The Cross and the Flag

American nationalism -- is it synonymous with evangelical Protestantism? Do Christians carry a cross in one hand and wave a flag with the other? The following chapters by young Christian scholars respond to this all-too-frequent identification of evangelicalism with the interests, values, and policies of Americanism. "Some of today's most sensitive issues are discussed -- militarism, disarmament, revolution, war, the Israel-Arab tinder-box, ecology, poverty, racism, the radical right, the radical left, and Women's Liberation. "Committed to a high view of Scripture, these critical lovers and loving critics of evangelicalism attempt to be Biblical -- socially, economically and politically as well as theologically. They have no hesitancy in attacking a number of sacred cows; they have no hesitancy, either, in advocating positions which their fellow-believers call leftist. Their approach, however, while occasionally sharp and necessarily negative, is objective, dispassionate and peaceful. "We are reminded in this courageous book that the political problems inevitably become moral problems, and on moral problems the Bible speaks in a loud voice. The writers plead for some serious thinking and rethinking instead of a closed-minded patriotism which proudly renders to Caesar the things which are God's. -- Vernon Grounds Conservative Baptist Theological Seminary

RICHARD V. PIERARD is Professor Emeritus of History, Indiana State University, Stephen Phillips Professor of History, Gordon College, and Adjunct Professor, Liverpool Hope University (U.K.). He was a Fulbright Professor at the Universities of Frankfurt/Main and Halle-Wittenberg in Germany and a Visiting Professor at the University of Otago, New Zealand.