The name "Christian" is often applied to groups who do not hold to the evangelical gospel. The influence of German rationalism in America's "mainline" denominations is represented here by leading liberal and neo-orthodox writers.
Despite their deficiencies, Bonhoeffer, Cullman, and Pannenberg have a few helpful insights. And it can be instructive to read biographical material on Greg Boyd and Clark Pinnock, to see what factors move orthodox writers to change their beliefs over time.
Karen Armstrong (b. 1945) - liberal member of the Jesus Seminar and frequent guest on secular TV specials on the Bible. An ex-Catholic and now "freelance monotheist," she denies that the Bible teaches any clear theology or relevant ethics, and that "even God's behavior occasionally leaves something to be desired." Titles: The Battle for God; The Future of God; A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam; Buddha; Holy War; In the Beginning: A New Interpretation of Genesis; Islam: A Short History; Jerusalem; Muhammad; Through the Narrow Gate; Visions of God. She was also a contributor to The Once and Future Faith.
William Barclay (1907-1978) - one of the few writers to bring neo-orthodoxy down to the lay level. A Glasgow professor whose universalism and disbelief in miracles are less controversial today than when he lived. His Daily Study Bible series remains one of the most popular lay commentaries, and his free translation of the New Testament is still in print. Other titles: Basic Christianity; Discovering Jesus; Introducing the Bible; The Life of Jesus.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945) - neo-orthodox existentialist, supporter of the ecumenical movement, and one of the few experts in both English and German theology. He taught at the University of Berlin. He is famous for calling upon Christians to oppose the rise of Hitler, but he was later arrested by the Nazis and hanged in a concentration camp.Widely remembered for his criticism of liberal Christianity as "cheap grace," he denied the historicity of the virgin birth and resurrection of Christ and embraced universalism. Titles: Christ the Center; The Cost of Discipleship; Creation and Fall; Ethics; Letters and Papers from Prison; Life Together; Psalms: The Prayer Book of the Bible; Spiritual Care.
Marcus Borg - liberal religion professor at Oregon State and fellow of the Jesus Seminar. A Lutheran by heritage and an admirer of Paul Tillich, Borg rejects the idea that Christianity is about belief in certain historical events or factual statements about the supernatural. He prefers to focus on the lenses through which we see reality, and the importance of seeing the truth in biblical stories even though they did not really happen. Titles: God at 2000 (Ed.); The God We Never Knew; The Heart of Christianity; Jesus: A New Vision; Jesus and Buddha; The Lost Gospel Q; The Meaning of Jesus: Two Visions (w/ N. T. Wright); Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time; Reading the Bible Again for the First Time.
Gregory Boyd (b. 1957) - liberal former professor at Bethel College, now senior pastor of Woodland Hills Church in St. Paul. A former Oneness Pentecostal, he became Baptist when he came to believe in the Trinity and was for a time a fairly orthodox evangelical. He has taken open theism beyond its usual boundaries to present God as in constant battle with Satan, sometimes winning and sometimes losing. Boyd's teachings have led to controversy within the Baptist General Conference, and censure from several other denominations. Titles: Cynic Sage or Son of God?; God at War; God of the Possible; Is God to Blame?; Letters from a Skeptic; Oneness Pentecostals and the Trinity; Repenting of Religion; Satan and the Problem of Evil; Seeing Is Believing.
Tony Campolo (b. 1935) - liberal American Baptist founder of the Evangelical Association for the Promotion of Education (EAPE) and former sociology chair at Eastern College. An entertaining and powerful speaker for social activism. Campolo is highly critical of fundamentalism and is an important member of the egalitarian organization Christians for Biblical Equality. He mixes elements of conservative theology with pantheism and other more liberal concepts. Titles: Adventures in Missing the Point (w/ Brian D. McLaren); Everything You Heard Is Wrong; Following Jesus Without Embarrasing God; Let Me Tell You a Story; Speaking My Mind; The Survival Guide for Christians; 20 Hot Potatoes Christians Are Afraid to Touch; Who Switched the Price Tags?.
