Even "Holy Land" Colorado Less Reliably Republican as State Demographics Shift

"Pray -- Fast --Vote." So Brady Boyd tells his flock at New Life Church in Colorado Springs the Sunday before voter registration closes in the Centennial State. "Be a good citizen," Pastor Boyd admonishes. "If you don't vote, you're worse than a puppy kicker." Volunteers are waiting in the church foyer to assist the morning's congregation with registration, so that the dilatory won't be in danger of committing a sin of cruelty, much less omission. At no time, however, does New Life's spiritual leader tell the 7000 waving and singing, swaying and jumping, how to vote. That is a decision everybody keeping time with the Christian rockers on the church stage will have to make for themselves.

When I interview Brady Boyd several days later, he repeats his Sunday dictum to pray, fast, vote. "There's more angst on this election than I've seen in twelve to sixteen years," he says. "But I won't endorse a candidate. . . . There are people on both sides of the aisle who represent our values." I ask Pastor Boyd exactly what those values are. "Biblical values," he says. Which biblical values? In answer, Boyd replies, "Not to be mean or nasty or contentious. To meet the need that comes across our path. And we can't pick and choose whom we help."

Boyd is echoing his Sunday sermon on the story of the Good Samaritan, which he recasts as a town hall meeting in which Jesus takes questions. How to live a good life? Follow the first two Commandments, Jesus says. "But," Pastor Boyd observes, "it is much easier to love God than to love your neighbor." Certainly, the final fraught days of this election would seem to bear out the wry comment. "Neighbors -- they aggravate us; they drive us nuts; they don't wish us well sometimes." We live in a circular world of family, friends and like-minded folk who believe exactly as we believe. We leave very little room for anyone else, Boyd points out -- and find it hard to open a door to someone radically different.

"These are critical times to be salt and light," Boyd tells the congregation. "We're in an economic crisis -- and this is our finest hour! To get out of our circular world -- to pay our neighbors' house notes, to provide food. We're going to help the poor, the [military] widows and orphans. We were called to a season such as this -- to be salt and light. . . . We are committed to the needs of people around us," even when, Boyd quips, such a neighbor might be "a very-left politician!" A howl of knowing laughter rises from the tiers on the far side of the dimly lit amphitheater, with its ring of huge flat screen monitors and overhead ganglia of starship electronics more like a rock concert arena than a church sanctuary.

Brady Boyd's sermon on the parable of the Good Samaritan dramatizes the shift in American Evangelical thinking that is playing a part in the 2008 Election. For two decades, James Dobson's Focus on the Family has reigned from its hilltop campus in "The Holy Land," as the local Obama operatives call southern Colorado Springs. Recently, however, younger Evangelical leaders in the Springs have begun to eclipse Dobson. On a word from John Morris, the chairman of the El Paso County Democratic Party, I spend a few days checking out New Life Church and its pastor Brady Boyd. Morris's view that "Boyd is not so much about Armageddon" proves true. The congregation and leadership at New Life have more urgent considerations these days than End Times. The change in vision and consequent action -- to "go" and to "do," as Brady Boyd frequently quotes the Jesus of Luke's Gospel -- is a return to an old relationship between faith and the public square that likely will influence politics locally and nationally for years to come.

A few miles south of Focus on the Family, New Life perches on its own hilltop acres. Like the longer-established Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, California, whose pastor Rick Warren brought his two friends McCain and Obama together for a Saturday night hour of soul-searching, New Life displays all the rawness and hasty architecture of a frontier town. For both mega-churches, parking lot placement and the space to lay more asphalt are primary. Memberships are young and expanding -- who knows how fast and how far they will grow? The flock at New Life is very young -- the Sunday I attend services most everybody is under fifty -- and I spy teenagers sprawled or sitting cross-legged in every nook and cranny. On my first visit to the campus, I follow a group of high schoolers into the World Prayer Center, a second worship hall, half-circled by the flags of nations, that juts from the New Life hill like the prow of a ship. The kids have come to hang out and to peck at their Apple laptops. I've come to poke around.

