Understanding key differences: Christian conservatism vs. Christian nationalism

[rambot]

Regardless of wether it's moral or not, the majority rules.

Well the tricky thing is that morals tend to arise out of cultures. So, different moralities can clash. But generally, there is sufficient overlap between culture for most of the important things.


It comes back to:
What is the alternative to democracy

 

[RoBo1988]

It comes back to:
What is the alternative to democracy

"A republic, if you can keep it"

Sad to say, we can't.

 

[rambot]

"A republic, if you can keep it"

Sad to say, we can't.

A republic has the power in democratic representation behind it.

What good is a constitution if it's 250 years old? Society and its values change. You think if the US is still around in 700year the original constitution would still be a viable document?

The Magna Carta is PRETTY COOL; nobody argues that. Set the foot for democracy and all that stuff. But ultimately, it would still suck as a ruling document in today's day and age.

I'm not in agreement that a 3-500 year old document should have complete power over a very different population in terms of ethnic make up and the values of the society.

 

[RoBo1988]

What good is a constitution if it's 250 years old? Society and its values change. You think if the US is still around in 700year the original constitution would still be a viable document?

Which parts of the constitution would you do away with?

If those we sent to "represent" us adhered to it, then yes, it would still be viable.

But as it's said: it (the constitution) is for a moral and religious people, and incompatible with any other. We are to govern ourselves, not looking to the government for every jot and tiddle of their lives. Today's majority do not govern themselves.

You will probably get your wish - the constitution will end up memory holed.

 

[keith99]

Christian nationalism's support is strongest in rural, conservative states​

In states including North Dakota, Mississippi, Alabama and West Virginia, half or nearly half of residents support the view that Christians should dominate all areas of American society, including its laws, according to a new survey about the influence of Christian nationalism by the Public Religion Research Institute, based on interviews with more than 22,000 people.

Nationally, about three in ten Americans believe, or at least sympathize with, ideas that claim the U.S. is a Christian nation and that the country's laws should draw from Christian values.
--
For the survey's purposes, whether people were Christian Nationalist adherents or sympathizers (or skeptics or rejectors) depends on the extent that they agree with the following 5 points:

• The U.S. government should declare America a Christian nation.
• U.S. laws should be based on Christian values.
• If the U.S. moves away from our Christian foundations, we will not have a country anymore.
• Being Christian is an important part of being truly American.
• God has called Christians to exercise dominion over all areas of American society.

It would seem they believe that their Christ's Kingdom IS of this world.

I think Christ disagrees.

 

[lifepsyop]

I don't think you know what the word "sacred" means. I think it is important.

Something sacred is something you treat with a sense of ultimate veneration, as an ultimate good for humanity. To lose the sacred thing would be to cast humanity into darkness, which is clearly how you feel about democracy.

What I'm saying isn't even controversial. Many people today, including the current POTUS, routinely use the phrase "Sacred Democracy"... Many people do in fact revere the spirit of democracy as something sacred... a Hegelian style "End of History"

 

[rambot]

Something sacred is something you treat with a sense of ultimate veneration, as an ultimate good for humanity. To lose the sacred thing would be to cast humanity into darkness, which is clearly how you feel about democracy.

I have watched you do a very poor job of responding to what I said an you've somehow creates tour own conclusion about me that is false (and also based on. A poor definition of sacred).

What I'm saying isn't even controversial. Many people today, including the current POTUS, routinely use the phrase "Sacred Democracy"... Many people do in fact revere the spirit of democracy as something sacred... a Hegelian style "End of History"

I am not many people.

 

[rambot]

Which parts of the constitution would you do away with?

Not saying I would do away with anything. Just dying I disagree with the idea.

A society should not be claimed forever to old ideas.

If those we sent to "represent" us adhered to it, then yes, it would still be viable.

But as it's said: it (the constitution) is for a moral and religious people, and incompatible with any other.

i think 3/5ths of black america may have a word.

We are to govern ourselves, not looking to the government for every jot and tiddle of their lives. Today's majority do not govern themselves.

they could if they were not filled with vindictive antagonists but your partymen are excited to vote that type.

You will probably get your wish - the constitution will end up memory holed.

 

[BCP1928]

It would seem they believe that their Christ's Kingdom IS of this world.

I think Christ disagrees.

Rural conservatives, mostly Christians, are being screwed over economically and socially. The only question is, who gets to do the screwing and who is going to get the blame for it.

 

[essentialsaltes]

In Superman's 'hometown,' a pastor vows to fight Satan's influence at the local library​

Apocalyptic warnings of an "evil" assault are fueling a struggle for control of the public library in Metropolis, Illinois.

“Evil is moving and motivated,” Brian Anderson told his congregation at Eastland Life Church on the evening of Jan. 13. “And the church is asleep.”

But there was still time to fight back, Anderson said. He called on the God-fearing people of Metropolis to meet the enemy where Satan was planning his assault: at their town’s library.

[Anderson also sits on the city council, and the mayor is part of his congregation.]

The dispute has pitted the city’s mayor, a member of Eastland Life Church, against his own library board of trustees. It led to the abrupt dismissal of the library director, who accused the board of punishing her for her faith. And last month, it drew scrutiny from the state’s Democratic secretary of state, who said the events in Metropolis “should frighten and insult all Americans who believe in the freedom of speech and in our democracy.”

To counter this movement, Illinois Democrats last year adopted the first state law in the nation aimed at preventing book bans— which ended up feeding the unrest in Metropolis.

