Thy Kingdom Come

A prominent religion scholar and evangelical Christian describes how the religious right is fighting -- and winning -- the culture wars. "I write as a jilted lover. The evangelical faith that nurtured me as a child and sustains me as an adult has been hijacked by right-wing zealots." These are not the words of a radical anti-Christian, but of a Columbia University religion professor and lifelong believer. In his latest book, Randall Balmer examines the rise of the American religious right and the means by which it is reshaping the country's political and cultural landscape. With a deft combination of grassroots organization, partisan passion, and media savvy, it has mobilized a preponderance of America's evangelicals behind a hard-right political agenda that endangers the civil liberties of all Americans and threatens to turn the United States into a theocracy. Balmer argues that the religious right has betrayed the very gospel that it espouses, has betrayed the heritage of 19th-century evangelical activism, and, in seeking to eviscerate the First Amendment separation of church and state, is working against the interests of the faith itself. He notes that religion has flourished in America as nowhere else precisely because the government has stayed out of the religion business. And he reminds his fellow evangelicals and others of the real teachings of Jesus and what it means to be Christian.