John Dominic Crossan (b. 1930) - liberal professor from DePaul University and former co-chair of the Jesus Seminar. He also chairs the Historical Jesus section of the Society of Biblical Literature. Crossan believes Jesus' body was destroyed by dogs and that the apostles did not intend the doctrine of the resurrection to be taken literally. He tends to take a dramatic or allegorical approcah to the Bible. Titles: The Birth of Christianity; Excavating Jesus; The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant; In Parables; Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography; A Long Way from Tipperary; Who Killed Jesus?; Will the Real Jesus Please Stand Up? (w/ William Lane Craig).. The name Crossan rhymes with Dawson.
Oscar Cullmann (1902-1999) - Swiss biblical theologian who, according to the World Council of Churches, "always tried to place his New Testament scholarship at the service of the ecumenical movement." Although he worked from an essentially liberal view of Scripture, he was relatively conservative in his doctrine and dealt primarily with the meaning of the biblical text from the standpoint of "salvation history." In focusing on the historical basis for the Christian faith, he opposed the existentialism of Bultmann. He also helped develop the "already/not yet" distinction that has guided both conservative and liberal scholars in understanding the tension in Scripture between the present and future aspects of salvation. Titles: Christ and Time; The Christology of the New Testament; Early Christian Worship; The Early Church; The Johannine Circle; Peter: Disciple, Apostle, Martyr; Salvation in History; The State and the New Testament.
Jacques Ellul (1912-1994) - described himself as an advocate of "pacifist, antinationalist, anticapitalist, moral, and antidemocratic anarchism." A French scholar once dismissed from teaching for protesting the Nazi occupation. He was a social commentator critical of all human government, urbanization, technological advancement, and materialism. Liberals consider him biblically conservative, but he was doctrinally far from it. Titles: Anarchy and Christianity; The Meaning of the City; Money and Power; The Politics of God and the Politics of Man; The Presence of the Kingdom; Propaganda; Reason for Being; The Subversion of Christianity; The Technological Society.
Robert Funk (d. 2005) - Panentheist, former executive secretary for the Society of Biblical Literature, and founder of the Jesus Seminar. He is also (for what it's worth) one of the most credentialed biblical scholars in the world. Funk's vision of reformation for Christianity (located here) went beyond liberalism, denouncing the existence of a personal God, the possiblity of miracles or answered prayer, the deity, virgin birth, atoning death, and resurrection of Christ, all end-time prophecy, and virtually every other historic doctrine of Christianity. Titles: The Acts of Jesus: What Did Jesus Really Do?; A Credible Jesus; The Five Gospels: What Did Jesus Really Say?; The Gospel of Jesus According to the Jesus Seminar (Ed.); Honest to Jesus; New Gospel Parallels.
Gustavo Gutierez - Peruvian liberal; primary spokesman for liberation theology. He advocated revolutionary political involvement as the primary mission of the Christian church. Gutierez saw Christianity as teaching the liberation of the poor from suffering by opposing institutions that perpetuate social sins. His primary work is titled A Theology of Liberation.
Stanley Hauerwas - Methodist professor of theological ethics at Duke University, whose beliefs have more in common with Mennonites than with mainstream Protestants. With regard to ethics, he is a pacifist opposed to both capital punishment and abortion, and he often speaks against capitalism and American patriotism. Named "America's Best Theologian" by Time magazine in 2001, his actual theology appears to be the standard liberalism found in most mainline churches. Titles: After Christendom; Against the Nations; A Better Hope: Resources for a Church Confronting Capitalism, Democracy, and Postmodernity; A Community of Character; Dissent from the Homeland (Ed.); The Peaceable Kingdom; Performing the Faith: Bonhoeffer and the Practice of Nonviolence; The Politics of the Cross (w/ Craig Carter); Prayers Plainly Spoken; Resident Aliens; The Truth About God (w/ William Willimon); Unleashing the Scripture; With the Grain of the Universe; Why Narrative?: Readings in Narrative Theology.
Glenn Hinson - emeritus professor at Baptist Theological Seminary in Richmond, formerly of Southern Seminary in Louisville. Hinson's liberal teachings were a key point of controversy during the SBC's conservative resurgence. He drew notice by his statements that the Gospel accounts were "embellished" that Christ was not raised with a physical body, and that missions should be reconceived as a dialogue with other religions. Hinson resigned from Southern in protest in 1992 when David Dockery became the dean of theology. Titles: Are Southern Baptists Evangelicals?; The Early Church; Fire in My Bones; The Integrity of the Church; Love at the Heart of Things; Religious Liberty; Seekers After Mature Faith; A Serious Call to a Contemplative Lifestyle; Spirituality in Ecumenical Perspective (Ed.).
