In theUnited States,evangelicalism is a movement amongProtestantChristians who believe in the necessity of beingborn again, emphasize the importance ofevangelism, and affirm traditionalProtestant teachings on theauthority as well as thehistoricity of the Bible.[1] Comprising nearly a quarter of the U.S. population, evangelicals are a diverse group drawn from a variety of backgrounds, includingnondenominational churches,Pentecostal,Baptist,Reformed,Methodist,Mennonite,Plymouth Brethren, andQuaker.[2][3][4]
Evangelicalism has played an important role in shaping Americanreligion andculture. TheFirst Great Awakening of the 18th century marked the rise of evangelical religion incolonial America. As therevival spread throughout theThirteen Colonies, evangelicalism united Americans around a common faith.[1] TheSecond Great Awakening of the early 19th century led to what historianMartin Marty calls the "Evangelical Empire", a period in which evangelicals dominated U.S. cultural institutions, including schools and universities. Evangelicals of this era in thenorthern United States were strong advocates of reform. They were involved in thetemperance movement and supported theabolition of slavery, in addition to working towardeducation andcriminal justice reform. In thesouthern United States, evangelicals split from their northern counterparts on the issue of slavery, establishing new denominations that opposed abolition and defended the practice ofracial slavery[5] upon which the South's expanding cash-crops-for-export agricultural economy was built.[6][7][8] During theCivil War, each side confidently preached in support of its own cause using Bible verses and Evangelical arguments, which exposed a deep theological conflict that had been brewing for decades and would continue long afterLee's surrender at Appomattox.[9]
By the end of the 19th century, the old evangelical consensus that had united much of American Protestantism no longer existed. Protestant churches became divided over ground-breaking new intellectual and theological ideas, such asDarwinian evolution andhistorical criticism of theBible. Those who embraced these ideas became known asmodernists, while those who rejected them became known asfundamentalists. Fundamentalists defended a doctrine ofbiblical inerrancy and adopted adispensationalist theological system for interpreting the Bible.[10][11] As a result of thefundamentalist–modernist controversy of the 1920s and 1930s, fundamentalists lost control of theMainline Protestant churches andseparated themselves from non-fundamentalist churches and cultural institutions.[12]
AfterWorld War II, a new generation of conservative Protestants rejected the separatist stance of fundamentalism and began calling themselves evangelicals. Popular evangelistBilly Graham was at the forefront of reviving use of the term. During this time period, several evangelical institutions were established, including theNational Association of Evangelicals, the magazineChristianity Today, and educational institutions such asFuller Theological Seminary.[13] As a reaction to the1960s counterculture and the U.S. Supreme Court's 1973Roe v. Wade decision, many white evangelicals became politically active and involved in theChristian right,[14] which became an importantvoting bloc in theRepublican Party.
Many scholars have adopted historianDavid Bebbington's definition of evangelicalism. According to Bebbington, evangelicalism has four major characteristics. These areconversionism (an emphasis on thenew birth),biblicism (an emphasis on theBible as the supreme religious authority),activism (an emphasis on individual engagement in spreadingthe gospel), andcrucicentrism (an emphasis onChrist's sacrifice on the cross andbodily resurrection from the dead as the heart of true Christian religion). However, this definition has been criticized for being so broad as to include all Christians.[15][16]
HistorianMolly Worthen writes "history—rather than theology or politics—is the most useful tool for pinning down today's evangelicals."[17] She finds that evangelicals share common origins in the religious revivals and moral crusades of the 18th and 19th centuries. She writes, "Evangelicalcatchphrases like 'Bible-believing' and 'born again' are modern translations of theReformers' slogansola scriptura andPietists' emphasis on internal spiritual transformation."[17]
Evangelicals are often defined in opposition tomainline Protestants. According to sociologist Brian Steensland and colleagues, "evangelical denominations have typically sought more separation from the broader culture, emphasized missionary activity and individual conversion, and taught strict adherence to particular religious doctrines."[18] Mainline Protestants are described as having "an accommodating stance toward modernity, a proactive view on issues of social and economic justice, and pluralism in their tolerance of varied individual beliefs."[19]
HistorianGeorge Marsden writes that during the 1950s and 1960s the simplest definition of an evangelical was "anyone who likesBilly Graham". During that period, most people who self-identified with the evangelical movement were affiliated with organizations that had some connection to Graham.[20] It can also be defined narrowly as a movement centered around organizations such as theNational Association of Evangelicals andYouth for Christ.[16]
News media often conflate evangelicalism with "conservative Protestantism" or theChristian right. However, not every conservative Protestant identifies as evangelical, nor are all evangelicals political conservatives.[21]
Conflicting definitions can create ambiguity when the term "evangelical" is applied toLutherans in the United States. The German termevangelisch more accurately corresponds to the broad English termProtestant[22] while the narrower German termevangelikal, more accurately describes Evangelicalism in the American sense. The largestLutheran denomination in the United States, theEvangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) describes itself as "evangelical" in the broader sense only, and is classified asmainline protestant.[23] The term "Evangelical Lutheran" is often used as shorthand to refer to members of the ELCA in a similar way the terms "Southern Baptist" and "United Methodist" are used to refer to members of those respective traditions. Lutherans subscribing to the narrower definition of evangelical are better described asConfessional Lutherans orPietistic Lutherans.
