Manifesto Destiny

It is not worth speculating on the contents of the so-called "Evangelical Manifesto" that Os Guiness, Richard Mouw, Rick Warren, and other evangelical leaders will release later this week. Various accounts portray the document as either a call for evangelicals to withdraw from political engagement on behalf of conservative causes or an attempt to pull evangelicalism even farther left (and therefore away from orthodoxy) than it has drifted in recent months. Until the mysterious missive is made public, the fragmentary evidence of its argument will not support fair inferences.

However, the advance marketing of the Manifesto itself raises questions. Whether Guiness et al have intentionally created an aura of exclusion and secrecy or merely done so clumsily and unintentionally, they have created a distasteful impression. Like a self-appointed college of cardinals of the evangelical church, they meet in clandestine quarters choosing who will receive an invitation to join their deliberations. Apparently they expect evangelicals to wait with bated breath for the white smoke and the declaration, "Habemus Papum!"

If that was the intent, the effect on this evangelical has been the opposite. I am growing increasingly skeptical and will greet the document not with jubilation but with a critical eye.