Jan Edmiston writes about the Evangelical Spectrum over at A Church for Starving Artists. She points to this good ad on the Sojourner’s site put out by Evangelicals for Darfur, and writes:

What are Ted Haggard & Rob Bell doing on the same list? (This was a full page ad in yesterday’s Washington Post.) And why isn’t Cliff Kirkpatrick on there?

I write (and, God-help-me, preach) as an evangelical Christian.

“Evangelical” used to mean “Protestant” in Europe. Today in 21st c. North America, it often means fundamentalist/ Biblical-inerrancy-believing/personal-relationship-with-Jesus-touting/politically conservative Christian.

I’d like to take back the word to mean spreading the Good News that God is liberating us — and all the world — through Jesus Christ. Good News isn’t about defending the Gospel. It’s about living the Gospel. (Or trying to.)

I include myself in The Evangelical Spectrum too.

With Jan, I wince at the co-option of the concept “evangelical” by the right, but we on the left have let the title go, somewhat. Time to claim our part?

…Looks like Jim found the same Evangelicals for Darfur page.

Seems to me that the badchristian has something important to say about the way we label one another, and ourselves. Meanwhile, dwight has some thoughts about being labeled contextual. Maybe some of the problem is how these terms develop so many meanings as to become difficult, such as ‘evangelical‘.