Internet age faith glows from the flat screens ringing the round-walled realm. Somewhere, everywhere, supplicants type at worldprayerteam.org, which sends out their words like digital prayer flags into the blogosphere. A Haitian orphan pleads for "the lost people in Perth." "Have mercy on our lives in this city," beseeches someone from New York. "Set those people free" in San Francisco. Sasha in Russia gives both the details of his life and the beauties of Orthodox invocation. A father is mindful of a daughter at the homecoming dance. Darla in Illinois thinks of Barack Obama: "Guide and protect him until his term is finished." Meanwhile stories of discipleship from Belgium, Bhutan, Bolivia, Brazil, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Burundi and so on into the Cs -- Cambodia, Cameroon, Canada, Central Africa -- unfold in looping ribbons of trailer. Like Saddleback, New Life is keenly aware of its fit into the world at large, and if Brady Boyd doesn't have Rick Warren's wherewithal for world missions (ministering to "spiritual emptiness, self-centered leadership, poverty, disease and illiteracy" in countries as diverse as Rwanda and Ukraine), he does remind his flock of America's place. "I grew up poor," he says, "but by that I mean America-poor -- we always had a solid roof over our heads -- not third-world poor."

Watching the streaming prayers soothes and calms, for I have just seen something to upset an old-school Presbyterian. Teetering on the ledge of the sound and lighting booth at the back of the room is a half-used tray of communion wine, its thimbles of juice with frayed pull-tops like the little Smuckers jam jars abandoned with the room service remains in a hotel hallway. Every person of faith has his or her Wittenberg moments. For me in Colorado, it is the casual treatment of a sacrament. For Brady Boyd and New Life Church, it is "the 50 million children who have been aborted." The wine incident is a reminder of how differently and quixotically people take stands on matters of belief. Likely, many of the 10,000 active congregants at New Life Church will vote "yes" in November on Colorado constitutional amendment 48, which expands the definition of personhood to include "any human being from the moment of fertilization as 'person,'" endowed with "inalienable rights, equality of justice, and due process of law." (Amendment 48 is not expected to pass.) The New Lifers are just as conservative on issues like abortion as older Evangelicals, even as they prioritize a different social gospel; but they are less interested in implementing change through the political process than through hands-on work with those sometimes-pesky neighbors.

Encountering New Lifers, I witness a dispassion about politics at odds with the "angst" about which Pastor Boyd speaks. "We trust God for the future of our country," Boyd says. This is the third biblical value he answers me, along with civility and helping others. It's a sentiment the members of his congregation often repeat. Bernadette, an immigrant from West Africa and a regular at New Life, gives this declaration of faith a special twist. George Bush has not been a good president, she says, but "it hurts" -- she touches her heart -- "how people talk about him. We should pray for him, that God may lift him up." Bernadette and her friends, two African-American sisters who do military work, are thinking aloud, for my consideration, about their choices for president. The sisters, who are Republicans, are slowly coming around to the idea that they might vote for Barack Obama. They've seen the effects of war; they want the country out of Iraq the sooner. "The President, who he is," Bernadette cautions me, "it is God's will. And we will pray for him."

Three days later, when I tell Pastor Boyd that I've met a few New Lifers who are voting for Obama, he seems taken aback. Because I've approached some in his church to discuss politics? Or because congregants are taking his dictum literally and deciding for themselves? After all, he has just told me that "Evangelicals are not one big robotic voting block," that they are "independent thinkers, critical thinkers." We move on to talking about age demographics. I describe my astonishment that everybody at New Life seems to be under the age of forty. He assures me that the church has older members, too, particularly among the Catholics who attend traditional Mass on Saturday night and then come to the hill on Sunday morning. Brady Boyd has recovered his equanimity. "We Evangelicals," he says, "we're no longer the old guys who are mad at everybody."

