A Layman’s Concern about the Future of the American Clergy

During 2020, the global pandemic, racial tensions, and a polarizing presidency put the United States through its most significant stress test since the terrorist attacks of 9/11. Throughout these crises we have had a growing sense of concern about the rising class of young Christian thought leaders, clergy, and theologians in the United States. Their writings and conversations have focused more and more on current hot topics and in many cases they seem to be bringing their substantial intellectual firepower to bear against radical fringes of public discourse whom they find understandably distasteful. As such, it has caused us to wonder what the underlying motivation for this discourse is? We have come to fear that it is a desire to be liked — to be seen to be acceptable to mainstream culture, or “polite society”, or in certain cases by a populist base.

Throughout history, and certainly in U.S. history, the church at its best has been a prophetic voice for the dignity of all people as bearers of God’s image. The anti-slavery and civil rights movements embody this willingness of Christian leaders to boldly carry the banner of the gospel for change in the face of great opposition. Yet, in our current moment the standard bearers of the Church seem to be falling in line behind the lead of secular intellectuals and trying to reconcile the gospel with those intellectual’s vision of human dignity.

An attempt to be acceptable is turning many rising church leaders into “pajama boy” intellectuals who seem boldest in their condemnation of the man in the pew, while that layman is looking at the world around him with increasing confusion and fear. A gospel-centered message should instead give our rising leaders an unparalleled strength to face our culture and speak the truth knowing that the only approval they need comes from God not man, and with the humility of knowing that God is the arbiter of all truth so they do not have to be; and that they are here to guide his bride to the work that we are given to do in this present age.

We do not intend to point to specific cases in this letter since we have no interest in the sorts of salacious ad hominem attacks that some have used to raise their own profile at their target’s expense. We are also going to avoid specific names because we consider many young leaders within the American church as friends, who we hold in high regard, and do not wish to point a finger at any particular individual. The spirit is to raise a genuine debate, not pass final judgement.

This observation is largely focused on Protestant Christianity. We have not observed the same tone and movement within the Roman Catholic Church, though largely Catholicism is historically less politically charged within the United States — with a few notable exceptions like the Pro-Life movement — as compared to the passion of Evangelicalism or the activism of mainline Protestantism. This may be a function of the fact that each parish priest is not responsible for taking a position on every cultural trend that is passing through his flock. Protestants, and especially evangelicals, expect and often desire their pastor and church leadership to address current issues, as they are generally the only Biblical authority to which congregants look. This inherent structure tends to make Protestant churches more susceptible to being caught up in the politics of the moment. There also appears to be a shift towards traditionalism within young intellectual Catholicism in America.

The threefold stress test of COVID-19, inflamed racial tensions, and divisive domestic politics has put all our institutions under incredible strain, and we have seen many cracks appear in walls that before were thought to be unbreakable. The church has been no exception. A fact which causes us significant concern. In a moment of profound fear, anger, and suffering, the Church does not seem to be focused on bringing to bear the powerful freedom from fear, hope for the future, and comfort in pain we have in the gospel. Much of the discourse among the rising clergy and theologians of the Church has centered around teaching the layman how he ought to think about the pandemic, racial discrimination, and the state of American politics. An honorable and important project that at certain times we look to our spiritual leaders to provide. But, in the face of a season where our families and institutions are cracking under pressure, the voices of moral guidance in the Church seemed to routinely be majoring in the minors.

When the coronavirus first swept across the U.S., churches scrambled to determine what their response should be. Many went quickly to virtual services to comply with state shutdown orders. As the pandemic shutdowns quickly passed the “two weeks to slow the spread” some churches began to wonder what the Biblical response was in the face of state orders not to convene in person. The New Testament seems clearly to prescribe the gathering together of the local church as an important element of Christian life. This sparked a debate that seemed to mirror a debate happening in the larger culture.

The larger political debate was one of individual liberty versus the power of the government to ensure safety during an emergency. The political right reacted strongly in favor of devolved power and the individual’s right to assume his own risk, while the political left pushed state emergency power in a time of crisis and for social responsibility to follow government response strategies. Largely we didn’t know the nature of the virus or what the facts we had portended, so the debate was happening in the dark. For the church the debate was between going on with the important and traditional functions of the church or continuing to remain in a pandemic posture out of prudence and a high concern for protecting the congregation from the virus.

While many urban churches remained virtual, many rural churches which were not under lockdown orders continued to meet. Some theologians roundly condemned churches meeting in person. In no uncertain terms they warned against prioritizing being in person over the safety of the members. There was a distinct moral tone to the condemnation. They asserted that these Churches were irresponsibly endangering people’s lives and in so doing jeopardizing their gospel directive to care for their communities. For yuppie theologians who mostly live in urban areas these concerns were quite rational. But they rarely took into account the fact that many of the churches choosing to stay open were rural churches, often with fewer than one hundred members. Some of these congregations did not see a COVID case until midsummer 2020.

