How to Be Evangelical without Being Conservative

211 Pages·2008·2.12 MB·English

by  Roger E. Olson

EVANGELICAL
HOW TO BE
WITHOUT BEING
CONSERVATIVE
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::ROGER E. OLSON
EVANGELICAL
HOW TO BE
WITHOUT BEING
CONSERVATIVE
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How to Be Evangelical without Being Conservative
Copyright © 2008 by Roger E. Olson
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By
payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable
right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be
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introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any
means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without
the express written permission of Zondervan.
AER Edition January 2009 ISBN: 978-0-310-29738-3(cid:13)(cid:10)
Requests for information should be addressed to:
Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49530
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Olson, Roger E.
How to be evangelical without being conservative / Roger E. Olson.
p. cm.
ISBN-10: 0-310-28338-8 (hardcover : alk. paper)
ISBN-13: 978-0-310-28338-6 (hardcover : alk. paper)
1. Evangelicalism. 2. Christian conservatism. 3. Conservatism. I. Title.
BR1640.O47 2008
270.8’3--dc22
2007045560
Scripture taken from the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright © 1946,
1952, 1971 by the Division of Christ ian Education of the National Council of Churches
of Christ in the USA. Used by permission.
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To Collin and Owen
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C
ONTENTS
Foreword ............................................................................9
Introduction:
Who’s an “Evangelical” and
What Does “Conservative” Mean? ..............................................13
1. Being Biblical without Orthodoxy .....................................29
2. Building Character without Moralism ..............................43
3. Celebrating America without Nationalism .......................58
4. Seeking Truth without Certainty .......................................73
5. Taking the Bible Seriously without Literalism .................87
6. Being Religionless without Secularism ..........................101
7. Transforming Culture without Domination .....................114
8. Redistributing Wealth without Socialism .......................128
9. Relativizing without Rejecting Theology .........................143
10. Updating without Trivializing Worship ............................157
11. Accepting without Affirming Flawed People ...................170
12. Practicing Equality without Sacrificing Difference ........184
Conclusion:
Toward a Postconservative Evangelicalism ...........................200
About the Publisher..............................................................209
Share Your Thoughts............................................................210
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F
OREWORD
Most of us are confronted daily with choices — choices to
choose one thing or its apparent mirror opposite. What will
we be? Catholic or Protestant, Democrat or Republican, Capi-
talist or Communist, Evangelical or Liberal, Emerging or Tradi-
tional, Moralist or Relativist, Seeker or Liturgical — we could go
on but need not. Why? Nearly every mirror opposite you and I
face presents a false dichotomy.
One of the more bewildering dichotomies of our day is the
assumption, paraded daily in the media and on blogs and web-
sites and by anyone who likes to sound off alarms, that Evangeli-
cal is opposed to Liberal in every way, shape, and form. Is it the
case, many today are asking, that everything Evangelical is Con-
servative? Many of us are asking this question and are coming to
surprising agreements on a variety of topics.
Roger Olson, in this splendidly clear and even-handed book,
How to be Evangelical without Being Conservative, maps out an
even dozen issues where the “more evangelical” line might just be
a Third Way between being conservative or being liberal.
Let me give you a few reasons why I think you might like this
book, because I sure did.
First, there are many Christ ians today who know deep inside
they are neither conservative nor liberal on each issue. Some
9
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