Manifesto Responses

From a Washingtom Post forum:

Some Christian leaders issued An Evangelical Manifesto last week to depoliticize the term 'evangelical.' "We evangelicals are defined theologically, and not politically, socially or culturally," they said. In your mind, what is the definition of an evangelical?

Here are some excerpted answers to the question:

But in general I welcome this as an open-hearted and generous statement. -NT Wright

These Evangelical leaders have come to rue the day they were discovered as a voting bloc by Republican strategists. They have been manipulated and “that way faith loses its independence.” -Susan Brooks

I wasn't aware of a demand for an "evangelical manifesto." -Cal Thomas

The Manifesto well defines the character of evangelicalism as a theological movement. Though it seeks always to bring Christian truth to bear in all of society, including politics, evangelicalism stands astride the mainstream of the church and apart from and independent of any worldly structure. -Chuck Colson

The most helpful, though not original, feature of the Manifesto is to show that the Evangelicals represented in it are more and other than scrubbed-up and toned-down ex-Fundamentalists. -Martin Marty