Joachim Jeremias (1900-1982) - neo-orthodox German Lutheran and world-famous New Testament scholar at the University of Gottingen. He opposed the Nazi regime during the 1930s and rooted his theology in the teachings of the historical Jesus. Though making considerable use of liberal methods of Bible interpretation, Jeremias helped popularize the already/not yet distinction for the kingdom of God, a view advocated among evangelicals by George Ladd. Titles: The Central Message of the New Testament; The Eucharistic Words of Jesus; Infant Baptism in the First Four Centuries; Jesus' Promise to the Nations; New Testament Theology; The Prayers of Jesus; The Problem of the Historical Jesus.
Ernst Käsemann (1906-1998) - neo-orthodox Tübingen professor inspired by Schlatter, Bultmann, and F.C. Baur. One of the founders of the "Second Quest for the historical Jesus" and specializing in the writings of Paul and John, he believed in the resurrection of Jesus but was skeptical of other Gospel material. Käsemann was ideologically revolutionary but was a poor political strategist, and so he was frequently involved in conflict. He was one of several German theologians who denounced Naziism as idolatry. Titles: Essays on New Testament Themes; Jesus Means Freedom; New Testament Questions of Today; Perspectives on Paul; The Testament of Jesus; The Wandering People of God; and commentaries on Acts and Romans.
Bruce Larson (b. 1925) - liberal psychologist, ordained Presbyterian minister, and executive director of Faith at Work (1963-1975). Larson approaches psychology from a psychoanalytic perspective, emphasizing self-discovery and practical experience over doctrine and ethics. He is a universalist, teaching that God's love and salvation are for everyone unconditionally, and that biblical "commandments" lead to fulfillment but have no bearing on a relationship with God. Titles: Ask Me to Dance; Dare to Live Now; Health Is More than Not Being Sick; Living Beyond Our Friends; Living on the Growing Edge; The Passionate People: Carriers of the Spirit (w/ J. Keith Miller); Setting Men Free; What God Wants to Know; Wind and Fire: Living Out the Book of Acts. Not to be confused with charismatic Bob Larson.
Bill Leonard - fomer Southern Seminary history professor, now dean of Wake Forest University, and leader in the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. One of the most liberal former Southern Baptists, Leonard is pushing for acceptance of homosexuals in church life and teaches that Christianity must move beyond the Bible if it wishes to survive in a changing society, and that religious issues are not matters of right and wrong, but of equally valuable alternatives. Titles: Baptist Ways: A History (w/ Edwin S. Gaustad); Christianity in Appalachia (Ed.); Dictionary of Baptists in America (Ed.); Early American Christianity; God's Last and Only Hope; The Nature of the Church; Risk the Journey; Word of God Across the Ages.
Molly Marshall (b. 1949) - liberal former dean of theology at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, now teaching at Central Baptist. Once mildly inclusivistic, she is now a universalist who believes most evangelical doctrines are either naive or barbaric. She is especially adamant concerning the concept of substitutionary atonement, which she has said amounts to divine "child abuse." Marshall criticized conservative Baptists' attachment to inerrancy in Beyond the Impasse? (a compilation work by conservative and liberal Baptists). Other titles: Joining the Dance: A Theology of the Spirit; No Salvation Outside the Church?: A Critical Inquiry; What It Means to Be Human.
J. Keith Miller (b. 1927) - liberal Episcopal director of spiritual growth conferences, whose writings popularized the idea of Christianity as "a relationship, not a religion." With degrees in business administration, theology, and psychological counseling, his methods influenced the way both conservatives and liberals describe their faith. Titles: Compelled to Control; Facing Codependence; Facing Love Addiction; A Hunger for Healing; The Passionate People: Carriers of the Spirit (w/ Bruce Larson); The Secret Life of the Soul; The Taste of New Wine.
Jurgen Moltmann (b. 1926) - liberal professor at Tübingen and leading proponent of the "theology of hope"–that God's promise to act in the future is more important than anything God might have done in the past. Moltmann insisted that the duty of the Christian is to aid the coming of a better world. Titles: The Coming of God: Eschatology; The Experience of God; God in Creation; Hope and Planning; On Human Dignity; The Spirit of Life; Theology of Hope. Not to be confused with existentialist Rudolf Bultmann.