Scholars have found it useful to distinguish among different types of evangelicals. One scheme by sociologistJames Davison Hunter identifies four major types: theBaptist tradition, theHoliness andPentecostal tradition, theAnabaptist tradition, and theConfessional tradition (evangelical Anglicans,pietistic Lutherans, and evangelicals within the Reformed churches).[24][25]
EthicistMax Stackhouse and historians Donald W. Dayton and Timothy P. Weber divide evangelicalism into three main historical groupings. The first, called "Puritan" orclassical evangelicalism, seeks to preserve the doctrinal heritage of the 16th century ProtestantReformation, especially the Reformed tradition. Classical evangelicals emphasize absolutedivine sovereignty, forensicjustification, and "literalistic"inerrancy. The second,pietistic evangelicalism, originates from the 18th-century pietist movements in Europe and theGreat Awakenings in America. Pietistic evangelicals embracerevivalism and a more experiential faith, emphasizingconversion,sanctification,regeneration, andhealing. The third,fundamentalist evangelicalism, results from theFundamentalist–Modernist split of the early 20th century. Fundamentalists emphasize certain "fundamental" beliefs against modernist criticism and often use anapocalyptic,premillennialist interpretation of the Bible. These three categories are more fluid than Hunter's, so an individual could identify with only one, any two, or all three.[26]
John C. Green, a senior fellow at thePew Forum on Religion and Public Life, used polling data to separate evangelicals into three broad camps, which he labels astraditionalist,centrist andmodernist:[27]
The roots of American evangelicalism lie in the merger of three older Protestant traditions: New EnglandPuritanism, Continental Pietism and Scotch-IrishPresbyterianism.[28] Within theirCongregational churches, Puritans promoted experimental or experiential religion, arguing that savingfaith required an inward transformation.[29] This led Puritans to demand evidence of aconversion experience (in the form of aconversion narrative) before a convert was admitted to full church membership.[30] In the 1670s and 1680s, Puritan clergy began to promote religiousrevival in response to a perceived decline in religiosity.[31] TheUlster Scots who immigrated to the American colonies in the early 18th century brought with them their own revival tradition, specifically the practice ofcommunion seasons.[32] Pietism was a movement within theLutheran and Reformed churches in Europe that emphasized a "religion of the heart": the ideal that faith was not simply acceptance ofpropositional truth but was an emotional "commitment of one's whole being to God" in which one's life became dedicated toself-sacrificial ministry.[33] Pietists promoted the formation ofcell groups forBible study, prayer, and accountability.[34]
These three traditions were brought together with theFirst Great Awakening, a series of revivals in Britain and its American Colonies during the 1730s and 1740s.[36] The Awakening began within the Congregational churches of New England. In 1734,Jonathan Edwards' preaching on justification by faith instigated a revival inNorthampton, Massachusetts. Earlier Puritan revivals had been brief, local affairs, but the Northampton revival was part of a larger wave of revival that affected the Presbyterian andDutch Reformed churches in the middle colonies as well.[37] There the Reformed ministerTheodore Frelinghuysen and Presbyterian ministerGilbert Tennent led revivals.[35]
The English evangelistGeorge Whitefield was responsible for spreading the revivals through all the colonies. AnAnglican priest, Whitefield had studied atOxford University prior to ordination, and there he befriendedJohn Wesley and his brotherCharles, the founders of a pietistic movement within theChurch of England calledMethodism. Whitefield's dramatic preaching style and ability to simplify doctrine made him a popular preacher in England, and in 1739 he arrived in America preaching up and down the Atlantic coastline. Thousands flocked to open-air meetings to hear him preach, and he became a celebrity throughout the colonies.[38]
The Great Awakening hit its peak by 1740,[39] but it shaped a new form of Protestantism that emphasized, according to historianThomas S. Kidd, "seasons of revival, oroutpourings of theHoly Spirit, andconverted sinners experiencing God's love personally" [emphasis in original].[40] Evangelicals believed in the "new birth"—a discernible moment of conversion—and believed that it was normal for a Christian to haveassurance of faith.[41] While the Puritans had also believed in the necessity of conversion, they "had held that assurance is rare, late and the fruit of struggle in the experience of believers".[42] Emphasis on the individual's relationship to God gave evangelicalism anegalitarian streak as well, which was perceived by anti-revivalists as undermining social order. Radical evangelicals ordained uneducated ministers (sometimes nonwhite men) and sometimes allowed nonwhites and women to serve asdeacons andelders. They also supportedlaypeople's right to dissent from their pastors and form new churches.[43]
The Awakening split the Congregational and Presbyterian churches over support for the revival movement, betweenOld and New Lights, leading to theOld Side–New Side controversy. Ultimately, the evangelical New Lights became the larger faction among both Congregationalists and Presbyterians. TheNew England theology, based on Edwards' work, would become the dominant theological outlook within Congregational churches.[44][38] In New England, radical New Lights broke away from the established churches and formedSeparate Baptist congregations. In the 1740s and 1750s, New Side Presbyterians and Separate Baptists began moving to the southern colonies and establishing churches. Many traveled along the difficultGreat Wagon Road on their way to the southern colonies. There they challenged the Anglican religious establishment, which was identified with theplanter elite. In contrast, evangelicals tended to be neither very rich nor very poor, but hardworking farmers and tradesmen who disapproved ofworldliness they saw in the planter class. In the 1760s, the first Methodist missionaries came to America and focused their ministry in the South as well. By 1776, evangelicals outnumbered Anglicans in the South.[45]
