Numerous events in 1986 set the stage for developments that will continue through 1987 and beyond. CHRISTIANITY TODAY spoke to a variety of experts in reviewing news events of the past year and assessing their impact on the years to come.
The Prolife Movement
Prolife leaders were encouraged by the movement’s broadening base and by the realignment of the U.S. Supreme Court. Liberal journalist Nat Henthoff has said a growing number of abortion foes are people who are otherwise “unwilling to join the forces of Reagan, Rambo, and Rehnquist.”
Later this year, Zbaraz v. Hartigan, a case that tests an Illinois law requiring a 24-hour waiting period before an abortion can be performed on a minor, will go before the Supreme Court. In addition, California filmmaker John Upton and Bernard Nathanson, a prolife advocate who formerly headed the National Abortion Rights Action League, will release a sequel to the film Silent Scream. The new movie captures a second-trimester abortion, filmed in utero via a fiberoptic camera system.
Church And State
Church pension boards retained their exempt status under the new federal tax laws. However, Stan Hastey, associate executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs, warned that in 1987 “government at every level is going to seek to tax churches in new and creative ways.” Hastey also said he expects legal challenges to the practice of allowing student-organized religious meetings at school.
World Hunger
Those involved in combating hunger generally regard last year’s United Nations special session on Africa as a major step toward finding permanent solutions to the continent’s hunger problems. “African leaders accepted some of the blame for their problems, and they made personal, long-term commitments to solving them,” said Serge Duss, program officer for Inter-Action, an umbrella group for 112 U.S. hunger and relief agencies. Duss said the priority for 1987 is to “sustain public attention on Africa.”
The Family
Jerry Regier, president of the Family Research Council, said President Reagan’s leadership has “changed the cultural climate” with regard to the family. A government task force gave Reagan a report upholding the traditional family (see article on page 47). “For the first time, government officials are making strong statements in support of strengthening families,” Regier said. “We’re seeing the beginning of a turnaround in cultural values.”
The Persecuted Church
Religious rights organizations will be watching as some 150 Nepalese believers are brought to trial on such charges as distributing Christian literature. They will also be eyeing Romania, which had its Most Favored Nation trade status renewed in 1986 when it appeared that religious persecution had eased. However, according to Steve Snyder of Christian Response International, conditions for Christians in Romania are as bad as ever.
The news from China is better, Snyder said, citing an easing of tension between the government and unregistered house churches. “We expect that 1987 will be a good year for the gospel of Christ to flourish in China.”
Social Justice
Last year, evangelical leaders played key roles in the formation of Just Life, a political action committee (PAC) that opposes abortion and the arms race as a consistent prolife ethic. Just Life secretary Ronald Sider said Democratic control of the U.S. Senate will do little to reverse the conservative political tide of the past decade, since several of the new Democratic committee chairmen are more conservative than the Republicans they replaced. He added, however, that it will be “more difficult for President Reagan to have his way in many areas, including free trade, aid to the contras, and Star Wars.”
Missions
Two trends—a growing number of both tent-making missionaries and short-term workers—are likely to continue gaining momentum in 1987, according to James Reapsome, executive director of the Evangelical Missions Information Service. More and more Christians are becoming “tentmakers” in restricted-access countries such as Communist bloc and Muslim nations. Tent-making missionaries work in those countries as teachers, business professionals, or students.
The other trend is toward short-term missionaries, who now make up nearly 40 percent of the total U.S. missionary force. Reapsome said the aggressiveness of Islamic fundamentalists worldwide has been accompanied by a growing commitment among young Christian missionaries to evangelize among Muslims.
The Charismatic Movement
“The American charismatic movement has gotten a world vision in the last three months that will carry over till the end of the century,” said Pentecostal Holiness leader Vinson Synan, who is helping plan a major event for July that is expected to draw some 70,000 charismatics to New Orleans. Synan said 1986 witnessed a “reawakened unity among Pentecostals and charismatics.”
The Black Church
The black church has awakened to the role of black Christians in the task of world evangelization. A conference called Destiny ‘87, which is scheduled for July, is designed to “enable black Christians to meet their personal responsibility to fulfill the Great Commission.…” In addition, an unprecedented national gathering of black Catholics scheduled for May is aimed at helping black Catholics deepen their spiritual lives.
Protestants And Catholics
This year, the Christian and Missionary Alliance will celebrate its one hundreth anniversary, and three Lutheran denominations will hold a constituting convention for the new 5.3 million-member Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
The Vatican took disciplinary actions last year against Seattle archbishop Raymond Hunthausen and Catholic University theologian Charles Curran. Both incidents raised controversy among Catholic leaders over the relationship between church authority and individual conscience. Over the last two decades, the U.S. Catholic church has leaned toward giving more responsibility to the individual, while Rome has pushed for a centralized moral authority focused on local bishops and, ultimately, the pope.
Some have interpreted the U.S. bishops’ statement of loyalty to the pope as an attempt to diffuse a head-on confrontation between the Vatican and U.S. Catholics on the issue of individual freedom. This tension could become more evident during the current Pope’s U.S. visit in September.
