Letters to the Editor
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Fundamentalism
Historically, fundamentalism was a response to modernist attitudes within the mainline Protestant denominations (the most offensive of which attitudes were 1. the acceptance of historical critical study of the Bible, 2. Darwin's theory of evolution, and 3. the theological responses of liberal Protestantism to 1. and 2.).
Fundamentalists were those who attended the Niagra conference (1895) and assented to the doctrinal opinions promulgated in The Fundamentals: A Testimony to the Truth (1910-15). Princeton Theological Seminary was a stronghold of fundamentalism up to the turn of the century, after which the movement abandoned the mainline seminaries and settled in independent Bible training centers.
The movement was respectable. It claimed some of the best minds of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries (American minds anyway). J. Gresham Machen, who left Princeton and founded Westminster Seminary, was a widely acknowledged fundamentalist (respected even by H. L. Mencken). William Jennings Bryant, who ran for President several times on the Populist ticket and prosecuted the Scopes Monkey Trial in 1925, was a fundamentalist.
The fundamentalist movement broadened in the 30s and 40s to accomodate most conservative denominations and independent churches, particularly those with low-church ecclesiologies. (There are conservative Anglican and Episcopalians who share many evangelical committments yet who avoid the Evangelical Theological Alliance). Fundamentalists today are those peculiar groups within the evangelical movement who preserve the archaic epistomologies and biblical hermeneutic of their nineteenth century namesakes, though usually without same intellectual rigor. Everything begins with scripture, which is inerrant and must be interpreted systematically, as a unified whole, not as a diverse miscellany of different genres. Most fundamentalists (with the important exception of the reformed calvinists sects) maintain the dispensational enthusiasms of their predecessors and await a rapture of the saints. Speaking in tongues, divine healing, and most of the stuff you see on TV belongs to Pentecostalism and the Charismatic Movement, neither of which necessarily belong to Evangelicalism (though in practice most Pentecostals and Charismatics are often Evangelicals).
Usually I just call anyone who makes me mad a fundamentalist. But that's a different story.
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an alternative view on Christianity
First of all, I want to say that I'm very happy with the quality of this conversation; particularly those out there who can succinctly explain the history of these loaded terms we now throw around with abandon. I find it very funny (or depressing, depending on the day) that so many secular thinkers out there bemoan the anti-intellectualism of the fundamentalist movement, and yet know nothing of the history of the American Protestant movement. Get informed first, and THEN attack, that's my motto.
At any rate, I would like to offer a non-Christian, yet very stimulating and sometimes sympathetic, analysis of Christianity. I admit, I'm wearing my continental philosophy hat here, but Jean-Luc Nancy's work on deconstructing Christianity provides a response both to the simplistic "Christianity equals hope" treacle (sorry, Poco, I liked your post otherwise, but Christianity ain't comfort food) AND to the 'I'll try not to be condescending' crud that follows Poco's post. Maybe, just maybe Christianity is doing something and posing a line of thought that is far more radical than the church OR its critics grasp. Interviews with Nancy can be found on the web by typing "Jean-Luc Nancy God" into Google. Your brain will thank you.
--supernerd
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stereotypes
I have not read the book, but I do want to say that as for the criticism about the characters seeming like stereotypes, chances are that's what they actually seemed like. I recently moved from the panhandle of Florida, Pensacola, the home of the Brownsville revival (the one where the couple traveled across country with the body of their baby after having been promised a miracle reanimation). I can tell you first hand that these people act like stereotypes. The smart funny friends I had in High School suddenly had nothing to talk about except Jesus. They pretty much cut themselves off from the outside world. I remember going to lunch with an old High School friend whom I had met up with. He had found God and spent the entire lunch trying to convert me. I couldn't get a word in about anything else. It wasn't just him. Everyone that got "saved" suddenly turned into zombies. It was as if the people I knew didn't exist any longer. They became stereotypical zealots.
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A world of options between fundamentalism and atheism/secularism
In the spirit of Christina Smerick's suggestion to know your opponent before challenging him/her (see preceding letter), check out Wikipedia's informative article on Fundamentalism. It delineates and clarifies various terms like fundamentalist, evangelical, charismatic, Islamist, etc.
My $0.02:
In her memoir, I wish Christine Rosen had talked about more her current spiritual/religious outlook as an adult. How did the fundamentalist experience of her childhood shape her current worldview and spiritual practice (or lack thereof)? How does having a spouse from a different religious background (Jewish, in her case) affect her views?
It seems almost de rigueur among liberal intellectual circles that once someone escapes from the stifling world of a strict obscurantist religious upbringing, that s/he automatically defaults to a secular non-religious agnostic/atheist worldview. But what about adopting a more expansive, open-minded form of spirituality? One that is not based on rigid dogma and fear of the "other"? There are many branches of Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, etc. that believe in a spiritual purpose to life, that believe in ethical living, but which do not preach hatred, fear, and an aversion to reason and scientific knowledge. It's possible to believe in God AND biological evolution (without resorting to viewing God as a magician), in holding progressive social views while also honoring ethics and standards of behavior, and in following a chosen spiritual path without judging other paths as aberrant or misguided.
I think most people in the world fall in between the two poles of strict fundamentalism and strict secularism, but they are never as vocal as those two groups.
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Feel the rage!
A bit of my own experience. The only thing that exremely religious people (of all sects and faiths that I've encountered so far) have in greater abundance than ignorance is arrogance.
They don't need knowledge, or good hygene, or a bow to social norms as to when to shut up, they have (T)ruth!
Anyway, for accounts of 'former insiders who will explain fundamentalism while allowing us to chuckle at it' I suggest you check out exchristian.net.
A typical example: http://www.exchristian.net/testimonies/2005/12/fantasy-versus-reality.html