Nearly 200 evangelical leaders slam Christianity Today for questioning their Christian witness

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In a letter to Timothy Dalrymple, the president of Christianity Today, nearly 200 evangelical faith leaders condemned both its editorial calling for the removal of President Donald Trump from office and its editor-in-chief, Mark Galli, for dismissing evangelicals who oppose his views on the matter as being “far right.”

On Sunday, the faith leaders said in the letter, which can be read in full below, that the editorial “offensively questioned the spiritual integrity and Christian witness of tens-of-millions of believers who take seriously their civic and moral obligations."

The signatories also decried Galli who they say “offensively dismissed” their point of view in comments he made in an interview with CNN Friday, where he said that evangelicals who are upset or outraged by his Christianity Today editorial do not read the magazine because they are “Christians on the far right, evangelicals on the far right, so they’re going to be as dismissive of the magazine as President Trump has shown to be.”

“We are, in fact, not ‘far-right’ evangelicals as characterized by the author," the letter states. "Rather, we are Bible-believing Christians and patriotic Americans who are simply grateful that our president has sought our advice as his administration has advanced policies that protect the unborn, promote religious freedom, reform our criminal justice system, contribute to strong working families through paid family leave, protect the freedom of conscience, prioritize parental rights, and ensure that our foreign policy aligns with our values while making our world safer, including through our support of the State of Israel.

It continues, "We are not theocrats and we recognize that our imperfect political system is a reflection of the fallen world within which we live, reliant upon the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, which is freely given to sinner and saint, alike.

“We are proud to be numbered among those in history who, like Jesus, have been pretentiously accused of having too much grace for tax collectors and sinners, and we take deeply our personal responsibility to render unto Caesar what is Caesar's — our public service."

They also denounced assertions Galli made in an essay published last year in the book Still Evangelical?, in which he derided the 76% of white self-identified evangelical voters who helped elect Trump in 2016. He described those individuals as "evangelicals [who] often haven’t finished college, and if they have jobs (and apparently most of them don’t), they are blue collar jobs or entry level work.” In the same piece, Galli referred to himself as belonging to a different group of evangelicals, the “elite” evangelicals.

The letter also assumes that Christianity Today will support a Democrat in the 2020 presidential election, and issues a challenge to publicly declare which Democrat they will support.

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Although Galli's opinion is that Trump must be removed from office, he stressed in an interview with The Washington Post Friday that he has supported some of the president's policy decisions, “including the judges he nominated and his support for anti-abortion policies.”

Galli, who will be retiring from his position at the magazine in January, added that despite the attention his editorial has received, he's keenly aware that it's not likely to change many people's opinions. “I don’t have any illusions that because of what I wrote or because it was under the masthead of Christianity Today that it’s going to change many minds. It’s not going to change many minds.”

He also pushed back against a belief held by many that the publication is tilting left, including the president who labeled Christianity Today as “far-left” and “progressive” in a series of tweets Friday in response to the editorial.

Support for the publication hasn't waned, he told the Post, which reported that the magazine has "received a surge in donations and new subscribers."

Galli argued in the Thursday editorial that Trump has to be removed from office because he violated the Constitution and is “profoundly immoral.”

“... The president of the United States attempted to use his political power to coerce a foreign leader to harass and discredit one of the president’s political opponents. That is not only a violation of the Constitution; more importantly, it is profoundly immoral,” Galli wrote in the piece published a day after Trump became the third president in U.S. history to be impeached by the House of Representatives.

He added, "To the many evangelicals who continue to support Mr. Trump in spite of his blackened moral record, we might say this: Remember who you are and whom you serve. Consider how your justification of Mr. Trump influences your witness to your Lord and Savior."

Ralph Reed, chairman of the Faith and Freedom Coalition, dismissed the publication in an interview with Fox News opinion host Laura Ingraham Friday night, recasting it as "Christianity Yesterday."

"You cannot imagine a publication more out of step with the faith community that it once represented," Reed said before lauding Trump's policies supporting religious liberty and Israel.

Family Research Council President Tony Perkins also hit back at Christianity Today's editorial in an interview with Shannon Bream on "Fox News @Night" by asking whether they had written editorials condemning the Obama administration's actions in thwarting Congress' investigation into Fast and Furious, or refusing to uphold the Defense of Marriage Act, or forcing Christian-owned businesses to pay for birth control and abortion-inducing drugs under the HHS' Obamacare mandate.

Franklin Graham, son of the late evangelist Billy Graham, who founded Christianity Today, also responded to the magazine's editorial, saying Friday that in spite of the president’s shortcomings, his father voted for him and would not be in support of Galli’s opinion.

“Christianity Today released an editorial stating that President Trump should be removed from office — and they invoked my father’s name (I suppose to try to bring legitimacy to their statements), so I feel it is important for me to respond,” Graham began in a statement posted on Facebook.

“Yes, my father Billy Graham founded Christianity Today; but no, he would not agree with their opinion piece. In fact, he would be very disappointed. I have not previously shared who my father voted for in the past election, but because of this article, I feel it is necessary to share it now. My father knew Donald Trump, he believed in Donald Trump, and he voted for Donald Trump. He believed that Donald J. Trump was the man for this hour in history for our nation.”

The letter to Christianity Today can be read below:

Dr. Dalrymple, We write collectively to express our dissatisfaction with the editorial Christianity Today published on Thursday, December 19, 2019 calling for the removal of our duly elected President, who was put into office at the behest of over sixty million voters. It was astonishing to us that your editor-in-chief, Mark Galli, further offensively dismissed our point of view on CNN by saying, “Christianity Today is not read by the people - Christians on the far right, by evangelicals on the far right - so they’re going to be as dismissive of the magazine as President Trump has shown to be.” It also came to our attention, that Mr. Galli has written other statements about Americans who chose Donald Trump over Secretary Clinton in 2016, referring to them as “These other evangelicals [who] often haven’t finished college, and if they have jobs, and apparently most of them don’t, they are blue-collar jobs or entry level work” as he describes himself with pride as an “elite evangelical.” Of course, it’s up to your publication to decide whether or not your magazine intends to be a voice of evangelicals like those represented by the signatories below, and it is up to us and those Evangelicals like us to decide if we should subscribe to, advertise in and read your publication online and in print, but historically, we have been your readers. We are, in fact, not “far-right” evangelicals as characterized by the author. Rather, we are Bible-believing Christians and patriotic Americans who are simply grateful that our President has sought our advice as his administration has advanced policies that protect the unborn, promote religious freedom, reform our criminal justice system, contribute to strong working families through paid family leave, protect the freedom of conscience, prioritize parental rights, and ensure that our foreign policy aligns with our values while making our world safer, including through our support of the State of Israel. We are not theocrats, and we recognize that our imperfect political system is a reflection of the fallen world within which we live, reliant upon the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, which is freely given to sinner and saint, alike. We are proud to be numbered among those in history who, like Jesus, have been pretentiously accused of having too much grace for tax collectors and sinners, and we take deeply our personal responsibility to render unto Caesar what is Caesar's --- our public service. The editorial you published, without any meaningful and immediate regard for dissenting points of view, not only supported the entirely-partisan, legally-dubious, and politically-motivated impeachment but went even further, calling for Donald Trump not to be elected again in 2020 when he certainly survives impeachment. As one of our signatories said to the press, “I hope Christianity Today will now tell us who they will support for president among the 2020 Democrat field?” Your editorial offensively questioned the spiritual integrity and Christian witness of tens-of-millions of believers who take seriously their civic and moral obligations. It not only targeted our President; it also targeted those of us who support him, and have supported you. Sincerely, Lourdes Aguirre

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