Wallace Thompson: The Caleb Founcation - 25 years of defending our priceless evangelical heritage

In 1995 a few evangelical Protestants, including myself, held a series of constructive meetings with the then head of BBC NI. Our purpose was to highlight our concerns about what was perceived to be an underrepresentation of the mainstream evangelical viewpoint in BBC output. We pointed out that the smaller evangelical denominations and churches represented, between them, a significant number of people.

The BBC’s positive response led us to conclude that the potential which we saw in those discussions could best be realized through the establishment of a body which could articulate the concerns of those various churches, and thus the Caleb Foundation was born.

An initial planning meeting in Ballymoney in February 1998, attended by a cross-section of evangelicals across the various separatist denominations, was followed by the official launch at a special event on October 16, 1998 in the Park Avenue Hotel in east Belfast.

The name was chosen in honour of a man in the Old Testament called Caleb. In the Book of Numbers he, along with Joshua, urged Moses to move forward and take the land of Canaan because God was with His people. Caleb later testified that “I wholly followed the LORD my God” (Joshua 14:8) and this declaration was supported by Moses and confirmed by the Lord himself.

Since its inception, the Caleb Foundation has sought to give clear leadership and direction to evangelical Protestant Christians in the area of public morals. Our representations to the BBC have been very beneficial. We have seen a greater evangelical presence on Thought for the Day, the Sunday morning broadcast services and also on discussion programmes such as Sunday Sequence, Talkback and the Nolan Show.

Of course, all is not perfect in some of these areas - for example we have concerns about some current trends within Thought for the Day - but our ongoing dialogue with the BBC is greatly valued and it does deliver results.

Apart from media involvement, we have done our best to lobby politicians, government departments and quangos on a range of moral, spiritual and ethical issues. These have included resisting easy abortion and challenging the LGBTQ+ agenda.

We admit that the past 25 years have not always been easy. Indeed, we have faced many difficult challenges in an ever-changing moral climate. The loss of our founding chairman, George Dawson MLA, through illness in May 2007, was a bitter blow.

In 2012, we faced a ferocious backlash when we suggested the inclusion of a very modest reference to the creationist viewpoint in the new Giant’s Causeway Visitors’ Centre. That backlash served to highlight the extent of the bitter intolerance of those who, while claiming to respect all views, will simply not countenance the presence of a Biblical world and life view in the public square. We have seen this intolerance manifesting itself time and time again.

As Ulster becomes more and more secular, as Protestants sadly continue to turn their backs on their evangelical heritage, and as the opposition intensifies, we have a solemn responsibility to press on with our work and witness. If it was needed in 1998, it is needed even more in 2023.

Who would have believed in 1998 that, by 2023, Northern Ireland would move from having abortion laws which valued life and protected the unborn child to a regime which is now the most pro-abortion in western Europe? Who would have contemplated the extent of the sexual revolution which threatens to destroy the very foundations of the traditional family unit? Who would have foreseen the growth of a cancel culture which demonises anyone who refuses to worship at the shrine of wokeism? Where will our society be in 25 years’ time? We could become despondent. Sometimes we feel powerless, but we believe in and serve a God who is sovereign over nations and peoples. We mustn’t lose heart. “So shall they fear the name of the Lord from the west, and his glory from the rising of the sun. When the enemy shall come in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up a standard against him” (Isaiah 59:19).

In October 2023, we are a smaller and more compact organisation than we were in 1998. In that regard, we are indeed far from unique. Many organisations across society have adapted to changing circumstances and Caleb is no different. We continue to lobby widely, and much of our work is done quietly and behind the scenes.

Recently, we have been increasingly active in our defence of the sanctity of the Lord’s Day. The Sunday issue is now more important and centre-stage than ever with the growth of Sunday marathons and football. We have lobbied extensively on both issues. Our concerns are two-fold. First, there is considerable disruption to churches and second, Christians who hold to a Biblical view of the Lord’s Day feel unable to compete. We continue to explore the human rights aspects of all of this.

Looking ahead, where do we go from here? We owe it to the generation growing up and those yet to be born to keep doing all we can to not only preserve, but to actively defend and promote, our priceless evangelical heritage. Whatever the cost, we will continue to wholly follow the Lord.

l Wallace Thompson is chair of the Caleb Foundation