Be Careful About the Multiplying Attacks on Christian Nationalism
“I am compelled to sound a word of warning here. Be very wary when CNN seeks to define what is and what is not true Christianity. And when anyone claims that a form of Christianity is a threat to democracy, it is usually a pretext for marginalization and persecution.” - Kevin Schaal
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I agree with much of what Kevin has written here, and I appreciate many of the distinctions he makes. There’s a kind of “between the lines” problem, though. The piece sort of implies that anti-Christian Nationalism is a bigger concern than Christian Nationalism.
It may be true that Americans in general need to be more concerned about anti-Christian Nationalism, but as Christians, it’s definitely not true. The bigger concern for us needs to be keeping our own doctrine and practice faithful. So our focus should be the threat to biblical Christianity—and doctrinal faithfulness—that Christian Nationalism presents.
Kevin quotes the CNN piece
One of the most popular beliefs among White Christian nationalists is that the US was founded as a Christian nation; the Founding Fathers were all orthodox, evangelical Christians; and God has chosen the US for a special role in history.
Then he implies that almost nobody teaches this.
Technically I would almost echo that. But only technically. I’ve been hearing teaching very, very close to this all my life—though it’s been more often assumed and defended than taught, per se. The spirit of it is ubiquitous.
And now that certain politicians on the right are trying to make it part of the core of the GOP, it’s more important than ever to aim our rhetorical guns in the right direction.
Christian nationalism is a huge problem because of how it’s used to feed unbiblical emphases, unbliblical entanglements, unbiblical distractions (for churches especially), and in more recent years, unbiblical ethics.
So does “CNN” get a few things wrong? Sure. But as Christians, our focus needs to be on getting our own house in order.
I need to add this also…
CNN seeks to define what is and what is not true Christianity
This is not “CNN defining” something. This is a human being, possibly a Christian, expressing an opinion on the topic of what true Christianity is. It’s not false because “it’s CNN.” We need to stop thinking that way, for so many reasons—not least of which because it implies there is some other source of opinion that would be correct because it’s against CNN. But truth doesn’t work that way.
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
Aaron, is it fair to keep saying that this is not what anyone is saying but this is what they mean even when they keep telling you that is NOT what they mean?
I would argue that they are saying this. I am 51 and have grown up in fundamentalism all of my life. I attended a number of churches that were the bedrock of fundamentalism at its height. I would say that it heard it very often at church, Bible Conferences, fundamentalist camps, colleges and Revivals (when they were a thing).
- America was founded on Christian principles
- The liberal agenda is seeking to erode those principles through their ideology which is anti-God
- If we are not careful and the nation turns from God as a result of adopting these elements than God will take away His blessing/His hand of protection and we may see the wrath of God on the US
- And then they will pull out of the verses of cities/nations that turned their back on God and were punished by Him
- Therefore, it is the duty of Christians to stave off this wrath by keeping the US on the right path (i.e. prayer in schools, Ten Commandments in city hall, prohibition on gay marriage….)
I would say that it was never assumed or defended, but outright taught.
[JD Miller]Aaron, is it fair to keep saying that this is not what anyone is saying but this is what they mean even when they keep telling you that is NOT what they mean?
It’s better to take people at their word. I think what happens on this, as with so many other topics, is that what we say is one thing but what people hear is another thing. It’s not all the hearers’ fault. Communicating in words carries some built in problems. Jesus said everything perfectly, but was still often misunderstood because 1) hearers have limits to their understanding and 2) “emphasis” is an art and depends so much on context. What gets your point across to 70% of your audience still fails to get it across to 30%, etc. And what you say as a corrective in response to A can become a problem when the problem at hand is B.
It’s hard to carve out balance, and so much depends on how you understand your context and what you believe needs emphasizing. My read of our cultural context and our Christian context right now is that there is way too much emphasis on what “the other side” is doing wrong and way too little emphasis on how our own side needs to be better. The whole will not improve until both sides get less interested in firing shots at the other and get more interested in addressing their own needs for improvement.
For conservatives and Christians, we need to stop letting what non-conservatives and non-Christians are doing and saying define us. With that, we need to stop being afraid to agree with them when they happen to be right.
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
I agree largely with the categories David Szweda points out above, and one thing to add is that there are times when it’s not the pastor, but rather people listening in to things like “David Barton Ministries” or whatever it’s called. So you get some of this via things like Christian radio and the grapevine and such.
Agreed on the need for balance, because while I am emphatically not of the “Barton tribe”, I do think there were some very beautiful things done, politically speaking, with the founding of our nation, some of which I can defend quite well from the Scriptures. So I would differ with many variants of “Bartonism”, but would call myself a patriot or (gasp) even a Christian nationalist at others.
Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.
I would argue that they are
dgszweda - Mon, 08/01/2022 - 10:53pm
I would argue that they are saying this. I am 51 and have grown up in fundamentalism all of my life. I attended a number of churches that were the bedrock of fundamentalism at its height. I would say that it heard it very often at church, Bible Conferences, fundamentalist camps, colleges and Revivals (when they were a thing).
