NARRATOR: In part two of Christianity at a Crossroads.

ADAM HAMILTON: Stepping into the pulpit, I knew there are going to be people who will leave over this.

People have said, "I don't trust you anymore to preach the gospel."

RUSSELL MOORE: We're at a moment right now where the fundamental question is, "Does the church have ideals and principles?'

KEITH LANDRUM: You're going to be accused of spreading that Christian nationalism.

NEAL JACKSON: We want you to take your city for Christ.

WILL GREEN: I knew that I was both gay and called to ministry.

ALEXIS RECORD: We wanted to be as welcoming as we wished churches had been with us.

ADAM: And there are so few places in our society today that bring people together across political divides.

[Dramatic music crescendos] ♪ ♪ FEMALE ANNOUNCER: Major funding for this program was made possible by Lilly Endowment.

Additional funding provided by The Catholic Communication Campaign through the MPT Foundation and The E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation.

[Pensive atmospheric music] ♪ ♪ RYAN BURGE: It's unfathomable for me to describe how much religion has changed in America in the last 30 or 40 years.

It's just unbelievably different today than it was in the early 1970s.

For instance, in 1972, only 1 in 20 Americans said they were non-religious, and now it's 3 in 10 Americans, 30 percent are non-religious.

That's a quarter of the country who left religion in just about a 30-year period of time.

[Cars on highway] NARRATOR: Understanding some of the reasons why people leave organized religion and where they go, provides insight at the crossroads of Christianity today.

For years, those who rejected religion but wanted a place to gather had few options.

But that's changing.

San Diego, California, is home to a chapter of Sunday Assembly, an international organization that offers community for those who want a church-like experience without doctrine or God talk.

AARON BIGELBACH: Having grown up in a very fundamentalist evangelical Christian background, I was homeschooled all the way through high school.

Science was demonized.

And, you know, it left me with a lot of physical and religious, you know, derived trauma.

JIM DAVIS: I was raised in a very fundamentalist Christian church.

I wanted something that was more rational.

VALERIE NORTON: I grew up in a pretty mainstream Christian church, a Congregational church, and I had a wonderful experience in that church.

And I had also kind of gotten sort of like to the "age of reason", where I realized I didn't really believe in God.

I just liked being in a community.

ALEXIS RECORD: So, the point of Sunday Assembly is to provide community for those without one.

Having that support is why we exist.

We're non-religious community that lives better, helps often and wonders more.

And that's what we strive to do in our community is provide support and friendship, and love and just an ear, and also education, and fun trips.

READER: "Untitled" by Nikita Gill.

The rage you are feeling comes from the same place inside your heart as the love.

This is why you refuse to accept a world where cruelty remains and the fire consumes all.

ALEXIS: Our speaker today is Benjamin Bergen.

He is a professor of cognitive science at UC San Diego.

[Applause] VALERIE: You might get a talk about our criminal justice system.

You might get a talk about what was happening during the COVID epidemic.

We are curious.

We are information seekers, and we're really interested in all kinds of ideas and experiences, not just sort of moral philosophy.

And I think that's one of the things that makes this a new model.

NARRATOR: In Kansas City, Missouri, a similar kind of community called Oasis bought one of the many empty church buildings in the area.

Now, it's home for a growing body of nonbelievers.

JULIE SAMUEL-LAMBERD: Am I spiritual but not religious?

Am I agnostic?

Am I atheist?

You know, so I had to really do a lot of soul-searching hard work to understand really who I was, what I believed in, and where I think I fit in the universe.

And that's, you know, where...where I've ended up as a secular humanist.

I believe in taking care of people above all else.

MARK MENDON: I've been here about eight years.

Uh, I think I'm the only one that doesn't really have any.

I don't have any religious trauma.

I haven't had any.

I'm not mad at God or anything.

Maybe there is a God out there, but nobody showed me any evidence.

And every argument always comes down to faith.

ETHAN POWELL: I had a situation of leaving an intentional Christian community where I where I grew up and spent most of my life.

The whole time I was there, I was hiding the fact that I was gay.

I was hiding the real person that I was and how I believed.

MARK: Every day I listened to the Bible.

Uh, I've also gone through the Koran.

I've read the Book of Mormon.

Uh I just question everything.

JULIE: I don't personally expect any kind of reward.

This is the life I have and I want to live it the best way.

That's the best for me.

The people around me in my little corner of the world is better for me, having been here, and that's all it is.

It's the thing about being a humanist is where we have.

We're here to stay.

We're here to stay and build this community for the long term.

ALAN COOPERMAN: Now, atheists and agnostics tend to be very knowledgeable about religion.

We know that from the studies we've done where we've measured religious knowledge, they tend to have high levels of education, and they actually tend to be very active in their community.

ALEXIS: So, just come on in from the lobby, grab your coffee.

Hello everyone, and welcome to Sunday Assembly San Diego.

[Applause and cheering] ALEXIS: You know, I grew up in a high demand religion.

We weren't allowed to have friends that weren't Christian.