Bill Moyers (b. 1934) - former Baptist pastor, now popular journalist for PBS. Politically and theologically liberal, his specials deal primarily with the issue of truth in politics, religion, and the broadcast media. His Genesis: A Living Conversation presents Genesis as a book of folklore that gives fascinating insights into the ancient human condition. Other titles: Doing Democracy; Faith Works; Fooling with Words; Healing of the Mind; The Language of Life; Moyers on America; The Power of Myth (w/ Joseph Campbell); Talking About Genesis; A World of Ideas. Not to be confused with Christian fiction author Bill Myers.
Elizabeth O'Connor (d. 1998) - liberal co-founder and pastor of the non-denominational Church of the Savior, and pioneer in church fellowship and urban ministry. She wrote groundbreaking books on spiritual gifts, based on her "theology of creativity." O'Connor combined self-discovery and a positive view of human nature with a commitment to servanthood. She has more recently become one of the most outspoken supporters of homosexuality within the church. Titles: Call to Commitment; Cry Pain, Cry Hope; The Eighth Day of Creation; For Lesbian Parents (w/ Suzanne Johnson); The Gay Baby Boom (w/ Suzanne Johnson); How to Find Your Gift; Journey Inward, Journey Outward; Letters to Scattered Pilgrims; The New Community; No One to Care; Our Many Selves; Search for Silence.
Elaine Pagels - Gnostic professor at Princeton University who helped translate the Nag Hammadi library. Prominent in the Jesus Seminar and a familiar face on PBS's religious documentaries. She proposes that Christianity was originally intended as a Gnostic or mystery religion, that its stories are based on pagan mythology, and that Mary Magdalene was Jesus' wife, which Pagels says the church covered up as part of its historic oppression of women. Titles: Adam, Eve, and the Serpent; Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of Thomas; The Gnostic Gospels: A New Account of the Origins of Christianity; The Gnostic Paul; The Johannine Gospel in Gnostic Exegesis; The New Book of Gnostic Gospels; The Origin of Satan. She was also a major contributor to Insights from the Secret Teaching of Jesus.
Wolfhart Pannenberg (b. 1928) - German philosophical theologian, conservative by German standards in that he believes in Christ's bodily resurrection and deity, but he is methodologically liberal and denies Christ's virgin birth. Pannenberg is a proponent of Moltmann's theology of hope, and has had a profound influence on moderate evangelicals in England and America. Titles: The Apostles' Creed in Light of Today's Questions; Eternity, Time, and the Trinitarian God; Jesus: God and Man; Metaphysics and the Idea of God; Revelation as History; Systematic Theology; Theology and the Kingdom of God; Theology and the Philosophy of Science.
Clark Pinnock (b. 1940) - liberal professor at McMaster Divinity College in Ontario. Originally a defender of Calvinism and inerrancy. Through the influence of I. Howard Marshall he became Arminian, and he eventually helped introduce open theism. He currently classifies himself as a "creative love theist," opposing the concepts of hell, substitutionary atonement, and exclusivism. Pinnock nevertheless classifies himself as an evangelical. Titles: Biblical Revelation; Flame of Love; The Grace of God and the Will of Man (Ed.); Grace Unlimited; Most Moved Mover; No Other Name: An Investigation into the Destiny of the Unevangelized (w/ John Sanders); The Openness of God (Ed.); Reason Enough; The Scripture Principle; Theological Crossfire (w/ Delwin Brown); Truth on Fire; Unbounded Love: A Good News Theology for the 20th Century; A Wideness in God's Mercy.
John A. T. Robinson (1919-1983) - English theologian at Trinity College in Cambridge, who popularized "death of God" theology. Rejecting all miracles, he saw the resurrection and return of Christ not as historical events but as an abiding presence. Unlike many liberals, he held to an early (pre-A.D. 70) date for the writing of the New Testament. Titles: Honest to God; Jesus and His Coming; Redating the New Testament Not to be confused with Baptist Greek scholar A. T. Robertson.
John Sanders (b. 1956) - liberal professor at Huntington College in Indiana, and head of the open theism movement. Sanders has a conservative mindset, but his straightforwardness and left-leaning positions make him appear more liberal than Pinnock. His view of salvation lies somewhere between inclusivism and pluralism. Sanders was nearly dismissed from the Evangelical Theological Society in 2003. His dismissal was unanimously recommended by the council, but the members' vote fell just short of the 2/3 majority needed to dismiss. Titles: The God Who Risks; No Other Name: An Investigation into the Destiny of the Unevangelized (w/ Clark Pinnock); The Openness of God (et al.); What About Those Who Have Never Heard?.