During and after theAmerican Revolution, the Anglican Church (now known as theEpiscopal Church) experienced much disruption and lost its special legal status and privileges. The four largest denominations were the Congregationalists, Presbyterians, Baptists, and Methodists. In the 1770s and 1780s, the Baptists and Methodists had experienced dramatic growth. In 1770, there were only 150 Baptist and 20 Methodist churches, but in 1790 there were 858 Baptist and 712 Methodist churches. These two evangelical denominations were most successful in the southern states and along thewestern frontier. They also appealed to Africanslaves; on theDelmarva Peninsula, for example, over a third of Methodists were black. In the 1790s, evangelical influence on smaller groups such as Quakers, Lutherans, and the Dutch and German Reformed was still limited. Because of cultural and language barriers, the Dutch and German churches were not a major part of this era's evangelical revivals.[46]
In the 19th century, evangelicalism expanded as a result of theSecond Great Awakening (1790s–1840s).[47] The revivals of the Second Great Awakening influenced all the major Protestant denominations, and turned most American Protestants into evangelicals.[48] From the 1790s until the 1860s, evangelicals were the most influential religious leaders in the United States.[15] For context, the U.S. population was 2.6 million in 1776. By 1860 it had grown to 31.5 million. Between 1790 and 1840, over four million people (more than the entire population in 1776) had moved west of the Appalachian Mountains.[49]
There were three major centers of revival in the Second Great Awakening. Revival in theCumberland River Valley of western frontier statesTennessee andKentucky started as early as 1800. InNew England, a major revival began among Congregationalists by the 1820s, led byEdwardsian preachers such asTimothy Dwight,Lyman Beecher,Nathaniel Taylor, andAsahel Nettleton. In western New York—the so-called "burned-over district" along theErie Canal—the revival was mainly led by Congregationalists and Presbyterians, but Baptists and Methodists were also involved.[50]
Unlike the East Coast, where revivals tended to be quieter and more solemn, western revivals tended to be emotional and dramatic.[51] Presbyterian ministerJames McGready led theRevival of 1800, also known as the Red River Revival, in southwestern Kentucky'sLogan County. It was here that the traditional Scottish communion season began to evolve into the Americancamp meeting.[52] In northeastern Kentucky'sBourbon County a year later, theCane Ridge Revival led byBarton Stone lasted a week and drew crowds of 20,000 people from the thinly populatedfrontier. At Cane Ridge, many converts experienced religious ecstasy and "bodily agitations".[53] Some worshipers caughtholy laughter, barked like dogs, experiencedconvulsions, fell intotrances, danced, shouted or wereslain in the Spirit. Similar responses had occurred in other revivals, but they were more intense at Cane Ridge. This revival was the origin of theStone-Campbell Movement, from which theChurches of Christ andDisciples of Christ denominations originate.[54][53]
During the Second Great Awakening, theMethodist Episcopal Church was most successful at gaining converts. It enthusiastically adopted camp meetings as a regular part of church life, and devoted resources to evangelizing the western frontier. Itinerant ministers known ascircuit riders traveled hundreds of miles each year to preach and serve scattered congregations. The Methodists took a democratic and egalitarian approach to ministry, allowing poor and uneducated young men to become circuit riders. The Baptists also expanded rapidly. Like the Methodists, Baptists also sent out itinerant ministers, often with little education.[55]
The theology behind the First Great Awakening had been largelyCalvinist.[56] Calvinists taughtpredestination and that God only givessalvation to a small group of theelect and condemns everyone else tohell. The Calvinist doctrine ofirresistible grace denied to humansfree will or any role in their own salvation.[57] The Second Great Awakening was heavily influenced byArminianism, a theology that allows for free will and gives humans a greater role in their own conversion.[56] The Methodists were Arminians and taught that all people could choose salvation. They also taught that Christians could lose their salvation bybacksliding or returning tosin.[57]
The most influential evangelical of the Second Great Awakening wasCharles Grandison Finney. He is best known for preaching from 1825 to 1835 inUpstate New York,[58] which experienced a population boom after the Erie Canal opened in 1825.[59] Though ordained by the Presbyterian Church, Finney deviated from traditional Calvinism. Finney taught that neither revivals nor conversion occurred without human effort. While divine grace is necessary to persuade people of the truth of Christianity, God does not force salvation upon people. Unlike Edwards, who described revival as a "surprising work of God", Finney taught that "revival is not a miracle" but "the result of the right use of the appropriate means."[60] Finney emphasized several methods to promote revival that became known as the "new measures" (even though they were not new but had already been in use among the Methodists): mass advertising, protracted revival meetings, allowing women to speak andtestify in revival meetings, and themourner's bench where potential converts sat to pray for conversion.[61] Finney was also active in social reforms, particularly theabolitionist movement. He frequently denouncedslavery from the pulpit, called it a "great national sin," and refused Holy Communion to slaveholders.[62]
Evangelical views oneschatology (the doctrine of the end times) have also changed over time. The Puritans were premillennialists, which means they believedChrist would return before theMillennium (a thousand years of godly rule on earth). But the First Great Awakening convinced many evangelicals that the millennial kingdom was already being established before Christ returned, a belief known aspostmillennialism. During the Second Great Awakening, postmillennialism (with its expectation that society would become progressively more Christianized) became the dominant view, since it complemented the Arminian emphasis on self-determination and theEnlightenment's positive view of human potential.[63]
Thispostmillennial optimism inspired a number of social reform movements among northern evangelicals,[64] includingtemperance (asteetotalism became "a badge of honor" for evangelicals),[65] abolitionism, prison reform, and educational reform.[63] They launched a campaign to enddueling.[66] They built asylums for the physically disabled and mentally ill,schools for the deaf, and hospitals for treatingtuberculosis. They formed organizations to provide food, clothing, money, and job placement to immigrants and the poor.[67] In order to "impress the new nation with an indelibly Protestant character," evangelicals foundedSunday schools, colleges, and seminaries. They published millions of books,tracts, and Christian periodicals through organizations such as theAmerican Tract Society and theAmerican Bible Society.[66] This network of social reform organizations is referred to as theBenevolent Empire.