We weren't allowed to say certain words, read certain books, listen to certain music.

When I came out as a nonbeliever, when I finally admitted it to my friends, they weren't my friends anymore.

We lost so many acquaintances.

We lost a community.

I know when I deconstructed my faith, I thought, I'm a cycle breaker.

My kids will never have purity culture.

They will never have a million rules.

They'll never fear going to hell or sin.

They'll never have potlucks.

They'll never be able to have an instant identity with a group.

They'll never be able to have that support system built in.

Yay!

My kids will never have to experience church.

Oh, no.

My kids will never get to experience church.

[Rock music] ♪ Only shooting stars break the mold ♪ [Cheering and applause] PAUL SVENSON: We don't have history.

We don't have traditions that you know, we can fight over.

And there's no rules here, you know, show up.

LAURA HEYWOOD: Well, we do have one rule.

It's unwritten.

It's basically, don't be a jerk.

[Bright music] NARRATOR: And what seems to be common across these groups, is a commitment to serve the outside community.

It's one of the aspects that attracts new members.

JEN MCCOWN: We're here as part of the Adopt-a-Beach program.

This is our beach that we have adopted.

A lot of times people will come to volunteer events because our volunteer events are open for anyone in the community to join.

We do cleanups.

We feed homeless youth and young adults.

We bring meals to a safe parking site.

We feed people at a migrant shelter.

We do a lot of different things.

ALEXIS: Service is a third of what we do because it is a third of our motto, help often, and I think it is important to have something bigger than yourself, or this community would be pretty hollow without service.

I hoped it would be a safe place to bring my whole family.

I wanted my kids to experience community like I experienced, just with none of the baggage, and it has exceeded my expectations.

We had tried an atheist organization I won't name.

We went to one of their events and they bashed Christians the whole time.

I am married to a Christian, I have Christian family and I am fresh out of the church at this point, so I couldn't have that kind of community.

But in San Diego, we worked really hard to make this welcoming for believers, nonbelievers, people of all faiths, a lot of spiritual, but none you use.

We are just welcoming to everyone.

And then, each Assembly got to kind of create its own self, its own identity out of the culture it was in.

But as the climate changed and Christianity took a dip and the "nones" took a rise, we wanted to be as welcoming as we wished churches had been with us.

[Cheering] [Song: "My Country 'Tis of Thee"] NEWSREEL ANNOUNCER: Throughout the world, throngs of people hail the end of the war in Europe.

It is five years and more since Hitler marched into Poland, years full of suffering and death and sacrifice.

Now the war against Germany is won.

[Song continues] NARRATOR: With World War II behind them.

Americans began building at a pace the country had never seen.

Entire neighborhoods were emerging.

ARCHIVAL FILM NARRATOR: Wherever the people go, these multiplying, moving, building people of America, the church must go too.

MARK ELSDON: In the first half of the 20th century, we saw a massive increase in attendance and in participation in churches, as well as just a population increase in general.

And so, that led to expansion right, adding properties, adding facilities, growing bigger buildings, more buildings to build spaces for the things that people thought were needed, and also for the sort of idea that this would go on forever.

NARRATOR: Two churches in Silver Spring, Maryland, only a few miles apart, exemplify the optimism of 20th century American Christianity.

Marvin Memorial was named for a Confederate chaplain in the Civil War who became a bishop in the Methodist Church.

Woodside Methodist was a predominantly White congregation that took the courageous step to integrate in the turbulent 1960s.

WILL ED GREEN: At one point, Woodside was worshiping somewhere between 2 and 3,000 people in a weekend Marvin was worshiping somewhere between 1,000 and 2,000 people in a weekend.

And that period of growth happened in a matter of 2 or 3 years.

So, imagine two very small congregations growing exponentially, multiple building campaigns within a decade.

MARILYN PARR: We joined Marvin in 1974, and in the '70s, there were less people beginning to attend church, and the neighborhoods were beginning to turn over.

People were moving out, new people were moving in that were not necessarily interested in coming to a white Protestant church.

KATIE WHITLEY: I came here in April of 1968.

It was the Sunday after Martin Luther King had been killed, but we could not get into the city then.

It was no entry into the District of Columbia because of all of the rioting and everything that was going on after King's death.

But I asked my mother, who was at that time 75 years old, and I said, "Do you want to take a chance and go to this church?

I don't know if they'll let us in or not, but let's try."

So, we came in and walked in and we were greeted graciously, and there was nobody else that I could see that looked like me.

NARRATOR: That changed in the years that followed.

Woodside became more integrated, and Marvin Memorial hired its first Black pastor in 1968, a move that nearly split the church.

But over time, both congregations struggled financially as attendance dropped.

In 2014, the decision was made to merge Woodside and Marvin, forming what is now Silver Spring United Methodist Church.

WILL: Not only was the merger very successful, it resulted in an incredibly diverse community of faith - economically, racially, culturally, politically.

KATIE: It began to grow.

There were more African-American families coming in, and we stayed and things changed in the church as it did overall in the world.. NARRATOR: Today, Silver Spring United Methodist is at the leading edge of a new crossroad.

