A LOT HAS BEEN written in recent months about how Christian nationalism is a threat to America — and of course that’s right. But it’s also worth noting that it’s a threat to Christianity.
This round of concern really took off when a new poll from the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) found that alarming numbers of people believed things such as “the U.S. government should declare America a Christian nation” and “God has called Christians to exercise dominion over all areas of American society.” Nearly 30 percent of Americans mostly agreed (sympathizers) or completely agreed (adherents) with such statements, which is scary enough — but among Republicans that number rose to 54 percent, which means it is the dominant belief system among one of the two parties that frequently swap control of the U.S. government.
PRRI President Robert P. Jones defines Christian nationalism as “the idea that America is destined to be a promised land for European Christians.” Nearly two-thirds of white evangelical Protestants, according to PRRI, qualify as adhering or sympathizing with this belief. Astonishingly, these beliefs cross racial lines. “White (29%), Hispanic (25%), and Black (20%) Christians who identify as born-again or evangelical are each about five times as likely to be Christian nationalism adherents as members of the same racial or ethnic groups who identify as Christian but not evangelical,” the institute reports.
The views that accompany this tendency are appalling: More than 80 percent of white Christian-nationalist adherents reject the notion that “generations of slavery and discrimination have created conditions that make it difficult for many Black Americans to work their way out of the lower class” (compared to 46 percent of nonwhite adherents). More than 80 percent of white adherents think that “immigrants are invading our country and replacing our cultural and ethnic background” — the core tenet of what’s called “replacement theory.” Forty percent of adherents agree that “true American patriots may have to resort to violence in order to save our country,” with no significant differences by race.
We can’t make progress on the key issues of our time — inequality, the climate crisis, racial oppression — with these attitudes anywhere near the fore.
But that’s a problem for society. The problem for Christians is that onlookers understand these views as the core of our religion. Forget the cross — its symbol might as well be an AR-15 waved in the face of anyone who gets too uppity.
Which means, I think, that a key task for Christians who have a different, gospel-oriented, red-letter, plain-text understanding of our faith is to denounce this nonsense for the heresy that it is. It’s helpful for our leaders — our clergy but also our laity — to denounce racism, classism, and sexism as wrong. But lots of people can do that. It’s imperative for our leaders to denounce it as unchristian, and to say quite plainly that those who claim the mantle of our faith but spew such nonsense are not in fact following the teachings of Christ.
The difference between a Christian nationalist vision of how the world should be and the gospel to which Jesus called us could not be more obvious. Left to their own devices, these nationalists would ensure that no one ever hears the good news again.
Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org, is the author most recently of The Flag, the Cross, and the Station Wagon: A Graying American Looks Back at his Suburban Boyhood and Wonders What the Hell Happened.
Got something to say about what you're reading? We value your feedback!