Postmillennialism also led to an increase inmissionary work.[63] Many of the major missionary societies in the U.S. werefounded around this time. Missionary efforts by northern evangelicals included the influentialAmerican Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM), founded in 1810, which sent missionaries overseas, placed missionaries withAmerican Indian tribes in theSoutheastern United States, and had established missions among theCherokee, for example, by 1820. The ABCFM fought against U.S.Indian removal policies in general and against theIndian Removal Act of 1830 in particular.[68] In 1836 the ABCFM sentMarcus and Narcissa Whitman west from Upstate New York to preach to theCayuse people inOregon Country.[69][70]
TheThird Great Awakening that began in 1857–1858 also gathered much of its strength from the postmillennial belief that the Second Coming of Christ would occur after mankind had reformed the entire Earth. It was affiliated with theSocial Gospel movement, which applied Christianity to social issues.[71]
The spread ofdispensationalism in late 19th-century America led many Evangelicals to return to the more pessimistic premillennialist point of view. According to scholar Mark Sweetnam,dispensationalists are evangelical,premillennialist andapocalyptic, insist on a literal interpretation of Scripture, identify distinct stages ("dispensations") in God's dealings with humanity, and expect Christ's imminent return torapture His saints.[72] As B. M. Pietsch notes, their leaders have built intricate new methods of text analysis to "unlock" the Bible's meaning.[73]
John Nelson Darby was an austere 19th-centuryAnglo-Irish Bible teacher and former Anglican clergyman who devised and promoted dispensationalism. This new and controversial method of interpreting the Bible,[74][75] which does not reconcile easily with findings from recent mainstream archaeological and textual research,[76][77][78] was incorporated into the development of modern Evangelicalism.[79] First taught in the 1830s by Darby and thePlymouth Brethren in England, dispensationalism was introduced to American evangelical leaders during Darby's missionary journeys to the U.S. and Canada in the 1860s and 1870s.[80] TheNiagara Bible Conference was organized in 1876 to teach dispensationalist ideas;[81] these ideas came to dominate the fundamentalist movement within a few decades.[11][82]
Dwight L. Moody played a key role in this transformation. In the latter half of the 19th century, Moody became the most important evangelical figure of the era, weaving ideas from business and religion into a compelling new form of evangelical Protestantism and reaching very large audiences with his powerful preaching.[83][84][85][86] Focused on the city ofChicago and active in the Sunday School movement andYoung Men's Christian Association (YMCA) from 1858 in his early ministry, Moody had relentlessly sought financial contributions from rich evangelical businessmen such asJohn Farwell andCyrus McCormick. Moody's approach was rough, blunt and unconventional, but wealthy philanthropists could see he truly cared for the urban poor and he found effective ways to improve their lot.[87][84] During an 1867 visit to England, Moody became acquainted with a group of pragmaticBrethren dispensationalists who shared many of his own concerns and approaches to charitable work.[88] After theGreat Chicago Fire in 1871 destroyed his church, his home and the Chicago YMCA, Moody left local church work for a new career as a traveling revivalist.[84] Convinced now that the world would be changed not by social work but by Christ's return and the establishment of His millennial kingdom on Earth, Moody abandoned his own previous postmillennialist views.[84] His revivals accelerated the spread of dispensationalist beliefs, and he was influential in preaching the imminence of the Kingdom of God that is so important to dispensationalism.[89]
Enlisting philanthropic support from the business community was one of several enduring innovations Moody had introduced into the conduct of revival campaigns.[84] Like many clergymen in theGilded Age that followed soon after the Civil War, Moody supported the business community's values. He helped forge the union between the evangelical mind and the business mind that came to be a hallmark of later popular revivalists.[90] Moody's religious individualism fit neatly with the rugged individualism of Gilded Age businessmen.[91] Moody radiated optimism when he spoke about how Christian conversion would impact a poor man's life.[92] He believed Christian conversion would make lazy, poor men into energetic men who would then work hard and prosper.[92] At his revival meetings Moody would look around at the wealthy men who sat on the platform with him, such as McCormick,William E. Dodge, andJohn Wanamaker, comment that they were all devout church members, all born again Christians, and say that few of the poor in the slums of Chicago, London, or New York attended church services.[92] Moody also viewedindustrialism and its ills through the same lens of Christian conversion. As he saw it, the fix was simple and obvious: believe in God, and the problems will vanish soon.[93]
American evangelical minister and Moody associateCyrus Scofield also promoted the spread of dispensationalism, starting with a pamphlet published in 1888, then by weaving extensive interpretive commentary into prominent notes on the pages of his ambitiousScofield Reference Bible. First published in 1909, the Scofield Bible became a popular one-volume reference used widely by independent Evangelicals in the United States.[94] It did much to popularize dispensationalism early in the 20th century, as Evangelicals sought to make sense of calamities likeWorld War I, the1918 influenza pandemic, the1929 stock market crash, theGreat Depression andDust Bowl in the 1930s, andWorld War II. By 1945, more than 2 million copies had been published in the United States.[95]
Evangelicals also launched a network of independent Bible institutes which soon became the nucleus for the spread of American dispensationalism.[96] Notable examples include theMoody Bible Institute[97] and theBible Institute of Los Angeles.[98] By the early 1930s there were as many as fifty such Bible institutes serving fundamentalist constituencies.[96]
In the late 19th century, the revivalistHoliness movement promoted the doctrine ofentire sanctification, and while many adherents remained within mainline Methodism, those associated with it also formed new denominations, such as theFree Methodist Church andWesleyan Methodist Church.[99] In urban Britain the holiness message was less censorious, and did not face as much opposition.[100]
From the 1850s to the 1920s, a more technical theological perspective came from thePrinceton Theologians, such asCharles Hodge,Archibald Alexander, andB. B. Warfield,[101] who strove to defend traditional doctrines they found in the Bible against rival claims from other learned scholars, including such claims that were based onhigher criticism.[102]
By the 1890s, most American Protestants belonged to evangelical denominations, except forhigh church Episcopalians and German Lutherans. In the early 20th century, a divide opened up between fundamentalists and the mainline Protestant denominations, chiefly over inerrancy of the Bible. After 1910, evangelicalism was dominated by fundamentalists who rejected liberal theology, emphasized inerrancy of Scripture, and taught a dispensationalist interpretation of the Bible to support their views of human history and mankind's future.
