Newsweek: Right wingers practicing "Assault Ministry"

This is scary. If Jesus hadn't risen from the dead he'd be turning in his grave: "Debaters are the new missionaries, having realized they can save a lot more souls from a seat at the top—perhaps even on the highest court in the land. 'Evangelicals have always wanted to persuade people to the faith,' says John Green, a senior fellow at the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. 'The new thing is that evangelicals want to be more involved in the world now. Conservative Christian leaders would like to have a cadre of conservative Christian attorneys, who then become judges, politicians and political appointees.' At Patrick Henry College, an evangelical school outside Washington, D.C.—where 30 percent of the student body engages in some form of debate—the president is so committed to producing leaders that he's also the moot-court coach. Baptist Cedarville University in Ohio just tripled its budget for debate scholarships. Falwell's school, in Lynchburg, Va., pours a half million dollars into the debate program every year, with the goal of eventually flooding the system with 'thousands' of conservative Christian lawyers. 'We are training debaters who can perform assault ministry, meaning becoming the conscience of the culture,' says Falwell, who is also hoping the team will elevate the humble academic reputation of Liberty itself. 'So while we have the preaching of the Gospel on the one side—certainly a priority—we have the confronting of the culture on moral default on the other side.'"