient analysis; and his conclusions and future projections. He combines poised writing with a devastating blend of data, history, cultural and political analysis, and his very nuanced feel for and understanding of religion in the US.
Jones’s The End of White Christian America (2019) was bracing, and his latest volume is equally compelling reading. Drawing on history, data, and surveys, Jones offers a provocative analysis of the relationship between American Christianity and white supremacy. The burden of the book is a call for denominations, congregations, and church leaders to reckon urgently with their pasts, face up to their legacy, and not deny that the links between oppression, injustice, and discrimination still live with us.
He traces the roots of Evangelical growth and success, in part, to white supremacy — white, male, privileged, entitled, educated, and in control of the apparatus of social, financial, economic, and political powers. He sees this domination coming to an end and, with it, the presumptuous hegemony of white Evangelicalism.
Jones suggests that the death-knell for white Evangelicalism, while not caused by Donald Trump’s Presidency, was, none the less, highlighted by his four-year sojourn at the White House. We now know that 80 per cent of white Evangelicals voted for Mr Trump. We also know that this same constituency were far more drawn to conspiracy theories such as those perpetrated by QAnon.
Likewise, white Evangelicals are more likely than any other Christian group to deny climate change and see it as a conspiracy; and oppose equal marriage and “gay rights”. On issues of race, white Evangelicals are the least likely to oppose continued use of Confederate flags, the most likely to suspect that Barack Obama was secretly a Muslim, and the strongest backers of police enforcement against Black Lives Matter marches and protests. Jones just lets the data-survey material speak for itself.
While Evangelicalism remains committed to evangelism, Jones also has indicative data for tomorrow’s Church. Most sociologists working on religion and generational change note that Evangelical youth are evolving, and fast. They are committed to tolerance, diversity, equality, and inclusion. They value sensitivity and mutual respect. They oppose discrimination on grounds of gender, sexuality, disability, and ethnicity. Targeting, grooming, and coercing their peers — previously known as evangelism — has become a mode of mission which many millennials and members of Generation Z increasingly want to keep their distance from. Everyone needs their space.
The emerging generation of Evangelicals no longer read books from “approved” publishers that strain and stretch to offer highly tenuous scriptural ground-rules for sexual relationships. Nor are they inclined to sign up for joint prayer meetings supporting missionaries in Muslim countries.
In contrast, white Evangelical male leaders continue to promote old-style mission. But their faith-language sounds hollow and inauthentic in an age that values integrity, humility, social and civic service, and kindness. Churches that champion the poor, foodbanks, social justice, climate change, refugees, asylum-seekers, equal marriage, and gender equality are becoming more attractive to young people.
Robert P. Jones notes that, for the first time in more than a century, mainstream American denominations are now performing better than their Evangelical rivals. They have pulled ahead in the attendance polls. Yet, all parts of the Church continue to decline — sexuality, abuse scandals, and putting reputation and survival before authenticity, truth, and integrity — are some of the reasons that emerging generations now stay away from churches. This generation is spiritual, but not religious.
The white Evangelical voters who put Trump in the White House are in steep decline. But the children of those voters won’t switch to mainstream denominations in large numbers. True, some have, attracted by the progressive values and politics that these Churches exemplify. But the rising seas of cultural change are ones that affect all churches, and the signs are not encouraging.
Facing up to stubborn systemic racism is part of the reckoning. I am with Robert P. Jones and Bob Dylan here, because “The times they are a-changin’.”
The Very Revd Professor Martyn Percy was Principal of Ripon College, Cuddesdon, before becoming Dean of Christ Church, Oxford, in 2014.
White Too Long: The legacy of white supremacy in American Christianity
Robert P. Jones
Simon & Schuster £16.99
(978-1-9821-2287-4)