JACQUALINE BROOKS: The fact that pastor Will is gay was a sign for us.

There was always someone who would get in the pulpit and say that, you know, I wasn't good enough or my lifestyle was wrong.

WILL: My identity as an LGBTQIA person is simply a part of who I am, right?

It's not the reason I'm in the pulpit.

It's not always pertinent to what needs to be preached or taught or proclaimed.

NARRATOR: Debates over homosexuality have stoked seismic divisions within the United Methodist Church, the largest mainline Protestant denomination in America.

One quarter...nearly 8,000 churches, elected to leave the denomination.

It was the largest church schism since the Civil War, when many denominations broke apart over slavery.

WOMAN: The chair recognizes Delegate Effie McAvoy at mic number one.

EFFIE MCAVOY: Female, New England, queer, Black, African American.

Can we end debate?

WOMAN: Is there a second?

[Cheering and applause] NARRATOR: At an International Methodist conference in 2024, the church voted to approve gay clergy and gay marriage, ending a long struggle for pastors like Will Green.

[Group singing] ♪ You are a child, you are a child of God ♪ WILL: Because I knew that I was both gay and called to ministry.

I had to wrestle with that early in my life.

And I remember a moment I think I was I was 17, almost 18, and I was feeling this call to ministry so profoundly, this call to preach so profoundly, and the deep desire to share my love and life with someone else.

And I laid down face first on the floor in front of the altar, and I prayed that God would take the life from my body.

I couldn't live in that tension anymore.

And I remember in that moment, this feeling of love enveloped me, and hearing in the back of my mind, almost as clear as a voice out loud in the space "I have called you, I've claimed you.

Nobody can ever change that."

WILL: As a gay man, on this reconciling Sunday, standing in a pulpit that five years ago, the Book of Discipline said, I could not stand.

WILL: Our commitments to inclusion have actually attracted more folk who were non-LGBTQIA identified, right.

They have cousins, brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, uh, children who are LGBTQIA identified, and they want to be able to help their family heal from religious trauma because they've come from families where there has been trauma around that, or because they want to raise their children or have spaces for their families to gather in faith that are safe and inclusive.

JENNIFER KIDWELL: That's a big motivating factor for many of us.

I wanted to be in a church where I knew that my children would be welcomed and would be celebrated for who they were, and so being here and having them see all types of families-- and all types of leaders and all types of people who are celebrated not just for who they are, but also for the gifts that they bring, is...is a huge deal.

And they're surprised to learn that other people might believe differently.

KYLE WHITLEY: When my family joined the church, it was more of racial integration.

But I think that there is a common thread that goes through the Civil Rights period into today, where inclusion has a much broader meaning, and I feel fortunate to have grown up not only as a member of this family, but a member of this church family that, you know, has carried that tradition through.

NARRATOR: Today, Silver Spring United Methodist Church and the congregations that merged to create it, are welcoming a new guest, this time from a different denomination.

Christ Congregational is part of the United Church of Christ, but dwindling numbers and rising financial costs, the same issues that plagued Marvin and Woodside, have forced them to sell their building.

Now, they'll temporarily move into the basement of Silver Spring United Methodist Church and share some joint ministries.

MATT BRADDOCK: This day is about the culmination of 80 years as a congregation who we've been and the people who've made this place what it is, and having a chance to say our final goodbye to this building.

Being here today feels a little strange, doesn't it?

In this room that has held us, shaped us.

This place has witnessed baptisms and weddings, and memorials.

And for those here feeling grief or uncertainty, what can we say?

Except to know God's love holds you and we hold each other as we take this step together.

[Pensive hymn like music] MATT: We started packing yesterday.

Have the U-Haul ready to go, a caravan of some cars that will go to Silver Spring United Methodist Church this afternoon, and we'll be unloading into an office suite there and keeping our things in storage until we're ready to worship.

I think the ones at this point who have stayed are the ones who are coming along with us, and it's a great core of people.

JUDY COX: I've been a member here almost 30 years.

That cross has been here since I first walked in the sanctuary, and now it does look like a void up there, but I am glad that we'll be bringing it with us.

MATT: Well, a lot of churches are shutting their doors or merging with other congregations, selling, and giving away their assets, and we're not ready to do that.

We still think we're a vital, important congregation.

[Dramatic music] NARRATOR: In 1925, a high-profile trial in Tennessee would play a major role in how many conservative Christians would engage American culture in the 20th century.

The Scopes Trial, also known as "The Monkey Trial," pitted science teacher John Scopes and his attempt to teach Darwin's theories of evolution in public schools against the traditional biblical account of creation.

It was the first trial broadcast on national radio, and it captivated the nation.

Scopes was found guilty and fined $100, but many felt it was the Christian fundamentalist movement that lost the battle for public opinion.

For the next decades, many Christians remained quietly under the radar, building up their schools and media and staying out of politics.

But in 1954, with the racial integration of public schools, in 1962, with the removal of prayer in public schools, in 1973 with legalized abortion; conservative Christians were outraged enough to mobilize.

