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4. The Neo-Evangelical Movement and Billy Graham

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Who Is an Evangelical?
This chapter is in the book Who Is an Evangelical?
4The Neo-Evangelical Movement and Billy GrahamAfter the Scopes Trial, American evangelicalism in its contemporary form began to coalesce. Conser-vatives had largely failed in their efforts to bar modernists from major denominations and semi-naries, especially in the North. J. Gresham Machen left Prince-ton in 1929 to form Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia. In 1936, Machen also helped to found the Ortho-dox Presbyterian Church (OPC), a denominational alternative to the mainline Presbyterian Church in the USA (PCUSA). Not all evangelicals left mainline churches and seminaries, of course. For example, prominent Pittsburgh Theological Semi-nary professor John Gerstner stayed in the PCUSA from the 1950s through the 1980s, seeking to maintain evangelical influ-ence even as his denomination headed in a modernist direction. But in forming Westminster and the OPC, Machen illustrated one of the key habits of fundamentalists: separating from theo-logical modernists when they could not be defeated in the exist-ing denominations and seminaries. After the Scopes Trial,
© Yale University Press, New Haven

4The Neo-Evangelical Movement and Billy GrahamAfter the Scopes Trial, American evangelicalism in its contemporary form began to coalesce. Conser-vatives had largely failed in their efforts to bar modernists from major denominations and semi-naries, especially in the North. J. Gresham Machen left Prince-ton in 1929 to form Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia. In 1936, Machen also helped to found the Ortho-dox Presbyterian Church (OPC), a denominational alternative to the mainline Presbyterian Church in the USA (PCUSA). Not all evangelicals left mainline churches and seminaries, of course. For example, prominent Pittsburgh Theological Semi-nary professor John Gerstner stayed in the PCUSA from the 1950s through the 1980s, seeking to maintain evangelical influ-ence even as his denomination headed in a modernist direction. But in forming Westminster and the OPC, Machen illustrated one of the key habits of fundamentalists: separating from theo-logical modernists when they could not be defeated in the exist-ing denominations and seminaries. After the Scopes Trial,
© Yale University Press, New Haven

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter i
  2. Contents vii
  3. Introduction 1
  4. 1. The Rise of Evangelicals 8
  5. 2. Evangelicals Ascendant and the Coming of the Civil War 28
  6. 3. The “Fundamentalists” and Evangelical Controversy 51
  7. 4. The Neo-Evangelical Movement and Billy Graham 74
  8. 5. Two-Track Evangelicals and the New Christian Right 94
  9. 6. Evangelicalism from Reagan to Obama 121
  10. Coda. Donald Trump and the Crisis of Evangelicalism 144
  11. Notes 157
  12. Index 177
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https://doi.org/10.12987/9780300249040-005

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter i
  2. Contents vii
  3. Introduction 1
  4. 1. The Rise of Evangelicals 8
  5. 2. Evangelicals Ascendant and the Coming of the Civil War 28
  6. 3. The “Fundamentalists” and Evangelical Controversy 51
  7. 4. The Neo-Evangelical Movement and Billy Graham 74
  8. 5. Two-Track Evangelicals and the New Christian Right 94
  9. 6. Evangelicalism from Reagan to Obama 121
  10. Coda. Donald Trump and the Crisis of Evangelicalism 144
  11. Notes 157
  12. Index 177
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