Comments

[TurnToTheLeft]

"We Evangelicals," he says, "we're no longer the old guys who are mad at everybody." - as you described they sound like the younger ignorant and more intolerant version.

[lewes17266]

Thank you for this great news. I was wondering when evangelicals would convert to Christianity. I hope the famous millionaire televangelists got the news and will follow suit. Their convenient angry and vengeful Republican god who sends tornadoes and terrorists is not scaring voters like he once did.

[PlainBread]

I came from a conservative and evangelical family. Even though for the last 20 years most of our family members have been heavily leaned toward republicans, but this year while many are switched to vote for Obama, nobody, literally none of us stands up for GOP. Even my mom a few days ago told me "I've watched a lot of times and seen the way Obama and McCain talk, smile, cherish, and express their body language, I can see Jesus only in Obama, not McCain."

[majorteddy]

Remember that Jesus was a person who would share what he had with those who had none and did not look down on anybody. He was always someone who would lift up those who could not lift themselves up. He healed those who were ill. Which candidate is more like that?

[Ani]

I received an email yesterday from a Colorado friend. She's an evangelical Christian and long-time Republican. We've always laughed about canceling one another's vote for President. She chatted on about this and that ... then she knocked me over by ending with this: "By the way, I'm voting for Obama."

Wow! I can only hope her sentiment extends into the Colorado community.

[AnalyzeIT]

This is the worst campaign I have ever seen. It's been utterly despicable - every minute of it. The fact that Obama is forced to discuss Ayers while McCain is not questioned about Liddy, Gramm, Iran Contra, Noriega, and the Keating Five is absolutely insulting to the public.

And not a word about Todd Palin and his Alaskan secessionists - despite the fact they were formed by Voegler, who was supported by the state of Iran.

Then we have to listen to McCain prattle on about ACORN and how he's offended - after two stolen elections and years of disgusting voter suppression tactics from the right. If only the press would do their jobs.

OBAMA-BIDEN

[lemonyashes]

As this election gets closer and nastier we all seem to thinking the same types of thoughts and feeling the same anxieties because this is the anniversary of 2 stolen elections and the thought of a third being stolen by the same people is almost overwhelming. I guess we could dare to have the audacity of hope this time around. Obama has little nuanced attacks that are subtle but seemingly far more effective than Gore or Kerry had. So here's cheers to the audacity of hope of our vote.

[Dystopic]

never forget John Singlaub.

[doneflyin]

Acorn is all about pandering to racism.
When this is all over, I wonder if John McCain will have trouble looking folks in the eye when he returns to the Senate.
His campaign has been quite despicable. I would have thought him better then this.

[sonnysj76]

How can any Christians vote for McCain?
McCain has committed THE biggest sin of all... He Cheated on his wife! Why are Christians so quick to look the other way and instead pretend as though Obama is the one who actually cheated on his wife.

[awwnuts]

As a Christian, I cannot vote for a man that accepts worship from people. Read, study, inform yourself. Obama is an idol. There is no reason for the world to worship him. He's done nothing - come out of nowhere. You are duped, deceived. There is a media-fueled mass deception going on and you've been taken in.

A true Christian does not accept worship. Obama does not silence the suggestible, enamored crowds from singing "Obama-lujah!" or, as Stevie Wonder asked the crowd at an Obama rally, "sing this hymn everyday, several times a day: Ba-ha-rock O-ba-ha-ma-ha (in an ascending scale) then Ba-ha-rock O-ba-ha-ma-ha (in a descending scale)".

I'm sorry, but if Obama were a humble follower of our Lord, he would remind people that he's just a man - "Look, I don't feel comfortable being put on par with Christ." He would be honest about his involvement with Acorn, his friendship with Ayers, and his agreement with Jeremiah Wright's racist philosophies.

If Obama's elected and Dems get their veto-proof 60, this country will not look the same in 4 years. Count on fewer civil liberties if you're a Christian. If a pastor preaches freedom from the slavery of sin, it will be hate-speech.

