Christian nationalism is the overcorrection to Big Eva

Michie · May 14, 2025

Suppose I told you that, at a certain well-known, purportedly conservative seminary, there is a professor who has been on staff for over a decade, who has openly stated that “the Gospel is about racial reconciliation”? Would you believe me?

Suppose I further said that the leader of said seminary is considered one of the most prominent conservative Evangelicals, and that he has asked specifically for people to judge him by those he platforms? And neither of these people has been publicly corrected, or fired, and are still training pastors?

Is the frustration mounting yet?

Now you can understand the frustration that is building within a generation of young Christians, particularly young men. They know the Gospel is not about racial reconciliation, or about social projects, and they are sick of being told that it is. They are sick of being told that being a celibate “homosexual Christian” is ok. They are sick of being told that they just have to live with how things are; that nothing can be done to restore biblical Christianity. And that makes them very vulnerable.

Continued below.

Christian nationalism is the overcorrection to Big Eva

Big Eva has worked exactly as Alinsky intended it has created a reactionary movement

www.christianpost.com

FireDragon76 · May 14, 2025

Evangelical Christianity just isn't that important, and doesn't account for the rise of MAGA.

Pioneer3mm · May 15, 2025

Interesting/informative OP/Title...

Ignatius the Kiwi · May 15, 2025

Christian Nationalism is a response to the weakness that liberalism in general has brought to Christianity. Liberalism and its principles have essentially castrated Christians in acting politically in their own interests. Sensible Christians are tired of feeling like they have to be the Dhimmis of non Christians or subordinate Christian principles to Non Christian ones.

RileyG · May 16, 2025

FireDragon76 said:
Evangelical Christianity just isn't that important, and doesn't account for the rise of MAGA.

What is the difference between Evangelical Christianity VS Fundamentalist Christianity?

FireDragon76 · May 16, 2025

RileyG said:
What is the difference between Evangelical Christianity VS Fundamentalist Christianity?

Fundamentalist Christianity tends to have more boundary-markers and even more legalistism. Often, the theory of evolution is rejected explicitly.

Tuur · May 16, 2025

FireDragon76 said:
Fundamentalist Christianity tends to have more boundary-markers and even more legalistism. Often, the theory of evolution is rejected explicitly.

That's externalities, which can vary. Evangelical churches take to heart Jesus' Great Commission (Matthew 28:16-20). Fundamentalist anything is a return to basic tenants. If you have a coach who argues his team needs to put more emphasis on running, tackling, and passing the football, that's arguably Fundamentalist Football and no, that's not completely a joke. Fundamentalist Christianity is Christianity with emphasis on core beliefs. Fundamentalists Christians tend to be sola scriptura. A nitty-gritty discussion among Fundamentalist Christians will often go back to the original Hebrew or Greek.

Note something important: There is an intersection between Evangelical Christians and Fundamentalist Christians. It's not that you have Evangelicals on one side and Fundamentalists on the other. You can have Evangelicals who aren't Fundamentalists and Fundamentalists who aren't Evangelicals. The big difference seems to come down to Calvinism. Note that there have been Calvinist evangelicals (Charles Spurgeon for one), but in generally strongly Calvinist churches tend not to be Evangelical. Somewhere around here I have a small booklet written by a Primitive Baptist. Primitive Baptists are Calvinist, and the writer lamented the lack of interest in missions. But Primitive Baptists would be considered Fundamentalist.

Sidebar: Roman Catholics have a concern about on missions, though aren't generally thought of that way. I've often wondered if Roman Catholics should be considered Evangelicals. Seriously.

Some Fundamentalist churches are legalistic; some aren't. It is entirely possible to have legalistic churches that aren't Fundamentalist. That's why you can't rely on externalities.

Suggestion: A resource for someone interested in learning about Fundamentalism is Hershel Hobbs Fundamentals of Our Faith. Hobbs was a Baptist, and writes from a Baptist standpoint. Much of his Fundamentals of Our Faith is similar to his What Baptists Believe.

Tuur · May 16, 2025

Ignatius the Kiwi said:
Christian Nationalism is a response to the weakness that liberalism in general has brought to Christianity. Liberalism and its principles have essentially castrated Christians in acting politically in their own interests. Sensible Christians are tired of feeling like they have to be the Dhimmis of non Christians or subordinate Christian principles to Non Christian ones.

Okay. First, I'm not convinced "Christian Nationalism" is more than a bugaboo of the American Left. Second, political and theological liberalism have been no barrier to church involvement in political issues.

mindlight · May 16, 2025

FireDragon76 said:
Evangelical Christianity just isn't that important, and doesn't account for the rise of MAGA.

Depends on how you define Evangelical. Evangelical to me is about being true to scripture and evangelising others both essential requirements for all true believers.

