Episode Details

“The scandal of the evangelical mind is that there is not much of an evangelical mind” (opening sentence of chapter one)

It’s no secret that modern Evangelicalism is not noted for its intellectualism.  In fact, with groups in our midst like Young Earth Creationists, Flat Earthers, anti-vaxxers, and climate change deniers, and the constant criticism coming from within our ranks directed at cultural changes and scientific advances, Christianity in general and Evangelicalism in particular have gained a reputation for being quite anti-intellectual.  We heard about this in spades when we talked to Frankie Schaeffer a year back. 

Over the past four years, this podcast has often referred to a particular book — The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind — which explores that Evangelical anti-intellectualism in detail.  In 1995, Christianity Today declared it the winner of the Book of the Year Award, and in 2004 they claimed that it had “arguably shaped the evangelical world (or at least its institutions) more than any other book published in the last decade.”  Today, on the 30^th anniversary of its printing, we brought in its author: Dr. Mark Noll, a premier historian of American and Canadian Christian history.  He is an Evangelical himself, and has impeccable credentials within Evangelical academia, even though he has often been critical of Evangelicalism. 

We first needed to talk about the label “Evangelical,” since that has broad dimensions demographically and theologically, and the movement has become quite wrapped up with politics and partisanship.  In the process, it was important to distinguish “Evangelical” from “Fundamentalist.”

Then we talked about the anti-intellectual aspect of this movement, as seen in their shunning of philosophy, culture, science and so many other dimensions of modern society. Progress has been made: we now have world intellectual leaders like Francis Collins, Kathryn Hayhoe, and Biologos.  Unfortunately, those are not household names, and yet Ken Ham and AiG are widely recognized!?  There is now an ever-increasing level of sophistication in Evangelical theology and scientific literacy (again, Ken Ham and AiG notwithstanding), and yet there is also an incre