Thread by @drantbradley

The main cause of the vitriol against Du Mez et al is that the TGC, SBC, DG, 9 Marks, Acts 29, Calvinist etc. world never saw itself as a sociological object of critique. There is now an entire academic world focussed on their failures & Reformed men are losing their minds.

The TGC/DG/etc. world is a Christian culture lacking epistemic humility and discourages self-critique. Internal critics are called “anti-gospel.” They built an entire platform based on critiquing *everyone* but themselves & taught an entire generation of pastors to do the same.

Modern white Calvinists, in their arrogance, conflated their religious culture with “the gospel” itself. To critique their religious culture is somehow equivalent to critiquing Jesus, the gospel, the Bible, etc. It’s unreal!

So now their hyper-critical chickens are coming home to roost by army of PhDs who are equipped with analytical tools exposing them every side. Calvinist culture missed Jesus’ point about the speck in the eye. They cheered like sports fans when someone said, “Farewell, Rob Bell.”

In their blindness, they believed themselves to be united theologically when, in fact, American evangelicalism (Puritans to Edwards to the present) was always first and foremost a sociological coalition cloaked in theological language about “the gospel,” “inerrancy,” etc.

Because evangelicalism has always been a sociological coalition, not a biblical nor theological one, it’s entire American history was in direct opposition to racial freedom for blacks & black Christians from slavery through Jim Crow.

In the 1950s, they abandoned the cities (esp. adjacent to black neighborhoods) and built institutions in the suburbs, built by the government, to support white middle-class thriving. It reinforced their arrogance about being right. They’ve always believed themselves to be right.

So, when you teach your children that “all Christians are wrong *except for us*,” and an army of scholars pull the low hanging bad fruit of errors throughout your history, your prideful, and sadly immature, response will be “counter-attack and defend the tribe.”

I remember this back in 2004 when white Calvinists started calling me, “Nigger,” “Anferny,” etc. when I started critiquing them. I’m not sure where all these scholars were back then but I could have told them what to expect. That world will not change. Ever. It’s a fool’s errand.

I’ve seen it over the years & the response to Du Mez, Jones, Perry, Coley, et al is not surprising. Critiquing white evangelicalism will never change white evangelicalism. If that were true, we wouldn’t be here today. Black theologians had these critiques, in print, 100+ yrs ago.

So now, because their chickens are coming home to roost, they are only left to play their victim card and whine like pre-schoolers. They are fragile. As soon as *their* plank in the eye is pointed out, they pout and say, “Stop hurting us.” They coddled themselves & their kids.

The teams are set. “White evangelicalism” is about to get a bunch white scholars tenure. White Calvinism will feed off the perceived attacks and circle their wagons. Articles & counter-articles. Books & counter books. Conferences & counter-conferences. This will last for years.

At the end of the day it’s same debates between Graham, Niebuhr, and Tillich 2.0. What will be accomplished? Not much, as history shows. It’s why I returned to family & public policy issues. I’ve already experienced these topics bearing little to no fruit. amazon.com/Aliens-Promise…

If you’re a racial minority, don’t feel like you have to make “white evangelicalism” your life project. There are more important issues to address & the attention feeds their narcissism. The devil is active in lots of other spheres. You’re free to focus on many of those as well.

For minorities, these intramural debates are lively but eventually you’ll get bored and/or discouraged (trust me!). “As far as the curse is found” means that we need people’s thoughtful energies to address race & Christianity issues but much, much, much, much, MUCH, more!