Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Evangelical
The real ghouls? The Evangelical Voter

The real ghouls? The Evangelical Voter

Last updated on: October 22, 2024 at 10:08 am by Erica Ramirez

0 Comments

The real ghouls? The Evangelical Voter 2024-10-22T10:08:48-04:00 Erica Ramirez

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Good society is generally certain there is something wrong with the mentality of evangelicals. We’re only weeks before an election that could see Donald Trump back into the Oval, but the verdict is already in on evangelicals. They think wrong and vote wrong.

Should Trump win, left leaning outlets of the press will lay heft blame at the feet of evangelicals (though Trump also draws the Catholic vote by a slim majority) –lamenting that so many religious actors could fail to be proper democratic citizens. This general despair of evangelicals’ ability to think and vote well sounds to me like a crescendo of Mark Noll’s influential The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind, first released in 1994 and rereleased in 2022. In Scandal, Noll laments how the anti-intellectual roots of the moment have corrupted the entire evangelical project. Now, a greek chorus of journalist has joined in: evangelical idiocy is corrupting the whole nation. Even should Vice President Harris win, the evidence is damning: evangelicals make poor democratic citizens.

In this vein of commentary on the failures, the ineptitudes, of the evangelical mind, Pentecostalism has now emerged as the darker, more sinister side of evangelical “thought.” If Noll has lamented the evangelical mind as a kind of blank, Pentecostalism figures here as a phenomenal upsurge of primitive thinking and primary processes that together overwhelm the (already poorly defined) evangelical mind and make impossible any evangelical intellectual life or project. Where evangelicals read as poor citizens, Pentecostals (with their marked enthusiasm for Trump and Christian Nationalism) read as active dangers, virulent actors, to the American project.

In this context, I was recently asked to explain the thought-life of Pentecostals.

The reporter was trying to make sense of the growing tendencies of Pentecostals (and charismatics), including ethnic minority adherents, to vote conservatively. Explaining this is a real challenge: how to address the character and activities of millions of Christians, given the bad faith that trenchant polarization has engendered in most readers. In answering the reporter, I ended up moving toward newish perspective on how to appraise the Pentecostal mind. It’s short because that’s how the newspaper people like their explanations:
_____________________________________________________________
Reporter: Would it be fair to describe Pentecostalism as a style rather than a formal system of thought?

Me: That’s a great question. In its system of thought Pentecostalism is both tragic and romantic.

The mentality of the movement is shaped by New Testament visions about the end of human history from the book of Revelation. No one better articulates this plot better than John Hagee, pastor of San Antonio’s massive Cornerstone Church. For decades, Hagee has been preaching about the “end times” during which “the nations” will turn on Israel and an Anti-Christ will rise to lead a “one world government” whose aim only seems to be “peace.” This is the tragic, even scary, strain of Pentecostal thought: they expect the political world to unite against Israel, for this to lead to war and death; they also expect malign forces to attempt to consolidate a global government. Pentecostals have longed been wary, then, of organizations like the United Nations and the International Court of Justice which are just proxies for globalized government. The current war in Gaza fits right into this framework– and it is both scary and tragic. This will cause Pentecostals to lean toward the candidate they see as a fighter in fraught geopolitics and a reliable ally for Israel.

The romantic aspects of Pentecostal concern the “Bride of Christ.” In all of the above plot points, through global war and devastation, the Jewish and Christian God YHWH is working on behalf of His people who, altogether, are figuratively the Bride. In their account, all true Christians and many Jews are/will be part of the Bride of Christ. God is working on their behalf to protect them, as a group, from the defiling cultures and politics of the rest of the world. This narrative is very like the one in the book of Esther, which features a marriage plot that rescues God’s people. The romantic aspect of Pentecostal thought is the source of its inegalitarian character. Being a bridal figure is an exclusive claim; not everyone is part of the Bride of Christ. Politically, this bridal status means Israel and “the people of God” are the true protagonists of every geopolitical situation. This plotline is also dualistic: there are people who are enemies of God and on the wrong side of salvation history who will most likely die. When Pentecostals worship, they do so in a romantic way– prioritizing feeling and aiming toward intimacy with the Spirit.

Taking these narratives together, Pentecostals will vote for the candidate who stands readiest too support their interests in a fraught plotline.
____________________________________________________

But what does this say about their minds and what kind of voters they are? Or as the reporter asked me: what is their system of thought?

Pentecostals and charismatics are shaped by the bible’s apocalyptic literary tradition, which is both tragic and romantic. These narratives help explain their electoral preferences.

