Compared to other religious groups in the country, white-evangelical Protestants top the chart in support for the death penalty. By contrast, black and Hispanic Protestants—groups that each overwhelmingly identify as born-again or evangelical—anchor the bottom of the chart. Only about one-quarter of black Protestants and Hispanic Protestants favor the death penalty for those convicted of murder, compared to more than two-thirds of black and Hispanic Protestants who prefer life in prison with no chance of parole.

The NAE resolution is notable, however, for explicitly mentioning “racial disparities.” The inclusion of these two words—even if they go by fairly quickly among a list of other problems—marks something genuinely new and significant.

The NAE’s willingness to talk about racial disparities in capital sentencing comes as it slowly strengthens its ties with black and Latino evangelical leaders. For example, the NAE board’s 12-member executive committee includes Reverend Samuel Rodriguez, president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, and Reverend John Jenkins, pastor of First Baptist Church of Glenarden, a predominantly African American megachurch outside of Washington, D.C. Rodriguez penned a 2014 op-ed in Time calling on his fellow evangelicals to rethink their position on capital punishment following the botched execution of Clayton Lockett in Oklahoma.

These increasing ties have been driven by moral conviction, but they are also dictated by demographic realities. Since 1998, white-evangelical Protestants have fallen slightly as a proportion of the population, from 22 percent in 1998 to 18 percent in 2014. Black Protestants have largely remained steady, comprising 10 percent of the population in 1998 and 9 percent in 2014. But Hispanic Protestants have shown remarkable growth in the 21st century, moving from only 1 percent of the population in 2000 to 4 percent in 2014.

Calculating this a bit differently—looking at all self-identified evangelical or born-again Christians by race over time—confirms the pattern. According to the General Social Survey (GSS), in 1998, 72 percent of self-identified evangelicals were white, while 24 percent were black, and 4 percent were some other race. In 2014, the white proportion of evangelicals had fallen 8 percentage points to 64 percent. Meanwhile, the black proportion of evangelicals remained steady at 25 percent, Hispanics accounted for 8 percent, and other races accounted for two percent.

The demographic data unequivocally point to an evangelical future that is less white, comparably African American, and more Hispanic. As whites are becoming less dominant in the American evangelical family, organizations like the NAE have begun to adjust to the new reality by becoming more inclusive in their leadership and membership. The recent NAE statement on capital punishment signals at least two ways in which these nascent connections may already be having a deeper impact on white evangelical moral theology and worldview.