Customer Reviews

The End of Evangelicalism? Discerning a New Faithfulness for Mission: Towards an Evangelical Political Theology (Theopolitical Visions)

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As Dr. Fitch warns in his blog, "there's some intense political theory in this book alongside some intense theology." While I lack formal education in both political theory and theology, I still found this book to be both accessible and full of hope.

It's accessible because Fitch provides a comprehensive overview of the methods he uses to understand the `fact' of experience (political theory) of Evangelical theology. He covers a lot of ground as he helps the reader understand and apply Slavoj Zizek's social critical framework. After a couple of sessions of reading and rereading, I was prepared to use Zizek's framework to explore Evangelicalism.

Fitch goes on to systematically investigate three central Evangelical theological commitments: "the inerrant Bible," "the decision for Christ," and "the Christian Nation." He clearly shows how these commitments have lead to the establishment of an ideology that tends to be against much more than it is for.

The good news is that he doesn't finish with a mere critique. I found hope as Fitch goes on to truly discern a new faithfulness for mission. Faithfulness focused on the formation of God's people, socially, into the Body of Christ, "the very extension of "the Sent One'" participating in the missio Dei - the restoration of all things.

On several occasions, I have struggled to understand the opinions of some of my Evangelical friends and colleagues. Having a desire to live together in unity (Psalm 133: 1-3), I have sometimes remained silent especially when confronted with strongly held group opinions. Fitch's book has given me a way to both understand where these opinions come from and a renewed hope for change. A hope that is based on faith in a loving God, a hope that claims that redemption, not suffering, is the final word.

s evangelicalism over? It is changing? Are we discovering a new way of being the church within evangelicalism? David Fitch in his new book The End of Evangelicalism takes an in-depth look at the political theology of evangelicalism, its foundations, its ramifications and alternative practices that might better suit us.

Having just read through and reviewed Love Wins by Rob Bell this book is a completely different animal all together. My main criticism of Love Wins is in the irresponsibility of the format and style. The questions it asked were far too important for the stylized unsubstantiated methods of the book. The End of Evangelicalism? is the opposite. From the get go you are very aware that this is part of an academic series and carries the weight and depth appropriate to such work. It is extensively footnoted, researched, and well put together. Immediately my mind was excited by the challenge of this book and its high level theological and political discourse.

That being said this is obviously not a book for the average lay person. It wasn't written for mass pop consumption, it was written for those in the church who are engaging in the hard fought battles of missional discourse. What is particularly unique about the book is the David uses the ideological theories of Slavoj Zizek as the basis for his analysis of the politic of evangelicalism. Not familiar with Slavoj? Well you can join the club on that one because his work was entirely new for me as well. But David does a very effective job of making Zizek's work approachable and insightful. Zizek's work provides a very fruitful soil for the conversations around evangelicalism. This is made especially more effective by David's addition of a robust kingdom theology that takes Zizek's critiques and insights and turns them into missional actions for the church.

What I appreciate most about this work is that there are real substantive missional ideas for us to interact with. This is not merely a critique or a vague theological work that has little bearing on daily church work. This is a book that if we engage with it properly it should regularly inform the daily missional of the church. That is its aim and that is what it delivers. I am sure that much of that is rooted in David's personal experience where he is not only a professor at Northern Seminary but also a pastor at Life on the Vine Christian Community in the Chicago area. So I highly recommend this book for those of you who desire to engage with the politic of the church on both intentionally theological and decidedly practical levels.

Is Evangelicalism an empty politic (Zizek)? Have Evangelical's fallen into the trap of defining themselves by what they are against, rather than what they are for? Why is there a disconnect between the professed belief of Evangelicals and their actions? These are the questions addressed in David E. Fitch's "The End of Evangelicalism?".

Using Zizekian analysis, Fitch examines three core Evangelical beliefs: 1) The Inerrant Bible, 2) The Decision (for Christ) and 3) The Christian Nation. In examining these beliefs, Fitch brings out attention to what is wrong within Evangelicalism, and ultimately provides a new understanding of the above core beliefs, making way for a new direction for Evangelicals to consider. Staying within Evangelicalism, Fitch provides a succinct and effective analysis of the current failings of Evangelicalism.

If you are disturbed by recent trends within Evangelical thought, or are otherwise curious to see how Evangelicals are responding to their (own) crisis, then Fitch is recommended reading.

