by | Jul 9, 2024 | Uncategorized
Lewi Pethrus founded the Christian Democrats, started a still-in-print newspaper, and preached his countercultural values to whomever would listen, explains historian Joel Halldorf.
Joel Halldorf is a fourth-generation Swedish Pentecostal, so it was natural for him when he became a historian of evangelical religion and politics to take a strong interest in the most famous figure in his tradition: Lewi Pethrus.
Born in 1884, Pethrus was a tireless, creative leader of a relatively small religious group that received little notice at the time. After guiding the Swedish Pentecostal movement, Pethrus helped shape Swedish society by entering politics—something Pentecostals did not do back in the 1940s. Along the way, he founded a Christian newspaper and spoke out against secularism.
“If the church should learn one thing from Pethrus,” said Halldorf, “it is that there is no need to fear the loss of power, the loss of status, and marginalization. Because when you’re on the margin, you can do a lot of creative things as a church.”
Halldorf, author of Pentecostal Politics in a Secular World, spoke with CT about Pethrus’s lasting influence on his country, the impact of secularism on Swedish society, and the different political priorities of Swedish and US evangelicals.
Why was Lewi Pethrus such an important figure in Sweden?
When some people want to understand themselves, they go to a therapist. As a historian, I go to the past. Lewi Pethrus was a leading architect of the movement that shaped me, my family, and my friends.
He was a charismatic figure and public speaker, so the gifts of the Holy Spirit, including reports of healings and speaking in tongues, were an important part of his ministry. Not only did Pethrus establish contacts and friendships all over the Swedish Pentecostal movement, he also created institutions that became pillars of the Pentecostal movement such as …
Continue reading…
by | Jul 9, 2024 | Uncategorized
How the early church’s example of public witness helps us avoid the extremes of triumphalism and retreat.
Early on in my reading and study of early Christianity, I was struck by an assertion from an unnamed author writing to a man named Diognetus in the second century. This author, in his Epistle to Diognetus, declared that “what the soul is to the body, Christians are to the world.”
The author was getting at a paradox resting at the heart of our faith: Christians dwell in the world, yet in the beliefs they confess and the virtues they seek to model, they also transcend the things of this world. While Christ and the apostles taught this same principle, the Epistle’s analogy of the soul to the body is compelling. Though existing in a mortal body, Christians are bound for immortality. As the soul holds the body together, they are meant to hold the world together. Their task is to live in a way that makes the world better because of their presence.
Stephen O. Presley, a scholar of early Christianity, articulates this vision wonderfully in Cultural Sanctification: Engaging the World like the Early Church. The book unpacks how early Christians viewed their place in a world that increasingly looks and feels like our own.
In a secular age, the postures and wisdom of early Christian voices can help us reclaim a vision for how to dwell within a society that has no room for religious exclusivity and little desire for transcendent moral reasoning. By exploring and connecting prominent themes of early Christian public witness, Presley channels the analogy presented to Diognetus and amplifies it through the voices of early Christian thinkers.
Active dualism
Presley begins by reminding us that our world is not just suspicious of the church; Christianity is seen as the antagonist. “Christianity,” he writes, “is …
Continue reading…
by | Jul 9, 2024 | Uncategorized
The administration’s new stance against childhood surgeries is only a start. Jesus has grave warnings for those who cause little ones to stumble.
The Biden administration’s newly announced opposition to gender transition surgeries for minors is welcome. But Christians would be mistaken to let this news make us less vigilant on this issue.
The announcement only came after The New York Times reported late last month on efforts by the administration to “remove age limits for adolescent surgeries from guidelines for care of transgender minors.” And the White House clarified that the administration still supports “gender-affirming care for minors, which represents a continuum of care,” and respects “the role of parents, families, and doctors in these decisions.”
Youth gender medicine of all kinds also remains a live issue in state government and the judicial system. On June 24, the Supreme Court agreed to review a case challenging a Tennessee law that prohibits “gender-affirming care for transgender youths.” United States v. Skrmetti addresses whether the state ban violates the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment.
Tennessee’s law currently differentiates the rights of a minor for treatment of a “congenital defect, precocious puberty, disease, or physical injury” from treatments rendered for “gender dysphoria, gender identity disorder, gender incongruence, or any mental condition, disorder, disability, or abnormality.” Even so, medical groups like the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and the American Medical Association (AMA) oppose such laws based on the claims that such medical procedures have reduced suicide attempts and decreased rates of depression and anxiety among minors who identify as transgender.
The neglected question is whether that’s true. What has been overlooked …
Continue reading…
by | Jul 8, 2024 | Uncategorized
Though they make up only 1 percent of the population, these believers want their presence to be meaningful.
Like the rest of the country, French evangelicals went to the polls on Sunday for the second round of parliamentary elections in what became a showdown between the far right and the rest of the country. The Nouveau Front Populaire (New Popular Front), a fragile new coalition of leftist parties, formed a “Republican front” with the centrist parties allied with President Emmanuel Macron. While this strategy successfully kept Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National (National Rally) in third, neither the leftist nor centrist parties won an outright majority in the National Assembly, a situation which may result in numerous political stalemates in the months to come.
French evangelicals represented only a tiny number of Sunday’s voter turnout; about 60 percent of all voters in the country of nearly 68 million showed up, the largest turnout since 1981. At 745,000, the number of evangelicals has grown by nearly 100,000 in recent years but remains squarely on the margins.
Despite their community’s size, French evangelical leaders have regularly engaged the challenges affecting their country, such as weighing in on concerns over Islam and free speech, speaking out about a bill trying to end Muslim separatism that could make churches collateral damage, and articulating their pro-life values after the country enshrined abortion into the constitution.
Prior to the June 30 first-round election that preceded yesterday’s runoff, the Conseil National des Evangéliques de France (CNEF, National Council of Evangelicals in France) called on believers to pray, to be discerning, and to vote.
“Politics cannot do everything,” the press release stated, noting that in such troubled times evangelicals …
Continue reading…
by | Jul 8, 2024 | Uncategorized
Though evangelicals make up only 1 percent of the population, they want their presence to be meaningful.
Like the rest of the country, French evangelicals went to the polls on Sunday for the second round of parliamentary elections in what became a showdown between the far right and the rest of the country. The Nouveau Front Populaire (New Popular Front), a fragile new coalition of leftist parties, formed a “Republican front” with the centrist parties allied with President Emmanuel Macron. While this strategy successfully kept Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National (National Rally) in third, neither the leftist nor centrist parties won an outright majority in the National Assembly, a situation which may result in numerous political stalemates in the months to come.
French evangelicals represented only a tiny number of Sunday’s voter turnout; about 60 percent of all voters in the country of nearly 68 million showed up, the largest turnout since 1981. At 745,000, the number of evangelicals has grown by nearly 100,000 in recent years but remains squarely on the margins.
Despite their community’s size, French evangelical leaders have regularly engaged the challenges affecting their country, such as weighing in on concerns over Islam and free speech, speaking out about a bill trying to end Muslim separatism that could make churches collateral damage, and articulating their pro-life values after the country enshrined abortion into the constitution.
Prior to the June 30 first-round election that preceded yesterday’s runoff, the Conseil National des Evangéliques de France (CNEF, National Council of Evangelicals in France) called on believers to pray, to be discerning, and to vote.
“Politics cannot do everything,” the press release stated, noting that in such troubled times evangelicals …
Continue reading…
