The political reflections of four prominent thinkers who have helped shape evangelical engagement in the public square took center stage at the Center conference entitled "Evangelicals in Civic Life: An Evangelical Intellectual Inventory," held September 21–23 at the Black Point Inn in Prouts Neck, Maine. In separate sessions, J. Budziszewski of the University of Texas assessed the contributions of Carl F. H. Henry, Abraham Kuyper, Francis Schaeffer, and John Howard Yoder, and responded to the subsequent comments of scholars, each an expert in the work of one of the four.

While respectful of the contributions of all the thinkers, Budziszewski faulted each to a greater or lesser degree for failing to develop a "systematic" or "comprehensive" political theory as compelling as those offered by the secularist establishment. He suggested, moreover, that evangelical political thought would be improved if it were more informed by the tradition of natural law. "Although evangelicals are rightly committed to grounding their political reflection in revelation, the Bible provides insufficient materials for the task." In addition to the "special" revelation of Scripture, evangelicals should also mine the "general" revelation, or natural law, that God has made evident to both believers and nonbelievers.

Carl F. H. Henry, the founding editor of Christianity Today, exemplified both the promise and the problems of evangelical thinkers, Budziszewski argued. Henry deserves "unbounded appreciation" for being "a gadfly" who "pricked the evangelical conscience in the 1940s" and encouraged evangelicals to enter the political and cultural fray of the wider civic realm. But because he spoke in biblical terms only, his influence with his nonbelieving fellow citizens was limited. Henry’s "value was inestimable, but his approach was not helpful." Evangelicals’ hostility to natural-law rhetoric limits their political effectiveness because it deprives them of ways to interact with nonbelievers.

In his response, David Weeks of Azusa Pacific University conceded that Henry downplayed natural law as a "rationalistic enterprise unmoored from God," and did little to provide a "common moral ground" between believers and nonbelievers. Weeks questioned, however, whether the kind of distinct, comprehensive political theory Budziszewski advocated was a realistic or desirable goal for evangelicals. Henry, "the grandfather of evangelical political thought," was predominantly a theologian who "made social engagement a persistent theme" of his writings. Seeing many of his evangelical brethren as "simplistic, fragmentary, and reactionary," Henry urged them "to understand the limits of earthly justice and accept civil authority," which had been created by God to maintain order. Rather than ignoring political and intellectual life as they were then wont to do, he said, they should insist on limited government and work for the spiritual "regeneration" of their fellow citizens.

Turning to the nineteenth-century Dutch theologian Abraham Kuyper, Budziszewski praised him as the "most impressive, powerful, and challenging" of the four thinkers under discussion. Even arguments with obvious flaws are "compelling," he said. Kuyper was well versed in Catholic social thought and "really was a natural-law thinker even if he didn’t know it." His doctrine of "sphere sovereignty" resembles the Catholic principle of "subsidiarity" in that it offers a defense of civil society based on a religious understanding of the order of creation.

Respondent John Bolt of the Calvin Theological Seminary agreed with Budziszewski about the anemic state of evangelical political thought in the United States and added his own call for "North American neo-Calvinists to get over their hang-up about natural law." Bolt remarked favorably on Budziszewski’s analysis of Kuyper as well, though he criticized some aspects of his understanding of sphere sovereignty. It is Kuyper’s enthusiasm for America’s providentially blessed "experiment in ordered liberty," however, that makes him most relevant today, Bolt contended. Evangelicals can use those of his insights that have "the greatest affinity" with the thought of the American founders to form intellectual and political alliances with others who eschew biblical language but share biblical values. An evangelical public theology should focus, as the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights do, on "the dignity and worth of the human person" created in God’s image.

In the third session, Budziszewski commended Francis Schaeffer for his "freshness" and "gift for making connections," but criticized his "intemperance" and unconvincing political theory. Schaeffer awakened evangelicals to the fact that by the 1970s secular humanism had become America’s dominant worldview in law, politics, and education. He proposed "graduated resistance" to particular injustices, such as abortion, if legal means of reversing them failed. Unfortunately, his impatience with ordinary politics drove him to move on too quickly to protest and revolution. Schaeffer did recognize the relationship between special and general revelation, however, and the need for a new civic rhetoric that could exploit the "points of contact" between believers and nonbelievers.

