between church and state during the Cold War fundamentally reshaped the
relationship between evangelicals and the federal government. Evangelical
identification with anticommunism, in particular, ushered in new
bureaucratic ties between a growing state and conservative Protestant
organizations. Indeed, evangelical agencies were among the nongovernmental
providers most favored by the U.S. government in its postwar foreign aid
programs. In this quintessential Cold War state-private collaboration,
World Relief, World Vision, and other evangelical groups became major
players. Moreover, federal government efforts to strengthen the
anticommunist training of army recruits, its support for evangelization
campaigns, and its promotion of church building on military sites were
decisive factors in furthering the role of conservative Protestants.
In turn, the postwar engagement with foreign policy eased the transition
for many evangelicals from their traditional misgivings about "big
government" and public aid for religious institutions towards the embrace
of Cold War state-building in the name of national security and global
power. Although this helped integrate conservative Protestants into the
liberal anticommunist foreign policy consensus, however, evangelicals
remained eager to preserve an insurgent identity. They were staunchly
unilateralist, if not isolationist; they opposed the recognition of China
and ridiculed the UN and "world government"; they attacked the alleged
Catholic infiltration of the U.S. foreign aid program; they adhered to
apocalyptic visions of impending global warfare; and they used
anticommunism as a means of infusing prophetic and millennial themes into
the public policy discourse.
In placing this unfolding church-state relationship in a broader Cold War
context, the paper explores how the new nexus shaped both the formation of
the national security state and the political dynamics of the evangelical
resurgence.