Voters Need to Educate Themselves About the Dangers of Christian Nationalism

Baptist News Global: The Threat of Christian Nationalism in All 50 States, Illustrated 

The article which is linked above is a very colorful explanation of the threat of Christian Nationalism to the United States.  There's no question that we are vulnerable to this kind of ideology, because of our guarantees of freedom of conscience, free speech and religious liberty, and because people are running for office, appealing for votes from a segment of the population that believes this is the "will of God" for the United States, and is the reason why he gave favor to the white, European settlers who came here to exploit its natural resources and develop themselves into the world's most prosperous, militarily powerful nation.  

As can be seen from the survey, 30% of Americans are identified as adherents or sympathizers to the various perspectives of Christian nationalism, including those dependent on racist white supremacy as a foundational essential, a number large enough to affect the outcome of elections and put politicians in place who will use their power to bring about Christian nationalist objectives.  There are already plenty of those serving in state legislatures, a few governorships, and in both the House and Senate, along with a scattering in the state and federal court system, including at least two identified members of the Supreme Court.  

This is Not New

I was raised in a small Baptist church, and was taught by three successive Sunday school teachers that America was a "Christian nation" because our founders were led by God to establish it that way, and that our prosperity and military might are his blessings, given as a reward for our obedience.  So if we ever start to do things bad, like the Israelites did, he will get mad at us and cause some other pagan country to come and take over us just like he did when Babylon conquered and carried the Israelites off into captivity.  

I was taught that we could be judged as a nation for electing the wrong people to office, specifically, people who weren't the same kind of Christian as we were.  And that God would judge the country collectively for passing laws that he didn't like and were against his will.  We got on the slippery slope to destruction when the Roe decision was handed down by the Supreme Court, according to them.  

No joke.  That's exactly what was taught and what it was like.  Imagine the effect of having that repeated, in countless such Sunday schools all over the country.  

Why Christian Nationalism is Dangerous to American Democracy

The idea of America as some kind of a promised land for white, European Christians predates the founding of the country, according to Robert P. Jones, who authored the commentary on the research in Baptist News Global.  It turns political contests in to apocalyptic battles, leading to the justification of violence, in spite of Christian principles against the use of violence under any circumstances.  And, says Jones, it leads to the belief that political opponents who are perceived to be representatives of "evil," should be jailed, exiled, attacked and even murdered for disagreement.  

Those Sunday school teachers I mentioned had no formal education beyond high school to speak of.  In fact, one of them didn't finish high school, and the others never went to college.  Nor did they have any formal theological or doctrinal training in Biblical content.  As a result, their teaching didn't even always reflect some passage of scripture, it was just some idea they had come to accept because it fit with what they believed.  So it is that Russell Moore, the editor of Christianity Today, is encountering the idea that some of the values Jesus taught as being essential to the faith, such as turning the other cheek and loving one's enemies, are now being called "liberalism" by many conservative, Christian nationalists. 

Completely abandoning the core values taught by Jesus, the survey results provided by Jones indicate a significant percentage of Christian Nationalists believe that it would be right for them to resort to violence in order to restore a nation that has gotten so far off the track of its Christian roots.  They believe that being an American patriot means that it is justified to take up arms and resort to violence to "save" the country, while others believe that some kind of upheaval will be necessary to sweep away the "elites in power" and restore the "rightful rulers."  

This is a very real threat.  As many as 44% of all Americans believe in some form of Christian nationalist need to take over the government to "restore" it.  There is absolutely no justification in the Christian gospel, or in the scripture Evangelical and conservative Christians claim is their "authority" for faith and practice, for the use of violence in this way.  

In fact, both of the leading apostles of the early Christian church, Paul and Peter, acknowledge the power and authority of the civil government, regardless of who it came from, as being established by God, and they weren't speaking about theocratic Israel, they were talking about the emperor of Rome and his civil authorities.  And as a result of their words, when severe persecution broke out against the church through most of the second century of its existence, there was no violent uprising against what was clearly an evil attack on Christianity.  The authoritative words of the Apostles in the New Testament taught that violence of any kind was sinful, submission to authority was Godly and personal sacrifice for the cause of the faith was necessary.  

There's no better example of loving one's enemies or turning the other cheek anywhere in scripture.  

Trumpism, the MAGA Cult and Extremist Right Wing Politics is Neither Saving the Nation Nor Is It Christian

Christians who need an authoritative word to show them how wrong, sinful and evil is Christian nationalism will find it in the short epistle of the Apostle Jude, near the end of the New Testament. Jude writes,

"Beloved, while eagerly preparing to write to you about the salvation we share, I find it necessary to write and appeal to you to contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints.  For certain intruders have stolen in among you, people who long ago were designated for this condemnation as ungodly, who pervert the grace of our God into licentiousness and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ."  Jude v. 3-4 NRSV  

It's an easy test of the faith to apply to anyone who claims to preach and teach the gospel to see if they pass the test of orthodoxy.  Denying things which Jesus specifically taught as the very nature and core of the Christian gospel, such as meekness, being a peacemaker, humility and hungering and thirsting for righteousness, as opposed to violence to achieve their cause, makes one an anti-Christ, according to I John 4.  So I would evaluate Christian Nationalism, in any form, as anti-Christian.  And when Jude calls those who rebel in this way "waterless clouds carried along by the winds; autumn trees without fruit, twice dead, uprooted, wild waves of the see, casting up the foam of their own shame; wandering stars, for whom the deepest darkness has been reserved forever, he's hitting the nail on the head in discerning the Christian nationalists of our day.  

The character of the leader of the MAGA cult tells you that neither he nor any of his followers have anything to do with the name "Christian."  A man who publicly bragged about his multiple adulterous affairs with porn stars and prostitutes, while humiliating his wives, who has been adjudicated as a rapist, who openly committed business fraud, who terrorized election workers and lied about their character and their actions is anti-Christ, not Christian.  

This Issue is a Voting Priority

Christian Nationalists, in any form, are people who are advocates of political revolution, which is also an anti-Christian concept (Romans 13:1-7 and I Peter 2:13-17).  And the best way we have in our American constitutional democracy to neutralize their influence and prevent them from getting into any position of power is to vote against them when they run in any election.  And since they have established themselves as the "ideological keystone" in today's Republican party, we must commit to cast our ballots against every Republican running for office in America.  Every single one.