The Fatal Flaws in Progressive Christianity

Left to its own devices, progressive Christianity stops being Christian and instead turns into a generic, self-affirming personal program focused solely on happiness, acceptance, and affirmation.

In my mind, there are three fatal flaws in “progressive Christianity” writ large. If I were more organized, I’d probably tackle these in a tidy series, but that’s not how my brain works.

The 3 Fatal Flaws

1. Progressive Christianity makes church irrelevant.

2. Progressive Christianity can’t account for sin and evil (every wrong is reduced to systemic injustice or power imbalance).

3. Progressive Christianity has no use for the Bible.

I’ve already written about how progressive Christianity risks making church irrelevant and how it often misunderstands sin (though I hope to say more on that soon). But for now, I want to focus on this third flaw: progressive Christianity has doomed itself by looking to secular ideology—not Scripture—for its vision of justice and inclusion.

The Death Spiral of Progressive Christianity: Why the Mainline Church is in Crisis

Hamartiology & Houselessness

Let me be clear: I know there is much to critique in conservative theological spaces. But what I’m doing here is not a retreat to fundamentalism. Rather, I am offering a caution from within—critiquing progressive Christianity from the left.

I am fully in favor of justice and inclusion within the church. Again and again, I’ve been humbled by the faith of LGBTQ+ Christians, and I trust that “those who earnestly seek God will find God” (Hebrews 11:6; Jeremiah 29:13). So this is not a post debating LGBTQ+ inclusion or movements for racial justice. This is about how we ground our convictions.

Conservative ≠ Hateful

But, before I dive in, I need to speak to something that I’ve long wrestled with: the assumption that you’re either fully on board with the progressive inclusion agenda—or you’re a hateful bigot. I’ve never liked that binary. Many of my conservative Christian friends and family may not be LGBTQ+ affirming, but they are not hateful or bigoted. Certainly, some conservative Christians who are not affirming are indeed hateful and bigoted. But it is intellectually dishonest to paint everyone who disagrees with progressive positions in such terms.

Even more, I’ve been challenged by conversations with evangelicals—many of whom are more inclusive than they’re given credit for, or at least more nuanced and thoughtful. Some hold traditional views but are open to dialogue and disagreement. Though I must also say, I am continually perplexed that infant baptism isn’t a test of fellowship amongst conservative churches, but LGBTQ+ inclusion is—despite the former having arguably more theological weight.

Progressive values and theological liberalism

But, I digress. Let’s get back to the topic at hand. I’ve written previously about trying to find a distinction between progressive values (LGBTQ+ inclusion, women in leadership, etc) and progressive ideology.

Progressive Values vs. Progressive Ideology: A Crucial Distinction

But I wasn’t quite sure how legitimate of a position I held. That’s why I was pleasantly surprised to hear a recent conversation Martha Tatarnic had with

Ben Crosby

on the Future Christian Podcast, in which he said:

“There is nothing theologically necessary about [inclusive] stances also including the position that evangelism doesn't matter or that holiness of life is not important... The sort of social progressivism and this particular sort of theological liberalism have tended to go together, but I don't think they have to.”¹

To summarize Crosby’s point: inclusion and justice don’t have to be rooted in secular ideology. They can, and should, be grounded in theology and Scripture.

Justice and Inclusion from a Christian lense

Take, for example, Nicole Massie Martin’s Nailing It: Why Successful Leadership Demands Suffering & Surrender. She offers a biblically rich framework for talking about power and privilege—two terms that dominate progressive discourse.

“Whether our power is overt or subversive... every one of us has God-given power, and we must understand what that means... The question cannot be, Who has power? but rather, What can I do with the power that I have?”²

She continues:

“The resurrection of divine power can only come from the crucifixion of human power as we once perceived it... We can confess that we are not always aware of the power at work in our lives and ask God to reveal it for his glory and for the good of those we serve.”³

That is deeply Christian theology. It stands in stark contrast to how power and privilege are often handled in progressive spaces—where “privilege” becomes a race to the bottom.

Progressivism’s Race to the Bottom

Andrew Root critiques this dynamic in Evangelism in an Age of Despair. On page 76, he writes:

“Inside recognition's divorce from virtue, what has arisen is tribes of warring victims... Only victimhood is authentic... We must constantly battle, even within our own tribes, for platforming and deplatforming.”⁴

And on page 79:

“Inside the victim-victimizer dialectic of tribalism... progress is not possible... If our goals are actually accomplished and the world becomes better, groups become less victimized and therefore have less power. See how justice is eclipsed by power?”⁵

In this paradigm, there’s no resurrection—only perpetual grievance. But the Christian gospel offers more. It offers crucifixion and resurrection. It offers hope.

The DEI Guilt Treadmill and the importance of Confession and Assurance in Christianity

The Bible as an Outdated Accessory?

The deeper problem is this: once we have built our case for these values from solely progressive ideological sources with the Bible and Christian theology as afterthoughts, the next logical step is that the Bible itself is no longer needed.

Don’t believe me? ProgressiveChristianity.org promotes a book by Rick Herrick titled Toward a Post-Biblical Christian Future.⁶ In the book, Herrick argues that "It’s a well-known fact that Christianity is slowly dying in the West. While there are many factors contributing to this decline, the most significant one is biblical belief. More and more people are finding the beliefs outlined in the Bible unbelievable. As a result, the time has come to have a conversation on what a post-biblical Christian faith might look like. This book begins that conversation."

If your foundational text is irrelevant, you’re not left with Christianity. You’re left with progressive ideology wrapped in religious packaging. And over time, that religious packaging becomes unnecessary overhead.

"Progressive Values" Are Biblical Values

I’m not going to re-litigate the biblical case for LGBTQ+ inclusion. Authors like Matthew Vines, Dale B. Martin, and

Colby Martin

have done excellent work there—especially God and the Gay Christian and Unclobber for accessible starting points.

More, these values—of sacrifice, of humility, of using one’s power for the good of others—are not foreign to the Christian tradition; they are modeled most powerfully in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus himself. As Nicole Massie Martin rightly argues, recognizing and surrendering power is not just a progressive value—it is a deeply Christian one.

It is indeed possible to be biblically grounded, justice-oriented, and inclusive. As Clint Schnekloth writes in A Guide to Progressive Church, “the gospel is ‘Left-resonant.’”⁷ But he also warns:

“The problem with Christian progressives abandoning a faith commitment... is then they no longer have any theological perspective that provides support for their actions and teachings.”⁸

Exactly.

When we cut ourselves off from Scripture and theology, we are no longer Christian progressives. We are just progressives. Though I’m not sure that automatically makes us Christian.

Notes

¹ Ben Crosby, interview by Martha Tatarnic, Future Christian Podcast, 2025.
² Nicole Massie Martin, Nailing It: Why Successful Leadership Demands Suffering & Surrender (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2022), 53, 58.
³ Nicole Massie Martin, Nailing It, 62–65.
⁴ Andrew Root, Evangelism in an Age of Despair (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2025), 76.
⁵ Andrew Root, Evangelism in an Age of Despair, 79.
⁶ Rick Herrick, Toward a Post-Biblical Christian Future (ProgressiveChristianity.org, 2025).
⁷ Clint Schnekloth, A Guide to Progressive Church (Dust Publishing, 2024), 6.
⁸ Clint Schnekloth, A Guide to Progressive Church, 6.