The connection between that and MAGA is more difficult to explain for a conservative Evangelical who lives abroad. But I understand the reactions to liberalism. American Christian nationalism often seems more about guns and greed than God.

mindlight · May 16, 2025

Michie said:
Suppose I told you that, at a certain well-known, purportedly conservative seminary, there is a professor who has been on staff for over a decade, who has openly stated that “the Gospel is about racial reconciliation”? Would you believe me?

Suppose I further said that the leader of said seminary is considered one of the most prominent conservative Evangelicals, and that he has asked specifically for people to judge him by those he platforms? And neither of these people has been publicly corrected, or fired, and are still training pastors?

Is the frustration mounting yet?

Now you can understand the frustration that is building within a generation of young Christians, particularly young men. They know the Gospel is not about racial reconciliation, or about social projects, and they are sick of being told that it is. They are sick of being told that being a celibate “homosexual Christian” is ok. They are sick of being told that they just have to live with how things are; that nothing can be done to restore biblical Christianity. And that makes them very vulnerable.

Continued below.

Christian nationalism is the overcorrection to Big Eva

Big Eva has worked exactly as Alinsky intended it has created a reactionary movement

www.christianpost.com

It is important to have such irritants in any Christian College as they help form faith and spiritual muscles as true believers wrestle with their positions. The challenge is always to keep the general ethos of a college on the right track. We want conservative Christians in Harvard so it follows that Christians in Bible College also need to be equipped to handle liberals.

mindlight · May 16, 2025

Tuur said:
Okay. First, I'm not convinced "Christian Nationalism" is more than a bugaboo of the American Left. Second, political and theological liberalism have been no barrier to church involvement in political issues.

The basic issue here is whether we should share our faith by love or force. If the levers of power have been taken over by liberals and misused then there are grounds for a forcible correction. But the elimination of freedom per se is a problem as we wish people to freely accept Christ not to be merely coerced into a Christian culture. Older forms of Christian nationalism like the British or Spanish version learned these lessons many centuries ago. But Russian & American Christian nationalism seem to be on extreme trajectories in the current era.

The Barbarian · May 16, 2025

Michie said:
They are sick of being told that being a celibate “homosexual Christian” is ok.

Then they are sick of being Christians. We all have a propensity to sin. Those who resist their impulses to sin are saints, regardless of what those impulses might be. Perhaps those sick people are members of the "my sin is nicer than your sin" Church. Jesus' Church is for sinners who are trying to do better. People who have no urge to sin have no need of His Church.

Chastity and homosexuality
2357 Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. It psychological genesis remains
largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity (Cf. Genesis 19:1-29; Romans 1:24-27; 1 Corinthians 6:10; 1 Timothy 1:10), tradition has always declared that “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.” (Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Persona humana, 8). They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.

2358 The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. They do not choose their homosexual condition; for most of them it is a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination
in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God’s will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord’s Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.

2359 Homosexual persons are called to chastity. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them their inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection.
https://www.catholichawaii.org/medi...y_-_from_catechism_of_the_catholic_church.pdf (my emphasis)

Ignatius the Kiwi · May 16, 2025

Tuur said:
Okay. First, I'm not convinced "Christian Nationalism" is more than a bugaboo of the American Left. Second, political and theological liberalism have been no barrier to church involvement in political issues.

In a certain sense you are right. The left doesnt understand Christian Nationalism and deliberately misconstrues those on the right as wanting some kind of Theocracy if they want Christian principles enshrined in law. Yet there is a legitimate Christian Nationalist movement which seeks to instantiate into law and society Christian norms that rejects enlightenment and liberal principles. You can see this in figures like Stephen Wolfe, who are unapologetic about this and critique the dominant secular and liberal tendencies of society from a purely Christian perspective.

I would disagree with you that political liberalism hasn't impacted Christians participation in politics. Christians in the western world voluntarily submit their political positions to the standards of the enlightenment, secularism, maximizing of individual freedom and other non Christian priorities.

It isnt just Christian Nationalists who are rejecting the enlightenment paradigm we live under but many other movements on the right as well that align themselves with Christian principles.

The Barbarian · May 16, 2025

Ignatius the Kiwi said:
It isnt just Christian Nationalists who are rejecting the enlightenment paradigm we live under but many other movements on the right as well that align themselves with Christian principles.

This has been implemented time and time again, by all sorts of people who were ready to do in God's name what God wasn't willing to do Himself. It's always been a horror. James Madison had it right:

...Because the establishment proposed by the Bill is not requisite for the support of the Christian Religion. To say that it is, is a contradiction to the Christian Religion itself, for every page of it disavows a dependence on the powers of this world: it is a contradiction to fact; for it is known that this Religion both existed and flourished, not only without the support of human laws, but in spite of every opposition from them, and not only during the period of miraculous aid, but long after it had been left to its own evidence and the ordinary care of Providence. Nay, it is a contradiction in terms; for a Religion not invented by human policy, must have pre-existed and been supported, before it was established by human policy. It is moreover to weaken in those who profess this Religion a pious confidence in its innate excellence and the patronage of its Author; and to foster in those who still reject it, a suspicion that its friends are too conscious of its fallacies to trust it to its own merits.