Pastors, theologians, and laity shaped the course of early fundamentalism, but wealthy businessmen also played a crucial role.[103][104] For example,Union Oil co-founderLyman Stewart was instrumental in establishing the Bible Institute of Los Angeles.[98][105] He also anonymously funded publication and distribution ofThe Fundamentals (groups of essays by multiple authors published quarterly in twelve volumes from 1910 through 1915), which became the foundation document of Christian fundamentalism, published as a set in 1917,[104][106][107] and he ensured that its many individual authors promoted premillennialist dispensationalism.[104][106] The essays were written by 64 different authors, representing most of the major Protestant Christian denominations. It was mailed free of charge to ministers, missionaries, professors of theology, Sunday school superintendents, YMCA andYWCA secretaries, and other Protestant religious workers in the United States and other English-speaking countries. Over three million volumes (250,000 sets) were sent out.[106]
Dispensationalism led fundamentalist evangelicals to see the world as a battleground in a deadly conflict between God and the Devil that would sweep all unbelievers to perdition very soon, so that they must focus on saving souls, with reform of society as a strictly secondary concern.[108] Adoption of this "lifeboat" theology also made the fundamentalists' message more welcome among American groups and communities who opposed reform of their own cherished institutions (such as violent enforcement ofracial segregation by local authorities and by self-appointedvigilante groups) and business practices (ruthless exploitation of industrial workers,[109]redlining, and theJim Crow economy).[110]
Dispensationalism also led fundamentalists to fear that new trends in modern science were pulling people away from what they saw as essential truth, and to believe that modernist parties in Protestant churches had surrendered their Evangelical heritage by accommodating secular views and values. Among these fundamentalist evangelicals, a favored way of resisting modernism was to prohibit teachingevolution as fact in public schools, a movement that reached a peak in theScopes trial of 1925. The sting of this public embarrassment led fundamentalists to retreat further into separatism. Protestant modernists criticized fundamentalists for their separatist self-isolation and for their rejection of theSocial Gospel that had been developed by Protestant activists in the previous century. By this time, modernists had largely abandoned the term "evangelical," and tolerated evolutionary theories in modern science and even in Biblical studies. In the 1930s, fundamentalist pastors and parishioners who rejected modernist viewpoints put forward by their own denominations turned more and more to the dispensationalist Bible institutes for guidance and community.[111] As the largest of these schools, the Moody Bible Institute set the pace, providing a wide variety of fundamentalist outreach services, from guest speakers and extension courses to Bible conferences, magazines andradio programs.[111][112]
During and after World War II, white evangelicals formed new organizations and expanded their vision to include the entire world. There was a great expansion of Evangelical activity within the United States, "a revival of revivalism." The doctrine of dispensationalism, with its intense focus on end times and the rapture, continued to be a major theme. Many earlier evangelists had preached in tents to small-town audiences on the "sawdust trail," but the new evangelicals sought ways to save souls in the big cities that had come to dominate American life.[113]Youth for Christ was formed in 1940 to help make the evangelical message attractive to soldiers, sailors, and urban teenagers;[114] it later became the base for Billy Graham's post-war revival crusades.[115][116] TheNational Association of Evangelicals was formed in 1942 as a response to the mainlineFederal Council of Churches, which had been organized in 1908.[113]Charles Fuller had started broadcasting theOld-Fashioned Revival Hour in 1937; by 1943 it had a record-setting national radio audience, with twenty million weekly listeners.[113]
But a split also developed among evangelicals in this era, as they disagreed among themselves about how a Christian ought to respond to an unbelieving world. Many evangelicals urged that Christians must engage contemporary culture directly and constructively,[117] and they began to express reservations about being known to the world as fundamentalists. AsKenneth Kantzer put it at the time, the namefundamentalist had become "an embarrassment instead of a badge of honor".[118]Fuller Theological Seminary founding presidentHarold Ockenga coined the termneo-evangelicalism in 1947 to identify a distinct movement he saw within fundamentalist Christianity.[119] This new generation of evangelicals sought to pursue a more open, non-judgmental dialogue with other traditions. They also called for greater application of the gospel to sociology, politics, and economics. Many fundamentalists responded by separating their opponents from the "fundamentalist" name and by seeking to distinguish themselves from the more open group, which they often characterized derogatorily by Ockenga's term "neo-Evangelical", or simply "evangelicals".
The end of World War II in 1945 and the onset of theCold War by 1948 provided new opportunities for evangelical expansion. The Second World War ended in August 1945 after the U.S. used twonuclear bombs to destroy the Japanese cities ofHiroshima andNagasaki. Evennonreligious people groped for religious language to express those bombs' nearly unimaginable destructive power.[120] And the end of the war affected almost everyone in America: millions of men returned from thearmed forces, while millions of women left theirtemporary wartime industrial jobs. The marriage rate and the birth rate soared, accelerating ababy boom that had begun while the war was still being fought.[121] As young American families crowded into new churches, their ministers, priests, and rabbis led them in fervent prayers for a world in upheaval.[121] No one in the U.S. voiced fears for the world's future with more fervor than evangelical and fundamentalist preachers. A key element in their preaching had always been that the Second Coming of Christ could happen at any moment and that everyone must be ready for the end of the world.[121]
In September 1949, 30-year-old evangelistBilly Graham set up circus tents in aLos Angeles parking lot for a series of revival meetings. A tall, handsome, spellbinding preacher fromNorth Carolina with a piercing gaze, Graham aimed to fill his listeners first with dread that they were lostsinners in a world rushing headlong into disaster, then with a deep longing to turn their lives around, trust Jesus, and be saved.[114] The crusade started on September 25, 1949,[122] and it was scheduled to last three weeks, from September 25 to October 17.[123] Two days before the start of the revival, in a statement released on September 23, 1949,President Truman revealed to the public that the communistSoviet Union had built and successfully detonatedits own nuclear bomb on August 29.[124] Six days after the revival started, mainlandChina fell toMao Zedong's communistRed Army.[125] Newspaper headlines that reported these shocking Cold War events put much of the nation into an anxious, apocalyptic mood. Then in October, media tycoon[126]William Randolph Hearst sent a telegram to all editors in his conservativeHearst chain of newspapers: "Puff Graham."[127][128] As a result, within five days Graham gained national coverage.[129][130] Planned to last three weeks, the event ran for eight weeks. Graham became a national figure with heavy coverage from thewire services and national magazines, and he went on to become the most influential American evangelist of the 20th century.