Emphasizing that Schaeffer was above all an evangelist "notoriously hard to label," respondent William Edgar of the Westminster Theological Seminary discussed Schaeffer’s roles as theologian, political conservative, cultural warrior, and resister. At his best, Edgar said, Schaeffer was "a master persuader" who had an admirable desire "to pry open the culture" and an "instinct for what could make an impact." He gave evangelicals "permission to think" and to engage the wider culture of art, philosophy, and politics. Though he was an "alarmist" and sometimes "succumbed to bad impulses," we should "celebrate and emulate the better Schaeffer." Edgar seconded Budziszewski’s observation that Schaeffer and the other three thinkers wrongly downplayed the limited but legitimate role of statecraft because of their "lack of a creation perspective." They neglected God’s original call to have "proper dominion over" the world.

The fourth major influence on contemporary evangelical political thought, the Mennonite theologian John Howard Yoder, is "felt almost exclusively on the evangelical left" and is the "most problematic," according to Budziszewski. Finding great political significance in the example of Christ’s life, Yoder urged believers to imitate His renunciation of violence and, because governance cannot be separated from coercion, to eschew statecraft. Budziszewski credited Yoder with asking "challenging questions from an unfamiliar perspective," but said that his arguments were unpersuasive and his answers incorrect. Scripture does not condone extreme pacifism; "magistrates must wield the sword responsibly to protect others."

Respondent Ashley Woodiwiss of Wheaton College argued that Budziszewski’s "partial portrait" of Yoder, which focused solely on his 1972 book The Politics of Jesus, failed to do justice to how his ideas changed and developed through his life. Yoder was "not a political theorist or a systematic theologian," furthermore, but "a theological ethicist" who addressed particular problems he identified within the church. Woodiwiss said that Yoder was concerned not with the debate between Athens and Jerusalem but, rather, with the one between "Rome and Bethlehem." He did not advocate that Christians "hide from politics"; he merely stressed that "the church be central to political activity." Woodiwiss suggested that Yoder saw the church functioning as a "counter-polis, not an anti-polis."

In the last panel, Jean Bethke Elshtain of the University of Chicago reflected on the conference from the perspective of a friendly, non-evangelical "outsider." A practicing Lutheran, Elshtain commented on several themes raised in the preceding sessions—the usefulness of the Bible in developing a coherent political theory, the relative merit of transforming individuals or governments in the pursuit of justice, the dual obligations of citizens and believers, the need to be "bilingual" when conversing with non-Christians, the proper roles of church and state, and the meaning of pluralism, among others. She called Budziszewski’s plea for a comprehensive Christian political vision perhaps "too much to expect," and said that the four thinkers under consideration should not be criticized "for what they knowingly did not do." She did contend, however, that Christians "must be prepared to offer a reasonable defense of their positions" and that churches should "play a role as interpreters of the culture." Effective political engagement is required to advance justice in the world.

Center vice president Michael Cromartie moderated the spirited discussions that followed the formal presentations in each session. The appropriateness of natural law as an orienting and practical doctrine for a public Christian theology was one of many topics that elicited strong opinions from participants. Those attending the conference were Joel Belz of World, Richard Cizik of the National Association of Evangelicals, Terry Eastland of The Weekly Standard, Os Guinness of The Trinity Forum, Cherie Harder of the National Endowment for the Humanities, Dennis Hollinger of Messiah College, William Inboden of the U.S. Department of State, Diane Knippers of the Institute on Religion and Democracy, Joe Loconte of the Heritage Foundation, Paul Marshall of Freedom House, William McClay of the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, Russell Moore of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Kenneth Myers of Mars Hill Audio, David Neff of Christianity Today, Timothy Samuel Shah of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, Ronald Sider of Evangelicals for Social Action, James Skillen of the Center for Public Justice, Bill Wichterman of the office of Senator Bill Frist, and John Wilson of Books & Culture.