Redemption earns even more glory among evangelicals than consistent faith and virtue. And for Ralph Reed, sudden self-reform has always come easily. A heavy smoker as an undergraduate at the University of Georgia in the early 1980s, he pitched his pack of Marlboro Lights out a car window one day and never bought another. Booze was also a problem, so he went instantly dry during the summer after graduation. Weeks later, sipping soda in a Washington saloon as some pals drank harder stuff, he was seized by a thirst for "deeper spiritual meaning" in his life. Reed chose a church at random from the Yellow Pages, went there the next morning and soon became a born-again charismatic, abandoning the genteel Methodism in which he had been reared.
Acts of contrition followed. To a victim of one of his nasty ploys as a college Republican, he wrote, "I was the cause of all the dirty politics and unsavory behavior . . . Politics for me had degenerated into a cheap play for power. I now realize that politics is a noble calling to serve God and my fellow man."
Today Reed strives, by his lights at least, to make politics serve those causes as executive director of Christian Coalition, the advocacy group founded by Pat Robertson four years ago. Reed's organizational and strategic talents have made the coalition the most potent unit within what its leaders call the profamily movement. He is also becoming a prophet and a public promoter of the conservative Christian cause in general. When he experiences an epiphany these days, the event is complex and political rather than religious and personal. His changing visions become the subject of TV schmooze shows and Washington seminars, as Robertson gives him increasing license to preach as well as plan. With a choirboy's serene phiz, and a resume that includes a doctorate in American history as well as many innings of political hardball, Reed, at 32, has made himself the model for the latest incarnation of the religious right.
This week Christian Coalition holds its annual Road to Victory conference. For the first time, the gathering of 2,000 cultural warriors will be in Washington rather than Virginia Beach, and will be open to press coverage. To overcome the group's conspiratorial image, Reed decided on the motif of a coming-out party. In a bow to political ecumenism, he persuaded David Wilhelm, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, to be the token liberal among dozens of conservative speakers. The movement remains overwhelmingly white and has roots in the backlash against the civil rights revolution; so Reed commissioned a national poll of minority churchgoers, hoping to find some unlikely constituency among their ranks. Sure enough, this week he will announce figures showing that on some social issues, devout blacks, Hispanics and Asian Americans sympathize with religious-right views.