Fundamentalism

Joel Carpenter is the Provost of Calvin Seminary. He is also the author of Revive Us Again, an excellent volume detailing the history of the “middle years” of fundamentalism, the period from the 1930s to the 1960s. Carpenter grew up as a fundamentalist, and he understands something about the way that fundamentalists do business. At one point in his history, Carpenter offers a long quotation from a sermon by John R. Rice.

Let’s call this post a completely unscheduled and unplanned editorial. Most of you have probably noticed a bit of a controversy brewing among fundamentalists on the question of Calvinism and related matters.

SI is inevitably involved in the conflict. What I’m really hoping, though, is that SI can be in the conflict in a helpful way. Fundamentalism has frequently lost sight of important questions in the midst of the fog of war that arises from the personal conflicts (and organizational-politics conflicts) of those involved.