In the last half of the twentieth century, neo-evangelicalism moved from an anticommunist nationalist consensus to a new internationalism characterized by concern for human rights, justice, and economic development. Case studies of World Vision, a global relief and development organization, and InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, a campus ministry, demonstrate that this trajectory was due in part to a growing global reflex in which many missionaries and third-world evangelicals “spoke back” to American evangelicalism. Interpreting the Bible for themselves—and increasingly for American evangelicals—substantial numbers of non-Western converts and missionaries offered sharp criticisms of American politics, culture, and capitalism. These critiques, sacralized by their origins on the mission field, helped turn some young evangelicals toward Vietnam protests, poverty relief, civil rights, and a tempered nationalism. By the 1970s, these progressive elements—and a more resolute global concern generally—had become important markers of the evangelical left.
References
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Barbara Benjamin Archilla. “Seminario Biblico Alianza—The Impossible Community.” Urban Mission,？1993, 50–59.
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Several of the few works to address the global dimensions of moderate and progressive evangelicalism are Earthen Vessels; David King. “Seeking a Global Vision: The Evolution of World Vision and American Evangelicalism.” Ph.D. dissertation, Emory University, 2012. Jay Case. An Unpredictable Gospel: American Evangelicals and World Christianity, 1812–1920. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012.
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