Christian Nationalism - Beliefs And Adherents

 The charts above are from a survey by the Public Religion Research Institute between November 22nd and December 14th of a nationwide survey of 6,212 adults, with a 1.6 point margin of error.

Most Touting "Christian Nationalism" Lost In This Election

One of the biggest dangers in the election just completed was candidates espousing "Christian Nationalism". That movement is both authoritarian and anti-secular. Fortunately, most did not fare well on Election Day.

Here is how Anthea Butler describes it for MSNBC.com: 

The GOP Game of Thrones headed by former President Donald Trump, Christian nationalists and an assortment of unsuitable candidates met reality on Election Day. Instead crowing about big wins, they are eating crow instead — and pointing fingers. Some high-profile Christian nationalist candidates — most notably Doug Mastriano, the Republican who ran for governor of Pennsylvania — struggled Tuesday. What does it mean for those candidates, and do Tuesday’s results mean the promotion of Christian nationalism will no longer be a Republican political strategy?

Christian nationalism is the general idea that America is a Christian nation and that it should be run by Christian leaders (with no regard for the idea that we have a secular government and that there should be a separation between church and state). And the biggest takeaway for the candidates who generally embrace those beliefs is that being a raving Christian nationalist isn’t enough by itself to win. At least not the biggest elections. Yes, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green, R-Ga., one of few Republicans to actually embrace the Christian nationalist title, won her noncompetitive congressional district in Georgia with 66% of the vote; but Mastriano, who talks like a Christian nationalist even if he doesn’t explicitly call himself one, lost by 14 points to Democrat Josh Shapiro in that statewide race.

In those big races, Republicans found out that the issues they thought would be winners with voters were weaknesses. Take, for example, those Republicans, such as Mastriano, who were ecstatic about the U.S. Supreme Court Dobbs decision that overturned Roe v. Wade and ecstatic about the rollbacks of abortion rights that followed that decision. They found themselves the victims of a backlash. On top of that, all of the five statewide ballot initiatives that would have restricted or eliminated abortion access were defeated by voters Tuesday. Kansas voters upheld abortion rights in August.

The large turnout of younger Generation Z voters and other voters disturbed by that Dobbs decision and the looming threat of authoritarianism from people pushing for an officially Christian nation stopped the predicted “red wave” from happening.

What is clear from that outcome is that Trump did poorly. He endorsed Mastriano, who lost. And stuck in very tight races are Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Col., who said “The church is supposed to direct the government” and Kari Lake, Arizona’s Republican gubernatorial nominee, who has said, “The same God who parted the Red Sea, who moved mountains, is with us now as we save this republic.”. . .

As for Christian nationalism, it is not going away. A Pew Research survey found that 45% of Americans say that America should be a Christian nation. According to the Public Religion Research Institute, half of white evangelicals believe that America is their promised land. These kinds of beliefs about America, which require that we ignore the clause in the Constitution that says there shall be no “religious test” for candidates, have made conservative Christianity a foundational plank of the Republican Party. . . .

The troubles some Christian nationalist candidates had this election cycle may hold some clues to the 2024 cycle. The RNC will have to decide if putting up Trump-style candidates who are all bluster but have lackluster messaging and theocratic leanings will be enough to retake the Oval Office, Congress and the Senate. The public is now much more aware of QAnon, and conferences such as ReAwakening that feature religious hucksters. The Republican Party is not the party of conservative values anymore; it is the party of extreme religious views that attract not only conspiracy theorists but violent agitators.

History Should De-Emphasize Nationalism And War

The following intelligent view is by Bertrand Russell in his autobiography:

"In the teaching of history, there should be no undue emphasis upon one's own country. The history of wars should be a small part of what is taught. Much the more important part should be concerned with progress in the arts of civilisation. War should be treated as murder is treated. It should be regarded with equal horror and with equal aversion. It will be said that boys under such a regimen will be soft and effeminate. It will be said that they will lose the manly virtues and will be destitute of courage. And all this will be said by Christians in spite of Christ's teaching.

But, dreadful as it may appear, boys brought up in the old way will grow into quarrelsome men who will find a world without war unbearably tame. Only a new kind of education, inculcating a new set of moral values, will make it possible to keep a peaceful world in existence. In the future there will, after all, be plenty of opportunity for adventure, even dangerous adventure. Boys can go to the Antarctic for their holidays, and young men can go to the moon. There are many ways of showing courage without having to kill other people, and it is such ways that should be encouraged."