Evangelicals' international missionary activity also expanded in the postwar era. White evangelicals found new enthusiasm and self-confidence after the nation's victory in the world war. Many came from poor rural districts that had struggled during the Great Depression of the 1930s, but wartime and postwar prosperity had dramatically increased the funding resources available for missionary work. Overseas missionaries began to prepare for their postwar role, in organizations such as theFar Eastern Gospel Crusade. AfterNazi Germany andImperial Japan had been defeated, the newly mobilized evangelicals prepared to combat perceived threats from atheistic communism, secularism, Darwinism, liberalism, Catholicism, and (in overseas missions) paganism.[131]
While mainline Protestant denominations cut back on their missionary activities from 7,000 overseas workers in 1935 to only 3,000 in 1980, evangelicals tripled their career foreign missionary force in the same period: from 12,000 in 1935 to 35,000 in 1980. At Youth for Christ's 70,000-person rally onMemorial Day 1945 in Chicago'sSoldier Field football stadium (seating capacity 74,000), soldiers and nurses marched along with missionary representatives who paraded in costumes representing all the nations still awaiting the dispensationalist gospel.[114][132] North Americans had sent out only 41% of all the world's Protestant missionaries in 1936, but their contribution rose to 52% in 1952 and 72% in 1969. Denominations expanding their overseas missionary efforts after the war included theUnited Pentecostal Church International, formed in 1945, and theAssemblies of God, which nearly tripled from 230 missionaries in 1935 to 626 in 1952.Southern Baptist missionaries more than doubled from 405 to 855, as did those sent by theChurch of the Nazarene, from 88 to 200.[133]
The post-war period also saw growth of theecumenical movement and the founding of theWorld Council of Churches (1948), which was generally regarded with suspicion by the evangelical community.[134] During the 1950s, the number of church members in America grew from 64.5 million to 114.5 million. By 1960, more than 60% of the nation belonged to a church.[135] Following theWelsh Methodist revival, theAzusa Street Revival in 1906 had begun the spread ofPentecostalism in North America. TheCharismatic movement began in the 1960s and led to Pentecostal theology and practices being introduced into many mainline denominations. Charismatic groups such asNewfrontiers and theAssociation of Vineyard Churches trace their roots to this period.
A 2018 report of polls conducted from 2003 to 2017 of 174,485random-sample telephone interviews byABC News andThe Washington Post show significant shifts in U.S. religious identification in those 15 years, including a decline in the share of Americans who identify as Protestants (both evangelical and non-evangelical) and a rise in the share of Americans who say they have no religion.[136] According to reports in theNew York Times, some evangelicals have sought to expand their movement's social agenda to include reducing poverty, combatingAIDS in theThird World, and protecting the environment: "a push to better this world as well as save eternal souls."[137] This has been highly contentious within the evangelical community, because evangelicals of a more conservative stance believe this trend compromises important issues, and values popularity and consensus too highly: "a 'capitulation' to the broader culture."[137] Personifying this division in the early 21st century were the evangelical leadersJames Dobson andRick Warren. Dobson warned of dangers, from his point of view, of a victory by Democratic Party presidential candidateBarack Obama in2008.[138] Warren declined to endorse either major candidate, on the grounds that he wanted the church to be less politically divisive and that he agreed substantially with both Obama and Republican Party candidateJohn McCain.[139]Many white evangelicals embracedDonald Trump because he addressed many of their concerns.[140]
Anywhere from 6 to 35% of theUnited States population is evangelical, depending on how "evangelical" is defined.[141] A 2008 study reported that in 2000, about 9% of Americans attended an evangelicalservice on any given Sunday.[142] A 2014Pew Research Center survey of religious life in the United States reported that 25.4% of the population were evangelical, whileRoman Catholics were 20.8% andmainline Protestants were 14.7%.[143] In 2020, mainline Protestants were reported to outnumber predominantly-white Evangelical churches.[144][145] In 2021, Pew Research Center reported that "24% of U.S. adults describe themselves as born-again or evangelical Protestants."[146] In 2025, Pew Research Center reported that "Evangelical Protestants now account for 23% of all U.S. adults, down from 26% in 2007."[147]
In 2007Barna Group reported that 8% of adult Americans were born-again evangelicals, defined as those surveyed in 2006 who answered yes to these nine questions:[148][141]
In 2012,The Economist estimated that "over one-third of Americans, more than 100 million, can be considered evangelical," arguing that the percentage is often undercounted because many African Americans espouse evangelical theology but refer to themselves as "born again Christians" rather than "evangelical."[149] As of 2017, according toThe Economist, white evangelicals overall account for about 17% of Americans, while white evangelicals under the age of 30 represent about 8% of Americans in that age group.[150]
In 2016,Wheaton College's Institute for the Study of American Evangelicals estimated that about 30–35% (90 to 100 million people) of the U.S. population is evangelical. These figures include white and black "cultural evangelicals" (Americans who do not regularly attend church but identify as evangelicals).[151] Similarly, a 2019Gallup survey asking respondents whether they identified either as "born-again" or as "evangelical" found that 37% of respondents answered in the affirmative.[152]
Sometimes members of historicallyblack churches are counted as evangelicals, and at other times they are not. When analyzing political trends, pollsters often distinguish between white evangelicals (who tend to vote for theRepublican Party) and African American Protestants (who share religious beliefs in common with white evangelicals but have tended to vote for theDemocratic Party).[141][153]
