At a time when conservative white Protestants are making headlines for their embrace of Christian nationalism, authoritarian leanings, and questionable support for democratic norms and institutions, Christian scholars have an essential role to play. How so?
For one, many conservative Christians have embraced an us vs. them mentality, exhibiting distrust for “outsiders”—including academic experts from outside their fold. It’s more difficult, however, to dismiss academic experts who may be in their small group at church, or whose kids attend their Christian school or participate in their homeschool circle.
Another critical factor is that in most evangelical churches, pastors serve at the pleasure of congregants. While a pastor may envision himself a leader, then, in fact his (it is usually his) leadership is constrained. If he pushes his flock too far, challenging them on beliefs or behaviors they hold dear, they are likely to suggest a parting of ways.
Christian academics, however, tend to have both expertise and at least a certain level of authority, and also—sometimes—a bit more job security. Many Christian colleges and universities do not have standard tenure protections, but some do, and many Christians hold academic positions at secular schools.
As a Christian scholar, and as someone with many Christian scholar friends, I’ve been reflecting lately the critical role that we can play in this fractious moment.
Over the past couple of months, I’ve had two opportunities to speak on this issue. The first, at the most recent Conference of Faith & History at Baylor University in Waco, TX, where I gave a plenary address “Doing Justice, Loving Kindness: Christian Scholarship in Polarized Times.” The second, this past week in Nashville, I gave a talk on “The Christian Scholars Challenge” at Lipscomb University’s Christian Scholars Conference.
At both, I gave a bit of my own backstory. I told of my immersion in the Kuyperian, Dooyeweerdian teachings of my Dutch Reformed tradition. I described my frustrated quest to master a sufficiently distinctive approach to the discipline of history, despite studying with George Marsden, the godfather of the evangelical historian mafia. I shared how I then determed that I’d first learned the discipline of history, to which I added the study of gender, before returning to the question of the integration. (Which, if you have been immersed in Reformed thinking, is entirely the wrong order in which to do things.)
When I began teaching at Calvin in 2004, the time came to revisit the question of the integration of my faith and my scholarship. For one thing, my reappointment depended on it.
At the Conference on Faith and History, I shared this recollection:
In preparation for this talk, I dug deep into my files and found my first reappointment statement on faith and learning, where I reflected on the task of the Christian historian. This being Calvin, I started off with John Calvin, pointing out how, in his Institutes, he wrote of the prophetic office that Christians, through their union with Christ, should take up: proclaiming good news to the poor, binding up the brokenhearted, proclaiming freedom for the captives, setting the oppressed free…[1] I wrote about how historians can help give voice to the voiceless, reveal oppression, illuminate suffering, and articulate the many forms—structural and personal—that sin can take.
I also found inspiration in Calvin’s “Expanded Statement of Mission,” which emphasized the need to “discern the cultural and social forces that shape our world and address the needs and issues of contemporary life.” It also spoke of how we “strive to learn the demands of justice…and an awareness of ways to renew the world for God’s glory.” I reflected in my reappointment materials on how historical inquiry contributes to one of the four cardinal virtues, prudence—or, as Aquinas calls it, “right reason in action.”[2] And it is through prudence that another cardinal virtue, justice, can be achieved. I considered, then, how historical inquiry is central to both: “Knowledge of the past can convict us in the present, illuminate injustice past and present, and reveal the complexities of human cultures and societies, complicating our understanding of sin and our human plans for restoration.”
Calvinists have a well-earned reputation for dwelling on sinfulness. If my own work doesn’t always come off as sunny and hopeful, I come by that honestly. John Calvin urged that we all “unremittingly examine our faults,” and insisted that it was only with an attitude of self-denial, “a heart imbued with lowliness and with reverence for others” that we could we be brought into right relationship with those around us.[3]
In my reappointment materials, I went on to discuss how I applied all of this in my scholarship on gender and sexuality. And that was a sticking point with a member of the board of trustees. As part of my reappointment process, I had to appear before the board and the university president to discuss my statement on faith and learning, and at that meeting, one board member flagged my claims. He had always heard that gender studies was incompatible with Christian scholarship.
I shared with him how I had come to see work in gender studies as providing tools—not neutral, and not perfect, but nevertheless useful tools—that could help us understand the ways in which power operated in societies, and the ways power could be used to oppress in the hands of fallen individuals. His response was striking. He said he was grieved that Christians were not on the forefront of pioneering these methodologies, and he gave me his blessing.
It’s almost shocking, isn’t it? In a world full of gotcha questions and guilt-by-association, of pre-ordained rules dictating which conclusions are acceptable and which are not, of gatekeeping and powerplaying, this deferential response by a person in a position of authority seems like a relic of a bygone era.
