President says he would have attended annual convention if an invitation had been extended.
After a dozen chummy years with the Reagan and Bush administrations, the National Religious Broadcasters (NRB) this year for the first time declined to invite the President of the United States to address its annual convention in Washington, D.C.
“We cannot give a platform to a leader who so aggressively supports and puts forth policies and positions which are blatantly contrary to scriptural views,” the ten-member NRB executive committee announced at the start of the fiftieth-anniversary gathering. Presidents have been invited to address the convention ever since evangelicals began to be noticed during the Nixon administration. Jimmy Carter spoke once, Ronald Reagan spoke five times, and George Bush thrice during their presidencies.
New chairperson Robert Straton says the NRB mailed two invitations to Bill Clinton to address the group at last year’s gathering in Los Angeles but received no answer. “We felt hurt that there was no courtesy of a response.” While acknowledging the invitations may have been lost in the shuffle during the transition of power, Clinton says he never saw an invitation last year.
“I would certainly have gone last year if they had invited me, in a heartbeat,” Clinton told CHRISTIANITY TODAY after the convention. “I like to engage people, so I certainly would have gone.”
Outgoing NRB chairperson David Clark, calling Clinton a skilled rhetorician, said the executive committee did not want to give Clinton such a forum this year. The secular media, Clark said, might have deduced that the NRB was endorsing Clinton by allowing him to speak with no rebuttal.
If the NRB decides to invite Clinton in future years, it will not be as convenient for him. Next year, for only the third time, the convention will be outside the Beltway, in Nashville. Indianapolis will host the meeting in 1996.
Despite pronouncements that the event is completely nonpartisan, this year’s lineup of speakers appeared to be a GOP roster: potential presidential candidates William Bennett and Jack Kemp; former attorney general Edwin Meese; former Nixon special counsel Charles Colson; U.S. Senate hopeful Oliver North; U.S. Sen. Dan Coats; and U.S. Rep. James Talent. Although NRB leadership announced that more than 100 members of Congress had accepted invitations to a breakfast on the final day of the convention, only two, both Republicans, showed up.
Overall, speakers gave mixed signals on how—or even whether—to engage the culture in the political arena.
“Our job is not to rescue the culture,” Colson, now chair of Prison Fellowship, declared on opening night. “Our job is to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ and be his disciples.”
Colson urged the attendees to treat political leaders with the utmost respect, civility, and love. “Christians ought to repent of laughing at Hillary [Clinton] jokes,” Colson cautioned. But he said the gospel cannot be held hostage by any political party, and politicians must be held accountable.
“Just because a politician quotes Scripture, don’t expect God to arrive on Air Force One,” said Colson, who spent seven months in prison for his Watergate role. “Politicians on the Right will use you and so will politicians on the Left. I know it. I’ve been there.”
Tony Evans, pastor of Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship in Dallas, said evangelicalism has suffered since 1980 because of a belief that the political order will bring about the kingdom of God. “God doesn’t ride the back of donkeys or elephants,” Evans said. “The Lord’s army doesn’t come to take sides; it comes to take over.”
That does not mean evangelicals are abandoning politics. Singer Carman Licciardello unveiled a plan to collect one million signatures on petitions to be presented to President Clinton seeking a constitutional amendment to allow voluntary prayer in public schools.
And 17 organizations, including the American Center for Law and Justice, the Christian Legal Society, and the American Family Association Law Center, announced the formation of the Alliance Defense Fund to finance lawyers involved in religious-liberty suits.
Clark, noting a record convention registration of more than 4,000, said NRB had fully recovered from the televangelist scandals of the late 1980s.
By John W. Kennedy in Washington, D.C.