- America was founded on Christian principles
- The liberal agenda is seeking to erode those principles through their ideology which is anti-God
- If we are not careful and the nation turns from God as a result of adopting these elements than God will take away His blessing/His hand of protection and we may see the wrath of God on the US
- And then they will pull out of the verses of cities/nations that turned their back on God and were punished by Him
- Therefore, it is the duty of Christians to stave off this wrath by keeping the US on the right path (i.e. prayer in schools, Ten Commandments in city hall, prohibition on gay marriage….)
I would say that it was never assumed or defended, but outright taught.
So would we be better off having politicians who support drag queen story hour or politicians who support the ideas above?
One of the areas of Christian Nationalism that I struggle to wrap my head around is bringing the Bible back into school. Back in the 70’s Christians began pulling their kids out of the public school system and into the Christian School movement. That lasted into the mid-90’s. School teachers who were christians found options to teach a Biblical world view in a Christian school while at the same time that opportunity was evaporating from the public school. As time went out the number of Christian teachers who were present in the public school system dwindled. Then in the mid-90’s (for a number of reasons), the homeschool movement began to rise, and kids were further being pulled out of the public school system (for Christian and secular reasons), as well as out of the Christian school movement, resulting in many Christian schools being closed in the late 90’s and 2000’s. So we now have a public school system that is for the most part devoid of students from Christian homes and school teachers who are Christians. As a side note, we wonder how its slide into secular elements went so quickly. Now we want a bunch of unsaved teachers praying to a God and teaching from a Bible that they do not believe in, to a student body who is antithetical to Christ. If that is not a recipe for doctrinal disaster, I don’t know what is. Why do we want a school teacher to go through the motions of praying to a God they have no desire to believe in, through a prayer that is written on a sheet of paper and mandated to them.
Regarding David’s comment about the Bible in school, I attended public schools and universities K-grad school, and I’ve seen what they do with “prayer” in school. I vividly remember my college graduation and praying “Lord, forgive me for needing to stand politely during this blasphemy.” It was bad. Even in the best cases, you’re going to get sectarian fights, watering things down to “least common demoninator”, and unbelieving teachers/professors using the time to mock Christ. Been there, done that, no, thank you.
Regarding the dichotomy of David’s listing of “Bartonism” vs. drag queen story hour, isn’t there a middle ground there somewhere? Someplace where we don’t post the Decalogue or host drag queen story hour?
Really, after the number of DQSH performers caught on Megan’s List, I don’t know that this should be too difficult, to put it mildly.
Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.
- America was founded on Christian principles
- The liberal agenda is seeking to erode those principles through their ideology which is anti-God
- If we are not careful and the nation turns from God as a result of adopting these elements than God will take away His blessing/His hand of protection and we may see the wrath of God on the US
- And then they will pull out of the verses of cities/nations that turned their back on God and were punished by Him
- Therefore, it is the duty of Christians to stave off this wrath by keeping the US on the right path (i.e. prayer in schools, Ten Commandments in city hall, prohibition on gay marriage….)
Which of these would you say is incorrect?
A large portion of the Founders were deists and children of the Enlightenment, so there are a number of things which are not “Christian principles”, and as I noted above, having secular people lead prayers/post Decalogue in schools is not helpful to kids. It can serve to inoculate them to the Gospel, IMO.
Gay marriage? My take on that is that our key thing to do is to remind the country why the government gets into family law in the first place; so they can help pick up the pieces and defend “weaker vessels” (generally women & children) when relationships break down. So if we do that, we’ve made gay marriage irrelevant without actually banning it, as there are no weaker vessels. Either that, or we expose exactly how volatile their relationships are. I’ve heard that domestic violence is far higher there.
Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.
Bert, are you saying Christian principles can only come from born-again Christians? It seems to me that Christian principles were largely assumed by nearly everybody at the time of our nation’s founding. Many deists supported Christian principles.
G. N. Barkman
I’m saying some of the provisions in the Constitution and the like are more clearly attributable to the Enlightenment, starting with the very structure as a republic instead of a monarchy, than to Scripture.
Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.
Like dgszweda, I’ve grown up in fundamentalism and have heard all those points taught and preached over the last 40 plus years. In the circles I grew up in there was a fusion of politics and Christianity, with the idea that advancing the kingdom of Christ and preserving our Christian way of life was to be done by means of political power. It’s literally the opposite of how Jesus established his kingdom when he was on earth. I find this article to be long but quite enlightening: Christianity Will Have Power
I live about 30 mi. north of Philadelphia. Three of my grandchildren are taught that whites are Privileged, homosexuality is something to be proud of and you can choose what sex you would like to be. My one daughter teaches in a public school about 2 hours north of us in Pa. There are a lot of Christian teachers in that school and there is a lot of respect for both God and Country.
Richard E Brunt
Christian nationalism is a huge problem because of how it’s used to feed unbiblical emphases, unbliblical entanglements, unbiblical distractions (for churches especially), and in more recent years, unbiblical ethics.
Would you consider Christian Nationalism a blessing of liberty?
Discussion