Moore is Talking…Are Evangelicals Listening?
I think I’d like Russell Moore if we hung out. Although he’s theologically conservative (some of which I appreciate and some of which I’d respectfully disagree with), he seems to land closer to the ‘middle’ in his expression of faith—drawing critique from the progressives and criticism from the conservatives—which I appreciate.
His book, Losing our Religion: An Altar Call for Evangelical America (1) is certainly written to a specific American audience. While various arguments and scenarios within his book could be extrapolated and applied to other contexts, including Canada, the book is written to an American Christian community that is in the midst of the disorientating experience of moving from the centre to the margins.
I live in Canada, where this transition has already taken place. I also live in a suburb of Vancouver, BC., which has the highest percentage of non-religious people in North America. Yes…North America. 47% of Vancouverites profess no religious faith (2). Because ‘evangelical’ is not a denomination it’s hard to get solid data, but the best estimations have the evangelical population at about 5-7% of Canada and it’s certainly less in Vancouver (4). All that to say, the ‘altar call’ for Canadian evangelicals is a little late! It’s even later for evangelicals in Europe (5).
Because of this, we have a saying: “American evangelicals should be looking at Canada for guidance and Canadian evangelicals should be looking at Europe to learn how to navigate post-Christian culture.” If there is a shortcoming in Moore’s book, I would suggest that he (perhaps in classic American fashion?) kept his focus exclusively in the US and didn’t draw in other voices from other parts of the world that have already taken the journey that American Christians are on, or from other Christians in countries that are truly persecuted for their faith.
Ok…perhaps I will mention one more ‘minor’ shortcoming: Moore’s content is great. It’s insightful and useful and important. Unfortunately, it is also somewhat meandering and, at times, lacks focus. Associated with this: while I appreciated his ‘application points’ in each chapter, they often became quite long—some of them almost a chapter in-and-of-themselves—and were too numerous. All told, he had no fewer than 20 application points within the book, which begins to hint at the lack of focus I mentioned above (from my point of view).
Having said that, I found most of his points to be accurate and necessary for the broadly defined evangelical church in America…and to a lesser degree, Canada. Not only that—within his meandering paragraphs Moore would often summarize his three-pages of thoughts into a pithy and memorable statement. As I read our required reading each week, I tend to write down those statement/quotes that hit me or represent a topic that I would like to address in my blog. With Moore’s book…I gave up. My entire word count could have easily ended up being great quotes!
So, here are just a few of the most impacting statements that I am taking away from this great (content) and decent (writing style/focus) book:
Things I appreciated:
“…Personal evangelism is, at its best, an ongoing reminder to evangelical Christians that their neighbours represent a mission field, not a battlefield…” (6)
YES! This statement has the potential to shift evangelicals out of the culture wars paradigm and into a biblically-informed missional paradigm.
“Embrace New Communities and Friendships” (8).
YES! In my denomination, we speak of trying to ‘keep the main thing the main thing.’ Of course, what is essential and what is secondary is not always easy to discern and agreed upon, but I believe the goal of being a ‘big tent’ (another phrase used in relation to our denomination in Canada which speaks to a group holding diverse secondary theological beliefs but unified on the essentials) is not only a worthwhile effort, but it will become increasingly necessary as our Christian faith is pushed further to the margins. Another way to say it: fighting about a bunch of secondary issues is a luxury we have when there aren’t more pressing issues or priorities to address. How would the church change and how would our impact increase if we started caring as much about the mission of God and not sectarian differences and who is ‘in’ and who is ‘out’? (While still recognizing the need for a bounded set).
“But the evidence is mounting that a significant amount of secularization is accelerated and driven not by the ‘secular culture’ but by evangelicalism itself” (9).
YES! Self-reflection is good. Humility is good. Repentance is good. Reform is good. All of those things are required if the evangelical church is going to address the issues in ‘our own house’. Let it be so, Lord!
Things I learned:
“The easiest way to success is to erase nuance, to seem to be leading the crowds while actually following them” (10).