There was a striking lack of an attempt to graciously consider the different contexts of different parts of the church, or admit the real danger that extended isolation also presented to followers of Christ. While the desire to return to in-person gatherings was often portrayed as selfish, little time was given to considering how jealously guarding their own health and welfare might also lead to increased selfishness.

The exception we saw, which was a bright spot, was churches that made clear that virtual church was an imperfect measure taken temporarily in extreme circumstances, and that they would be back together the moment they could reasonably do so. Even so, in many cases it has been difficult to get members to come back, even when the vaccine was widely available. Some churches that were much more cautious about returning have struggled to get members to return at all.

The motivation often seemed like moral grandstanding over the pandemic from young church leaders in mediums like the press and on twitter, where very few average church attendees are likely to see it. Seemingly to be an attempt to demonstrate to outside onlookers that they were in opposition to the reckless, conspiratorial elements of the church who did not take the virus seriously.  

The pandemic was in full swing when vicious killings of multiple black men rocked the country and unleashed a summer of “mostly peaceful” protests. While many gatherings were not violent, all too many others were vicious and destructive. The cultural debates and conflicts that were thrown into the spotlight by these events took many forms–from defunding the police to the mainstreaming of critical race theory, and also the coming out party for the Woke movement. 

Many, perhaps it is not an exaggeration to say all, church leaders felt the necessity of addressing these racial challenges, especially younger clergy. With some notable exceptions, this commentary took the form of Christianized sensitivity training, often critiquing the laity for their failure to approach racism well. This is not to suggest this was all empty moral lecturing. In many cases it was well intended and came from a desire to more truly manifest the gospel within the church. The effect of this messaging has often been to leave people feeling alienated and frustrated, or in some cases smuggly morally superior. Strident calls for justice from a cadre of theologians and leaders who had made their banner “grace above all else” was jarring and left the layman again to assume that the lecturing from their leaders was to demonstrate the political correctness of the church more than to help him process the trauma he was seeing his country go through. 

It is not necessary to describe the similar story that played out during the 2020 election cycle and during the confusing, frustrating, and finally tragic post-election circus. Much moral indignation and pearl-clutching was done by the theological yuppie class, while many people in the pews of America who felt unheard by those leaders thrashed about looking for voices that spoke to their frustration and fear. Too often the alternative voices they found were not credible sources of information.

The year 2020 presented an incredible opportunity for the church to meet and serve people in their moment of need and vulnerability. Sadly, instead of pushing into this opportunity, many churches seem to have become more divided with many congregants conspiratorially searching for hidden progressive agendas in their church leader’s teaching.

Church leaders should not expect, nor be expected, to comment on every aspect of these crises as many issues are beyond their responsibility. A Pastor recently brought this timely insight from C.S. Lewis to our attention:

“When they ask for a lead from the Church most people mean that they want the clergy to put out a political programme. That is silly. The clergy are those particular people within the whole church who have specially trained and set aside to look after what concerns us as creatures who are going to live forever; and we are asking them to do quite a different job for which they have not been trained. The job is really on us, the laymen. The application of Christian principles, say to trade unionism or education, must come from Christian trade unionists and Christian schoolmasters; just as literature comes from Christian novelists and dramatists – not from the bench of bishops getting together and trying to write plays and novels in their spare time.”

We want to make clear we are not arguing for recklessly populist church leaders, or that we support church leaders who seem to think the church is a wing of the Republican party. These are also distractions for the work of the church and should be guarded against. We address them less only because we observed them less among emerging church leaders.

It is worth adding an addendum to this letter that we generally haven’t found the old guard — the generation of church leaders that includes the likes of John Piper, Timothy Keller, and Albert Mohler — to have subordinated their message to the shifting winds of cultural debates. This is not to say at different times and in different ways they have not advised laity on how they will approach cultural and political issues, but when they have done so it has been laced with nuance, an elevation of the gospel above temporal issues, and a reticence to become a cultural commentator. For this, we have been grateful. We hope that young church leaders will follow their example.

We are living through a moment of incredible opportunity for the gospel to meet the very real needs of people across our nation and world, and the church is incredibly well suited to move into that space. As laymen of the church, we hope and pray that our leaders will boldly lead us in these challenging days.

Peter Burns is an independent consultant working with Open Doors USA and Matias Perttula is Director of Advocacy for International Christian Concern (Institutional affiliation is provided for identification purposes only).