Focus on Os Guinness, drafter of the Evangelical Manifesto
Os Guinness, principle drafter of the Evangelical Manifesto:
When you have best-selling authors who appear on public television with “feel-good” gospels who have to apologize to their own churches that they’ve diluted the faith when they get home, something is profoundly wrong. When you have Evangelical leaders who make predictions in the name of God, which by biblical standards are openly false prophecy, something is badly wrong. When scholars and writers can look at the Evangelical political movement and describe them as “theocrats” or worse, as “fascists,” something is badly wrong.From his statement at the National Press Club this morning. God and Culture blogger Paul Edwards provides us an mp3 of the statement (5 minutes). Listen to it all.
More about Guinness here.
UPDATE. In the comments Jim Naughton points out that Guinness co-authored a recent op-ed in the Washington Post with The Rev. John Yates of the breakaway The Falls Church where Guinness is a parishioner. In the op-ed they wrote about why they left the Episcopal Church. Read for yourself and decide whether the Episcopal Church they describe bears any resemblance to reality. Is it civil to slander an entire church in this way?
The news of the day: This is the author of the Evangelical Manifesto. He talks the talk, but does he walk the walk?
I can't get too excited about Guinness, who co-authored a slanderous op-ed piece about the Episcopal Church in the Washington Post some months back. You can't write this sort of thing and then portray yourself as a moderating influence.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/07/AR2007010700982_pf.html
Posted by Jim Naughton![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.episcopalcafe.com/lead/nav-commenters.gif)
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May 7, 2008 3:10 PM
Fundamental to a liberal view of freedom is the right of a person or group to define themselves, to speak for themselves and to not be dehumanized by the definitions and distortions of others.
Posted by Randy Muller![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.episcopalcafe.com/lead/nav-commenters.gif)
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May 7, 2008 5:12 PM
Goodness' sake! When I read the executive summary of the Evangelical Manifest this morning, I thought, "Hey, this is pretty good." (A few points that I would want to be a little more flexible about, but, hey, what the heck!) The Manifest certainly lost credibility when I read the piece that Guiness and Yates wrote a few months back in the WP, as pointed out by Jim Naughton. I hope some of the other co-authors of the Manifest realize they have some repair work to do. I don't get too upset when people disagree with me (a lot of people do). I don't get too upset (though I am sad) when people say, "I am just not comfortable in the Episcopal Church, and I need to go somewhere else." But on the basis of the article that Jim gives the link for, what else can I conclude but that Guinness and Yates are either mindless dupes, or liars?
Bill Moorhead
Posted by Bill Moorhead![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.episcopalcafe.com/lead/nav-commenters.gif)
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May 7, 2008 9:25 PM
HA! And just when I thought that *I* was having trouble re-activing as an Episcopalian because I couldn't say as many "I believe"-s as I thought most would expect from me, Guinness describes a church that would be significantly less challenging...if it really existed. But it doesn't. What is it about people like him who really think the world is soo simple that its constituent parts-dare I say, even God-can be neatly put into boxes for our examination, assent or rejection and, ultimately, control?
Posted by Clint Davis![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.episcopalcafe.com/lead/nav-commenters.gif)
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May 7, 2008 10:36 PM
Julia Duin at the Washington Times:
http://video1.washingtontimes.com/beliefblog/2008/05/manifesto_part_2_1.html
My goodness, what a bomb that turned out to be.
Posted by John B. Chilton![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.episcopalcafe.com/lead/nav-commenters.gif)
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May 12, 2008 3:13 PM