Instead of being sanctioned, I was given a blessing to do my work, to follow where my investigations led me. They led me to my first book, a study of the history of Christian feminism, and then, ultimately, to Jesus and John Wayne.
In fact, already at that first reappointment, in 2006, I’d already started the research that would lead to Jesus and John Wayne. Here’s what I had to say about it:
My…research explores links between American evangelical constructions of gender and ideas of militarism and foreign policy. The ultimate goal of this research is to examine the historical development of these connections in order to invite the Christian community to reconsider ideas of both gender and militarism in light of biblical teaching.
That goal eventually receded, as I became convinced that these patterns were too deeply embedded to expect any real change. But in my talk at the CFH I outlined how Jesus and John Wayne reflects my own understanding of Christian scholarship. How it reflects love for the marginalized, rather than privileging those in power. How it refuses to give a false sense of hope where there is none. How it reflects my Reformed faith formation, a belief that human sinfulness finds expression individually but also in terms of structures and societies. And it takes seriously the notion of antithesis, not as a vertical line between Christian and secular, but as a horizontal line through everything, the church included.
I concluded both of my recent talks with a call to Christian scholars to step up and do their work with intgrity and courage, meeting the challenges of our moment. For so much of my career, my focus had been on how to bring my faith to bear on my scholarship. At many Christian colleges, this is an annual practice. Over the past couple of years, however, I’ve been thinking more about the reverse: how to bring historical scholarship, and historical methods, to Christians.
If you follow me on Twitter, you’ve seen me post threads on historical research and analysis, on how historians work with primary and secondary sources, how we weigh evidence and construct arguments, how we don’t claim objectivity but nevertheless have methodological and evidentiary standards.
Most fundamentally, however, I think that Christian scholars can teach other Christians how to argue. One of the most important things we can do is to model disagreement well.
To resist the current “take no prisoners” discourse. To absolutely refuse to mischaracterize arguments we don’t like, put forth by people we also may not like. And to not be afraid to critique people we like very much.
There is such a need for us to do this. In fact, we historians do this all the time. I tell students in my intro courses that historians love to argue. It’s our specialty, and I show them the arguments in the texts and also in the footnotes. I show them, too, how nobody is objective, but how subjectivity is not the same as bias, which for my students always has a negative connotation and is too hastily used to dismiss an author’s work out of hand. No, we are all bringing our insights and our blind spots into our scholarship, and then we fight it out. But we have rules of engagement: Honesty. Proper use of sources. Peer review.
We are really good at this, and most people right now are really, really bad at this. So we model it in our scholarship. We model it in our classrooms. Some of us can model this for a larger public as well.
At both of my recent talks, I issued a challenge: that we work to model our disagreement with as much attention to the cultivation of virtue as we give to our pursuit of Christian scholarship. That we strive to disagree with honesty, with integrity, with empathy, and with courage.
I would remiss if I didn’t mention the other highlight of my week: appearing onstage at the Tokens Show with Lee Camp and the amazing singers Odessa Settles, Ashley Cleveland, and Beth Nielsen Chapman. Not a place I ever imagined I’d end up (and something that gives a whole new meaning to “public scholarship”), but an absolute delight.
It occurs to me as I wrap up that I didn’t even mention that WSJ hit piece. It’s a puzzling one, so for more on that, read Matt Sutton’s thread and my own, and see comments from other historians:
[1] Institutes 2.15.2; see Isaiah 61:1-2; cf. Luke 4:18.
[2] Catechism of the Catholic Church, Part III, Life in Christ; Section 1, Chapter 1, Article 7, I.1805, 1806
[3] Institutes, 3.7.4.
The WSJ has been become a tale of two Journals. While the news section is typically balanced, too much of the opinion section content now looks like the Hart column. The open warfare between the newsroom and opinion page editors has been widely reported. It is not uncommon for the newsroom to feature a balanced, well-researched story about a controversial topic and to have the opinion editors simultaneously feature a snarky, misleading editorial on the same subject. In my view, the concurrent timing is no accident.
I have subscribed to the WSJ for decades but almost never read the opinion page anymore. I made the mistake of reading the Hart column when it was first posted because the title intrigued me. I had a very difficult time trying to find a coherent theme in the column and thought that I would need to reread it - until I reached the end and saw Hillsdale College and realized I had wasted my time.
It is perhaps ironic that, earlier this morning, the WSJ newsroom posted a balanced article on the issues facing the SBC in its forthcoming convention.
Thank you for your continued thoughtfulness and erudition in a cacophony of quick takes and shallow observations.