In 2022, theState of Theology survey conducted byLigonier Ministries reported a continued shift in biblical belief among adults in the United States. When respondents were asked whether they agreed with the statement“The Bible, like all sacred writings, contains helpful accounts of ancient myths but is not literally true,” 53 percent of U.S. adults agreed. This represented an increase of 12 percentage points since 2014, making it the most consistent trend identified by the survey over that period. Among U.S. Evangelicals, the same survey found that 26 percent agreed with the statement, indicating a 9-percentage-point increase since 2016. The findings suggest a growing divergence within Evangelical populations regarding the literal truth of the Bible. The survey also reported changes in Evangelical views on religious exclusivity. In 2022, 56 percent of Evangelicals agreed with the statement "God accepts the worship of all religions, including Christianity,Judaism, andIslam," compared with 48 percent in 2016. Additionally, between 2020 and 2022, there was a 13-percentage-point increase in the proportion of Evangelicals who agreed that "Jesus was a great teacher, but he was not God", from 30% to 43%.[154]
Evangelical political influence in America was first evident in the 1830s with movements such as theprohibition movement, which closed saloons and taverns in state after state until it succeeded nationally in 1919.[156] TheChristian Right is a coalition of numerous groups of traditionalist and observant church-goers of many kinds: especiallyCatholics on issues such as birth control and abortion, plus Southern Baptists,Missouri Synod Lutherans, and others.[157] Since the early 1980s the Christian Right has been associated with several political and issue-oriented organizations, including theMoral Majority, theChristian Coalition,Focus on the Family, and theFamily Research Council.[158][159]
In the2016 presidential election, exit polls reported that 81% of white evangelicals voted forDonald Trump,[160] despite criticism from some conservative evangelicals.[161][162][163]
Most African Americans who identify as Christians belong to Baptist, Methodist or other denominations that share evangelical beliefs, but they are firmly in the Democratic coalition, and (with the possible exception of issues involving abortion and homosexuality) are generally liberal in politics.[164][153]
Evangelical political activists are not all on the right. There is also a small group of liberal white Evangelicals.[14][165][166] Some Evangelical leaders, such asTony Perkins of the Family Research Council, object to equating the termChristian Right withtheological conservatism and Evangelicalism. Although white evangelicals constitute the core constituency of the Christian Right within the United States, not all evangelicals fit that political description. Secular media do frequently conflate the Christian Right with theological conservatism, but this becomes complicated when the labelreligious conservative orconservative Christian is also applied to other religious groups who are theologically, socially, and culturally conservative but do not have overtly political organizations associated with them. Some of theseChristian denominations may best be described as indifferent toward politics.[167][168]Tim Keller, an Evangelical theologian andPresbyterian Church in America pastor, has argued thatConservative Christianity (theology) predates the Christian Right (politics), that being a theological conservative does not necessitate being a political conservative, and that somepolitically progressive views around economics, racial diversity, helping the poor, and theredistribution of wealth are compatible with theologically conservative Christianity.[169][170]Rod Dreher, a senior editor forThe American Conservative, a secular conservative magazine, argues for the same distinctions, even claiming that a "traditional Christian," a theological conservative, can be aneconomic progressive or even asocialist while maintaining traditional Christian beliefs.[171]
A Pew Research report published in 2021 showed that between 2016 and 2020, the number of white Americans who started identifying as evangelical increased.[172] Ryan Burge, an assistant professor of political science at Eastern Illinois University and Baptist pastor, notes that a significant number of Americans who have begun to embrace the evangelical identity are people who self-report as "never" or "seldom" attending church. Burge also notes there is a rise in people who are embracing the identity of "evangelical" but have no attachment to Protestant Christianity, such as Catholics, Muslims, and even Orthodox Christians, Hindus and members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.[173]
On the other hand, a Pew Research report published in September 2022 reported that "70% of adults who were raised Christian but are now unaffiliated are Democrats or Democratic-leaning independents, compared with 43% of those who remained Christian and 51% of U.S. adults overall. Some scholars argue that disaffiliation from Christianity is driven by an association between Christianity and political conservatism that has intensified in recent decades."[174]
Evangelicals often reject mainstream scientific views out of concern that those views contradict traditional "young earth" chronologies and certain verses in the Bible.Scofield-inspired dispensationalists and other fundamentalists reject evolution in favor ofcreation science andflood geology (both of which contradict thescientific consensus and the well-establishedgeologic time scale).[175] Their influence has led to high-profile court cases over whether public schools can be forced to teach eithercreationism orintelligent design (which is the claim that the complexity and diversity of life can only be explained by the direct intervention of God or some other active intelligence).[176][177]
However, other evangelicals have found evolution to be compatible with Christianity. For example, prominent evangelicals such as Billy Graham, B. B. Warfield, andJohn Stott believed the theory could be reconciled with Christian teaching.[178] Careful study by theAmerican Scientific Affiliation, an organization for evangelicals who are professional scientists,[179] led it to reject "strict" creationism in favor oftheistic evolution, encouraging acceptance of evolution among evangelicals.[180]The BioLogos Foundation is an evangelical organization that advocates forevolutionary creation, a belief that God brings about his plan through processes of evolution.[181] BioLogos expresses the belief that God is the source of all life and that life expresses the will of God. BioLogos represents the view that science and faith co-exist in harmony.[182]
Since 1980, a central issue motivating conservative evangelicals' political activism has beenabortion. The 1973 decision inRoe v. Wade by theSupreme Court, which legalized abortion at a federal level, proved to be decisive in bringing Catholics and evangelicals together in a political coalition, which became known as theChristian Right when it successfully mobilized its voters behind presidential candidateRonald Reagan in 1980.[183]