McCain admitted his affair to be his greatest moral failure. How could I, as a Christian, not forgive him?

[R.W. Sanders - Huffpost Blogger]

Mayhill, wondered if you caught the "denver post" endorsement of obama? in the first few paragraphs, really just the intro, they said that the surge had reduced the violence in iraq enough to precipitate a troop withdrawal. and that the only disagreement between obama and mccain on the war was how fast to pull out the troops. though they do indeed differ on that, i think there may be a few other differences of opinion.

you should check it out. pretty sad for my wife's home state. their primary newspaper should be better than that.

[wembakoy]

I am a Christian for Obama. I believe God will answer my prayers and Obama will be the next President. I trust my God will make sure that the victory will be on my side.

For Barack Obama:

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Thanks.

[LadyBeryl]

I am also a born again Christian who has been reared in and chosen to belong to evangelical churches over 40+ years.

Change is not easy. When the change relates to faith, change is even more difficult. Barack Obama and his younger and diverse Christian supporters are making the difference. We are highlighting the contradiction and deception from the so called "Christian Right" over the last few decades.

[emcslead]

Colorado Springs is quite the mix of people. I've lived here almost two years and am no longer surprised by people I encounter The cowboy in the ten gallon hat is just as likely to show up at the new fusion restaurant as the young fashionista...sometimes together! It's a people watchers paradise!

I think this backdrop fosters the sort of evangelical you describe. There are younger congregations who still follow lock-step with those who came before in other parts of the country, in those parts of the country who do limit their circles to those who believe like them as Pastor Boyd mentions. Much of the Rockies still has that "live and let live" mentality which allows for acceptance. It is an area of transplants; people who do that tend to be more naturally curious about the world, therefore more open to other ideas. Also CO is the most highly educated populace in the nation, and those people also tend to be more curious and open to new ideas. Take live and let live, mix it with some curiousity, strength, brains and thin air and viola! a whole new type of Christianity is born!

And honestly, one that seems more in step with the teachings of Jesus as I was raised to understand then then even my own faith or many of the others out there. I've been wary of evangelicals of the Dobson and Graham age, but maybe Boyd will help usher in a kinder, gentler Christianity.

[progressivelady]

I believe in seperation of church and state, never the 2 shall meet

[SisterSoul-08]

"Ditto".

[Dystopic]

each are poison to the other

[vew]

Good story. But don't be mislead. The new evangelical church is still a controlling environment like the old evangelical church was. As a born again Christian who's been a member of several evangelical churches for over 40 years they are not bastions of "free thinking" as the pastor wants to suggest. The pastor's surprise that any of his congregation might vote for Obama is that he basically finds it illogical for someone to attend his church and/or Sunday School classes and not vote Republican. And people attending the main services preached by the pastors and/or the church staff may hear a more open philosophy. But the "proof of the pudding" is when you attend Sunday School and the small group meetings and hear the conversations during coffee hour. The church people are good people and they want to do what they believe God is calling them to do. But they don't expose themselves to different thought; they don't read any liberal journals/news; they keep in their cocoon of conservative church, friends, and information sources.

[tm22]

This is so very true...the basic premise, or tenet (and you are welcome to correct me, "vew") is that many evangelicals see themselves as "outsiders" of mainstream culture, but, "insiders" to God's plan or what prophets, apostles, minsters tell them via "the word" or "signs" that have been revealed.

Therefore, to better understand the evangelical church goes, one must attend Tuesday night prayer meetings, Thursday afternoon charity work, or even the aerobics class performed with christian rock music

It is the "insider" who is an "outsider" point of perception that is the glue, the tradition that binds the old group to the new group via church indoctrination processing or group-think.

There is no judgment on my part in as much as there is a desire (for lack of better word) to help myself as well as others understand people of evangelical faith churches...we need more education and less "hater'ation", more understanding and less isolation.