Secular Progressives | Revolution in Jesusland

If not “secular,” then what? December 5, 2007

Posted by Zack in Missouri | 31 comments

Ok. As I turn 38 (today!) one lesson I can say I have learned is: Don’t comment about a blog comment thread. Yesterday, I wrote about my disappointment with the tone and content of the responses to Brian McLaren’s posts at TPM Cafe. But, of course, a handful of commenters represent nothing, and it’s impossible to make an objective count of how many were negative, rude, etc.. and how many were not. Also, since I wrote, the level of the discussion over there has come way up.

What I saw in so many of those comments were the same stereotypes and misconceptions about Evangelical Christians that I hear coming from so many otherwise smart, open minded and well-intentioned activists on the left who are outside of the church. I hear it in meetings, at dinners, on conference calls, in one on one conversations. I hear it all the time.

At this point, I really can not say that I belong to one or the other culture. But for the purpose of this conversation, I’m putting on my “outside of the church” hat.

My point is NOT that we should change our views for Christians’ sake. Not at all. They don’t care what we think. My point is that they are something like half the country — and as long as we carry this false and negative understanding of their culture, then we are cutting ourselves off from having a productive social and political relationship with HALF THE COUNTRY. We may as well quit politics.

Please understand what I am NOT saying: I am not saying that we should try to find common ground with a group that stands against everything we believe in. I’m saying: “Surprise! This huge group stands for almost everything that we stand for—and they’re on the move, organizing tens of millions of Americans around our own very same values: people over profit, the environment over mindless growth, meaning over consumerism, means of making a living and health care for all, care for the needy, peace and more.” But we are divided from them by stereotypes and misconceptions.

Instead of pointing to some chaotic comment thread, I should just lay out these stereotypes and misconceptions that are in the way.

But wait — before I can get to that, there’s another problem. Last night I had Matt Stoller yelling at me on the phone (ok, I did some yelling too) about my very use of the categories of “secular progressive” and “progressive evangelical.” Others have criticized me for that too, including Pastor Dan at Street Prophets, several people on the TPM thread and friends in the thread to my last post here.

There has got to be some acceptable way for us to talk about these two different cultures. Yes, they overlap. (More and more, I’m an example of that myself.) I know lots of people who fall into the “progressive evangelical” category working on Democratic presidential campaigns, “secular” progressive orgs, and so on.

Nevertheless, there are two different cultures that we can talk about. And anyone with a foot in each one knows how different they are and how awkward it can be to straddle both.

So I’m asking Matt, Pastor Dan, Mave and others to please help me out here: How would you rather refer to “secular progressives”? First of all, “secular” does not mean atheist. Check out the substantial wikipedia article on Secularism. And here’s a dictionary definition:

Secular: (1) denoting attitudes, activities, or other things that have no religious or spiritual basis : secular buildings | secular moral theory. Contrasted with sacred. (2) Christian Church (of clergy) not subject to or bound by religious rule; not belonging to or living in a monastic or other order.

As with any political label, to say, “Secular Progressive” bends the definition of “Secular” a little bit. But it works well in the sense that a secular progressive, like a “secular priest” is not acting in the world directly in the service of a religious community. In other words, all of us “secular progressives” can have a range of religious and atheist views.

By “Evangelical Christian Progressives,” on the other hand, I mean people who are tightly woven into an intimate Christian church community that pervades all aspects of their life and politics. Likewise, all aspects of their life and politics are guided by a very specific theological belief set — those beliefs vary somewhat from one community to the next, but all Evangelical Christians have a core theology in common.

Equally as important for this discussion, they mostly (but not all) have a lot of cultural practices in common that stand in stark contrast to most (but not all) “secular progressives.” They don’t approve of sex before marriage, think divorce is unacceptable, find common expressions that “take the lord’s name in vain”—and cussing in general—jarring and believe homosexuality displeases God.

Those cultural differences rule out simple social gathering, let alone intimate political collaboration, between “Secular Progressives” (soon to be renamed!) and “Evangelical Progressives.” It is those cultural and ideological/theological differences that need to be bridged—accepted where possible and negotiated where necessary.

And I don’t see how we can do that without at least having words to use for these two different, albeit overlapping and fuzzy, groups. Without words, we can’t talk. Without talking, we can’t work things out.

But, as Matt said last night, “secular” has become derogatory term used by the right wing against progressives. OK. Then what term can I use?