A Century of American Church Movements

From Broad Ecumenism to Smaller Tents

Introduction

The early 20th century witnessed a dramatic reconfiguration of the American church landscape. From the Federal Council of Churches’ vision to “Christianize the social order,” to the rise of neo-evangelicalism calling for renewed biblical fidelity and cultural engagement, Christians wrestled with a vital question: What does it mean to be faithful in the modern world?

As the church navigated world wars, depression, and social upheaval, two institutional streams emerged — one broad, ecumenical, and reform-oriented; the other, convictional, evangelistic, and culturally strategic. Together, they shaped the spiritual and social terrain of Protestant America.

📜 Timeline Infographic: Key Dates and Turning Points

🌍 From the Federal Council to the National Council of Churches

The Federal Council of Churches (FCC) emerged from a shared conviction that the gospel demanded collective moral action. The early decades saw remarkable collaboration across denominational lines — Methodists, Presbyterians, Congregationalists, and Baptists working side by side.

In 1950, the FCC united with other inter-church bodies to form the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA (NCC). The new council represented over 30 Protestant, Anglican, and Orthodox traditions. Its priorities—civil rights, poverty alleviation, and peacemaking—reflected the legacy of the social gospel while adapting to the Cold War world.

The NCC’s work through the 1960s and 1970s placed it at the forefront of civil rights advocacy, ecumenical dialogue, and global development. However, its progressive stances on social issues increasingly alienated conservative evangelicals who sought a more theologically defined movement.

🔥 The Rise of Neo-Evangelicalism: Smaller Tents, Sharper Focus

By the early 1940s, many conservative Protestants felt isolated between fundamentalist separatism and liberal ecumenism. Into this gap stepped a new generation of leaders—visionaries who longed for a faith both intellectually credible and culturally relevant.

They called themselves neo-evangelicals: orthodox in doctrine, but open to dialogue, social involvement, and academic rigor. Out of this impulse emerged the National Association of Evangelicals (1942), the founding of Fuller Theological Seminary (1947), and later, Christianity Today (1956)—each providing a platform for re-energized evangelical identity.

👤 Profiles in Renewal

Harold John Ockenga (1905–1985)

Founder of Fuller Theological Seminary | First President of the NAE

A Boston pastor with both academic and evangelistic passion, Ockenga coined the term “neo-evangelical” in 1947. He envisioned a movement that would move beyond fundamentalist isolationism while maintaining fidelity to Scripture.

“Neo-evangelicalism differs from fundamentalism in its repudiation of separatism and its determination to engage itself in the theological dialogue of the day.”

Ockenga’s leadership at Fuller and Park Street Church made him a bridge between intellect and revival.

Carl F. H. Henry (1913–2003)

Theologian, Editor, Architect of Evangelical Thought

Henry, once a journalist, became the mind behind evangelical resurgence. As founding editor of Christianity Today, he urged evangelicals to think critically and engage culture biblically. His monumental six-volume work, God, Revelation and Authority, defined evangelical theology for a generation.

“The early church won the Roman world by out-thinking and out-living it. If we do neither, we shall lose our world.” — Carl F. H. Henry

The Founding of Christianity Today (1956)

The idea came from Billy Graham, who wanted a magazine that combined theological depth with cultural relevance—a publication to unite evangelicals under thoughtful, credible witness. He enlisted Carl F. H. Henry as founding editor and based operations in Washington, D.C., to signal public engagement.

From its first issue, Christianity Today sought to provide what Henry called “a middle way between the harshness of fundamentalism and the vagueness of liberalism.” It became a touchstone for evangelical thought, hosting voices like John Stott, Francis Schaeffer, and later, Tim Keller.

🕊️ Legacy and Reflection

The story of the FCC → NCC and the NAE → Christianity Today reveals two complementary visions of faithfulness:

• One emphasizes cooperation and social transformation;
  
  
• The other emphasizes conversion and doctrinal conviction.
  
  

As Lesslie Newbigin observed, “The church is only true to itself when it exists for the sake of the world.” Yet, as John Stott added, “Evangelism and social responsibility are like two blades of the same pair of scissors.”

Perhaps the enduring challenge is not to choose one over the other, but to let both sharpen each other—so that the gospel shines in word and deed.

Closing Prayer

Lord of the Church,

You have guided Your people through division and renewal, broad visions and small tents.

Grant us humility to learn from each movement’s wisdom—

and courage to live a gospel both pure and public,

faithful in heart and active in the world.

Amen.

Soli Deo Gloria

Two streams, one landscape

From Broad Ecumenism to the National Council of Churches

Origins of the Federal Council of Churches

The Federal Council of Churches (FCC) was founded in May 1908 when 32 Christian communions met in Philadelphia.  The meeting signalled a conviction among a range of Protestant communions that the gospel must address social issues: immigration, labour reform, child labour, poverty, temperance.  This was very much in the spirit of the social gospel movement in early twentieth-century America—churches engaging the “social order” in the name of Christian faith.

