[Excerpts from the article "Backgrounds of the Restoration Movement" by Jay Guin. It describes the two poles of Christian thought that emerged in the late 19th and early 20th century (Social Gospel and evangelicalism) and how they gave birth to our modern political camps of liberal and conservative. For the most part, Guin's analysis is accurate, although he incorrectly characterizes the mainline Christian denominations as heavily Democratic, when in fact they are politically split down the middle.

In the end, Guin calls for a revitalization of the church using the best traits of these two movements, and he does so in a way that is both suspicious and accomodating of the current political structure.  I can't say I agree with his final assessment, but it does give me hope that liberal and conservative Christians might be able to find some common ground.]

In the late 19th century, many Americans were disgusted by the poverty level and the low quality of living in the slums. The social gospel movement provided a religious rationale for action to address those concerns. Activists in the Social Gospel movement hoped that by public health measures as well as enforced schooling so the poor could develop talents and skills, the quality of their moral lives would begin to improve.

Important concerns of the Social Gospel movement were labor reforms, such as abolishing child labor and regulating the hours of work by mothers. By 1920 they were crusading against the 12-hour day for men at U.S. Steel. Many reformers inspired by the movement opened settlement houses, most notably Hull House in Chicago operated by Jane Addams. They helped the poor and immigrants improve their lives. Settlement houses offered services such as daycare, education, and health care to needy people in slum neighborhoods. The YMCA was created originally to help rural youth adjust to the city without losing their religion, but by the 1890s became a powerful instrument of the Social Gospel.

In the United States prior to World War I, the Social Gospel was the religious wing of the progressive movement which had the aim of combating injustice, suffering and poverty in society. During the New Deal of the 1930s Social Gospel themes could be seen in the work of Harry Hopkins, Will Alexander and Mary McLeod Bethune, who added a new concern with African Americans. After 1940, the movement withered …

At the same time, men such as Horatio Alger and Russell H. Conwell preached the gospel of wealth: Christian values and hard work will lead to wealth, which the Christian holds in trust to serve others. Andrew Carnegie, who became one of the richest men in the world through making steel, taught and practiced this, giving his fortune away to many good causes. He wrote,“The man who dies rich dies disgraced.”…

…The Social Gospel largely died out during the Great Depression because it succeeded so thoroughly that the federal and state governments took over its agenda. Laws were passed banning child labor, women’s suffrage was granted, Prohibition was passed, mandatory, free public education became a right, and the Fair Labor Standard Act set a minimum wage and required overtime pay after a 40-hour work week.

In the 19th Century, almost all schools were private schools, and education was far from universal. The churches had been providing schooling, but massive immigration and population shifts overwhelmed church resources, causing them to look to the government to take on the massive task of educating all children. The Social Gospel advocates argued that free, compulsory, public education would make better citizens and eliminate poverty and so eliminate crime. By the turn of the century, most states had been persuaded to provide mandatory, free elementary school…

..There are two conflicting approaches to the Social Gospel in modern American Christianity. First, there are those who see Christianity as purely a private concern. We go to church on Sundays, we have the correct doctrine, we study Bible at home and at church, and Christianity is between us and God. If there are problems in society, the cure is evangelism, and we should seek to evangelize our neighbors. Therefore, if workers are being abused, we just need to persuade the bosses to become Christians.

This view severely compartmentalizes our Christianity — so that Christianity doesn’t apply in the public sphere. When we vote, we vote out of self-interest, not love for our enemies and our neighbors.

The other approach is that if we truly love our neighbors, such as abused workers, we should use the power of government to compel fair treatment of workers. If workers are being underpaid or forced to work in dangerous conditions, the solution is a minimum wage law or OSHA.

However, for most of the 20th Century, those taking this view also compartmentalized their Christianity. The goal was to alleviate poverty and crime, but not to change hearts and bring people to Jesus. The concern was for the needy was real enough, but it was expressed in entirely secular terms. Indeed, Christians of this persuasion could work perfectly well with atheists and other non-Christians to achieve their goals.

And we see this split in American Christianity quite plainly. White, evangelical churches fit in the first camp. They tend to vote Republican, they favor free markets, and they oppose government intervention. However, they are serious about evangelism and believe that Christianity requires a true rebirth. They distrust big government and public schools because they don’t see much Christian about either.

Mainline churches, such as the United Presbyterian, United Methodist, and Christian Churches (Disciples of Christ) (not the independent Christian Churches), often fall in the second camp. They tend to vote Democrat, they favor government solutions, and they are weak regarding evangelism and missions. Indeed, these churches can be quite accepting of theological liberalism (even the denial of the incarnation), because the agenda is much more about humanistic solutions rather than being reborn.

You see, the Social Gospel began as an entirely appropriate Christian response to serious problems, but as it got in bed with government, government became the savior. Thus, these churches correctly understand the importance of loving their neighbors, but they tend to see the goal as eliminating financial poverty to the exclusion of spiritual poverty.

On the other hand, the evangelical community tends to deeply see the importance of alleviating spiritual poverty but often has very little concern regarding financial poverty. Indeed, there is often very little difference between the Democratic Party and the mainline denominations, but then there is often very little difference between the Republican Party and evangelical and many fundamentalist denominations. I mean, go to any predominantly white Church of Christ, and you’ll find a building full of Republicans, with any Democrats present keeping quiet about their political views.

This division in American thought traces back at least to the Third Great Awakening, following the Civil War. On the one hand, there were great revivalists converting people by the thousands by promising a personal relationship with Jesus. On the other hand, there were established churches working hard to relieve genuinely tragic social conditions. And both movements had great success — but they were separate movements.

The Social Gospel movement dramatically improved the qualify of life of many people, but it failed to win souls — indeed, by preferring humanistic, governmental solutions, it had the ironic effect of teaching that man and man’s government is the solution to man’s problems…

… As American Christians look to find a truer, less secular, less compartmentalized, less compromised way of being God’s people, we have to realize that both parties are smart and want to push the church to become a part of their coalitions. The first step, therefore, is to leave both parties and therefore to leave behind the desire for secular power, being content with God’s power.

And this means we’ll sometimes agree with one party or the other, and often disagree with both. We can be passionate about the environment without worshipping the environment. We can be passionate about raising the poor out of poverty while insisting that we must also let Jesus lift them out of spiritual poverty. We can be passionate about free enterprise while insisting the enterprise should not be free to oppress the weak.

We can look for solutions entirely outside the government or in coordination with the government, so long as we never ever see the government as the solution. Jesus is the answer, and there is no other.