wfn.org | Evangelical Christians urged to tackle "Moral Maze"

["EAUK Press Office" <press@eauk.org>]

For Immediate Release: 16th September 1998

Talk show hosts like Jerry Springer and Kilroy will increasingly
become the nation's moral counsellors on a par with parish
clergy, a senior church leader warned today.

Rev Joel Edwards, general director of the Evangelical Alliance
UK, which represents more than one million churchgoers in 30
denominations, said society had entered a 'moral maze' in which
Christian values with agreed moral frameworks had been abandoned
in favour of privatised morals and relative values. 

Speaking to the Evangelical Alliance's Council of Management's
annual general meeting and retreat, Joel Edwards challenged 80
senior evangelical leaders from across the denominations to steer
their churches and the Alliance into a new era of transformation
of society. 

He said: "In spite of some bright spots the UK still experiences
a declining church attendance. It is estimated that church
attendance will decline from three-and-a-half to three-million by
the year 2010.

"We are already in a moral maze. Having lost agreed Christian
identity with agreed moral norms, our popular culture is
increasingly swept along by privatised and relative values. It is
a culture in which Kilroy or Jerry Springer are likely to be
moral mentors on a par with the average church leader.

"British spirituality is however going through a real time of
soul searching. All the indications are that we are in a period
of intense spiritual hunger. The Pagan Society in the UK is
experiencing steady growth: 65 percent of the population accept
paranormal activities and 71 percent of the population still
believe in God." 

Joel Edwards added: "An Alliance content with past achievements
is likely to lose momentum. Worse still, it could become an
anachronism, losing touch with its mandate. 

"The future of the UK is not dependent on the Evangelical
Alliance. But the Alliance must see itself as an integral part of
the future of the United Kingdom, implicated in its brokenness
and urgent need.

"To achieve this we must become more than a growing organisation
with a bank balance. More than a safe bland church group. More
than a growing cluster of professional sound bytes in the media.
We must do more than make a good impression. We must seek to
bring transformation.

"To be anything less than the movement for the transformation of
society is to fail the mandate to be salt and light to risk
becoming a comfortable irrelevance in the 21st Century."

At the two-day meeting at the High Leigh conference centre in
Hoddesdon, Herts, which concludes tomorrow [Thursday]. Dr Derek
Copley, former principle of Moorlands Bible College,
Chirstchurch, retired as chair of the Council. Dr Robert Amess,
of Duke St Baptist Church, Richmond and Fran Beckett, chief
executive of the Shaftesbury Society were unanimously elected
chair and vice chair of the Alliance.

ENDS

For further information, contact:

Keith Ewing, kewing@eauk.org 
0171 207 2116 or + 44 171 207 2116 

or
Gavin Drake, gdrake@eauk.org
0171 207 2117 or + 44 171 207 2117

Evangelical Alliance UK,
Whitefield House,
186 Kennington Park Road,
London, SE11  4BT

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