NARRATOR: In 1979, Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority formed to speak out publicly on behalf of conservative biblical values.

They put their support behind the Republican Party and Ronald Reagan, who won.

Since then, conservative Christians have been a significant part of the Republican voting bloc, and it has often made for strange bedfellows.

ALBERT MOHLER: If you put an Orthodox Jewish person and a traditionalist Roman Catholic person and a confessional evangelical Protestant person in the room.

The fact is that on the most controversial cultural issues, they're actually pretty much together, far more together than anyone would have imagined.

RYAN BURGE: So, there's this really interesting social science concept called "The God Gap."

And that's the idea that the political parties in America have sorted over the issue of religion.

It's really, really hard to be a Republican atheist.

And it's really, really hard to be a Democrat who's also an evangelical.

For a long time in social science, we just assumed that religion was the first lens.

It was the way we looked at the world, and politics lived downstream of religion.

Maybe we had it all wrong to begin with.

Maybe politics has always been the first lens that everything lives downstream of that.

So now, we don't pick our candidate based on what church we go to.

We pick what church we go to, or if we go to church, based on who we vote for.

AMBASSADOR MIKE HUCKABEE: It's life and death.

It is good and evil, and it is God versus the Prince of Darkness.

And if you see it in any other way, you'll miss the whole picture.

If pastors would use their pulpits not to tell people how to vote, but to encourage people simply to take their biblical values into the polling place and vote what they believe.

NARRATOR: The American Renewal Project is a nonprofit organization that coordinates gatherings at Christian churches to register people to vote, and to guide pastors and church leaders to run for public office.

They claim more than 100,000 pastors are engaged.

AMBASSADOR MIKE: Forty million people who call themselves evangelical Christians in this country don't vote.

Forty million.

If 40 million people showed up and voted their biblical convictions, it's game over.

[crowd responding] DAVID LANE: Our mantra is that every church in America has to have a pastor, a deacon, an elder, or a congregant running for local office, if we're going to save the country, turn the country back to the Lord.

AMBASSADOR MIKE: Don't be afraid to take the Scripture and apply it to the culture of the day.

That's not being political, that's being biblical.

JIMMY BENTION SR.

: One of the things that I said when I ran for school board was that I was going to make sure that God has a seat at the table.

SHERRY HODGES: We're the ones who can make a difference and protect our families, our legacy, our communities, and our nation.

CAMERON MCGILL: What will we as pastors and ministry leaders do to make sure we thwart the attack of the enemy when it comes to our democracy and the future of our nation?

NEAL JACKSON: We want you to take your city for Christ.

Our goal is spiritual now.

The result is political.

If you don't take Monroe for Jesus, who is?

GROUP: That's right.

CAMERON: We have in the Word of God a moral compass that goes beyond the feelings of the day or the fads of the day, or whatever it might be.

You know, the foundational truths that our that our nation was founded upon were biblical.

They were solid.

They would withstand the test of time.

AMBASSADOR MIKE: Mobilization of pastors is really important in terms of helping the people in the pews realize that the country is in their hands.

We have not just a right of voting.

We have a responsibility.

And it doesn't matter whether a person is one of faith or not.

Citizenship goes along with the idea that if we don't vote, we get the government we deserve, and we really kind of lose the right to complain about it.

NARRATOR: Yet, churches becoming politically involved is concerning for many Americans.

GREGORY SMITH: When we ask people what they think about the involvement of churches in politics, most people tell us they want churches to stay out of politics.

Majorities of the public tell us they think churches should keep out of political matters, and they definitely think churches should not be in the business of endorsing political candidates.

NARRATOR: The American Renewal Project sees things differently and may now have even greater latitude to work.

The First Amendment to the U.S.

Constitution says, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."

While, the application of the amendment is endlessly debated, the principle has been a cornerstone of religious freedom from the earliest days of the nation.

The separation of church and state means churches, and other nonprofits are prohibited from endorsing or opposing political candidates at the risk of losing their tax-exempt status.

But over the decades, the law has been enforced only on rare occasion, and new court rulings may give churches even more latitude to endorse or criticize candidates or parties.

AMBASSADOR MIKE: There is a nonsensical attitude of separation of church and state.

People use that phrase without even understanding where it came from.

It came from Thomas Jefferson in a letter to the Danbury Baptist Association in 1803.

He wrote it to that Association who had written him because of a rumor that was circulating that the government was getting ready to declare an official state church in America, likely the Episcopal Church.

Jefferson basically said, "There is a separation of church and state, but it's not that the church shouldn't speak to government, it's that government shouldn't speak to the church."

NARRATOR: And at each American Renewal event, those who hold public office and those who plan to run are prayed over.

[all praying aloud] KEITH LANDRUM: Father, thank you for the stand they take in the public square that brings honor and glory to you, and we pray that their tribe will increase.

In Jesus name, Amen.

DAVID: This is about the transformation of the culture.

We're looking to the next generation.

