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"In a sense," Billy Graham said in an address launching Christianity Today 50 years ago, "we are almost leaderless" in the evangelical movement. Half a century later, lack of leadership isn't a problem—we may have more leaders than followers.

When the Institute for the Study of American Evangelicals in 2001 provocatively named Tim LaHaye "the most influential American Evangelical of the last 25 years" (for the breadth of his bestselling bibliography), few took notice. But since the presidential election, both religious and mainstream media have been trying to map the tricky network and hierarchy of the popeless priesthood of evangelical believers. Evangelicals are now seen as key political influencers, so observers want to know: Who's influencing them?

New York Times columnist David Brooks came early to the fight, challenging fellow journalists to stop quoting Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson. "There is a world of difference between real-life people of faith and the made-for-TV, Elmer Gantry-style blowhards who are selected to represent them," he said.

Evangelicals agree. A spring 2004 poll from PBS's Religion and Ethics Newsweekly found that only 23 percent of self-described evangelicals had "warm or positive feelings" toward Falwell—the same percentage they gave "pro-choice groups." Robertson scored higher, at 34 percent, but still lower than labor unions (36%) and far below Pope John Paul II (44%) and James Dobson (40%).

The real spokesperson for evangelicalism, said Brooks, is John Stott, who is "always bringing people back to the concrete reality of Jesus' life and sacrifice."

Christian publications followed Brooks with their own lists. Christian Retailing's "Top Fifty People" shrewdly broke up the names by category, then published the lists alphabetically (top authors: Chuck Colson, Dobson, T.D. Jakes, Tim LaHaye, Hal Lindsey, Max Lucado, Catherine Marshall, Janette Oke, Frank Peretti, Charles Swindoll, Phyllis Tickle, Rick Warren, and Bruce Wilkinson).

The Church Report, a tiny trade magazine with a circulation of 30,000, sought to make a splash in January with its own list of "The 50 Most Influential Christians in America." George Bush, Mel Gibson, Graham, Warren, and Joel Osteen started off the eclectic list.

Pollster George Barna sought to put some hard numbers behind the issue, asking pastors who most influences American churches. Graham, Warren, Bush, Dobson, Bill Hybels, Jakes, and John Maxwell hit the top, followed by Barna himself, just above the Pope and Lucado. Asked for the most trusted spokesperson for Christianity, pastors listed Graham, Dobson, Warren, Jakes, Swindoll, Falwell, Hybels, and Colson.

Still, it's Dobson whom the Times news section has taken to calling "the nation's most influential evangelical leader," and a January U.S. News profile calls him "the best-known leader" of the movement. Pundit Hugh Hewitt spent much of January arguing why the Focus founder is America's "most influential individual not in government," evangelical or no—which led to a Dobson vs. Oprah debate between Hewitt and fellow blogger Joshua Claybourn.

Dobson's "political influence is not everything people might think," an unnamed Bush aide told Time magazine, but the publication acknowledged that "only a sliver of the activities [at Focus on the Family] are political," highlighting him among "The 25 most influential evangelicals in America." Warren, wearing black instead of his usual aloha shirt, led off the February 7 photo essay, but the other names were listed alphabetically, from philanthropists Howard & Roberta Ahmanson to missiologist Ralph Winter.

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February (Web-only) 2005, Vol. 49