When I think about the intellectual lives of Pentecostals (and charismatics), I think of people who adopt a tragic-romantic posture toward the world, with tragic and romantic metanarratives guiding their thinking. I don’t take this to be a dearth of thought, exactly. The French writer Chateaubriand and the English poet Wordsworth were both romantics. I take Lord Tennyson’s Lady of Shalott and Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride to, both, be inflected with a tragic bridal romanticism. (Both, by the way, are derived from significantly older source materials.) Tragic romantic viewpoints– with origins in oral traditions, guided by literary traditions and now expressed in films–credibly represent a tradition of thought. If readers want to appraise the thought-life of Pentecostals, we might ask: What cultural work have such tragic bridal narratives done? What kind of work might they presently being doing?

By taking Pentecostal eschatology about the Bride of Christ as a species of cultural discourse, by recognizing that participates in a longer tradition of tragic romanticism, we can appraise, not what is missing from the evangelical mind, but what is there. Like the Bride in Burton’s Corpse Bride, Pentecostals in the US are driven by a romance plot, witness their worship!, but for their societies both brides appear ghoulish and deeply troublesome.

If we know them as political ghouls, what is their provenance? They do not arise to threaten the nation ex-nihilo.

To answer this we can look to their archives, their narratives, the practices, their mood: Pentecostal politics are ex-profundo.

On the eve of an election that has decent chance of giving us a second Trump term, we might ask:
Why are pentecostals giving body to this kind of plotline, this posture and mood, into the life of our body politic, now? Why are we thus haunted?

The life of the mind that Noll laments is missing in evangelicalism seems actually to be a certain kind of mind– positivist, traditioned, aiming for objectivity, committed to critical thinking. Noll writes,“By an evangelical ‘life of the mind’ I mean…the effort to think like a Christian—to think within a specifically Christian framework—across the whole spectrum of modern learning” (7) I too love these qualities and this project. But Pentecostals think very differently than do academics; they have their thought traditions that are predicated on much older thought traditions. It would be, I think, a mistake to characterize this traditioning as having no life of the mind at all. Instead: what advantages and disadvantages, what challenges, do these thought traditions pose for the democratic project?

Contemplative

Christian Nation

Christian Nationalism

Previous Post

October 18, 2024

Forging Franciscan History: Nahuas, Games & Devotional Texts

Next Post

October 22, 2024 Is Basil Wrong? On Teaching Historical Theology

Recent Comments

0 | Leave a Comment

"I love horror but would have to acclimate back to Lovecraft and especially Machen. Have ..."

Terry

Fairies, Witches, Folk Horror, and the ..."

"Very good point about MacDonald.I am certainly a Machen fan!"

philipjenkins

Fairies, Witches, Folk Horror, and the ..."

"The Scottish author George MacDonald integrated fairy world into his fiction in a way that ..."

Terry

Fairies, Witches, Folk Horror, and the ..."

"I like the idea that we can have different streams. The coffee analogy is genius."

Lisa Clark Diller

How Do You Take Your Evangelicalism?