And you know, it may take 50 years of this before we get our people in such a position across the nation.

We want Christian values.

We want biblical values.

That's what our goal is.

KEITH: You're going to be accused of spreading that Christian nationalism, but it's not Christian nationalism, it's Christian citizenship.

MELISSA DECKMAN: One thing that we've seen in American politics is the rise of Christian nationalism as an influence.

Christian nationalists believe that the that America was founded as a Christian nation and should still remain a Christian nation.

They think that America's greatness is linked to its status as a Christian nation.

[Chanting of crowds] NARRATOR: January 6th, 2021: one of the most shocking days in recent American history.

It was a day when the deep convulsions within American Christianity were on full display.

Certainly, many in the crowd would consider themselves Christian nationalists, but for many others, even millions of conservative Christians, the events were deeply disturbing.

RUSSELL MOORE: I was angered at almost every level by watching what happened at the insurrection on, on January 6th, but I was uniquely outraged as a Christian, seeing the "Jesus Saves" sign and the Christian imagery that was being used, while you have a hangman's gallows being constructed to execute the Vice President of the United States.

NARRATOR: Christian nationalism has captured America's attention, but how representative of American Christianity is it?

ALAN COOPERMAN: Most Americans not only don't take that label for themselves, they've never heard of it.

We get about 5.0 percent of Americans, 5.0 percent who say both that they've heard of Christian nationalism and that they support it.

MELISSA: We also find, however, that an additional 19 percent are sympathetic to the views that many Christian nationalists espouse.

NARRATOR: For some, the rise of Christian nationalism reignites a dangerous flame from America's past.

OTIS MOSS III: Christian nationalism is not anything new.

The post reconstruction period was all about what we would call Christian nationalism.

The KKK was born during that period because the South felt it was losing something.

It had to create a system to say to people who are working class, these people are taking your jobs.

Don't you want to do something about them to keep them in their place?

We need churches that are going to be patriotic to ensure that America will thrive.

So, Christian nationalism is a part of the lineage of America not dealing with its original sin.

ALAN: There are many Americans who are both patriotic and religious.

And if you ask them, if the United States is a Christian nation or should be a Christian nation, they will say, yes, it is a Christian nation, or it should be a Christian nation.

Many of those people do not think that Christianity should be the "official" religion of the United States, or that Christians should have privileges that other religions don't have.

For many Americans, American Christians, when you ask whether we should be a Christian nation, what they hear in that question is should we be a moral nation?

A nation that adheres to good principles?

[Applause] ROBERT JEFFRESS: America was founded not exclusively but primarily by orthodox Christians, and they founded this country upon the unchanging foundation of God's eternal truth.

And furthermore, our founders believed that our success as a nation depended upon our faithfulness to God's eternal word.

And though this, though it is completely politically incorrect to say, the truth is this: America was founded as a Christian nation.

[Applause] [Choir singing] ♪ I'll praise 'cause You're sovereign ♪ ♪ I'll praise 'cause You reign ♪ ♪ I'll praise 'cause You rose and defeated the grave ♪ ♪ I'll praise 'cause You're faithful ♪ ♪ Praise 'cause You're true ♪ ♪ Praise 'cause there's nobody greater than You ♪ ♪ Praise the Lord, O my soul ♪ NARRATOR: Robert Jeffress is pastor of historic First Baptist Church in Dallas, Texas.

With 16,000 members, it is a vibrant congregation that prides itself on preaching what they see as the unchanging, inerrant truth of the Bible.

Pastor Jeffress has become one of the more influential conservative Christian voices in America today.

♪ I won't be quiet, my God is alive ♪ ♪ How could I keep it inside ♪ ♪ Praise the Lord, O my soul ♪ ♪ ♪ ROBERT: But church filled with true believers is a lot more powerful than a church that's filled with mediocre, lukewarm Christians and I see more and more people turning away from biblical Christianity.

The falling away that we see, the decline in church attendance is really a good thing in some senses.

People are no longer feeling the necessity to be a cultural Christian.

It used to be, in the 1950s and '60s, that to be a good person you had to go to church, people thought.

Whether or not you believed what was being taught in church was another matter, but you wanted to maintain the appearance.

In today's increasingly secular culture, people feel the less to put on religious airs and to pretend they're religious.

The way you measure the success of the church is in its fidelity to the Bible.

ROBERT: If you have your Bibles, turn to James chapter one, as we discover today, triumphing over troubles.

How to triumph over your troubles.

The churches that seem to be growing, in most cases, are churches that retain a belief that the Bible is God's word to man and preaching that message regardless of what the culture does.

Cultures change, polls change, people change, but the Word of God never changes.

NARRATOR: American culture clearly has changed, dramatically over the last several generations, and Christianity finds itself at the crossroads.

ROBERT: One of the most obvious is 2015, when the definition of marriage was changed by the Supreme Court.

I think that was a seismic shift when people said, and many in the church went along with the fact that we can redefine marriage.

Views on abortion and the sanctity of life have changed over the years.

