Thread by @JoeNBC

“We’re losing an entire generation. They’re just gone. It’s one of the worst things to happen to the Church.” ⁦

@Peter_Wehner⁩’s piece is a must read on the existential crisis now facing the Evangelical church. theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

This is an important follow up to @DavidAFrench’s observations re: evangelical’s contempt for refugees. As David noted, it not only ignores the teachings of Jesus in the Gospels, it also is a dramatic break from the church’s tradition of aiding the poor and less fortunate.

Though I ache for my church, I understand the “Flight 93 Forever” mentality. As a child looking through my Southern Baptist parents’ eyes, I saw their fear as one cultural norm after another collapsed with Vietnam, Woodstock, riots, the sexual revolution, and drug epidemics.

Add to that the constant contempt heaped upon conservatives over a generation from a elite cultural centers, and you have a toxic brew that makes a charlatan like Trump an evangelical icon.

But here’s the bitter irony for the church: this toxicity will cripple the church for decades. The church cannot turn its back on the teaching that we’re central to Jesus’ ministry and survive. See Matthew 25 (sheep and goats), the Beatitudes, and the Good Samaritan parable.

I’m a sinner but even I can read the Bible and understand how far from the teachings of Jesus Christ many evangelical leaders have taken their church.