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category abolitionism Abortion Abraham Joshua Heschel Abraham Kuyper Abraham Lincoln Academia Activism Adam Renberg Advent Adventist africa African American Religion Agnes Howard Albert Camus American History American Religious History American Revolution American West Anabaptists Ancient History Andrea Turpin Andrei Tarkovsky Anglicanism Annales Ansley Lillian Quiros anti-Catholicism Antisemitism Anxious Bench apologetics Apparitions Arash Azizi Archaeology archives art Artificial Intelligence Asia Asian Americans Augustine Authors Bad Bunny Baptism Baptists Barack Obama Battle of Hastings Benjamin Franklin Bernard-Henri Levy Beth Allison Barr Beth Moore Bethany Mannon Bible Bill Cunningham Billy Graham Black Music Bob Dylan Body Boenhoffer Books Breastfeeding Bruce Springsteen C.S. Lewis Calvinism Cancel Culture Capitalism Carmelites Catholicism Cedric Robinson Cesar Chavez Charismaticism charity Charles Dickens Charles Lindbergh Che Guevara Chicago Children Chinese Christianity Chris Gehrz Christ Christian death Christian Higher Education Christian life Christian Nation Christian Nationalism Christianity Today Christmas Church life Church Practice cinema Civil Religion Civil Rights Movement Civil War civility Classics Climate Change Cold War Colonial Mexico colonialism Comer Communism community complementarianism Conference on Faith and History Congregationalism Conspiracies Conspiracy Conversion Narratives Coronavirus Costa Rica Council of Nicaea Covid-19 Creation Critical Race Theory Crusades Culture culture wars Daniel K. Williams David Barton David Swartz Death Ways death with dignity DEI democracy Democratic Party Devotion Digital Age Diplomacy discipleship diversity Donald Trump Drama Dua Lipa Early Church early modern Early modern Catholicism Easter Eastern Christianity economic exploitation Education elections Elie Wiesel Elizabeth II Elizabeth Taylor emotions Empire Engineering England enslavement Entertainment Episcopal Church Erica Ramirez eschatology Eurocentrism Evangelicalism Evangelicals Exegesis Family Feminism Film Flannery O'Connor folk music Food Foreign Policy founding fathers Franciscans Franciscus Junius fundamentalism Funerals G.K. Chesterton Gender Genocide genre geography George W. Bush George Washington George Whitefield Global Christianity Global church Grief Guadalupe Guest Post guest post gun control gun violence Gustavo Gutierrez Hamid Dabashi Harold John Ockenga Harvest Hate Hawaiian Christianity Healing health care Heather Cox Richardson Hell Heresy Hermeneutics Higher Education Hinduism Hippocratic oath Historical Fiction Historical Methodology Historical Profession Historical Profession Historical Theology Historical Thinking historiography Holidays Holocaust horror movies Human rights Humanitarian Work humanities Hummingbirds Hungary hymns Imago Dei Immigration Injustice Interviews Iran Islam Islamophobia Israel Ivan's Childhood Jacob Randolph James Bratt Janine Giordano Drake Japanese history Japanese Literature Jean Paul Sartre Jesse Miranda Jesus Jesus Christ Jimmy Carter Joan Baez Joan Didion Joanne Freeman João B. Chaves Joao Chaves Joey Cochran John Calvin John Fea John Tillotson John Turner Johnny Cash Jonathan Edwards Jonathan Tran Joseph Smith Josh Howerton Journalism Jr. Judaism Jürgen Moltmann Just War Justice Justin Brierley Karl Barth Katelyn Beaty koi ponds Kris Kristofferson Kristin Kobes Du Mez Latin American Religious History Latino Americans Lectio Divina Leisure Lent Leonard Cohen liberal arts liberalism Liberation Theology Linda Ronstadt Lisa Clark Diller Literature Lou Reed Lynchings Lynneth Miller Renberg Mainline Protestantism Malcolm Foley Marilyn Monroe Maritime history Mark Noll Marriage Martin Luther Martin Luther King Martyrdom Marxism Mary Masih Alinejad mass shootings material culture medieval Christianity Medieval Ethiopia Melissa Borja memory Mennonites Mental Health Mental Illness Methodism Mexican Americans Mexicans Mike Madrid Miles Mullin Min Jin Lee Miscarriage Missionaries Mister Rogers Mitt Romney modernity Monasticism Mormonism Motherhood Mothers of the Church Moving Music Musicals Nadya Williams Nahua Christianity Native Americans Natsume Sōseki New Contributor New England New Year New York Nico Non-Violent Protest Orthodoxy pacifism Paleo Evangelicals Palestinians Parenting Patti Smith Paul Kingsnorth Pedro Calderón de la Barca Pentecostalism Philip Jenkins Phillis Wheatley physician-assisted suicide pilgrimage Pilgrims pluralism Plutocracy Poetry Politics Pope Francis Pope Leo XIV post-modernism prayer preaching Presbyterians prosperity gospel Protest Public history Publishing Puritans purity culture Quakers race Race Massacres Racial Capitalism racial reconciliation racialization Racism Raha Bahloulipour Re-Enchantment reading Reformation Refugees religion and the university religion and war Religious Freedom Religious Nones Religious Pluralism Religious Symbols religious violence Republican Party Revival Rita Coolidge Ritual Roger Williams Roman Catholic church Royalty Russell Moore same-sex marriage Sarah Irving-Stonebraker Scandinavia Science Science and Technology Scopes trial Scriptural Interpretation secularism Selena Quintanilla seminary Seventh-Day Adventists sexual morality Sexuality Sikhs Silence slaveholders theology Slavery Slavoj Zizek social justice Social Media Southern Baptist Convention Southern Religion Spain Spiritual Autobiography Spiritual but not religious Spiritual Discipline Sports Stanley Hauerwas Suffering Summer Camps Sunday Night Odds and Ends Supernatural Supreme Court Syriac Christianity Tal Howard Taylor Swift Teaching Technology Television Thanksgiving The Beatles The Mission theater TheoBros Theology Thomas Dixon Thomas Jefferson Thomas Kidd Thomas Merton Tim Gloege Tim Walz Tom Holland Tourism tradition Tragedy Translation Transnationalism Travel Trump Ukraine Uncategorized Unitarians United Methodist Church US History Vanessa Chan Velvet Underground Verónica A. Gutiérrez Veronica Gutierrez Vikings Violence Virgin Mary Virtue Virtue ethics Visions Voting War WCTU Wendell Berry Westminster Assembly White Evangelicalism Wildfires Winnie the Pooh Witches women Women in Ministry Women's and Gender Studies Work Worship writing Yasunari Kawabata Zena Hitz

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

According to 1 John, what three things testify on earth?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Prayer, fasting, and almsgiving The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit The Spirit, the water, and the blood Faith, hope, and love