Ulster Says Maybe: The Restructuring of Evangelical Politics in Northern Ireland

The recent electoral triumphs of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) have stimulated debate about the role of fundamentalist or ‘traditional evangelical’ Protestantism within the party and in Northern Irish politics. This paper argues that a significant restructuring of evangelical politics is taking place, one that is interest group‐centred rather than DUP‐centred. This process has been facilitated by changes in the structure of civil society. Traditional evangelical interest groups are ‘reframing’ their political projects in surprising new ways: abandoning Calvinist conceptions of church and state, using discourses of marginalisation and discrimination, and focusing on ‘moral’ issues. These subtle shifts in rhetoric constitute an acceptance of the post‐Belfast Agreement order. Rather than the tired, ‘Ulster Says No’ politics of the past, evangelicals are speaking out with a pragmatic ‘maybe’. This move parallels and reinforces the DUP’s ideological shifts, and provides an extra‐party platform for evangelicals to impact politics.

The Emerging Church Movement: A Sociological Assessment

With so many voices, groups, and organizations participating in the Emerging Church Movement (ECM), few are willing to “define” it, though authors have offered various definitions. Emerging Christians themselves do not offer systematic or coherent definitions, which contributes to frustration in isolating it as a coherent group – especially for sociologists who strive to define and categorize. In presenting our understanding of this movement, we categorize Emerging Christianity as an orientation rather than an identity, and focus on the diverse practices within what we describe as “pluralist congregations” (often called “gatherings,” “collectives” or “communities” by Emerging Christians themselves). This leads us to define the ECM as a creative, entrepreneurial religious movement that strives to achieve social legitimacy and spiritual vitality by actively disassociating from its roots in conservative, evangelical Christianity. Our findings are extensively developed in The Deconstructed Church: Understanding Emerging Christianity (Marti and Ganiel 2014).