Rusty Benson

AFA Journal associate editor

August 2009 – Some might consider efforts to redeem the once great mainline churches of America a futile effort, but they would be wrong, according to the newly appointed president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy (IRD). 

IRD is a Washington, D.C.-based ecumenical alliance of Christians “working to reform their churches’ social witness, in accord with Biblical and historic Christian teachings and to contribute to the renewal of democratic society at home and abroad,” according towww.theird.org.

Mark Tooley joined IRD in 1994 and directed the organization’s United Methodist committee. He was appointed president of the organization in April 2009. 

Orthodoxy would be hard pressed to find a more articulate or able defender than Tooley. His challenging commentaries have been published in The Wall Street Journal, The American Spectator, The Weekly Standard, Human Events, The Washington Times and others. 

Tooley is not only hopeful that America’s mainline denominations will return to their Biblical roots, he is firmly committed to that faithful part of Christ’s body whose witness for orthodoxy within the mainlines remains strong.

In the following interview, Tooley explains the work of IRD, then reflects on the current state of the mainline churches in America.  

AFA Journal: Considering that the mainlines have been on a path away from orthodoxy for more than 40 years, do you ever feel that IRD is a voice crying in the wilderness, that no one is listening?
Mark Tooley: No! God clearly has preserved a strong voice of orthodoxy and renewal within all the mainline denominations. We should be careful not to conflate the views of church elites with the views of all church members. They are part of the Body of Christ. None of us has the liberty to write off any part of the Body of Christ, no matter how troubled. 

In a more temporal sense, the mainliners still bring a powerful history and legacy to American Christianity from which modern evangelicals can and should learn. As we see from distressing current evangelical trends, doctrine, church structure and appreciation for church history are vital for strong churches. 

AFAJ: In IRD’s founding document Rev. John Neuhaus wrote: “God has given us no one pattern for the ordering of societies or of the world,” yet you use the word “democracy” in your name. What do you see as valuable or Biblical about democracy?
MT: IRD was founded in 1981 primarily as a reaction against churches that were supporting non-democratic and often violent movements, primarily Marxist. They were claiming that Marxist or collectivist solutions were the best options for the poor and the oppressed, so IRD’s response to that was: “No, totalitarianism is not the answer for poverty or any other human problem.” In fact, history shows that democratic governments, for all their failures, tend to better provide for their people in terms of material and political liberties than other forms of government typically do. 

AFAJ: Part of your stated mission is to “reform the Church’s social witness, in accord with Biblical and historic Christian teachings.” What does this mean? 
MT: The denominations that IRD has primarily focused on over the past 29 years are the mainline Protestants sometimes called the seven sisters: United Methodist Church, Episcopal Church (USA), Presbyterian Church (USA), United Church of Christ, Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, Disciples of Christ and American Baptist. These are the historic denominations that have been around almost since America’s founding. All of these, at least in their upper reaches, became theologically and politically liberal at the beginning of the 20th century. 

Each has had a strong political witness in that they all have had leaders and agencies that have addressed political issues in a very detailed way. Sometimes their witness has been helpful like on civil rights struggles of 40 and 50 years ago. But in recent decades, more often than not, they have not been helpful.

They have been inclined toward wanting to constantly increase the power of a centralized federal state. So IRD is primarily a reaction against a faulty political witness coming from those mainline churches.

But increasingly we’re finding those same mistakes being made – if not by specifically evangelical denominations – certainly by an increasing number of evangelical leaders and spokespeople who seem to have forgotten the history of what took the mainline churches to the sideline. 

AFAJ: In a recent article you wrote for The American Spectator, you refer to “pessimistic and grumpy conservatives, who sometimes even take a grim pleasure in expecting cultural defeat.” What should be the attitude of Christians as we see our dominant cultural values becoming more and more unbiblical? 
MT: There are many Christians who are orthodox and faithful, but nonetheless, as they look at the world seem to always anticipate defeat. We would suggest that Christians should strike a balance. First, [we must] understand the pernicious power of human sin and that humanity will never create perfect governing or economic systems. Forgetting that was the great mistake of Protestant liberals in the 20th century. On the other hand, there are conservative Christians who have such an understanding of human sin that they assume that the worst will always happen and seem to forget about the power of God’s grace and His redemptive power. They seem to forget that that human history ultimately belongs to God and is not determined by our own actions alone. 

