Your GetReligionistas have, over the past two decades, dedicated oceans of digital ink to mainstream press struggles (especially political reporters) to grasp the meaning of this church-history term — “evangelical.”
You ask: Oceans?
Here is a small sample of those headlines:
* Please define 'evangelical' (yet again)
* Define 'evangelical,' please. Alas, many Americans don't think that this is a religious term
* Define 'evangelical,' 2023: What is a 'reconstructionist,' low-church Protestant?
This is a complex topic. The Rev. Billy Graham told me, back in the late 1980s, that he had no idea what “evangelical” meant. Honest.
Now, the professionals at the Gallup organization have offered a Frank Newport “think piece” on this topic that journalists and news consumers need to read. The headline: “The Thorny Challenge of Defining Evangelicals.” Here’s the overture:
The practical challenge arising from any analysis of evangelical Protestants in the U.S. is finding a reliable and valid way to measure the group. Much of the data about evangelicals comes from surveys, creating the need for a lucid and straightforward measure that can be easily incorporated into questionnaires.
In recent decades, this challenge has more often than not been met by using the question, “Would you describe yourself as ‘born-again’ or evangelical?”
Gallup began incorporating this question into its surveys in the summer of 1986, primarily as a way of understanding political issues. As Gallup researchers said at the time, “Since the views of the large bloc of evangelical voters likely will be a major factor in the 1988 presidential election, The Gallup Poll regularly will report the vote of both evangelicals and nonevangelicals in three key dimensions: candidate popularity, basic party strength and issues.” Of note here is the fact that Gallup’s analysts used the shorthand evangelicals for the group of those saying yes to the born again or evangelical question, a tradition that has endured since.
This double-barrel is problematic, he admitted, sort of like asking survey participants, “Do you identify as a Democrat or a liberal?” or “Did you enjoy the food and the service you received at this restaurant?”
Why try both? Simply stated, using “evangelical” alone ignores the beliefs of many Americans.
The data show the predicted wide difference in the percentage of Americans who identify as born again and those who identify as evangelical when these questions are asked separately. Twenty-seven percent of American adults in the Gallup Panel interviews identify as “born again,” while 12% identify as “evangelical.” … (The) born again or evangelical question can sow confusion in the minds of respondents who may agree with one term but not the other.
What should pollsters, academics and, yes, journalists do?
Newport offers several suggestions. Here is the one, methinks, that should hit home for religion-beat journalists:
Ask people questions about their beliefs and practices that are identified as being indicative of evangelicalism.
Asking people to agree or disagree with a specified set of beliefs and then labeling those who agree with the statements as evangelicals is seemingly logical, but largely impractical. There is the initial challenge of deciding on a set of beliefs and practices to use in defining evangelicals. The National Association of Evangelicals, for example, developed a set of four statements it asserts constitute the best measure of being an evangelical. But these in turn can differ from those developed by others. Barna Research, as a case in point, developed its own set of nine beliefs and practices it claims people must agree with in order to be classified as an evangelical.
Others could come up with their own set of statements. Gallup tried a version of this process in 1980, using three conditional belief statements to define evangelicals, but by 1986 had switched to the born again or evangelical measure I’ve been discussing in this article. There are also other practical problems. Most surveys don’t have the space or the time to routinely include a lengthy set of complex theological questions. And many respondents may not be conversant enough with the theological terminology used in these questions to be able to provide quick and valid answers.
OK, but there is no question that evangelical is a church-history term. In my interview with Graham, the world’s best-known evangelical stressed that this term has to be defined in doctrinal terms or it turns into, well, a mere cultural or political adjective.
From a church-history point of view, what is the most common set of “evangelical” doctrinal stances?
I continue to believe that the work of British historian D. W. Bebbington remains crucial. This leads us, with Graham, to the “Bebbington Quadrilateral.” Here is one summary:
* Biblicism: All essential spiritual truth can be found on its pages.
* Conversionism: The belief that human beings need to be converted.
* Crucicentrism: A focus on the atoning work of Jesus on the cross.
* Activism: The belief that the Gospel needs to be expressed in effort.
Can pollsters work with that, in a political world?
Back to Gallup. Read it all.