The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind

This book caused quite a stir when it was published in 1994. This is the quote that upset a lot of people:

The scandal of the evangelical mind is that there isn’t one.

The author was basically saying that evangelical Christians have stopped thinking rationally about anything.

Unfortunately, it was a harder read than I was ready for. It’s a lot of church history, which gets technical and that I honestly wasn’t that interested in. The author is a college professor, and the book reads like it.

I’m writing this a couple of weeks after I finished it, and I’m embarrassed to say that I can’t remember any specific argument from it. The general vibe was that fundamentalism has overtaken rational thought in the evangelical space.

Back in 1994 (before the mainstream Internet), I suppose the evangelical world was dominated by televangelists like Jerry Falwell and Jimmy Swaggart.

I deeply wonder what the author would think of today’s political, scientific, and evangelical environment?

I wish I had more to say, but I don’t think I absorbed much from it, outside the basic argument.

Book Info