D. Michael Lindsay is a member of the sociology faculty at Rice University where he is also the Faculty Associate of Leadership Rice and Assistant Director of the Center on Race, Religion, and Urban Life.He applied the "Page 99 Test" to his new book, Faith in the Halls of Power: How Evangelicals Joined the American Elite, and reported the following:
My book tells the story of evangelicals’ 30-year effort to reach the heights of power. Page 99 deals with one of the key aspects of the evangelical ascendancy. The big point actually begins with the last few lines of page 98:Read more about Faith in the Halls of Power at the Oxford University Press website.
The Pew Younger Scholars Program was the most strategic initiative evangelicals undertook over the last thirty years. It enabled more evangelicals to attend select graduate programs and establish a foothold for evangelicals at some of the world’s most prestigious universities. Unlike politics where mobilized citizens can vote their representative into office, advancement in the world of ideas requires the approval of academic gatekeepers. Pew’s philanthropy secured academic respectability for evangelicals and produced a revolution in evangelical scholarship.
The opening of the evangelical mind has to be one of the most important but least appreciated ways evangelicals have risen in American society. It has not happened by accident. The Pew Younger Scholars Program is one of the most important parts of this strategy. It provided funds for evangelical college students to attend a special summer workshop with a renowned scholar in a specific academic field. The students and scholar not only shared an interest in particular disciplines, they also shared the same faith. The program became an important vehicle for students at lesser-known schools (most of them church-based) to secure a recommendation to a top graduate school from a leading authority in the field. It also gave them a chance to work on a paper that could become their writing sample for graduate school — which can make or break an application.
This program was spearheaded by a forward-thinking evangelical historian, Joel Carpenter, who directed Pew’s religious grantmaking efforts during the 1990s. He joined forces with another evangelical academic, Nathan Hatch, so the program could be housed at the University of Notre Dame where Hatch was Provost.
Page 99 has all of the vital elements that emerged in my analysis of the rise of American evangelicalism: strategic philanthropy from a faith-friendly source, a focus on long-term cultural change, support of a new generation of leaders, and unexpected twists and turns. After all, who would have thought the evangelical advance would come from happenings at the nation’s leading Catholic university? But an alliance with Catholics has been critical to evangelicals’ growing power, both political and intellectual.
Page 99 (starting at the bottom of 98):
The Pew Younger Scholars Program was the most strategic initiative evangelicals undertook over the last thirty years. It enabled more evangelicals to attend select graduate programs and establish a foothold for evangelicals at some of the world’s most prestigious universities. Unlike politics where mobilized citizens can vote their representative into office, advancement in the world of ideas requires the approval of academic gatekeepers. Pew’s philanthropy secured academic respectability for evangelicals and produced a revolution in evangelical scholarship.
The establishment of the Evangelical Scholars Initiative came at a key moment when other developments were bringing evangelical and Catholic academics together. For example, evangelicals were beginning to explore more deeply the idea of “cultural engagement” — first articulated for them by Carl Henry in 1947. According to Henry, the Bible taught that believers should be active in society, not retreat from it. Evangelical scholars were naturally drawn to the example of Roman Catholics who, unlike evangelicals, have never isolated themselves from the culture. Many of those I spoke to noted that in the 1980s, evangelical colleges and universities began hiring more Catholics, and many of those new professors had attended graduate school at Notre Dame. So when the Pew programs were established at Notre Dame, evangelical academics did not scoff as their forebears might have. Moreover, many saw new funding — over $2 million initially — become available to them, and, as one person told me, “we didn’t care where it was based.”
Evangelicals continue to look to Notre Dame as a model institution. While Baylor is trying to become a top-tier Christian research institution, one of its presidents told me that Notre Dame is the “industry leader.” The data support that assertion. Notre Dame has consistently been ranked among the top 20 research universities by U.S. News & World Report. In addition, it has received more research fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities than any other university in the nation over the last five years. These institutional strengths, coupled with the number of Notre Dame departments that sponsor doctoral programs, create an environment where evangelical scholars can interact with colleagues who share their vision for first-rate scholarship conducted by practicing Christians. Notre Dame has raised the bar for evangelical scholarship substantially.
--Marshal Zeringue
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