NARRATOR: So, to educate and prepare people for what they view as the challenges of contemporary culture, First Baptist designates part of its campus to what they call Discipleship University.

Here, people receive instruction on everything from how to confront addiction.

OLDER WOMAN: 2 Peter 2:19: "People are slaves to whatever has mastered them."

That's what the Bible says.

NARRATOR: To the biblical understanding of marriage, a Christian approach to finance, and how to live according to their understanding of God's laws.

MAN: "It's not made for a righteous person, but for those who are lawless and rebellious, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for murderers and immoral men and homosexuals, and kidnapers, and liars."

MATTHEW MCKELLAR: Human nature has not changed.

We are sinners, and we are prone to repeat the same sins.

[Applause] ROBERT: Would you join me in welcoming our great friend, President Donald J. Trump?

Come on up, Mr.

President.

Love you.

[More cheering] PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We ask God to bless our nation and our people with faith and hope, and love, and peace.

ROBERT: People misunderstand First Baptist Dallas that we're here endorsing candidates.

We follow very clearly the IRS regulations about endorsing particular candidates.

We don't do that.

He's worshiped with us here.

President Trump is a friend of mine.

He calls me and asks questions.

I certainly respond when he does.

We always hear stories of a few people leaving the church.

Not everybody agreed with my advocacy outside of the church for President Trump, but the vast majority of people here are people who believe like I do, and they believe that the Bible has the answer to man's dilemma.

[Triumphant music] NARRATOR: Founded in 1868, First Baptist Dallas has been a flagship church in the Southern Baptist Convention long before Robert Jeffress became pastor in 2007.

Two pastors, George Truett and W.A.

Criswell, served back to back for nearly a century, and while many churches begun in the city later followed population growths to the suburbs, First Baptist has remained committed to downtown Dallas.

ROBERT: It is a church that hosted presidents like Woodrow Wilson and Gerald Ford and George Bush.

Billy Graham preached from that sanctuary many times.

He was a member of our church for 54 years.

[Sirens] ROBERT: Our historic sanctuary that served our church for about 130 years recently burned to the ground.

It was a four-alarm fire.

It was a gut punch.

It was for the city of Dallas.

NARRATOR: Yet, like a phoenix rising from the ashes, First Baptist Dallas now uses its sprawling new facility to preach an understanding of Scripture that often puts it at odds with contemporary culture.

ROBERT: One recent cultural issue that the church needed to address, and in many cases failed to do so, was the gender issue.

God has created us for good, and to try to change your gender is in fact, to defy what God has ordained.

MATTHEW MCKELLAR: Biblically speaking, the male-female relationship is not a matter of culture.

It's a matter of what God has ordained in creation.

Now, having said that, there are no second-class citizens in the Kingdom of God.

God uses women and their giftedness, and he uses men in their giftedness.

But when it comes to the primary leadership roles in the church, those have been entrusted to men.

Women understanding God's assignments for them gladly serve in roles under the male leadership of the local church.

MARGIE FOSTER: I've been ministering to women who mostly stayed home with children.

How to raise your children.

How to be a loving wife and a training mother.

ROBERT: At our church, we have reaffirmed the value of women in ministry.

When a woman feels called to be a children's pastor, or to work with young adults, or to be a missionary, or to work with other women, we commission them.

That's what we call it commissioning.

But the one thing they can't do according to Scripture is to be a pastor.

We have to be clear about that.

A church that has a woman pastor as the lead pastor preaching every week is not a biblical church according to the New Testament.

But in denouncing that, we need to affirm women as capable of doing other things as well of service and value in the church.

ROBERT: You know, if you've been abandoned by your mate, if you've lost a child or a grandchild, if you've experienced bankruptcy, you're not the first Christian who's gone through that.

And that's one reason we are together in a church, so that we can encourage one another and strengthen one another.

[Choir singing] MARGIE FOSTER: We have to take that responsibility to pass on the faith to the next generation.

I see that happening here.

MATTHEW: I think, what's distinct about First Baptist Dallas there is a commitment to the authority of Scripture, not just its ideas, but every word and syllable inspired by the Holy Spirit.

And so, so that is our authority, the Bible.

ROBERT: If the church is parroting the same message people are hearing on television or YouTube or the Internet, why do they need to get up and get dressed on Sunday morning to go hear the same thing they're going to hear during the week?

They need to hear something that's counter to the culture, and that is unique to the Word of God.

[Choir singing continues] NARRATOR: At First Baptist Dallas, there is a steadfast assurance in the inerrancy of Scripture.

Yet, other Christian communities, drawing on the same sacred texts, feel compelled to take a less literal, more contextualized understanding of Scripture, particularly when it comes to gender identity and the role of women.

[Melodic piano music] NARRATOR: This is a gathering for people who are making a decision to join Resurrection, a United Methodist church in Kansas City, Missouri.

While, many congregations are struggling, Resurrection is adding between 1,500 and 2,000 members every year.

ADAM: You can be smart and a Christian, and you don't have to reject science to be a Christian.

And you can ask critical questions of the Bible.