Robert Schuller (b. 1926) - liberal pastor at the Crystal Cathedral and host of The Hour of Power; affiliated with the Reformed Church of America. His possibility thinking shows influence from Norman Vincent Peale. Schuller believes people don't need to be told they're sinners; they simply need to discover hope. Schuller is currently working to build common ground with Muslims, with whom he says Christians share worship of the same God and equal reverence for Jesus. Titles: The Be Happy Attitudes; Believe in the God Who Believes in You; The Greatest Possibility Thinker that Ever Lived; If It's Going to Be, It's Up to Me; Living Powerfully One Day at a Time; Move Ahead with Possibility Thinking; My Journey; Power Thoughts: If You Can Dream It, You Can Do It; Self-Love; Tough Times Never Last but Tough People Do; Tough-Minded Faith for Tender-Hearted People; Turning Hurts into Halos.
Cecil Sherman - liberal, first executive head of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, now a key writer for Smyth & Helwys Publishing. Sherman's famous 1985 Donahue appearance with conservative Paul Pressler laid out clearly the theological differences between conservative and liberal Baptists. Sherman openly proclaims evolution and inclusivism, believing that all basically good people go to heaven. He remains one of the most bitter opponents of the SBC's conservative resurgence. Titles: A Kingdom of Surprises; Modern Myths. Not to be confused with fellow liberal Baptist Walter Shurden.
Walter "Buddy" Shurden (b. 1937) - liberal executive director of the Center for Baptist Studies at Mercer University. Shurden was the most extreme figure opposing the SBC's conservative resurgence and is vehemently opposed to inerrancy and exclusivism. Titles: Associationalism Among Baptists in America, 1707-1814; The Baptist Identity: Four Fragile Freedoms; The Church; Encounters with the Living Christ; The Godmakers: The Legacy of the Southern Baptist Convention; Going for the Jugular: A Documenatry History of the SBC Holy War; The Life of Baptists in the Life of the World; Not a Silent People; The Priesthood of All Believers (Ed.); Proclaiming the Baptist Vision; The Struggle for the Soul of the SBC. Not to be confused with fellow liberal Baptist Cecil Sherman.
John Shelby Spong (b. 1931) - openly atheistic Anglican bishop of Newark. His mission is to move Christianity away from its ties to God and the Bible so it can survive in today's society. Titles: Beyond Moralism; Born of a Woman; God in Us: A Case for Christian Humanism; Here I Stand; Into the Whirlwind; Liberating the Gospels: Freeing Jesus from 2,000 Years of Misunderstanding; Living in Sin?: A Bishop Rethinks Human Sexuality; A New Christianity for a New World; Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism; Resurrection: Myth or Reality?; The Sins of Scripture: Exposing the Bible's Texts of Hate to Reveal the God of Love; Why Christianity Must Change or Die.
Gardner C. Taylor - one of the most important contemporary black preachers, and former friend and advisor to Martin Luther King, Jr. Liberal in theology but powerful in the pulpit, he has been lauded by The Christian Century and Baylor University. His denominational connections are with the Baptist Church of Christ and the Progessive National Baptist Convention. His sermons have been collected in a three-volume series.
Amos Yong (b. ca. 1965) - charismatic professor at Bethel College, and major writer for the World Council of Churches. An extreme pluralist, he believes the Holy Spirit saves people even through atheistic religions and philosophies, and does so apart from the work of Christ. He has criticized Christian interfaith efforts for keeping Christ at the center of their understanding of salvation, and is particularly critical of missionaries who try to convert people other religions to Christianity. Titles: Beyond the Impasse; Discerning the Spirits; Does the Wind Blow Through the Middle Way?: Pneumatology and Christian-Buddhist Dialogue; Spirit-Word-Community. He was also a major contributor to Toward a Pneumatological Theology.See also the section on Catholics and other non-evangelicals. Depending on how tightly one draws the boundaries of evangelicalism, Word of Faith teachers and moderates may also fall outside those boundaries. There may be other authors in this database who hold non-evangelical views on particular issues.
For a statement of my beliefs, see my Declaration of Faith.
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