September 30, 2011 | David Gushee is a Christian ethicist teaching at Mercer University who has long been a voice calling evangelicals to take up progressive social causes.

The Rev. Richard Cizik is an ordained Evangelical Presbyterian minister who was the chief lobbyist for the National Association of Evangelicals for a decade before resigning in 2008 after facing criticism for expressing openness to same-sex unions during an interview.

Last year, the two joined with the Rev. Steven Martin, a documentary filmmaker, to establish the New Evangelical Partnership for the Common Good.

Gushee and Cizik were at Duke University as panelists for the interfaith conference “Toward a Moral Consensus Against Torture.” They spoke with Faith & Leadership about the New Evangelical Partnership for the Common Good and how to move a disparate group of people.

Q: Why did you create the New Evangelical Partnership for the Common Good?

Gushee: There were three strands that came together.

I was head of Evangelicals for Human Rights. At the time -- in 2008 or 2009 -- it seemed clear to me that with the mission of EHR -- the focus on torture -- that it was time either to shut the organization down or to have a broader focus.

Steve Martin has been a pastor and documentary filmmaker for years. In a sense, starting this organization provided a chance for him to have a higher profile and a bigger platform.

With Rich, the way I would say it is that Rich needed a new organizational home.

Cizik: So we all needed each other for various reasons. I needed someone to work with me and give me accountability. EHR needed a new forum.

I had gotten the call from David in early 2009, and I was a little bit timid at first and a little bit resistant.

In my selfish, individualistic, American way, I was thinking, “Oh boy, I wonder how far along I can get this on the road before I take the risk of joining with my colleagues and finding that I would then be working for somebody else again.”

You have to understand, I was going through shock. The idea of then submitting myself to an organization and a board, and having to deal with someone equally as strong and compelling as David is, I was thinking, “Gosh, you know, do I really want to do that?” So I had to come to terms with that.

In desperation, finally, after about three or four months, I came to the humility of saying, “You were right. I can’t do this on my own.”

Q: Rich, is the idea for the New Evangelical Partnership to continue to do the kind of lobbying work that you’ve done but with a vision that you can embrace more fully?

Cizik: Yes, to be able to effect public change with a structure that fits my own politics, because I was beating my head against the wall for many years. Truth be told, I would come home from the NAE board meetings depressed. I’ve never said that publicly before, but I would come back feeling concerned, at the least, and depressed at the worst, because I felt like there weren’t people who shared my passion.

I thought I was building an executive committee of other like-minded people, but when push came to shove, the reality is even those friends weren’t willing to push back. Even though there are some real progressive voices in the NAE, I don’t think they were willing to pay the price themselves to say to the rest of the board, “This is something we should try.” They weren’t willing to say to the religious right any longer, “You’re wrong.”

Gushee: I think the original question was kind of, “Why partner with each other?” In my book “The Future of Faith in American Politics,” I suggested that there was an evangelical center that was distinguishable from the religious right and the left, but the center didn’t really have an organizational embodiment per se.

So, especially given the polarizing forces in American politics, the center easily disappears.

There was a need for an organization independent of the centrifugal forces right and left that was able to stand on its own two feet -- to follow what we understand the implications of Scripture and our faith to be without fear. Any organization that has the potential to be impacted by the religious right, in particular, you’re always in fear that somebody’s going to come get you from the right. It happened to Rich. It’s happened to me in different ways.

Likewise, if you’re in an organization that is funded by or loyal to the left, you can always get nailed from the left. You’re not liberal enough on this issue. You’re not saying what we want you to say.

We wanted a genuinely independent voice, in which we could follow God’s truth where we believed it led.

Cizik: The pressure from the left is to drop the faith factor and the pressure from the right is to be uncivil. There’s a gaping hole in the middle.

Q: What do you mean by the term “common good”?