Since the Christian right has become institutionalized in D.C. and within the Republican Party, and particularly since the 2004 election, there has been no shortage of books seeking to expose the movement for what it is: a gross distortion of the gospel.  I used to read all of them.  But now there are so many, I have to be more judicious in my choices.  I did not pick up this book; my sister bought it and I read it in one sitting.  I had never seen the book before, nor heard of its author.  Wakefield has apparently done some religious writing, including a "spiritual autobiography," in addition to his work as a journalist.

Wakefield's first chapter establishes his credibility not as an expert, but as a concerned follower of Jesus wondering how peace and justice got dropped from the message of Christianity:

Christianity in this country has become almost synonymous with right-wing fanaticism, conservative politics, and - courtesy of Mel Gibson - a brutally sadistic version of religious experience.  Millions of Christians like me are appalled by this distortion of our faith, which only three decades ago stood for peace, equality, healing, and compassion for society's outcasts - the issues that comprised the ministry of Jesus.

He goes on to tell the story of his UCC parish's minister getting some rough treatment from conservative church members outraged by her prophetic voice for fairness and justice.

Throughout the book, Wakefield weaves together narratives of interviews he conducted with various Christian leaders dismayed and disheartened by the association of Christianity with conservative politics.  He gets solid insights from his sources, but in some cases he does not seem to make even the most obvious connections regarding how their work is relevant to the broader arena of religion in politics.  For example, he mentions John Buchanan, a pastor in Chicago, without even mentioning that Buchanan is the editor and publisher of the flagship publication of liberal Protestantism, The Christian Century.

One thing Wakefield does particularly well is show how the growth of the Christian right as a political movement was fueled almost entirely by Republican Party operatives and the conservative political machine.  He offers a damning critique of the thinly-veiled war being waged against mainline Protestantism by the Washington, D.C.-based Institute on Religion & Democracy.  Wakefield also describes several religious leaders (including Robert Wenz on the right and Jim Wallis on the left) who seem to, in my view, possess deep religious convictions but display a level of political naivete that makes them particularly susceptible to being snookered by the ascendant Christian right.

My greatest disappointment in the book concerned not the author's treatment of politics, but rather his unfortunate foray into theology.  After 147 pages of denouncing conservative politics, Wakefield ends his penultimate chapter by essentially slamming liberal theology.  The implication is that while the Christian right is wrong in distorting the authentic gospel into divine sanction for right-wing policies, the Protestant liberals are wrong for abandoning classical, orthodox theology.  

After giving a very unfavorable review of the theology of (recently deceased) megachurch pastor D. James Kennedy of Ft. Lauderdale, Wakefield approvingly cites Kennedy's disdain for liberal theology:

Rev. James Kennedy analyzes the downfall of the mainline churches as "those that have, by and large, become liberal [in their theology], while seminarians (sic) turn out ministers who do not believe in the Bible - the kinds of ministers . . . who don't believe Jesus said three-fourths of what is attributed to him and now reveal that they don't believe that He rose from the dead."

Rev. Kennedy's case against liberal theology strikes at the cause of the weakness of Christian belief in mainline Protestant and even some current Catholic theology.

Wakefield subsequently equates the (admittedly questionable) findings and methods of the Jesus Seminar with the whole of liberal theology and most mainline clergy.  Trotting out that tired old phrase from H. Richard Niebhur, Wakefield laments that:

Nevertheless, that is the "liberal theology" (as opposed to "liberal politics") that has influenced most mainline ministers.  Many of them take the work of the Jesus Seminar as - well, it's hard to resist saying - they "take it as gospel."  This leads to the problem H. Richard Niebhur (the brother of Reinhold and a noted theologian in his own right) was talking about when he mockingly defined liberal religion as "A God without wrath brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgment through the ministration of a Christ without a Cross."

For those whose interest in the health and vitality of mainline Protestantism is concerned not only with making sure its politics are consistent with the gospel, but also that its theology withstand even the most basic intellectual scrutiny, you will be disappointed that Wakefield invests great energy debunking the Christian right, only to punctuate his critique with a brief, rather unthoughtful polemic against liberal theology.

Wakefield's final chapter includes many pages of approving quotations from Jim Wallis and Michael Learner.  Readers will have to decide for themselves whether they resonate with the perspective on a new "religious left" that Wallis and Lerner promote.

For those looking for an introduction to the Christian right, this book is probably as good as the several dozen that are out there.  The narrative style makes for easy and interesting reading.  Readers who have in-depth knowledge of the Christian right will find that the book contains an alarmingly high number of editorial mistakes.  I assume this appeared in hardcover; I read the paperback edition and my errata list included 10 items that really should have been caught, such as the spelling of notable names such as Tim LaHaye and Bill Hybels.  Other silly errors include confusing "seminiarians" and "seminaries" and referring to evangelicalism as "evangelism."

Overall, this book is an achievement not because it comes from an expert, but because it comes from a sincere layman who wonders what happened to the Jesus of his Christian faith over the past few decades.  If ordinary American Christians like Wakefield took the time to engage in the fight against the Christian right's hijacking of Jesus, that would do more to reinvigorate mainline Protestantism than copying the growth strategies of megachurches.  However, Wakefield might be surprised to find that many people outside the church today are as troubled by conservative theology as much as by the conservative politics of the Christian right.

Cross posted at Street Prophets and Daily Kos