Why Neo-Calvinists Are Like Feminists

Damon Linker comments on the folly of ideological purity in a democracy:

In a democracy, successful political movements go broad. They are ecumenical, seeking to bring as many people as possible into an inclusive coalition, because that’s how elections are won and mandates are forged, and because they understand that politics involves compromise and building bridges of partial agreement and commonality with those who disagree on some important issues but not on others. (Pro-life feminists tell Green that they’ve been inspired to attend the march by “cultural misogyny, the state of education and health care, and a desire for their own daughters to be able to lead.”)

Sects (whether political or religious) have different priorities — like upholding ideological purity, enforcing conformity to official doctrine, policing the boundaries of acceptable opinion, and excommunicating those who fail to toe the party line. They prefer losing to compromising their principles.

So why do neo-Calvinist treat 2kers like they are not Reformed? Remember Lutheran?

And since when is neo-Calvinism the way to approach society and politics? If you think you have the “real” w-w, the one that is True Truth, the one that is orthodoxy in the church, how exactly does that build a political consensus? At least Abraham Kuyper didn’t approach church life or politics that way.

5 thoughts on “Why Neo-Calvinists Are Like Feminists

  1. And why do 2kers return the favor to NeoCalvinists?

    BTW, ideological purity is democracy’s auto-immune disease. For democracy is about sharing and inclusion in terms of power while ideological purity is about taking and exclusion from power

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  2. Curt, no 2ker is saying Abraham Kuyper is not Reformed. Are you for real?

    What we do say is that Kuyper is different from Calvin. And so are we.

    We also say, Kuyper and Calvin and Machen didn’t set the standard. We all need to figure it out in our time.

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  3. You mean Schaeffer’s “A Christian Manifesto” isn’t necessarily a mandatory manifesto? That’s comfortably deflating.

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