On morality, evangelicals get religion
Pastor David Floyd, appalled that a president of the United States had had the soul-destroying gall to embark on a sexual relationship with a woman less than half his age, told his Alabama flock in 1998 that Bill Clinton had crossed the line and had to go.
But as new allegations of sexual advances by Senate candidate Roy Moore on women less than half his age have peppered Alabama voters nearly daily this autumn, Floyd is telling his congregation that Moore is “an upright man” who should be forgiven for his sins and elected to office.
Floyd, who for 34 years has been the pastor at Mervyn Parkway Baptist Church in Opelika, Ala., says his evangelical theology has not changed in the past two decades. It’s just that he knows Moore to be a more moral man than Clinton was.
“All of us have sinned and need a savior,” Floyd said. “Of course, moral character is still important. But with Bill Clinton or Harvey Weinstein or Bill Cosby, we’re talking about something completely different. You have to look at the totality of the man. That’s why I support Judge Moore. I’ve prayed with him. I know his heart.”
Alabama’s pastors are struggling to make sense of the allegations by at least nine women that Moore, the Republican candidate in a special election next month, made advances on teenage girls when he was an adult in his 30s.
Some ministers have concluded that the accusations against Moore, who has based his political career on a decades-long crusade to bring faith back into the public square, disqualify him for public office. But many others have stood by a man they consider a champion of their effort to restore traditional values in a country that has embraced abortion, same-sex marriage and childbearing outside of wedlock.
“When we vote in elections, we should vote for those who hold positions close to ours,” Floyd wrote in a Facebook post to his followers last week. “It is our desire to see sinners saved.”
What’s happening in the churches of Alabama — a state where half the residents consider themselves evangelical Christians, double the national average, according to a Pew Research study — is nothing less than a battle for the meaning of evangelism, some church leaders say. It is a titanic struggle between those who believe there must be one clear, unalterable moral standard and those who argue that to win thewar for the nation’s soul, Christians must accept morally flawed leaders.
Evangelicals are not alone in shifting their view of the role moral character should play in choosing political leaders. Between 2011 and last year, the percentage of Americans who say that politicians who commit immoral acts in their private lives can still behave ethically in public office jumped from 44 percent to 61 percent, according to a Public Religion Research Institute/Brookings poll. During the same period, the shift among evangelicals was even more dramatic, moving from 30 percent to 72 percent, the survey found.
“What you’re seeing here is rank hypocrisy,” said John Fea, an evangelical Christian who teaches history at Messiah College in Mechanicsburg, Pa. “These are evangelicals who have decided that the way to win the culture is now uncoupled from character.
“With Donald Trump, the playbook faced its greatest test because hewas not a man of character that evangelicals could embrace, but many did anyway. In the Roy Moore situation, very much like Trump’s ‘Access Hollywood’ situation, they’ve decided that the need to keep the Senate justifies embracing someone whose behavior they would universally condemn,” Fea said. “I wish I could tell you there was some interesting theological distinction here, but it’s all just politics. It is a form of moral relativism.”
No, the decision to stick with Moore is not just a power play — rather, it’s an evolving view of human nature, said Robert Jeffress, pastor of the 12,000-member Dallas First Baptist Church and perhaps the most prominent evangelical supporter of President Donald Trump.
“For evangelical Christians, morality doesn’t change,” Jeffress said. “But over the last 40 years, Americans have become more aware of the flaws of individuals. Remember how shocked Christians like Billy Graham were when they heard Nixon’s tapes — his foul language, his racist remarks. We’re more aware nowbecause of media scrutiny that our leaders are flawed and morality cannot be the only measure.”
Jeffress argued that Christians have come to see that “leadership, experience, morality and faith are all important” in choosing a candidate “and the rank of those changes according to circumstances.”
In supporting Trump, Jeffress decided that although the president “may not be a perfect Christian, he is a good leader.” About 80 percent of white evangelicals voted for Trump last year, exit polls showed.
In Moore’s case, Jeffress said that if the allegations against him are true, “that’s disqualifying from holding public office,” yet the pastor said he understands why many Christians in Alabama are standing with their candidate.
“We should judge everyone by the same standards, but we do revert to our tribes,” he said. “That is a natural default position.”
As he fights to save his candidacy, Moore has sought to demonstrate that his religious base is sticking with him.
His campaign last week published a list of more than 50 Alabama pastors who still support him. Several ministers on the list have said that they were not asked for permission to use their names, but many confirmed that they still back Moore.
By contrast, more than50 progressive Alabama pastors on Friday signed a public letter stating Moore isn’t fit to serve in the U.S. Senate. The letter continued to collect signatures Saturday.
The letter says Moore demonstrated “extremist values” incompatible with traditional Christianity even before the recent allegations of sexual misconduct involving young women.
The change in how some Christians judge politicians has been underway for a long time, Jeffress said, leading some evangelicals to overlook private behavior and past deviations from a socially conservative world view.
“A watershed moment was 1980,” he said. “Evangelical Christians chose between a born-again Baptist Sunday school teacher and a twice-married Hollywood actor who had signed the most liberal abortion bill and whose wife practiced astrology. And evangelicals chose Ronald Reagan over Jimmy Carter.”