They say never let a crisis go to waste. So, Woke Evangelical Elites are making sure to use the COVID-19, coronavirus pandemic to promote Social Justice Theology to Evangelical churches.
A group of Evangelical Elites including Ed Stetzer, Rick Warren, and Wheaton College are using a new website to promote to Social Justice to unsuspecting churches. The content includes promotions of Woke thinking using Social Justice Tropes of marginalization and racism to urge the church to social action.
“Trusted Resources from Leading Experts?”
Rick Warren is a mega church pastor and considered a leader of the church growth movement. I must admit to knowing very little of Rick Warren. But I do know this—a secular political scientist included this analysis of Warren and the church growth movement among Evangelicals:
“Rick Warren, whose Church Growth Movement has transformed many thousands of evangelical churches in recent decades, has put forth a similar therapeutic message. His trademarked Purpose Driven Life movement emphasizes the importance of pastors attending to the ‘felt needs’ of nonbelievers, deemphasizing traditional Christian doctrine in favor of an overtly psychological language. Like Schuller, and like the California task force, he downplays sin and any judgmental aspect of traditional religion; the Gospel is more of an ‘owner’s manual’ for how to achieve happiness in this life rather than in the one beyond.’”[1]
Ouch.
When the secular world passes that judgment on your Church Growth Movement, then what else is left to say?
Stetzer is a primary trusted voice and consultant to the Evangelical Immigration Table—a group partnered with the Soros-funded National Immigration Forum promoting progressive border and immigration reform plans. Stetzer is also head of the 2020 SBC Resolutions Committee. He is also involved in a major scandal involving ethical allegations regarding Christianity Today’s relationship with disgraced megachurch pastor James MacDonald.
Julie Roys detailed the scandal: “Getting paid for these kinds of jobs and engagements is common among Christian speakers and leaders. However, Stetzer’s receipt of a large gift from a celebrity pastor like MacDonald raises conflict of interest issues, given Stetzer’s position at Wheaton College and especially his role as an editor for Christianity Today (CT).”
Ethics only applies to the Little People. It is not for Evangelical Elites.
Wheaton College is involved with its Humanitarian Disaster Institute and Billy Graham Center.
Unfortunately, Wheaton is a center of Woke thinking. One of its professors recently questioned English Bible translations because the translators did not include enough women and minorities.
Dr. Esau McCaulley tweeted, “A question that I can’t stop asking: If all translation is interpretation and interpretation is influenced by social location, what does it mean that most of our English bibles were translated with very few Black or other Christians of color or women involved?”
So, consider these “trusted” experts and then consider what they slip into their resources.
The Wuhan Virus & Racism
The Coronavirus Outbreak is only in its early phase in the United States, but these experts are predicting church goers will respond as racists.
Writing on March 4 for the liberal RNS the founder of the Humanitarian Disaster Institute said, “Collectively, our findings suggest that if the coronavirus continues to spread in the U.S. over the coming weeks and months, we can look for a significant swath of Americans — especially those more motivated by an externalized faith — to feel more threatened by the outbreak, and to translate that into discrimination against groups they perceive as different.”
A review of the material online included this Woke analysis that racism is already happening!
The downloadable PDF alleges, “People of Asian descent have faced stigmatization and discrimination because the COVID-19 outbreak has its origins in China. Your church has an important role in promoting faithful preparedness, and also in reducing fearful panic and prejudice.”
The progressive worldview always sees racism.
Travel bans?
Racist.
Calling it the Wuhan Virus?
Racist.
It is everywhere.
Why?
Consider the Woke definition of racism. In Translations from the Wokish, secular academics skeptical of Critical Theory explain it is a tool: “’Racism,’ then, is a Trojan-Horse term because it is a powerfully morally salient term—one of the most morally salient in contemporary society—and yet it doesn’t mean what most people think it means.”
This is how the Woke always work. They sneak concepts like Critical Race Theory and Intersectionality into the Church. And this is particularly dangerous.
In fact, Dr. Norman Geisler warned about the way Critical Theory and its attendant Neo-Marxist thinking harms the church. He wrote, “It has a knack for replacing Christianity as a purely secular counterfeit. It also has a knack for infiltrating Christian worldviews, hybridizing with them, retooling and secularizing them. Marxism invariably drips the acid of criticism onto everything it touches. That’s part of the bargain.”
That acid of criticism can be seen in the earlier quote in this article about Bible translations. The Neo-Marxist use of Identity Politics can even corrode our trust in the English translations of the Bible.
And the use of Critical Social Justice thinking doesn’t stop there.
These “trusted” experts tell us, “COVID-19 is likely to disproportionally impact the socially and economically vulnerable.”
And, then make sure everything is “fair.”
The Coronavirus resource explains: “Leverage ways your church is already speaking out on behalf of the marginalized and vulnerable; ensure the fair distribution of resources so that these groups don’t fall through the cracks amidst the public health crisis at hand.”
Marginalized?
That term has a very specific Social Justice meaning.
According to Translations from the Wokish, “In particular, Theory assumes that marginalization is systemic and ultimately rooted in mattes of identity, such as race, sex, gender, sexuality, and so on. That is, Social Justice Theory assumes that society is socially constructed in such a way that members of dominant groups (like white, male, masculine, straight, and so on) have built the system so that it excludes and oppresses members of marginalized groups (like people of color, women, femininity, homosexuals, and so on), their knowledge(s), and their ‘ways of knowing.’ These social constructions are deemed to be real, permanent, and unjust and in need of disruption, which can only be adequately achieved through a social revolution that remakes the system in a new way without oppression.”
Conclusion: Christians should help, but be wary of Social Justice Rhetoric
There is nothing wrong with helping those in need.
In fact, we should help those struggling. This pandemic is a time for the church to step up and help. Christians have a long history of establishing hospitals and giving aid to everyone. The Romans complained that Christians not only helped their own sick and needy but were helping the sick and needy among the pagans. It was a great apologetic and evangelistic tool.
So, helping our community is good.
But we can help the community without the ideas and concepts of the Social Justice movement. Notice how identity politics poisons everything.
Racism is everywhere—including how the church responds to pandemics.
Reject this thinking. And look for better resources. Resources from conservative, trusted sources.
[1] Francis Fukuyama. Identity (p. 100). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Kindle Edition.
9 thoughts on “Evangelical Elites Exploiting the Coronavirus to Promote Social Justice”
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The Woke-ians of Woke-ianity try to turn the Good Samaritan into a card carrying SJW. But the Good Samaritan didn’t attend to anyone’s “felt needs” (whatever those are). He attended to a victim of crime whom he had come across. And he used his own money and efforts to do it; he didn’t presume to dictate how OTHER PEOPLE should carry out their acts of charity, or how their money should be spent.
Years ago, an undiscerning Christian gave me Rick Warren’s Purpose Driven book back around the time it came out. I don’t know why this person thought my life was not already driven by purpose, but I didn’t enjoy the insult. This person is the type who thinks that if a book is at a Christian book store and it’s popular, it must be authentically Christian. I never read a word of it, and trashed it later. I have many, many faults, but at least I’m pretty good at smelling organic fertilizer a mile away. Rick Warren is a self-help guru with an unused Bible.
COVID-19 is fake and the panic is intended to destroy the economy. Its just the flu. All the info is coming from Chinese liars. Lots of people will starve or die of sepsis from lack of toilet paper just because the media hyped up lies from China like being able to spread it with no symptoms, the virus living on surfaces for weeks, and so on, and created a panic that shut down the restuarants and emptied out the grocery stores. And Trump can’t point out its all fake because stupid people will not accept it, even Republitards, so he has to play the media’s game. Its sick.