By Ruth A. Sheets
Christian Nationalism is a central focus of the current Republican party, even if they don’t call it that. Of course it is and has been for a long time. It may be helpful to have a definition for Christian Nationalism as if the name itself isn’t clear enough. It is the belief that the United States of America was founded as a Christian nation (white of course too). The founders were all Christian and wanted this to be a Christian nation, just didn’t say so. It means that whatever is done nationally will have a Christian bent.
This idea showed up periodically throughout our history when there were national stresses and people’s fears drew them into a conservative Christian movement that had to justify itself and its desire to impose its precepts on everyone else. If one could claim the Founders wanted this to be a Christian nation, then we have to enforce it, right?
To be clear, this nation was not founded as a Christian nation, a white one, for sure, but not a Christian one. If the founders had wanted that, they would have enshrined it. They didn’t. Among the founders were some Christians like John Adams, but he was not in favor of imposing his religion on the nation. He believed that once out from under the yoke of Britain and its established religion it would not be a good idea to reimpose such a thing no matter which branch of Christianity was chosen. There were numerous deists like Jefferson and Franklin who believed God set the worlds in motion, then stepped back to note what happened. Even Washington thought one’s faith was personal.
There were “Christians” like the slave-owners who tried hard to find a means in Christianity to justify one human being owning another for the purpose of making the one rich and the other a victim of whatever violence or kindness the owner chose to impart. They did find a few biblical passages and the book of Philemon that worked for them, so they created a church that ignored the “love your neighbor” parts when it came to African-Americans, or twisted it to mean loving them was making them work hard as God commanded. It worked best to pretend Black Americans were not even real human beings, more like animals. One has to work pretty hard to do that when it is clear the enslaved persons were as human as and probably more humane than the owners.
The current batch of Christian Nationalists got wound up around the time of Richard Nixon (a "true" Christian, you know). He and the men around him saw their approval of the violence against Vietnam War protesters as their Christian duty to those who had already sacrificed so much in the war, or something like that. Covering up crimes they had committed against the American people was OK too. Nixon hobnobbed with Billy Graham, a popular evangelical minister who dished out an easily-digested form of Christianity that beyond verbal “acceptance of Jesus as one’s Lord and Savior” there were few demands except for issues related to sex, of course. The word “sin” appeared often, but didn’t really mess with the good feeling gospel too much. It was about being saved.
Over the years, that self-centered brand of Christianity began to morph into doing what the preacher said was right with certain scripture (mostly Psalms, some parables, and Revelation) thrown in. It kept evolving and forcing itself into the lives of people who are not Christian. The evangelizing moved a bit away from the church onto the TV screen, involved a lot of blaming others for the mess the world was in, an intense begging for money , which would bring one closer to salvation. One could prove oneself worthy by giving most of one’s money to the evangelism leaders who lived in style while the donors often lived from paycheck to paycheck.
The guys (and it was mostly guys) knew this kind of Christianity could not last forever. They needed it to evolve even more. They wanted “causes” to insert regularly into their message. There were plenty of people around they disapproved of, targets. They needed “respected” evangelical preachers to clamp onto a cause or two and push for condemnation. Men like Pat Robertson of “700 Club” fame and Jerry Fallwell of Liberty University jumped in. As southern white men, they naturally resented Black Americans, poor white people (I guess because they couldn’t send in enough money), women (the bastions of sin), and gay men, Sodomites.). At the same time, they wanted rich white people to believe that their wealth was a direct gift from god for their personal “righteousness” (Oooo, that word is used a lot).
Then, a woman, they had to have a woman to prove to women this Christianity was legit) Phillys Schlafly told women that God’s will for them had three parts: first, their purpose in life was to care full time for hubby and the kids; second, abortion is murder; third, not having children is a sin against God (or something like that). The hypocrisy was right in your face, a woman lawyer, constantly on the road, spreading her gospel of patriarchy, male supremacy, and the cult of the little wifey. Gotta love it! Nearly all of these “new” Christians were Republicans desperately pretending Nixon wasn’t a crook and that Ronald Reagan would save our nation from something (it wasn’t clear from what since Reagan wasn’t a practicing Christian. They said he was, though.
Something happened in the 1980s that fueled the fires of Republican fear and hatred, AIDS. Since it showed up first in the gay male community, the TV preachers claimed it was God’s punishment against gays. That crew liked to claim “God’s will” or “God’s punishment” for a lot of things that happened, 9/11 being one of the best examples (that was supposed to be punishment for homosexuality). Floods and fires in northern states are God’s punishment, but somehow, not the disasters in the South, those were just nature.
TV Christianity did not stay on TV. It moved into political meetings, campaigns, and non-religious gatherings. While schools and other public institutions were getting away from prayers at events because of more inclusivity, Republicans made sure every one of their gatherings had a super Christian prayer that had to emphasize that what they were doing was God’s will and should not be questioned. Even Democrats were “bullied” into saying “God bless the United States” at the end of speeches and appearances.