Nationalism, Racism, And Religious Hatred Are Evil

The following is part of an article written by historian Howard Zinn for The Progressive back in 2005. It's as valid today as it was back then.

There was something horrifying in the realization that, in this twenty-first century of what we call “civilization,” we have carved up what we claim is one world into 200 artificially created entities we call “nations” and armed to apprehend or kill anyone who crosses a boundary. 

Is not nationalism—that devotion to a flag, an anthem, a boundary so fierce it engenders mass murder—one of the great evils of our time, along with racism, along with religious hatred? These ways of thinking—cultivated, nurtured, indoctrinated from childhood on—have been useful to those in power, and deadly for those out of power.

National spirit can be benign in a country that is small and lacking both in military power and a hunger for expansion (Switzerland, Norway, Costa Rica, and many more). But in a nation like ours—huge, possessing thousands of weapons of mass destruction—what might have been harmless pride becomes an arrogant nationalism dangerous to others and to ourselves.

Our citizenry has been brought up to see our nation as different from others, an exception in the world, uniquely moral, expanding into other lands in order to bring civilization, liberty, democracy.

That self-deception started early. When the first English settlers moved into Indian land in Massachusetts Bay and were resisted, the violence escalated into war with the Pequot Indians. The killing of Indians was seen as approved by God, the taking of land as commanded by the Bible. The Puritans cited one of the Psalms, which says: “Ask of me, and I shall give thee, the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the Earth for thy possession.”. . .

It was our “Manifest Destiny to overspread the continent allotted by Providence,” an American journalist declared on the eve of the Mexican War. After the invasion of Mexico began, the New York Herald announced: “We believe it is a part of our destiny to civilize that beautiful country.”

It was always supposedly for benign purposes that our country went to war. We invaded Cuba in 1898 to liberate the Cubans, and went to war in the Philippines shortly after, as President McKinley put it, “to civilize and Christianize” the Filipino people. . . .

Nationalism is given a special virulence when it is blessed by Providence. . . .

Nationalist super-patriotism is not confined to Republicans. When Richard Hofstadter analyzed American presidents in his book The American Political Tradition, he found that Democratic leaders as well as Republicans, liberals as well as conservatives, invaded other countries, sought to expand U.S. power across the globe. . . .

One of the effects of nationalist thinking is a loss of a sense of proportion. The killing of 2,300 people at Pearl Harbor becomes the justification for killing 240,000 in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The killing of 3,000 people on September 11 becomes the justification for killing tens of thousands of people in Afghanistan and Iraq.

What makes our nation immune from the normal standards of human decency?

Surely, we must renounce nationalism and all its symbols: its flags, its pledges of allegiance, its anthems, its insistence in song that God must single out America to be blessed.

We need to assert our allegiance to the human race, and not to any one nation. We need to refute the idea that our nation is different from, morally superior to, the other imperial powers of world history.

The poets and artists among us seem to have a clearer understanding of the limits of nationalism.

Langston Hughes (no wonder he was called before the Committee on Un-American Activities) addressed his country as follows:

You really haven’t been a virgin for so long

It’s ludicrous to keep up the pretext . . .

You’ve slept with all the big powers

In military uniforms

And you’ve taken the sweet life

Of all the little brown fellows . . .

Being one of the world’s big vampires

Why don’t you come out and say so

Like Japan, and England, and France

And all the other nymphomaniacs of power.

Henry David Thoreau, provoked by the war in Mexico and the nationalist fervor it produced, wrote: “Nations! What are nations? . . . Like insects, they swarm. The historian strives in vain to make them memorable.” In our time, Kurt Vonnegut (Cat’s Cradle) places nations among those unnatural abstractions he calls granfalloons, which he defines as “a proud and meaningless association of human beings.”

Dallas Newspaper Blasts Trump For His "Nationalist" Claim

(The caricature of Donald Trump is by DonkeyHotey. I added the tag line.)

Donald Trump recently claimed to be a "nationalist" -- echoing the beliefs of other authoritarians throughout history.

Here's what the Dallas Morning News editorial staff thinks of his audacious claim:

This week in Houston, before a cheering crowd of thousands, President Trump needed no dog whistle or code words to rile up the worst elements of the far-right in this country or rally those who fear what he calls “globalists” to his cause.