In a previous blog—likely in several previous blogs—I lament the fact that the extremes hijack meaningful conversation (a loose quote of Jim Wallis). I also express frustration with the culture’s (and church’s) black and white thinking and dogmatic statements, arguing that more careful thinking and nuance is required when discussing complex social topics. While I have lamented this, I have not really done any deep thinking as to why this reality exists. As such I appreciated Moore’s exploration around some of the ‘why’—arguing that the elimination of nuance (which allows for the dramatic, click-bait statements) is a way to accumulate followers. Thus the desire for position, power, recognition and fame becomes the motivating factor to not just simplify issues (for clarity’s sake) but actually distort issues while playing off people’s emotions. God help us! (Insert a whole other paragraph here exploring how the world-wide web is facilitating this issue!)
“…Power [is] ‘something external and based upon force,’ while ‘authority is rooted in persuasion and allegiance…Power arises only when authority breaks down’” (11).
I appreciated the distinction between power and authority and I suspect this will be one of the statements I most often repeat from this book. While there are numerous books and articles that explore the issues of ‘types of power and authority’ (12), Moore’s statement (a quote of sociologist Robert Nesbet), for me, succinctly presents a personal leadership goal related to relational leadership (something addressed, at least in part, by Schein and Schein in their book, Humble Leadership (13)): I want to be a leader that leads using my authority (which is fostered by relationship, consistency, trust, etc.) and not my (positional) power. There may be times when I have to say, “Because I said so…” (am I parenting or leading?!) but hopefully those times are relatively few as they most often represent a ‘withdrawal’ and not a ‘deposit’ in the relationship.
I could list a host of other great quotes on important topics—many of which resonated with me. However, I don’t think I am the target audience of this book. I can’t help but wonder if Moore will lose most of his intended audience in his direct critique of former President Trump. In most of this other examples in the book, he holds back the names of the people he is speaking about….not so with Trump. Is there a way to write this book so that the vast majority of evangelicals (who support Trump) could digest its content without writing him off? I wonder…and it seems to me he’s left ‘preaching to the choir’ with this current offering, which is too bad—his message is one that all evangelicals need to hear and wrestle with.
(1) Russell Moore, Losing Our Religion: An Altar Call for Evangelical America (New York: Sentinel, 2023).
(2) https://vancouversun.com/opinion/columnists/douglas-todd-metro-vancouver-tops-list-of-non-religious-big-cities-in-north-america#:~:text=Canada’s%202021%20census%20shows%20almost,big%20city%20in%20North%20America.
(3) https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2015/07/29/major-u-s-metropolitan-areas-differ-in-their-religious-profiles/
(4)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_in_Canada#:~:text=Evangelical%20portions%20of%20the%20Protestant,growth%20from%20a%20higher%20birthrate.
(5) https://www.voanews.com/a/a-13-2006-07-24-voa48/322976.html
(6) Russell Moore, Losing Our Religion: An Altar Call for Evangelical America (New York: Sentinel, 2023) 134.
(7) Russell Moore, Losing Our Religion: An Altar Call for Evangelical America (New York: Sentinel, 2023) 149.
(8) Russell Moore, Losing Our Religion: An Altar Call for Evangelical America (New York: Sentinel, 2023) 228.
(9) Russell Moore, Losing Our Religion: An Altar Call for Evangelical America (New York: Sentinel, 2023) 37.
(10) Russell Moore, Losing Our Religion: An Altar Call for Evangelical America (New York: Sentinel, 2023) 40.
(11) Russell Moore, Losing Our Religion: An Altar Call for Evangelical America (New York: Sentinel, 2023) 75.
(12) For example:
https://www.bishophouse.com/leadwell/new-leader/5-types-of-authority-available-to-managers/
https://courses.lumenlearning.com/wm-introductiontosociology/chapter/types-of-authority/
https://triuhttps://triumphias.com/blog/max-weber-authority/mphias.com/blog/max-weber-authority/
(13) Edgar H. Schein and Peter A. Schein, Humble Leadership: The Powers of Relationships, Openness, and Trust (First edition. Oakland, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2018).
About the Author
Scott Dickie
8 responses to “Moore is Talking…Are Evangelicals Listening?”
