Mark Noll's book The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind thoughfully critiqued Protestant evangelicals for having abandoned the life of the mind. Over at Mirror of Justice, Rob Vischer reports on Noll's current thinking, which is much more optomistic. Interestingly, Noll credits the ecumenical bridges being built between evangelicals and Catholics with having revived interest in intellectual rigor among the former:
"Because evangelicals tend to disregard tradition," Noll explains, "we are liable to miss the rich contributions that other strands of faithful believers have made to interpreting and applying the multitudinous biblical words that are so potent for the life of the mind. But this can change." The first "source of hope" Noll points to in this regard is "the increasing engagement between evangelicals and Roman Catholics," which has "contributed dramatically to improved evangelical use of the mind."
