Ministering in Manhattan

Conservative ministers adhere more closely to traditional morality and do not find much fertile soil in California and New York. However, one such pastor has attracted followers in Manhattan: [bold added]

Dr. [Timothy] Keller, 71, has earned a wide following for his erudite and engaging teaching of the Gospel. Since he founded Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan in 1989, his appeal to young, educated professionals has helped it grow from a few dozen members to more than 5,000 weekly attendees across three locations. His sermons, which address believers and nonbelievers alike, are available on a podcast that over 2.5 million people download each month. He has also written more than two dozen books on subjects such as God, death, marriage and meaning; his new book “Forgive: Why Should I and How Can I?” will be published in November.

Dr. Keller’s model of evangelism is often described as “winsome.” He avoids talk of fire and brimstone and never raises his voice. Instead he uses logic and the occasional joke to make a case for the Christian worldview: “You can’t prove it but you can reason for it,” he says.

He likes to point out that both theists and atheists operate in the absence of proof, and that all values and worldviews demand some faith. For example, Dr. Keller argues that the secular concept of human rights makes little sense “in a universe in which there’s nothing but the material, everything is a product of evolution and all morality is relative.” Why, he asks, should we care if someone else suffers? How do we know the difference between right and wrong? The view that all human beings are “precious and equal in dignity,” he argues, comes from the idea of “a personal God who made us all in his image.” Dr. Keller therefore worries about the fate of morality in a world without God.

Though he is theologically conservative, Dr. Keller is wary of calling himself “evangelical,” largely owing to the term’s political implications. “It creates images in people’s minds that don’t fit me,” he explains. Although the Bible teaches that we should welcome immigrants and help the poor, he notes that it doesn’t specify whether government should be big or small, or whether taxes should be high or low. Thus Christians shouldn’t feel they are obligated to vote for either Democrats or Republicans. He adds that politics are creating serious fissures within the church. “People are walking away from each other,” he says. “It’s quite painful.”

For at least 15 years the bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of which I am a member has espoused political positions indistinguishable from the Progressive wing of the Democratic Party. Now that the bishop has announced his retirement, my hope is not that his successor's politics will be closer to mine but that we will find a bishop who is less concerned with preaching about politics at all.

Outside the walls of the church the airwaves are filled with opinions about Caesar and who the next Caesar will be. Dr. Keller, who by the way is a registered Democrat, and 5,000 Manhattanites prefer to talk about God instead.