Background
The IRD was founded in 1981 by United Methodist evangelist Edmund Robb and AFL-CIO official David Jessup. Michael Novak and Richard John Neuhaus joined the IRD board early on, as did Christianity Today magazine founding editor Carl F. H. Henry. Mark Tooley became IRD's president in 2009.
The early focus of IRD was to identify Marxist tendencies in mainline Protestant churches and draw attention to what it saw as attacks on religious liberty. IRD challenged churches that supported Marxist regimes such as the Sandinista regime in Nicaragua and Vietnam in the 1980s. In 1985, IRD co-sponsored a conference with the Reagan administration, where speakers attacked the National Council of Churches for its efforts to develop contacts with church leaders in the Soviet Union.
Since the early 1990s, the IRD has actively urged U.S. churches to affirm traditional Christian sexual ethical teachings, including opposition to same-sex marriage. IRD has also challenged mainline Protestant church agencies that support abortion rights. According to the IRD, international religious liberty is a chief concern, and their religious liberty program has especially focused on southern Sudan.
Since 9-11, IRD has emphasized the importance of traditional Christian "Just War" teachings. Most recently, IRD has challenged church officials who they say uncritically accept worst case scenarios regarding human-induced climate change. The IRD focuses much of its criticism on the policies of the United Methodist Church, the Episcopal Church and the Presbyterian Church (USA).
Notable members of the organization's Board of Directors include journalist Fred Barnes, United Methodist theologian Dr. Thomas C. Oden, Princeton University ethicist Dr. Robert P. George, theologian Michael Novak and former papal biographer George Weigel.
Read more about this topic: Institute On Religion And Democracy
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