Glenn Beck, Social Justice, and the Limits of Public Discourse – Al Mohler has written an extremely helpful and clarifying article about Glenn Beck’s now infamous call to leave churches that deal in social justice.
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As usual, a very good job by Mohler cutting through the clutter to clearly discuss the issue. Those who tried to paint Beck as “anti-justice” because of his words were being as silly and un-careful as Beck is accused of being.
Though I agree that Beck’s points were much more political than theological, they were also linked beyond contemporary events to political issues stemming back to the same period as the social gospel movement. Beck is a serious student of the Progressive movement (which happened in the late 19th/early 20th century, same time as the upswing of the social gospel). This movement still forms the basis of most of our current political thought, Republican or Democrat. Beck has been a critic of those political ideas for some time now. Those who ignore his thoughts on Woodrow Wilson, Teddy Roosevelt, Hegel, and Herbert Croly do so to their own loss. So while I don’t think he’ll maintain a discussion of the religious angle, don’t count on him quitting critiquing the political any time soon.