In a recent op-ed in the New York Times titled "The Evangelical Rejection of Reason," my colleague Randall Stephens and I argued that most of the GOP candidates, reflecting widespread evangelical sensibilities, were effectively rejecting secular knowledge. The argument was essentially an abstract of our new book, "The Anointed: Evangelical Truth in a Secular Age."
The response from leading evangelicals has been very encouraging. It appears that there is widespread concern about rampant anti-intellectualism and many important leaders added their voices to ours. Evangelicals from the fundamentalist end of the spectrum, however, are upset. After all we did suggest that they embraced "simplistic theology, cultural isolationism, and stubborn anti-intellectualism." Their response has been to accuse us of capitulating to secularism and forfeiting any claim to being genuine Christians. Al Mohler was especially critical in his piece "Total Capitulation: The Evangelical Surrender of Truth." In particular he excoriated me a second time for my earlier claim that "I am happy to concede that science does indeed trump religious truth about the natural world."
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