I don't expect to read the New York Times for "faith news." Yes, the paper covers the world, which religion is a part of, but the Times rightly lets scores of church magazines and newsletters cover their own field. Therefore, I am surprised when the Times' op-ed pages take sides in ecclesiastical controversies.
And yet, ecclesiastical justice is exactly what Ross Douthat and David Brooks concern themselves with. Their decision to enter the fray of church controversy raises questions about the wisdom of using a powerful institution like the Times to alter affairs that have virtually no connection to the newspaper.
David Brooks' column on evangelicals, "The Dissenters Trying to Save Evangelicalism From Itself," tried to provide an objective analysis on current divisions among white evangelicals. He framed his inquiry around three topics: the "embrace" of Donald Trump, sexual abuse scandals in churches and the parachurch, and "attitudes about race relations." This was the hook for Brooks' assessment of more traditional evangelical leaders who have vigorously dissented from evangelicals who supported Trump.
Among those featured were Russell Moore, the former executive of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission; Thabiti Anyabwile, an African-American pastor in Washington, D.C.; Kristen Du Mez, a historian at Calvin University; and Tim Keller, a retired pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City. Their work, which corresponds with much of Brooks' viewpoint, includes efforts to overcome political tribalism through better education, church planting, campus ministry, less partisan teaching about society, racial justice, evangelism that is sensitive to a post-Christian age, and hands-on cultivation of Christian virtues.
Like Brooks, Ross Douthat uses his column to comment on controversies in the Roman Catholic Church. Yet Douthat isn't reluctant to provide contrast against the progressive side of the church and the Times' editors. After Pope Francis' visit to the United States in 2015, for instance, Douthat wrote a column in which he opined that the pope's ideas about divorce and remarriage was undermining the church.
This was not simply a lament about church politics from an acknowledged proponent of traditional marriage. Douthat also worried that further erosion of marital norms would destabilize families and society at large. Although he admitted that a pope's powers can be absolute, such authority doesn't allow for changing doctrine. He added, "custom, modesty, fear of God and fear of schism," were restraints that curbed any pope tempted to rewrite church teaching.
Although pushback to Brooks' column on white evangelicals has been confined to religious outlets, Douthat's 2015 column provoked a direct rebuke to the newspaper. Soon after the publication of Douthat's piece on Pope Francis, a group of theologians, priests, and scholars sent an open letter to the Times, signed by more than 30 people. The letter questioned the legitimacy of a lay Roman Catholic criticizing the pope or trying his inexperienced hand at theology. It also reminded the editors that throwing around accusations of heresy had serious consequences. Finally, it expressed disappointment, saying, "This is not what we expect of The New York Times."
Writing about churches is fair game for anyone reporting or commenting on society. But, as gatekeepers who write for an even bigger gatekeeper, columnists risk using their platform to influence debates among leaders who lack the means to take on opinions in a national publication. In Douthat's case, someone could argue that the Times' challenging the pope is an example of a high-status institution picking a fight with an institution its own size. Perhaps not in the history of the West, but in the current moment the Church and the Times' are in a high category of thought leaders, albeit operating in completely different spheres.
Brooks may not have known it, but he when he weighed in on evangelicalism, he was inserting the Times' considerable clout into a church controversy similar to the one that Douthat was addressing. Brooks, however, did not try to represent both sides. Nor did he acknowledge the disproportion between his newspaper's stature and the influence of the church implicated in his column. The denomination to which Keller belongs, the Presbyterian Church in America, has debated two constitutional amendments that would bar pastors who identify as gay Christians and are celibate, also known as Side B Christianity. As debates surrounding this issue have escalated, so has their rhetoric.
Some progressive pastors devoted to Keller's style of ministry and sympathetic to Side B Christians have branded conservatives as fundamentalists. Keller himself, now retired, has been on the sidelines of this chapter of the controversy even as he has tried to adopt a moderate position. But his stature within the PCA over the last thirty years and the coincident branding of the denomination as an urban-centric and "thought-leader" in communion within evangelicalism means the current controversy is part of a wider discontent with efforts to make Presbyterianism relevant to Red America. Brooks also went out of his way to praise David French, a member of the PCA and a columnist at The Dispatch, who has been uncharitable about the defects of his fellow evangelicals, even as he basks in the approval of writers like Brooks. French, for instance, mocked Al Mohler for endorsing Trump and then took the high road of following Jesus.
Meanwhile, Brooks failed to mention that many PCA conservatives who likely voted for Trump are as opposed to racism as they are to sexual abuse. In 2016, conservatives also supported a resolution, which won by a vote of 8-to-1, that repented of and condemned the denomination's segregationist past. This is a history that Keller had to know when he received financial assistance to plant a congregation in New York City.
Brooks' naivete was evident from the very opening of his column. "Imagine if six of [your closest friends] suddenly took a political or public position you found utterly vile." "Vile" was hardly a considerate way to introduce the piece. Brooks proceeded to associate voting for Trump with sexual scandals and questions about Black Lives Matter. Certain Trump voters have acted impulsively at times, but did Brooks mean to imply that Christian Trumpists also defend sexual abuse and all police shootings? Ironically, Brooks' snark will likely damage the very proposals that his friend, Keller, thinks may heal evangelicalism. Why will conservatives in the PCA listen to Keller when he allows Brooks' judgment to go unchallenged?
Brooks' and Douthat's personal faith lives create their most notable difference. The former separates the evangelical wheat from the chaff with the august, official approval of the Times, whereas Douthat writes as a member of the church. When Douthat wrote about parish closings in Hartford, he did not hide his anger. The bishops, he conceded, were in a difficult position but they "had no clear idea what they're doing." Douthat also ended his column by identifying with the ministry of his bishops: "Whatever world-changing power we might seek, whatever influence we might hope to wield, starts with the ancient prayer: Lord, I believe; help my unbelief."
In a country that celebrates freedom of the press, columnists have every right to write about churches. Still, they need to be aware of their influence, especially when they write as outsiders. People in the pew and ministers in assemblies are no match for their ecclesiastical rivals who can point to an endorsement from a column in the Times. After all, it is the rare church that can carry on as if the Times' disapproval does not matter. For those communions that seek a measure of respectability, following the teachings of ancient texts is hard enough without having to worry about the opinions of the nation's paper of record.
D. G. Hart teaches history at Hillsdale College.