wfn.org | Promise Keepers Looks to Build on Success

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21-October-1997 
97404 
 
    Promise Keepers Looks to Build on Success 
    of "Stand in The Gap" 
 
    by Adelle M. Banks 
    Religion News Service 
 
WASHINGTON--When Promise Keepers brought hundreds of thousands of men to 
the National Mall on Oct. 4, it looked like the apex of the seven-year-old 
evangelical Christian men's movement. 
 
    But Bill McCartney, the movement's founder, has a plan for much more: 
Free stadium events, regional pastors' conferences and a bold display of 
"vibrant" men's ministries by the year 2000 are part of this very organized 
group's plans to become even more institutionalized. 
 
    And in the year 2000, after churches manifest their dedication to 
racial and denominational reconciliation in the United States, Promise 
Keepers says it will turn its attention to taking its message to a global 
audience. 
 
    For six hours, the hundreds of thousands of men on the Mall confessed 
personal and corporate sins and pledged to do better by their faith and 
their families in a setting whose massive breadth was in stark contrast to 
the quiet solemnity that often covered the mall-turned-church. 
 
    "Even though you had this huge number of men, there was a remarkable 
intimacy in each moment, where a single man knew that he was visible, 
naked, laid bare before the eyes of God," said the Rev. Steve Henderson, a 
Christian school administrator in Easley, S.C. 
 
    Now, after getting up off their knees and heading home, participants 
carry with them the action plan enunciated by McCartney, a plan for all -- 
and for each -- of them.  "Can't no guy leave out of here a lone ranger," 
he said.  Rather McCartney urged men to return to their churches, heed 
their pastors and work with other churches toward "vibrant men's 
ministries." 
 
    Some experts, however, wonder about the potential dangers and 
challenges of a plan clearly aimed at making its mark on American -- and 
global -- society. 
 
    Stephen Boyd, professor of religion at Wake Forest University in 
Winston-Salem, N.C., was struck by McCartney's being convinced he was 
enunciating a plan given him by God. 
 
    "He said, `We all have to leave here with a plan,'" recalled Boyd.  "A 
plan.  Who defines the plan? ... What's going to happen when a pastor 
doesn't share the vision?  Does that mean the pastor is out of God's will? 
What happens when these men go home and their pastor is a woman?" 
 
    Mark Muesse, a religious studies professor at Presbyterian Church 
(U.S.A.)-related Rhodes College in Memphis, Tenn., agreed there are some 
potentially destructive aspects to McCartney's hierarchical thoughts. 
 
    "It encourages a very uncritical acceptance of the perspective of 
another person," he said.  "It sets up a pattern where you've got superiors 
and subordinates, and subordinates are supposed to do what they're told to 
do and there can be no questions." 
 
    Muesse said such sentiments might be rooted in McCartney's background 
in the Catholic Church and his past support of the idea of "shepherding," a 
controversial practice among some charismatics that critics say can lead to 
submissiveness and cultlike mentalities. 
 
    Part of McCartney's plan -- which scholars find laudable if not 
plausible -- is for churches to become more visible examples of racial and 
denominational reconciliation by standing together on the steps of state 
capitols on Jan. 1, 2000. 
 
    "I look to the year 2000 ... to mark the end of racism inside the 
church of Jesus Christ, and then it will have a dynamic impact on society," 
McCartney said in his address near the close of the gathering. 
 
    But Muesse said he believes Promise Keepers can only go so far in 
addressing racism because it chooses to do so only by personal and not 
political means.  "I do believe it's going to help race relations in the 
country, but I don't think it's going to eradicate racism in the church," 
he said. 
 
    Merle Longwood, professor of religious studies at Siena College in 
Loudonville, N.Y., said he sensed the men on the Mall were not only 
confessing their individual sins, but also were repenting for "the soul of 
the nation."  He said it would be a far greater challenge for participants 
to change the nation than to change their individual home and church lives. 
 
    "I suspect that ... a significant number of those persons will have 
been affected deeply, and what they do in their local churches will be 
significant," Longwood said.  "Whether that event itself is going to be 
transforming to the nation as a whole, that's anybody's reading." 
 
    Much of what was said from the podium at "Stand in the Gap" was not 
new.  Promise Keepers has consistently worked to encourage men to be 
committed to church, family, community and improved relations across racial 
and denominational lines.  But the announcement that the organization's 
future stadium events will be free may mark a turning point for the group. 
 
    In the past, mostly mainstream evangelical men have attended the 
stadium events, forking over $60 in advance or $70 at the gate.  Now, 
McCartney said, they can attend, along with faithfully "lukewarm" brothers, 
without opening their wallets.  Experts say this could be a move to keep 
their numbers growing after seeing a sharp decline in stadium-event 
attendance this year. 
 
    Muesse said Promise Keepers also seems to be trying to maintain support 
among a wide swath of evangelical supporters by leaving some issues off the 
table.  For example, he said, platform speakers didn't discuss the Second 
Coming of Jesus, which is a "point of great contention" among evangelicals. 
 
    "I think that is part of their efforts of trying to have some sectarian 
reconciliation," Muesse said.  But leaving out such fundamental issues 
raises objections from religious critics who think they aren't serious 
about doctrinal issues. 
 
    While Promise Keepers has managed to escape some of the long-standing 
disputes between Christians about sacraments and polity, it has not been 
able to avoid the issue of gender roles.  "What the Promise Keepers are 
exposing is a fault line within denominations, not just between 
denominations ... around issues of gender roles and human sexuality," said 
Boyd. 
 
    Promise Keepers speakers voice more than one sentiment, sometimes 
romanticizing women and at other times declaring their need to submit to 
men's decisions.  At "Stand in the Gap," for example, Promise Keepers 
president Randy Phillips declared "no woman should feel threatened by this 
gathering because the ground is level at the foot of the cross." 
 
    But a few hours earlier, McCartney told reporters that when a husband 
and wife cannot reach consensus, "the man should take responsibility for 
making that decision ... Almighty God ordained that somebody would make the 
final decision in any organization or team." 
 
    "They speak out of both sides of the mouth," said Muesse.  "Neither one 
treats the woman as an equal partner.  Either she's above us or below us." 
 
    Henderson, who also is the editor of the Council on Biblical Manhood 
and Womanhood's newsletter, didn't see Phillips and McCartney's statements 
as being contradictory.  His organization believes women should be 
submissive to their husbands' leadership.  And he said he thinks Promise 
Keepers, having established itself as a men's ministry, has been in the 
uncomfortable position of always being reactive rather than proactive about 
its views on women. 
 
    "That always is going to put them in a negative position, a negative 
light," said Henderson.  "I think they are making good progress in being 
able to say this is what we understand the Bible to say as relates to men's 
and women's roles." 
 
    Nor do the experts believe the movement has peaked with "Stand in the 
Gap."  Muesse said, "I think it's [the rally] going to pump enough life 
into the movement where it's going to last and maybe increase for the next 
couple of years."  But like other movements, he added, he expects it will 
decline over time. 
 
    Grassroots participants, on the other hand, see many years -- and 
perhaps generations -- ahead for Promise Keepers.  Ronald Conn, 22, a 
chaplain's assistant at the Naval Training Center in Orlando, Fla., said he 
hopes Promise Keepers doesn't end with his generation, but rather is 
extended to his young sons. 
 
    "Who's going to carry on the Promise Keepers once all of us are gone?" 
he asked as the "Stand in the Gap" crowd dispersed.  "If they don't have 
leadership ... they're not going to be able to carry God's word and God's 
grace on." 

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