Evangelical Anti-intellectualism. Part Two: Why Should We Care?

In Part Two of this series on Evangelical Anti-intellectualism, Anthony Alberino considers the disastrous fallout of the church's long neglect of the mind. Several crises now confront the church, at least in part, because of its deep-seated anti-intellectualism. First, the church is losing its young people. between 70-75% of Christian raised youth walk away from the faith by their sophomore year in college and between 80-90% of youth leave the church after the age of 18. When asked why they've left, the most common reasons given are intellectual in nature. Young Christians are not being mentally equipped to know what they believe and to know why they believe it. Second, the church is losing its thinkers. Many who are gifted intellectually within the evangelical church end up leaving it in frustration. Many of those who leave transfer to other Christian traditions, such as Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy, that appreciate their gifting and that have long traditions of valuing the intellect and intellectual pursuit. The evangelical community is losing these critical soldiers at the very moment in our history when we need them the most. Third, the American Protestant Church has become too feminized. Church services and ministries cater to the feminine personality and thus struggle to attract and retain men. Worship services focus on emotions, pastors are often strong in traditionally feminine traits, and sermons are commonly heavy on sentiment and light on doctrine. The feminization of the church is partially the result of the historical turn toward anti-intellectualism and it tends to perpetuate the problem today. Finally, Anthony turns to look at the devastating consequences that evangelical anti-intellectualism has had on American culture. Because Christians have largely abandoned the arena of higher education and high culture, our society has been left undefended from and exposed to the onslaught of anti-Christian ideas that have poisoned our cultural environment. The plausibility structure that now dominates our society is making evangelism harder by the day. The church's mission is not unaffected by the condition of the culture in which it lives, and moves, and has its being. By continuing to neglect the mind we are contributing to the hardening of the spiritual soil of our nation.