The New Evangelical Social Engagement - Hardcover

[T]he essays...succeed in presenting new and surprising images of evangelicals' engagement with the public sphere. As evangelicals continue their foray into new territories of engagement, their assumptions, convictions, and styles will profoundly shape the terrain they encounter. This book will ignite the curiosity of any social scientist interested in the evolving relationship between evangelical Christianity and civic life. (Amy Jonason, Sociology of Religion)

The strengths of this book are many. It offers an important corrective to the widely held view of evangelical activism that is predominately political and right-wing....All the substantive chapters are strong contributions. They cover a broad range of topics, are informative, and show excellent depth of analysis. The book is well written and coherent....I recommend this book highly. It is necessary reading for those interested in American religion. I thank the authors for this important contribution. (Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion)

Well written and compellingly argued...the book's composite portrayal of the new evangelical social engagement is full-bodied and complex...The New Evangelical Social Engagement provides an excellent introduction to its subject...Not only does the book enrich the study of American evangelicalism, it also enriches the broader study of American religion in civil society. (Review of Religious Research)

A collection of outstanding essays on Christian evangelicalism's turn to social action...The essays address issues of globalization, diversity, and gender and their concomitant complexity, and succeed admirably as a needed corrective to public misperceptions. Summing up: Recommended. (CHOICE)

The standard academic view of American evangelicalism is growing more dated by the year. Many new movements and subcultural shifts are underway in evangelicalism that open up possibilities for major changes in the future. Steensland and Goff offer one of the best windows into these important changes among evangelicals. This is a must-read for any student of American religion, culture, politics, and civil society. (Christian Smith, author of Souls in Transition: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of Emerging Adults)

Evangelicals are increasingly turning their attention toward issues such as the environment, international human rights, economic development, racial reconciliation, and urban renewal. This marks an expansion of the social agenda advanced by the Religious Right over the past few decades. For outsiders to evangelical culture, this trend complicates simplistic stereotypes. For insiders, it brings contention over what "true" evangelicalism means today. The New Evangelical Social Engagement brings together an impressive interdisciplinary team of scholars to map this new religious terrain and spell out its significance.

The volume's introduction describes the broad outlines of this "new evangelicalism." The editors identify its key elements, trace its historical lineage, account for the recent changes taking place within evangelicalism, and highlight the implications of these changes for politics, civic engagement, and American religion. Part One of the book discusses important groups and trends: emerging evangelicals, the New Monastics, an emphasis on social justice, Catholic influences, gender dynamics and the desire to rehabilitate the evangelical identity, and evangelical attitudes toward the new social agenda. Part Two focuses on specific issues: the environment, racial reconciliation, abortion, international human rights, and global poverty. Part Three contains reflections on the new evangelical social engagement by three leading scholars in the fields of American religious history, sociology of religion, and Christian ethics.