This increasingly oppressive brand of Christianity I and others, call "Pseudo-Christianity" because it has very little to do with the Christianity of scripture, but a lot in common with some historic flavors of Christianity that were used as clubs to beat into submission, anyone who didn’t go along with the state's pronouncements and cruelties.
Right now, Republicans all over the country are hefting their clubs ready to strike down anyone who does not agree that this is a Christian nation and that Republicans have the ear of god and have the right to hurt anyone who will not go along. They want to put “The Ten Commandments” in every public school and building even though they themselves can’t follow, recite, or explain them, or even which ten (there are several in Hebrew scripture).
Catholics, white evangelicals, and other believers in this pseudo-christianity, hold misogyny as almost a sacrament. They make up all kinds of laws they say are Christian particularly about abortion, even birth control, when their real aim is to control the lives of women. They assume Jesus was ignorant of abortion and of homosexuality and transgender persons, which he would not have been, living in a crossroads of the world like first century Palestine. If Jesus were so against these practices, he would have said so; he didn’t. He did tell people to love their neighbors as they love themselves and reminded people that our neighbor is everyone. And beside loving God, loving one’s neighbor is the greatest commandment. If these points are presented to pseudo-christians, they claim we don’t know what we are talking about or that we are somehow heretics (maybe witches), just as their ancestors did. It seems some people choose not to learn from history. In fact, Roman Catholic American bishops are rebelling against Pope Francis’s points like, “who am I to judge?) related to LGBTQ persons, and the Pope is supposed to be infallible, but I guess, not when he is preaching Jesus’s message.
our current Supreme Court shows us why no religious group should have a majority anywhere perhaps except, maybe in their own churches. On the Court there are 6 Roman Catholics, 5 of them conservatives (there is one high Episcopalian there too who was raised Roman Catholic). They have tried to rewrite our Constitution, taking away people’s rights to bodily autonomy (they have no medical expertise, but rule as though they do). Their brand of Christianity also sees white men as superior to everyone else and anyone who tries to challenge that will be ultimately crushed: right to abortion care, Affirmative Action, voting rights, gun safety, etc. One Black and one female justice are on board with this racism and misogyny. Those justices act as though everything they do to warp our Constitution they swore to uphold and defend is god’s will. Pseudo-christian institutions are permitted to stop covering birth control on their insurance plans, not bake wedding cakes for same-sex couples, and deny same-sex couples a wedding website (even though there was a fraudulent case with this one). Abortion was overturned even though it was a near 50 year precedent well, because the Catholic Church doesn’t approve of it, no matter what other religious entities believe, even in a democracy.
Republican religionists are continuing to rework Christianity to suit their own personal comfort. There is little of the gospel, but a lot about wealth being from god and deserved by whoever has it. There is a lot about fear, hatred, anger, and the negative emotions that can be used to control and manipulate vulnerable people. There is a deep lack of understanding of anyone who is not rich, white, "straight," and male. The desire is there to control the movements of everyone so they can be sure that the power-grabbing of the Republican religionists is not questioned, kind of like what happened in Nazi Germany and fascist Italy in the 1920s and 1930s. Remember, both countries were very Christian and the "church" often participated in the cruelties. Pseudo-Christians say they don't like hearing themselves positively compared to the Hitler crowd in Germany and the Mussolini contingent in Italy, but I think, they doth protest too much. I think they secretly love it and are trying to live up to the comparison. They are pushing laws that are clearly unconstitutional: book banning (1st amendment), anti-trans laws (14th amendment personhood), voter suppression of non-white, non-Republican voters (ignoring the 15th, 19th, & 26th amendments), pushing the use of "The Ten Commandments” (1st Amendment freedom of religion), arresting and harming journalists (also 1st Amendment freedom of press), planning to take trans children from their parents (kidnapping), "letting" children work at dangerous jobs (the child labor laws), and on and on. Where are our Dept. of Justice and our courts? Have the Christian fascists infiltrated so deeply they can't or won’t respond on behalf of our democracy?
Pseudo-christian bullying is raining down on people who will over time become helpless to stop it because the targets as usual, are vulnerable people, “the least of these.” White male legislators and their female, Black, and Latinx surrogates just can't help themselves. They are so desperate for power and so scared they might have to share it with OMG! women, people of color, trans persons, LGBTQ persons in general, poor people, Muslims and atheists, immigrants, young people, they just have to participate in Hitleresque behaviors. They don't want their racism, misogyny, homo/transphobia, antisemitism, and xenophobia publicly attributed to them. They are comfortable with being those things but don’t want those words attached to their names. After all, their comfort is paramount, isn't it?
Yep, pseudo-Christianity, AKA Christian Nationalism, has taken over the Republican party. It is now just out in the open for all to see. What are We the People going to do about it?
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