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Scott- I appreciated reading your perspectives on Moore, and on the American-centric posture his work takes. Your final thought about Moores outspoken critique of Trump is interesting to me. I imagine Moore is taking this approach because of Trump’s co-opting of Evangelicalism in a way that is starker than we have seen previously? I am not sure.
I also liked your thoughts on authority vs power. Moore left his positional power behind when he left SBC, but time will tell if any of his remaining authority with his tribe of origin will heed his appeals.
Yes, Jen, time will tell….in fact, about a week!
All the polls seem to indicate American evangelicals continue to largely ignore Moore and endorse Trump for a wide hosts of reasons.
I am aware of a bit of Moore’s story within the SBC…and I wonder if he choose to leave or if he was essentially chased out of town (and perhaps chose not to fight…or at least fight while staying in that venue. Taking the up reigns of Christianity Today would seem to be a ‘leaving of power’ within his own tribe to try and assert some influence on the broader (or other?) evangelical community.
I lament how much all of this sounds and feels like the power and politics of secular society and pray the church can learn a new counter-cultural way of being more in line with King Jesus.
Scott, I found Moore to be a breath of fresh air, though I totally can see your point about his focus on only American Christianity. I guess we should be looking to Canada and Europe and countries with persecuted Christians…but then it wouldn’t be all about me!
You pulled out this quote: “…Power [is] ‘something external and based upon force,’ while ‘authority is rooted in persuasion and allegiance…Power arises only when authority breaks down’” and said that you will probably use this quote repeatedly. While I too, hope that my leadership is more authoritative than based in power dynamics, I couldn’t help but think of a particular presidential candidate who loves himself some power…and once again, I make it all about me and America 🙂
Yes…as I’ve pondered that quote further…I wonder if you also change it to read: “Power is about fear, influence is about love.” When someone has power over me (and little relationship), I want to stay in their good books and fear repercussions if I stray out of line. When someone has influence in my life, I have gotten to see and know and appreciate them in such a way that I want to learn from them and go the way they are going. It seems to me that healthy long-term leadership in any organization (including church) can only be sustained by influence and not power–long-term power seems to create autocratic power-mongers.
Scott, I just want to pop in here and say how much I appreciate the clarity of this statement, “Power is about fear, influence is about love.” What followed described so well what I believe about the foundations of leadership and relationships. It makes me want to reflect on those places where my fears may move my actions away from love and into avoidance or control. I keep thinking of 1 John 4:18, “Perfect love casts out fear.” I wonder how well or how deeply ministry leaders explore their fears and how they can be potential de-railers. I know my fears tendancy to silence me (at least for a time) but it might be different for others.
I too noticed Moore’s “shotgun” approach. He would have benefited greatly from a strong(or better) content editor. Punchy applications are important in our, admittedly, soundbit generation, especially to those that are looking for direction and clarity in these days.
Great post as always Scott!
Thanks John. Yes…if someone did a summary of his book and reduced it down to 30 pages of the best content and quotes…..it would be gold! Perhaps a project for my post-doctoral life…
Ps. I thought your post was terrible. Or at least part of your post. ‘Terrible’ because I was not aware of just how far the ‘saviour-fication’ of Trump has gone….and it’s downright embarrassing. It’s terrible. It feels like the once ‘strange and embarrassing uncle’ that was a part of your family (that you only saw on holidays) is now 50% of our evangelical family…and I can’t help but think, “What happened?”
The ‘terrible’ part of your post led to some brilliant concluding questions….YES to all! God help us lead his people to embody and different, Kingdom way of being. God’s empowerment to you in this calling…
Scott,
Good work analyzing Russell Moore’s book and memoir. Reading your thoughts makes wonder if Moore needed to write this book for himself first, which is often the case when we lament.
I like this quote that you pulled out: ““…Power [is] ‘something external and based upon force,’ while ‘authority is rooted in persuasion and allegiance…Power arises only when authority breaks down’” (11). This reminds me of Simon Walker’s work about the undefended leader.
So if we are to look to Canada and Britain for our spiritual future, what advice do you give American churches now?