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I sometimes say that I am "evangelical" but not "an evangelical." The definition of the word is, as we all know, highly problematic in the contemporary period. As I see it the troubles are traceable to the 18th century. The New Siders were not particularly interested in being bound to the confession. For them religious experience trumped confession. Be that as it may, there is an important sense in which confessionalists are evangelical. We are so in the same way the Protestants were. One of the first adjectives used of the Reformers was "evangelical."
I think Darryl Hart makes a good point when he says that there isn't really anything such as "evangelicalism" any more. There are two many particularities among the evangelicals to speak of a unified entity "evangelicalism" any more.
As to evangelicalism within NAPARC, absolutely its an issue and so is fundamentalism. Those are, in my view, the two great issues. The antidote for both is confessionalism.
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