The Modernist Element In Protestantism

Abstract

“It should not be necessary to say that the earthquake, the displacement, and the decline of mainline Protestantism is an occasion of great temptation. … After the earthquake, we begin to envy religious movements that glitter with power and slick success and wonder whether to imitate them. After the earthquake, we look for aspects of our heritage we might blame for our failures: our ecumenism, our commitment to scholarship, our social witness. In the face of these things, I want to try to make a case for another response, a kind of calling we have in the situation of displacement and decline, a calling to recover and more vigorously pursue a certain part of our heritage.”