Jeffery L. Sheler, a longtime reporter and editor at U.S. News & World Report, has written a new book on evangelical Christians titled "Believers: A Journey into Evangelical America." A seasoned religion reporter and one-time evangelical, Sheler has written a book that has received positive reviews from magazines such as Christianity Today, which said he deserves gratitude for his work of "cross-cultural translation."

Sheler, who will give a reading of his book Monday, in Durham, answered some of our questions.

Q. You say in your book that the evangelical movement you once considered home had become a stranger to you beginning in the 1980s. How so?

A. Over the last two or three decades, evangelicals have become a very visible and influential part of American society. As a result, they've received a lot of attention from the news media, which often ignored them before. But the image that comes through is a flawed one. It's filled with stereotypes and caricatures. It presents evangelicals in political terms -- a movement whose agenda is primarily political. As a former evangelical, it just didn't reflect who I thought evangelicals to be. I felt it was time to explore the evangelical subculture to see who evangelicals are, what they stand for, who stands for them. My goal was not to polish the public image of evangelicals, but to present a more accurate and properly nuanced portrait.

Q. What are the biggest misconceptions about evangelicals?

A. First of all, that they're motivated primarily by politics. Another is that all evangelicals think alike, act alike and vote alike. Or that they're obedient, malleable followers of a bunch of broadcast preachers.

Q. You make the point that evangelical Christians are a diverse group. But what unites them?

A. When you think of hot-button issues, opposition to homosexual marriage, abortion and pornography -- those issues tend to unify evangelicals. [Theologically] what unites them are core religious beliefs: belief in the Bible as God's inerrant word; belief in Jesus as the only way of salvation; belief that the Bible compels them to spread the faith.

Q. Do you see the issues they are concerned about broadening?

A. It is broadening due to the efforts of some leaders who for years have been disappointed by how evangelicals are perceived in the wider culture and in Washington. The National Association of Evangelicals has made a deliberate effort to expand evangelical horizons in the political sphere by taking positions on global warming, human rights violations in Darfur, religious discrimination, war and peace, poverty, victims of AIDS in Africa. Not everyone welcomes that. Some are fighting it.

Q. Why?

A. They feel it dilutes their political influence. Some organizations such as Focus on the Family built their reputations on hot-button issues. To them it's a distraction. One can get cynical about it and say they don't want to share the limelight with other organizations or leaders. But I would be more charitable and say the issues they feel strongly about are those family issues. Anything that would distract them from it is an oppositional force.

Q. How have those disagreements been fought?

A. In February, a group of evangelical leaders including the NAE prepared an ad in the New York Times calling for action on global warming. A week before the ad came out, [some other evangelicals] fired a preemptive strike and took out an open letter to the NAE not to take a position on global warming. There's been some real vitriol between and among evangelicals over broadening the agenda.

Q. So how do evangelicals contribute to the national scene other than in politics?

A. What evangelicals do all the time is ministering in their communities, sharing their faith, working among the poor, taking care of the spiritual, human and social needs of their flock. It's what evangelicals have always done. ... Evangelical Christians are also catching up to the needs of people in Africa suffering terribly from the AIDS epidemic. Those things are beginning to be noticed. The increasing efforts and resources poured into these needs indicates a hopeful trend for the future of the evangelical movement.

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