And it's okay to have doubts.

And in asking questions and having doubts, we find often a deeper faith.

So, our focus has been not trying to convince people from other churches to join us, but instead to find people who have been turned off to Christianity or turned off to faith.

Or maybe they have faith, but they've been turned off to the church.

MALE MEMBER: Here, you're almost encouraged to question things, right?

And what you find is if you start questioning things, it doesn't make you a bad person?

FEMALE MEMBER: Now, I'm understanding what so much of the Bible means.

And so, every week when I come to listen to the sermon, I'm like, I am actually like learning.

It's opened my eyes a lot.

NARRATOR: Resurrection was started in a funeral home in 1990 by then 25-year-old Adam Hamilton.

He has been Resurrection's pastor ever since.

Today, with more than a half dozen locations in the area, resurrection is not only the largest church in Kansas City, it's the largest mainline Protestant church in America with over 22,000 members.

Some church buildings are traditional, others ultramodern, and the music and worship offerings are both traditional [Congregation singing] ♪ Holy, Lord God Almighty ♪ NARRATOR: and contemporary.

[Christian rock band performing] ♪ Reaches right down to the heart of us, ♪ ♪ I don't know what ♪ NARRATOR: Yet, each church receives the same weekly message from the pastor.

ADAM: Here's the problem: when you start trying to separate yourself from sinners, you're having to make a judgment call and you're deciding that person is a sinner.

And I can't associate, they're enough of a sinner that I can't associate with then because everybody's sinners.

And what sometimes happens is you forget the kind of sins that's growing up in your own heart.

And then, what that does is that judgment call inside of you begins to well up into self-righteousness and judgmentalism, and hypocrisy.

NARRATOR: With locations across the city, it enables Resurrection to provide much needed services and the chance to build small communities for their own members and others who might never step into a church.

This group is called Resurrection Moms.

YOUNG MOTHER: I've never felt judged within this group.

That's why I keep coming back.

Everyone's faith based, but no one shoves it in your face.

It's just moms trusting each other and being there for each other.

LEADER: Do you think it's easier to invite someone to come to something like this than it is to come to Sunday morning worship?

GROUP: Yeah.

FEMALE MEMBER OF GROUP: My husband is not religious.

He completely identifies as agnostic, and nobody has ever held any of that for us or against us.

JEN SCHULTZ: You have pastors' kids, working moms, single moms.

You have stay at home moms, moms with children who struggle with addiction.

It's about a safe place to say, I do not want to do this alone.

CHERYL JEFFERSON BELL: And we ask for your mercy.

For those dealing with poverty or sickness, troubled relationships, mental health, loneliness, or anything else that is heavy on our souls.

MAN: Who are you?

And what brings you here?

NATHAN: My name is Nathan.

I'm a recovering addict, alcoholic, and I have 13 days clean.

MAN: Yeah.

[cheering and applause] NARRATOR: For the thousands who struggle with some form of addiction, creating community is critical.

And it is a part of Resurrection's many recovery programs.

LAURA MUSSULMAN: I'd been homeless.

And um, when I came back from, from Afghanistan, I went right back to drinking.

And, um, you know, that's where I hit my bottom.

And I wanted to make a change.

JEN: Most of the groups that start were started because someone in the congregation said: "I need this.

Can I start it?"

TOM LANGHOFER: I felt a need to start a recovery ministry here at the church.

I'm a recovering alcoholic in long term recovery.

Somewhere in the range of 16 to 17,000 people attend at least one of our recovery programs a year.

NARRATOR: When Tom Langhofer was given the chance to start Resurrection's Recovery program, it came with the request he leave his job and study to become a pastor.

TOM: I get to officiate a lot of weddings.

I get to be part of a lot of baptisms.

There's a lot of overdose deaths, a lot of deaths from alcoholism.

Uh, I get the honor of doing a lot of services.

MALE MEMBER OF GROUP: I don't know how the next day will go, but today I have 365 days.

MAN: That's right.

[cheering and applause] ADAM: As a church, you know, we want to be a place that welcomes and embraces people who feel like they're broken.

They're outsiders.

And for me personally, my grandfather was an alcoholic.

I, you know, my stepfather was an alcoholic.

I had my uncle was an addict.

We...you know, my experience growing up was not was fairly closely linked to people who struggled with alcoholism.

LAURA MUSSULMAN: I think right now I'm still on a spiritual journey.

I'm not really sure where I'm going to land.

I attend this church every Sunday because I'm really interested in growing as a human and how I can serve my community.

JEN: No matter where you are, or what you're going through, as long as you're safe and you don't bring drugs or alcohol into the building, you are welcome.

ADAM: Some people think that large churches never really say anything controversial, never say anything difficult.

They're all about bringing people together and soft selling, you know, hard things.

But that's not been the case here at Resurrection.

You know, our aim has been to speak into the critical issues that we face in our society, controversial issues, and to do that in a way that people on both sides might be heard, but in the end, to come out and say, but as your pastor, this is how I see this issue, and I could be wrong, but I'm inviting you to think about this with me.