Growth, activity, and critique

Over the next several decades the FCC worked through commissions and departments addressing race relations, industry, evangelism, pastoral and institutional concerns. For example, the FCC’s Department of Race Relations (from 1932) brought together leaders across races to address racial conflict.  The council also drew criticism—especially from fundamentalist quarters—for being too socially engaged, too liberal, too entangled in politics and ecumenism. 

Merger into the National Council of Churches

In November 1950 the FCC and a number of other inter-denominational Protestant ecumenical bodies merged in Cleveland, Ohio, forming the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA (NCC).  As the NCC history puts it: “In November 1950 the US churches that formed the Federal Council of Churches joined with additional ecumenical bodies to establish the National Council of Churches during a Constituting Convention held in Cleveland, Ohio.”  The NCC inherited the social witness, public policy engagement, ecumenical structures of the FCC and expanded them. 

Significance

What this evolution shows is a church movement that believed Christian faith demanded corporate, structural, institutional engagement—in labour, race, poverty, global issues—not just private piety. The broad “tent” of mainline Protestantism committed to social reform, ecumenical cooperation, and public witness found its organizational expression in the NCC.

The Neo-Evangelical Movement and Smaller Tents

The birth of the National Association of Evangelicals

While the mainline Protestant world was broadening its tent, another movement was carving out a smaller, more defined evangelical “tent”. In April 1942, 147 evangelical leaders met in St. Louis and formed what became the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE).  The NAE aimed to represent evangelical churches and groups—those committed to a conservative theological core—but who also wished to engage society rather than retreat into separatism. 

Neo-Evangelicalism and its Institutions

Leaders like Harold John Ockenga, Carl F. H. Henry and others defined a “neo-evangelical” movement in the late 1940s and 1950s, one that rejected the extreme separatism of earlier fundamentalism, sought to engage culture and scholarship, and maintained doctrinal clarity. Ockenga later recalled:

“Neo-evangelicalism … different from fundamentalism in its repudiation of separatism and its determination to engage itself in the theological dialogue of the day. It had a new emphasis upon the application of the Gospel to the sociological, political, and economic areas of life.” 

In 1956 the magazine Christianity Today was founded (by Billy Graham and others) with the express goal of giving evangelicalism a clear voice in the culture and church. 

Why this mattered

The NAE and Christianity Today signalled a shift: rather than the very broad ecumenical direction of the FCC/NCC world, this was a more narrowly defined evangelical coalition—smaller tent, but intentionally so. It emphasized biblical authority, personal conversion, missions and social engagement—but on evangelical terms. It also created institutional capacity (media, education, policy networks) for evangelicals to engage American religious, political and cultural life.

Inter-play and Legacy

Two streams, one landscape

These two streams—the broad ecumenical mainline (FCC → NCC) and the neo-evangelical evangelical movement (NAE + Christian media)—intersect and sometimes overlap, but they are distinct in emphases. The mainline project emphasised institutional cooperation, structural reform, social ethics; the evangelical project emphasised doctrinal clarity, personal salvation, cultural engagement, mission.

Implications for today

• The NCC remains a key ecumenical body in the United States, still involved in social justice, public policy, inter-faith dialogue.
  
  
• The NAE remains a major representative body for many American evangelicals.
  
  
• Christian media like Christianity Today continue to shape evangelical identity, discourse, and cultural engagement.
  
  
• The existence of both streams reminds the church today that faith involves both truth and justice, doctrine and action, personal conversion and public witness.
  
  

Reflection for the church

For Christians and church-leaders today, the story invites a couple of reflections:

• Do we embrace a church vision large enough to engage society (as the FCC/NCC did) while staying faithful to the gospel?
  
  
• Do we maintain the doctrinal clarity and mission-focus of the neo-evangelicals (as NAE/CT did) without erecting walls that prevent cooperation for the common good?
  
  
• How might we build wooden frameworks that honour both the broad social concern of the gospel and the narrower convictional integrity of evangelism?
  
  

Closing Thought & Prayer

Thought:

The American Protestant landscape in the twentieth century was shaped by both “big tents” and “smaller tents.” The challenge for the twenty-first century church is to remember that the gospel calls us both to broadcast good news to individual souls and to work for the good of communities and nations.

Prayer:

Lord of all churches, grant us wisdom to honour our heritage—social justice and evangelistic zeal alike. Help us to avoid shrinking Your tent by narrowing our mission, and avoid wandering aimlessly under a tent so large that it lacks gospel shape. Draw us into faithful cooperation across traditions, while preserving our convictions. In Jesus’ name. Amen

Soli Deo Gloria