[ This review originally appeared in

THE ENGLEWOOD REVIEW OF BOOKS - 22 April 2011 ]

David Fitch's first book, The Great Giveaway: Reclaiming the Mission of the Church from... cemented his role as a prominent critic of contemporary evangelicalism. Although he laid out some pointed critiques in that book, he also demonstrated a deep love for the evangelical tradition, out of which he sought to reform rather than abolish evangelicalism. In his newest book, The End of Evangelicalism?: Discerning a New Faithfulness for Mission, Fitch continues on the same trajectory, hammering home a multi-faceted critique of evangelicalism and yet arguing just as vehemently that the heart of evangelicalism should be retained.

The End of Evangelicalism is perhaps the most significant theological work to be published so far this year (of course, it is only still April), which although it is targeted primarily at evangelicals, is strikingly pertinent to all traditions of Western Christianity. Fitch utilizes here the work of noted Slovenian philosopher and critic Slavoj Zizek to critique three essential evangelical ideals: "the inerrant Bible," "the decision for Christ" and "the Christian nation." Fitch's use of Zizek here is brilliant, but dense. Fitch, however, is a patient guide explaining relevant terminology from Zizek as he goes, and even offering a glossary of key terms and suggesting in the book's introduction a way that readers can work through the heart of the book's basic arguments when they cannot make it through the chapter on Zizek's thought. The gist of Fitch's argument is that the three central evangelical concepts named above function as "master signifiers" in the Zizekian sense that although they draw the allegiance of a people allowing for the formation of a political entity, they become empty and devoid of reference to any sort of reality. A good example of a master signifier is the American concept of "freedom," which is interpreted in all sorts of ways (not having a clear reality to which it refers) and yet it has extraordinary power to unite the nation-state. Fitch's argument that each of these three evangelical concepts is a master signifier is compelling and undoubtedly will articulate some long-held theological frustrations about evangelicalism in a fresh way.

Fitch rightly observes that although Zizek is an extraordinary critic, his work is not particularly helpful for imagining a transformed evangelicalism that would be rooted in a "politics of fullness" instead of the hollowness of master signifiers. Toward this end Fitch identifies three parallel historical commitments of evangelicalism "a high view of Scripture, a conversionist soteriology, and a church active in society for its salvation," which he believes have the potential for grounding a renewed evangelicalism. He notes:

Re-grounding these three commitments politically in the triune work of God through Christ by the Spirit will not only establish their substance in God but also shape evangelicals into a participation in his mission in the world (128).

Weaving together the work of a number of key theologians and biblical scholars, Fitch proceeds to flesh out a vision of how these re-grounding these commitments in this way in our post-Christendom age will renew evangelicalism. His arguments are compelling, and have the potential to launch evangelicalism quite far down the road toward renewal. However, as much as I agree with all of Fitch's critiques and his vision for starting to move forward, I am not sure I can stomach his bent to preserve evangelicalism. Yes, we should honor the gifts of the evangelical tradition (e.g., the historical commitments that Fitch commends for moving forward), but it seems that preserving evangelicalism as a movement in the way that Fitch describes only serves to propagate many ills of the Western culture in which evangelicalism is deeply embedded. Can evangelicalism - even the sort of transformed evangelicalism that Fitch envisions - persist in a post-Western world? Fitch's work undoubtedly shapes our imagination in a way that we will be more capable to do so, but still seems to lack the sort of holistic re-ordering of the Christian social imagination that we observe, for instance, in stories of Christian faithfulness in post-Western contexts like Africa (like those recounted in Emmanuel Katongole's new book The Sacrifice of Africa, reviewed below). My suspicion is that there are a host of other socio-political "master signifiers" that give shape to contemporary evangelicalism and will eventually need to be addressed. (For instance, the Western ideals of "universals" and "ahistoricism" both seemingly fit Zizek's "master signifier" concept and have played key roles in the formation of evangelicalism.) The pressing question is, as we rid ourselves of the mythology of empty signifiers (or have them ridded by shifts in the broader culture), will "evangelicalism" become its own sort of master signifier, evacuated of its meaning, yet still politically formative?

In short, while I wish that Fitch would have expanded the scope of his critique of evangelicalism, the points on which he bases his critique are essential and will take us a long way down the road toward a deeper faithfulness. May we have the courage to hear his challenges and to submit our minds, our bodies and every fiber of our beings to be transformed by the Good News ("Evangel") of Jesus, which - unlike our movements and our language - can never be conquered by death!