Born Again: The Christian Right Globalized

Last updated on: May 9, 2013 at 6:22 am by Faithful Democrats

Born Again: The Christian Right Globalized 2013-05-09T06:22:40-06:00 Faithful Democrats

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.

By Jennifer S. Butler
Executive Director, Faith in Public Life

My book, Born Again: The Christian Right Globalized, reveals how the Christian Right is building international, interfaith coalitions and shaping policy in every corner of the world. The book provides the first insider’s account of the strategies and effectiveness of Christian Right lobbying at the United Nations, and their efforts to build a global conservative family values movement. Drawing on interviews with Christian Right leaders, I reveal how today’s most powerful Christian Right organizations are poised to challenge progressive social policy on a worldwide scale.

By Jennifer S. Butler

Executive Director, Faith in Public Life

I wrote the book while serving as the Presbyterian Church (USA) Representative at the United Nations where I witnessed Christian Right groups working with Catholic, Mormon and Muslim allies to advance a conservative agenda. In 2000, the Christian Right began a new phase of its global organizing by bringing 300 Christian Right activists to a UN meeting on women’s rights and encouraging a voting bloc of socially conservative governments. They also began to expand their already diverse coalition by holding international conferences in Qatar, Malaysia and Mexico that drew thousands to organize to advocate for conservative family values. The United States joined this Christian Right alliance, and President George W. Bush began to give them significant access in shaping U.S. positions on issues including women’s rights, reproductive health, human cloning, children’s rights and AIDS.

butler

The Christian Right is having surprising success at expanding its agenda globally and promises to challenge progressive activism on a worldwide scale. They speak a compelling message about family and religion in an era in which many feel besieged by rapid social and economic changes. They build alliances in the developing world by claiming that progressives will destroy their families and secularize their culture as the have allegedly done in the United States and Europe. They increasingly pit what they call the “secular West” against a religious global south.

What concerned me even more was that progressives seemed so ill equipped to counter these particular allegations or to counter the Christian Right’s organizing strategies. I found the Christian Right’s message to be backwards, but it’s organizing to be more progressive and technologically advanced than those of us who called ourselves progressive. Between the lines the book is really about what progressives must do to reclaim the advantage.

Progressive secular and faith advocates have far too often given up the language of faith and values. They’ve allowed the Christian Right to usurp this terrain and claim to be the voice of religion. In the same way, we’ve also ceded ground on family language. By not speaking proactively to these two concerns we are not only losing a national culture war: we may risk losing a global culture war as well.

The final chapter assesses Christian Right strengths and explores what progressives need to do to regain their advantage:

While progressives are accustomed to academic works and newspaper articles implicitly dismissing these kinds of movements as extremist, or “outside the mainstream,” it is more important for progressives to take a step back and take note of why the Christian Right will change civil society. While out of hand dismissal of these movements might confirm to us that all is right with the world… it does not encourage the necessary standard of self- reflection to which we should hold ourselves as organizers.

There are several basic reasons why they will end up changing civil society. First, the Christian Right’s organizing strategies have outpaced both Christian progressives and the larger political Left represented at the U.N. Second, the Christian Right message appeals to a great number of people in the global South, particularly because it embraces two values that progressive leaders often ignore or reject: religion and the family. Third, these conservatives already have a global infrastructure to deliver their message in the form of growing religious communities (Catholic, evangelical and Mormon).

… The Christian Right has gained a measure of success from its own efforts and the weak state or progressive organizing….Whatever one thinks of Christian Right aims, it would be difficult to deny that the movement is one of the great community organizing success stories of the late twentieth century and will continue to be so in the twenty-first. Any experienced organizer knows that he or she must excel in the following areas to succeed: openness to building new kinds of strategic alliances, openness to new organizing techniques, openness to changing funding priorities and openness to new kinds of rhetorical strategies.

I now get to work on implementing some of these ideas as the Executive Director of Faith in Public Life, a resource center that helps religious moderates and progressives reclaim their once dominant moral voice so that they can shape public debates. We are making sure that those using religion as a tool of division and exclusion do not dominate public discourse. I see victories daily among faith leaders organizing for justice and the common good. So after reading my book, which may be a little scary, visit Faith in Public Life’s website and get some inspiration!

Books

Previous Post

November 16, 2006

What was Glenn Beck thinking?

Next Post

November 20, 2006 What's Really Fundamental?

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category About Us About Us Action Center Advertise Ask a Theologian Ask a Theologian Blogs Books Campaign Blog Candidate Spotlights Commentary Donate Facebook Featured Writers Fellows Fellows From the Pulpit General Information Hillary Clinton Interfaith Blog Latest Media Center Media Center Media Center MyBlog MyBlog News Newsflash Newsflashes Our Team Reader Blogs RSS Sermon of the Week Shop Social Networking Static Items Support Talking Points Test blogs The Basics Theology Uncategorized YouTube

Select a Month November 2020 October 2020 February 2020 August 2019 July 2018 July 2017 March 2017 February 2017 August 2016 July 2016 June 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 June 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 April 2012 March 2012 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006 August 2006 July 2006 January 2006 August 2004

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What was a biblical measurement of a span?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Third of a cubit Quarter cubit Half a cubit Full cubit