Because experience witnesseth that ecclesiastical establishments, instead of maintaining the purity and efficacy of Religion, have had a contrary operation. During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity, in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution. Enquire of the Teachers of Christianity for the ages in which it appeared in its greatest lustre; those of every sect, point to the ages prior to its incorporation with Civil policy. Propose a restoration of this primitive State in which its Teachers depended on the voluntary rewards of their flocks, many of them predict its downfall. On which Side ought their testimony to have greatest weight, when for or when against their interest?
James Madison, Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments

Ignatius the Kiwi · May 16, 2025

The Barbarian said:
This has been implemented time and time again, by all sorts of people who were ready to do in God's name what God wasn't willing to do Himself. It's always been a horror.

I reject this assessment of Christian history. It has not always been a horror. It has been normative and forms the basis of western society. Secularism has caused far more horrors than any of old Christian regimes. Fascism, Communism and Liberalism all have blood on their hands that outweighs the blood of Christian principalities ten fold. The enlightenment did not get rid of all evil, nor did it erase injustice. More than anything it lead to a breakdown of reverence for the sacred as it elevated individual freedom as the ultimate value in society. Christianity was never a creed of the Individual, unless you think a bunch of rebellious Deists best represent Christianity.

The Barbarian · May 16, 2025

Ignatius the Kiwi said:
I reject this assessment of Christian history.

That's the funny thing about reality. It doesn't care what we think of it.

Ignatius the Kiwi said:
It has not always been a horror.

To the degree that Christianity was allied with government, it's been a horror. As Madison noted, Christianity has been most pure and faithful to God where it's been separated from govermental power.

Ignatius the Kiwi said:
Secularism has caused far more horrors than any of old Christian regimes.

Merely new cults to replace old. Nazism, for example, took inspiration from Martin Luther. About 90% of the "Final Solution" can be found in Luther's The Jews and Their Lies. Nazis on trial at Nuremberg openly admitted it.

Marxism is a heresy that replaces God with "historical necessity." But to compare that to the religious freedoms guaranteed in our Constitution is absurd. C'mon.

Ignatius the Kiwi said:
The enlightenment did not get rid of all evil, nor did it erase injustice.

Nor did anyone think it would. It did produce our religious freedoms, however. Which as the Founders noted, was a huge improvement from the governmental religion among supposedly Christian European nations of the time.

Ignatius the Kiwi said:
More than anything it lead to a breakdown of reverence for the sacred as it elevated individual freedom as the ultimate value in society.

St. Paul would laugh at that notion. Indeed, he struggled against establishment of religion in his time. God neither wants nor needs a government handout.

Ignatius the Kiwi said:
Christianity was never a creed of the Individual

Nor was it a call to governmental action. Why not just accept it as Jesus preached it?

Ignatius the Kiwi · May 16, 2025

The Barbarian said:
That's the funny thing about reality. It doesn't care what we think of it.

To the degree that Christianity was allied with government, it's been a horror. As Madison noted, Christianity has been most pure and faithful to God where it's been separated from govermental power.

Merely new cults to replace old. Nazism, for example, took inspiration from Martin Luther. About 90% of the "Final Solution" can be found in Luther's The Jews and Their Lies. Nazis on trial at Nuremberg openly admitted it.

Marxism is a heresy that replaces God with "historical necessity." But to compare that to the religious freedoms guaranteed in our Constitution is absurd. C'mon.

Nor did anyone think it would. It did produce our religious freedoms, however. Which as the Founders noted, was a huge improvement from the governmental religion among supposedly Christian European nations of the time.

St. Paul would laugh at that notion. Indeed, he struggled against establishment of religion in his time. God neither wants nor needs a government handout.

Nor was it a call to governmental action. Why not just accept it as Jesus preached it?

Let's challenge the presupposition that Christianity in power was always a horror. Do you believe the worst regimes in history were Christian ones? That all non Christian regimes are superior and to be preferred?

The Barbarian · May 16, 2025

Ignatius the Kiwi said:
Let's challenge the presupposition that Christianity in power was always a horror. Do you believe the worst regimes in history were Christian ones? That all non Christian regimes are superior and to be preferred?

You seem to like inventing ideas for other people. Maybe it's harder to deal with the actual argument presented, but that fact might be a revelation in itself.

Ignatius the Kiwi · May 16, 2025

The Barbarian said:
You seem to like inventing ideas for other people. Maybe it's harder to deal with the actual argument presented, but that fact might be a revelation in itself.

Well you are asserting every Christian regime was pure horror right? Let's test this out against secular systems.

Tom8907 · May 17, 2025

The social Gospel you describe isn't the Gospel and Christian Nationalism is not Christian living.

Christian nationalism is the overcorrection to Big Eva

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