Supreme Court decisions that outlawed organized prayer in public schools and restricted church-related schools (e.g., preventing them fromengaging in racial discrimination while also receiving a tax exemption) also played a role in mobilizing the Christian Right.[184] Survey data published in 2002 indicate that "between 31 and 39% do not favor a 'Christian Nation' amendment," but that 60 to 75% of Evangelicals consider Christianity and political liberalism to be incompatible.[185]
A study conducted in May 2022 showed that the strongest support for declaring the United States aChristian Nation comes from Republicans who identify as Evangelical or born-again Christians.[186][187] Of this demographic group, 78% are in favor of formally declaring the United States a Christian nation, versus 48% of Republicans overall.[186][188]
TheEvangelical Climate Initiative is a campaign by U.S. church leaders and organizations to promote market based mechanisms to mitigateglobal warming. The Evangelical Climate Initiative was launched in February 2006 by theNational Association of Evangelicals, who worked with theCenter for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School to bring scientists and evangelical Christian leaders together for the project.[189] Young Evangelicals for Climate Action "educates and mobilizes young evangelical Christians across the country to take action to address theclimate crisis."[190][191][192][193][194]
Evangelicals have had a significant impact onU.S. foreign policy. They have worked in coalitions with other religious and secular groups to press for action on matters like ending Sudan's civil war, addressing theAIDS crisis in Africa, and combating human trafficking.[195] Evangelicals played a key role in passing theInternational Religions Freedom Act, which made freedom of religion and conscience a top objective of U.S. foreign policy. The act established an agency to monitor countries' performance on religious freedom and allowed for potential sanctions against those with poor grades.[196] Evangelicals were also involved in the passing of theNorth Korean Human Rights Act of 2004, which required the appointment of a special envoy forhuman rights in North Korea and emphasized the importance of human rights in future negotiations with the country.[195] Evangelicals also supported the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, which aimed to deter human trafficking, punish traffickers, and protect and rehabilitate victims.[195]
Evangelicals generally view the Middle East through adispensationalist biblical framework and strongly supportIsrael. Often perceived as the most vocal supporters ofChristian Zionism in the West, they believe that God gave the land of Israel to the Jews and that the U.S. will be blessed if it blesses Israel. The establishment of the State of Israel was seen by many American Protestants as the fulfillment of biblical prophecy, reinforcing their commitment to Zionism as a religious duty.[197] However, there are variations in views among Evangelicals, with some holding more rigid stances than others. Some have supportedIsraeli settlements in the occupied territories, and others disagree with certain peace initiatives that involve territorial compromises.[198]
However, research published in the early 2020s indicates a generational shift within evangelical communities. Based on a series of public opinion surveys conducted between 2018 and 2021, there have been documented changing attitudes toward Israel especially among younger American Evangelicals. According to the surveys, by 2021, 42.2% of Evangelicals under the age of 30 reported supporting neither Israel nor thePalestinians. In comparison, in 2018, this group represented 25% of respondents, while support for Israel at that time stood at 68.9%. By 2021, support for Israel among young Evangelicals had declined to 33.6%, while 24.3% expressed support for the Palestinians. The data also indicate a notable increase in pro-Palestinian sentiment among younger Evangelicals over the same period. In 2018, slightly more than 5% of respondents in this age group supported the Palestinians; by 2021, this figure had increased to 24.3%.[199] In particular, the "Very Strong Support for Israel" among under 30 Evangelicals had dropped to 10.3% in 2021 as compared to 31.8% in 2018.[200]
In 2025, a generational breakdown of a survey of U.S. Evangelicals found notable differences in theological views by age group. Among Evangelicals under the age of 35, 29 percent agreed with the statement that Jews are God’s chosen people. Respondents in this age cohort were also more likely than older Evangelicals to express uncertainty about this belief or to hold views associated withreplacement theology. Commenting on the findings, analysts noted that age-based differences within the U.S. Evangelical community were statistically significant. According to the researchers, younger Evangelicals were consistently less engaged with Israel, less supportive of Israel, and less likely to affirm traditional theological positions regarding the Jewish people. They further suggested that, if these attitudes persist as the cohort ages, they could contribute to long-term changes in how Israel and Jewish identity are perceived within U.S. Evangelical circles.[201]
Contemporary Quakers worldwide are predominately evangelical and are often referred to as the Friends Church.
In addition to these separate denominational groupings, one needs to give attention to the large pockets of the Holiness movement that have remained within the United Methodist Church. The most influential of these would be the circles dominated by Asbury College and Asbury Theological Seminary (both in Wilmore, KY), but one could speak of other colleges, innumerable local camp meetings, the vestiges of various local Holiness associations, independent Holiness oriented missionary societies and the like that have had great impact within United Methodism. A similar pattern would exist in England with the role of Cliff College within Methodism in that context.
{{cite journal}}:Cite journal requires|journal= (help)More than half of all Christian Right candidates attend evangelical Protestant churches that are more theologically liberal. A relatively large number of Christian Right candidates (24 percent) are Catholics; however, when asked to describe themselves as either "progressive/liberal" or "traditional/conservative" Catholics, 88 percent of these Christian Right candidates place themselves in the traditional category.
