CFH in Mexico 2: The Challenges of intercultural dialogue about Evangelical Identity

I have become acutely aware of the challenges of defining evangelical identity in a global context while here in Mexico. Latin Americanists are well aware of this of course, but this is less familiar to those of us who have not had many experiences with the nuances of religious life in the Latin American context. In the United States, “evangelical” refers to a particular kind of Protestant person but in the Latin American context, “evangelical” is synonymous with “Protestant” – essentially the generic alternative to Catholic identity. So it becomes a challenge when Protestants from the United States and Latin America come together for a conference on religious history. Needless to say defining terms becomes important. And this becomes yet even more complicated when we move this discussion outside of the Americas. I just had a conversation with two individuals from Germany who, interesting enough, are also participating in this conference. Because of my interest in the Moravians and in pietism, I know a bit about how Germans feel about “evangelicals” and so I asked one of them what they thought about all the talk about evangelicals that the conference was generating. We had an engaging discussion about the way evangelicalism is a pejorative term in Germany. Although in America, evangelicals are not without stigma, thoughtful individuals will acknowledge that evangelicals are an incredibly diverse lot. But for many Germans, evangelicalism is monolithically militant, bigoted, and permeated by the worst elements of what we would call “fundamentalism.” It would seem that it is crucial for American evangelicals (and historians of evangelicalism) to engage in international gatherings such as this one, if nothing else to wrestle with the challenges of talking about what the identifier “evangelical” means in various global contexts.