And that's exactly what we did when it came to same-gender marriage.

ANN WILLIAMS: God, we know that the journey hasn't always been easy and that there have been places of rejection, places of discouragement, and maybe moments where um, we didn't know if there would be hope at all, ever.

RYAN BLISS: I grew up Southern Baptist.

And I was actually a Southern Baptist pastor.

When I came out, I was afraid I would lose that ministry that I felt God had called me to.

And so, I started coming here to Resurrection with Ryan.

And I feel like I'm at home.

I'm seen as a person first, um, but I have opportunities to minister to people in my community, in the queer community.

And so, I didn't lose that ministry.

RYAN CONRAD: We not only feel that we're welcomed but we feel that we have a seat at the table.

ADAM: Stepping into the pulpit, I knew there are going to be people who will leave over this.

They're going to be people who won't be my friends anymore over this.

And of course, that's what happened.

We had 800 people who left the church over the next few months, people have said, "I don't trust you anymore to preach the gospel."

MARGOT SEYMOUR: Being queer just means, I'm a little bit different, and I love a different way.

But I pay my bills, I do all my things, and I find solace with my fellow people at the table and experiencing Christ together.

JENNIFER MARIE: Churches are hateful, is what people tell me.

And and I say, God is not hateful.

And so, there are churches.

You just have to dig deep to find the right church near you that is accepting and you can be your authentic self in.

NARRATOR: Resurrection estimates as many as 1,000 of its members are gay.

ADAM: And ultimately, for us, this question is a question of how we interpret Scripture.

How are we interpreting those hard passages that say something about same gender relationships?

A, it's possible to interpret them literally the way they are, but it's also possible to interpret those scriptures, the way we interpret passages that allow for slavery in the Bible, or challenge parents to discipline their children with rods, or require women to be silent in the church.

We don't want to live those literally today.

We're going to try to understand them in the light of their historical and cultural context.

And isn't it possible that those handful of passages that speak to same-gender relationships are the same?

Most of our people say, yes, and some of our people say, well, I'm not really sure, but I love this church.

JEN: Regardless of where you're from, regardless of what you believe, regardless of how you identify, regardless of who you are.

This is a safe place for that to happen.

As a result, we have people that are coming into the church that are helping us as an entire population of people be better.

ADAM: Let's make room for both traditionalists and progressives to be in the same church.

And we're going to welcome and love everybody, and we're going to stop saying things that hurt people.

Here at Resurrection, we survey our people from time to time, not to find out what we should say, but to find out who are the people who are sitting here.

And the last time we surveyed and asked about politics, we found 40 percent of our people were Republicans, 40 percent were, and 20 percent were independents.

And there are so few places in our society today that bring people together across political divides.

And, you know, I just I think that's one of our strengths.

ADAM: He took bread.

He gave thanks to God.

He blessed it and broke it.

And he said, take and eat.

This is my body given for you as often as you do this, remember me.

ANN WILLIAMS: This is the blood of the new covenant poured out for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins.

ADAM: All right.

Look up at the window.

It's the largest single stained glass window in a church in the world.

When we designed the window, we asked the artist, we want the risen Christ to be standing there.

And we want him to be saying, "come to me, all, who are weary and heavy laden."

At the end of worship, we wanted him, in essence to be saying, now get out of here and get to work.

LAURA MUSSULMAN: I think the biggest thing about recovery is that has given me a purpose, not only to um stay sober, but the key is to helping others.

ADAM: Will you make this your church family?

Will you love the people who are here and allow them to love and care for you?

We're Church of the Resurrection.

We're a place that believes that evil, hate, sin and death don't have the final word and that there's always hope, no matter how dark our life may be at a particular moment.

WOMAN: Thank you.

Thanks, so much.

ADAM: Absolutely.

It's an honor to be your pastor.

Thanks.

See you later.

I love these people.

I love this church.

I love these people.

And I consider it one of the great joys and honors of my life to get to be their pastor.

Amen.

See you next week.

[music ends] [Geese honking] NARRATOR: In part three of Christianity at a Crossroads.

MARK KOPKA: Life on the farm is difficult.

People that live in the country that live close to the earth have this deep connection to the soil.

BRIAN JONES: People will have to decide either to change their politics or to change their faith.

OWEN LEE: There is Korean spirituality and there is also a kind of a Korean-American spirituality.

SHAY AUERBACH: Hispanic presence is a blessing and a challenge.

It can and is changing the church.

TANYA GONZALEZ: These are immigrants with very different stories.

JEANETTE SALGUERO: [translating from Spanish] God used Joseph the immigrant to save a nation.

ALFREDO ARREOLA: This is who we are in a country that sometimes is not happy with us being here.

[Dramatic music crescendos] FEMALE ANNOUNCER: For more information about this film, visit Journeyfilms.com.

[Dramatic music] ♪ ♪ Major funding for this program was made possible by Lilly Endowment.

Additional funding provided by The Catholic Communication Campaign through the MPT Foundation and The E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