For the first time since Pat Buchanan’s nationalist and nativist leanings sank his chances of becoming president in 1992, 1996, and 2000, a prominent American leader — the president no less — has embraced the term “nationalist” and encouraged his supporters to describe themselves in the same manner.

We understand that many Americans feel they’ve been left behind by globalization and want a government that looks out for their economic interests. But we see no need for the president or his supporters to embrace a term that is heavy with negative connotations that include nativism, racism, and, yes, fascism.

Marching under a nationalist flag would be divisive and intimidating at any time in our nation’s history, given that ours is a country of immigrants with diverse backgrounds and ethnic roots that join them together under the banner of freedom, democracy, and plurality. Since this nation’s inception, E pluribus Unum (Out of many, one) has been our motto.

But in today’s America, with the country torn culturally and politically, the president’s use of the term “nationalist” is akin to shouting fire in a crowded theater.

Surely, our president understands that describing himself as a nationalist and encouraging others to do the same will not just rile up the base for next month’s election but further coarsen our discourse and perhaps motivate the most radical elements on the far right and left.

Even if Trump tries to walk back his embrace of the term nationalist, which he shows no sign of doing as yet, his willingness to describe himself and his followers with the term has already gone a long way toward normalizing the word. We can expect to see signs at marches and rallies across the country that read “I am a proud Nationalist” next to “Keep America Great” signs. This will in turn bring out more comparisons in response to past and present radical “nationalist” organizations in other countries, including Adolf Hitler’s Nazi party or modern far-right fascist movements.

We understand that in Europe and elsewhere there’s a mounting rebellion against what many see as the  overreach of the European Union and the diminishment of national pride in countries as diverse as France, Great Britain, Spain and Italy. The common currency, ease of travel between EU nations, and the great influx of immigrants from the Mideast, Africa and other war-torn and drought-stricken regions have tested democracies and contributed to a growing wave of nationalism and tribalism.

But America is exceptional in that it has always been a nation of nations. So much so that past nativist movements were often populated with the children or grandchildren of immigrants who made their way to America’s shores.

All of this reminds us that, 53 years ago this month, at the height of the Civil Rights movement and anti-Vietnam War protests, less than two years after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, with shock and disillusionment still thick in the air, President Johnson traveled to the Statue of Liberty to sign the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 into law.

The 1965 law abolished the national origin quota system that favored immigrants from Northern and Western Europe and discriminated against aspiring Americans from Asia, Africa and the Middle East. The new law made room for immigrants based on their family connections to the U.S. and the skills and talents they had to offer the country. Race, creed, color or national origin was no longer to play a part in weighing who would be welcomed as an American.

LBJ spoke of unity, not strife, pluralism, not discord, and a nation of nations — not nationalism.

We look back at those trying times now, with a nation bitterly divided over so much, for any wisdom they might offer us today, and inspiration they might offer for the way forward. And we believe it is worth quoting President Johnson’s words at length:

Our beautiful America was built by a nation of strangers. From a hundred different places or more they have poured forth into an empty land, joining and blending in one mighty and irresistible tide.

The land flourished because it was fed from so many sources — because it was nourished by so many cultures and traditions and peoples.

And from this experience, almost unique in the history of nations, has come America's attitude toward the rest of the world. We, because of what we are, feel safer and stronger in a world as varied as the people who make it up--a world where no country rules another and all countries can deal with the basic problems of human dignity and deal with those problems in their own way.

Now, under the monument which has welcomed so many to our shores, the American nation returns to the finest of its traditions today.

We Are All Citizens Of Earth

Americans not only like to believe that this country is better than all others, but that the people in the U.S. are somehow better than the people in other countries. Of course both are rather ludicrous beliefs. This country has a lot of problems. While we may be a bit better in some areas, there are other areas in which other countries are better (an obvious example would be those countries that provide decent health care to all their citizens). And humans are humans regardless of what country they live in. Living in a certain country doesn't make any human better than any other human anywhere in the world.

The truth is that we all must share this tiny planet, and if we were smarter we would learn to get along with each other. It is stupid to hate another person or look down on them, simply because they were born outside the borders of this country. Borders are just imaginary lines created by humans to discriminate against other humans -- and are the cause of as many wars as religion and greed.

It's time we realized that we are all citizens of Earth -- and then start acting like it.