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D. Michael Lindsay is a member of the sociology faculty at Rice University and is the author of Faith in the Halls of Power: How Evangelicals Joined the American Elite. In the post below he reflects on the Republican candidates. This post originally appeared on The Immanent Frame.

Mike Huckabee’s early success in the primary season shows that evangelicals have political muscles to flex in the post-George W. Bush era. Just as scribes across the country were ready to write Huckabee’s political obituary, he came out of nowhere and won the Republican Caucuses in Iowa by nine points over Mitt Romney. He also did better in New Hampshire than many pundits predicted, and with South Carolina and many other states up for grabs in the next few weeks, Huckabee’s political star will continue to rise—at least for a few more weeks. (more…)

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David Domke is Professor of Communication and Head of Journalism at the University of Washington. Kevin Coe is a doctoral candidate in Speech Communication at the University of Illinois. They are authors of the The God Strategy: How Religion Became a Political Weapon in America. To learn more about the book check out their handy website here. In the article below Domke and Coe look at Romney’s upcoming address to the nation.

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney will address the nation Thursday night about his Mormon faith and how it relates to his candidacy and policy goals. Many are calling it his “JFK moment” because the context recalls John F. Kennedy’s storied 1960 address to a group of conservative Protestant clergy in Houston. (more…)

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After Terryl Given’s post earlier today about Mitt Romney, I thought that it would be a good time to post this podcast with D. Michael Lindsay (author of Faith In The Halls of Power) about the role evangelicals will play in the upcoming election. The transcript of the podcast is after the break.

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D. Michael Lindsay is the author of Faith in The Halls of Power: How Evangelicals Joined the American Elite and is a member of the sociology faculty at Rice University. Lindsay conducted interviews with a variety of prominent Evangelical Americans — including two former presidents, dozens of political and government leaders, more than 100 top business executives, plus Hollywood moguls, intellectuals, athletes and other powerful figures. His book shows who the real evangelical power brokers are, how they rose to prominence, and what they’re doing with their clout. In the post below he ruminates on the role Evangelicals play in popular culture. Read Lindsay’s other blog posts here.

Evangelicals have been making strides in all kinds of places over the last thirty years. We know about their gains in Washington, but they’ve also been quite active in Hollywood. As I conducted interviews with media moguls and artists—all of whom are evangelical—I was struck by the number of times they compared themselves to another group that has also been on the move, the gay and lesbian movement. (more…)

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The post below is by Theo Calderara, editor at OUP.

Evangelicals in politics get a lot of attention these days, much of it focusing on issues like abortion. But while everyone’s watching what James Dobson is doing in America, they’re missing what Rick Warren is doing in Africa.

Last night, Michael Lindsay spoke about his new book, Faith in the Halls of Power, at the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs. One of the many fascinating things the crowd heard is that while everyone thinks evangelicals have a lot of influence on domestic issues, they’re really making an impact abroad. (more…)

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Students everywhere are heading back to school. But is school the way you remember it? In the post below D. Michael Lindsay, author of Faith In The Halls of Power: How Evangelicals Joined The American Elite, blogs about how faith has changed on campus, specifically evangelical faith. Read Lindsay’s other posts here.

Today, thousands of students will begin another year at Harvard, which begins its 369th year of classes. Since its founding, Harvard has been home to all kinds of religious believers, people of various faiths and of no faith at all. In recent decades, though, the nation’s leading university has diversified its student body geographically, ethnically, and racially. What’s surprising is how that diversity has changed Harvard’s religious makeup. (more…)

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