AFAJ: What is IRD’s strength?
MT: IRD’s strength has been that we articulate an argument for theological orthodoxy across the mainline churches. Unlike any of the renewal groups individually inside those churches, we also address the political and social witness of those denominations. And because we are ecumenically Christian, we are not concerned exclusively with the mainlines, but are also addressing problems cropping up in the evangelical world and related to Roman Catholics and Orthodox Christians as well. 

AFAJ: Describe success for IRD.
MT: One success seems to have unfolded this week. In Methodism, liberals have continuously lost the debates over marriage and sex, increasingly because of the growing African component in our church. So the idea of the liberal leadership has been to partly separate the U.S. church from the African church so the U. S. church could have their own arena where they could win. This proposal seems to be going down in defeat. It’s being voted on now in the various annual conferences in the U.S. and around the world. (See below.)

AFAJ: How do you understand the core problem of the decline of mainline churches? 
MT: Starting in the early 20th century, these churches compromised on the authority of Scripture and on the Lordship of Christ. So they essentially became universalists, and as a result of that, lost interest in evangelism and instead focused on social and political redemption. 

AFAJ: On a scale from 1-10 with 1 being orthodox and 10 being heretical, where is the struggle between liberalism and orthodoxy in the mainline churches? 
MT: About a five. The largest mainline – the United Methodist Church – is headed slowly in a more orthodox direction. The United Church of Christ would be the most far left of the mainlines. The others are in between. The Lutherans will perhaps decide their future at their synod in August when they vote one more time on same-sex unions. 

AFAJ: How has it come about that issues involving the acceptance of homosexuality have become such a flashpoint in the mainline denominations?
MT: Ideally, the more clear-cut debate would be over the authority of Scripture and the Lordship of Christ. Those are the ultimate issues. But rather than hashing that out, orthodox and liberals have fudged it, continuing to use orthodox sounding language with the liberals reserving the right to interpret that language as they please. But when it gets down to the actual understanding and practice of marriage and sexual ethics, it’s more than just language. It involves actual activity and that could not be fudged. The orthodox could not compromise on that and still adhere to orthodoxy. 

So the liberal side thinks the church is just an organizer of constant political and social liberation They see sexual liberation on the same par as civil rights for racial minorities. And they couldn’t compromise on that.

AFAJ: In a day when so many believers and unbelievers have a low view of “organized religion,” how do you defend the importance of the church?
MT: That’s another important problem that we want to give attention to and hopefully others will as well. American evangelicals have become very individualistic in their faith and have increasingly forgotten the importance of the organized body of Christ. In doing so, they have lost touch with Christian tradition and seem to think that Christianity is only a personal relationship between Christ and themselves. However, the Scriptures, not to mention Christian tradition, argue that Christians do not stand alone, but stand within the larger body of Christ. Christians must always be mindful of that.   

Methodists decline global segregation plan
United Methodists (UMC) are expected to reject proposed amendments to their church constitution that some conservatives fear would have the potential to allow U.S. United Methodists to establish their own standards regarding homosexuality apart from United Methodists in the rest of the world.

Some liberals within the denomination are supporting the amendment because it would set up a U.S. Regional Conference. In recent years, votes from the growing international component of the UMC, particular Africans, have been a major reason the UMC has upheld Biblical standards concerning homosexuality. Currently 3.5 million United Methodists live outside the U.S. while 7.9 million live in the U.S. However the church in Africa is growing, while the U.S. church is declining.   

By mid-June, 43 of 62 U.S. annual conferences had reported their vote tallies. The amendments, which would alter the structure of the worldwide denomination, were being defeated by a margin of about 65% to 35%. To be enacted, a constitutional amendment must be ratified by two-thirds of the aggregate “voting members” from all the conferences. There are 135 conferences in the UMC, including 73 in Africa, Asia and Europe. 

For more information: www.goodnewsmag.org