Unlike in comic books and the Bible, the fight in Metropolis doesn’t break along simple ideological lines. Virtually everyone on either side of the conflict identifies as a Christian, and most folks here vote Republican. The real divide is between residents who believe the public library should adhere to their personal religious convictions ['You might be a Christian nationalist if...'], and those who argue that it should instead reflect a wide range of ideas and identities.

--

Glenn Coram, pastor of Immanuel Baptist Church in Metropolis, said he also opposed efforts to portray the library as a site of spiritual warfare.

“They’re seeing their mission,” Coram said, “as establishing the kingdom of God in Metropolis through the government.” ['You might be a Christian nationalist if...']

--

Baxter, the embattled library director, appeared alongside Anderson and another local pastor on the “Greg Dunker Show,” a local conservative talk radio program.

Baxter defended her decision to donate or sell thousands of books, which she said she did to make room for additional children’s programming. Those removals, she said, were not “an attempt to pull any specific thing.” [Although the result is there are now 8 children's bibles and 1 book on Halloween.]

“God said he did not give us a spirit of fear,” Baxter said, alluding to the scary themes sometimes found in Halloween books. “Why would I want to instill that on anyone?”

Baxter also elaborated on her refusal to apply for state grants. She had chosen instead, she said, to rely on God to provide.

“We don’t need to live by the regulations and the rules of this state,” Baxter said. “We are here to serve and to honor God.” ['You might be a Christian nationalist if...']

A week later, the board went into a closed session and presented Baxter with an ultimatum: If she wanted to keep her job, she needed to sign a performance improvement plan. It stipulated that she would abide by the Library Bill of Rights, seek state grant funding and discontinue praying aloud with children and other religious activities at the library. [She refused to sign it and was removed. The mayor then targetted three board members who voted for her removal. The city council chose not to remove them.]

[One board member] lies awake some nights, worried about what her critics might do to harm her or her family if they truly came to view her as a tool of Satan out to “kill” children. She thinks about the phrase etched in stone at the foot of the Superman statue in the center of town — Truth, Justice, The American Way — and wonders if some of her neighbors have lost sight of what those words really mean.

 

[essentialsaltes]

How one evangelical leader uses the Bible to expose the ‘False White Gospel’​

[Jim] Wallis conducts another provocative theological experiment in his latest book, “The False White Gospel: Rejecting Christian Nationalism, Reclaiming True Faith, and Refounding Democracy.” In the book he compares six iconic Biblical texts to White Christian nationalist beliefs. His conclusion: White Christian nationalists also follow a Bible that’s full of holes.

Wallis has been warning people about the dangers of White Christian nationalist beliefs long before the term became popular.

“White Christian nationalism has cut out of their Bibles all of the Scriptures that lead faith to justice,” Wallis writes in a passage that recounts his youthful episode with the scissors. “When is the last time you heard a white Christian nationalist MAGA pastor talk about justice from the pulpit — justice for the poor, for the immigrants, for those being discriminated against? The only words that relate to ‘justice’ are predictions of punishment for all those who oppose their political agenda.”

Wallis, who speaks in a gravelly preacher’s baritone, is currently the director of the Center on Faith and Justice at Georgetown University in Washington. He recently spoke to CNN, and his remarks were edited for brevity and clarity.

Some defenders of White Christian nationalism say the term is mostly used as a smear against conservative Christians who just want to defend the role of religion in American public life. Your response?

No, that’s wrong. I want to defend the role of religion in public life. I’ve done that my whole life. The separation of church and state, which I believe in, does not require the segregation of moral and religious values from public life.

You write that White Christian nationalism is not new, and that it’s a form of heresy. Why do you consider it to be such a danger?

The name spells the problem. You have the most inclusive and inviting, welcoming vision in the history of the world for all people and it becomes White. You’ve got “Christian,” but it doesn’t mean service, sacrifice and love. It means control and domination. And then it’s nationalist. In the Great Commission, Jesus tells his followers to go into all the nations, making disciples and teaching them to observe whatever I have commanded you. [White] nationalists just don’t fit into that.

What’s the difference between patriotism — believing that the US is an exceptional country — and White Christian nationalism?

To love your country and love so many things about your country is a good and healthy thing. Pete Seeger’s “This Land Is Your Land” is a lovely patriotic song. However, American exceptionalism is wrong. It’s not biblical. After I finished the book, [former President] Donald Trump began selling his own Bible and taking the proceeds himself [Trump is reportedly just taking a portion of the proceeds]. When you have “God bless the USA” on a Bible cover, that’s idolatrous, that’s a worship of a nation. Idolatry is just false worship.

 

[essentialsaltes]

CNN’s Donie O’Sullivan and his team have an hourlong documentary, “MisinfoNation: The Trump Faithful,” airing on “The Whole Story with Anderson Cooper” on Sunday at 8 p.m. ET.​

WOLF: A theme throughout the show is a belief among Christian nationalists that the US is a Christian nation and that Christianity is laced throughout the Constitution and the founding documents. There are some interesting moments in the show where it dawns on people that actually the word “God” does not appear in the Constitution. Was that something you expected? Or is it something you stumbled upon?

O’SULLIVAN: There are so many strands to what is happening in the country right now, especially when it comes to trust and distrust in democracy, and Christian nationalism is one of them. We wanted to show in this documentary how two of these strands are kind of intertwining.

When it comes to Christian nationalism specifically, the reasons that we went down that route are 1) it’s something I hear all the time at these events and 2) there is increasing awareness about it.

Pastors have seen members of their congregation, members of their flock who leave because their sermons weren’t political enough or weren’t directly supporting Trump as the candidate.

There’s nothing wrong with being a Christian. There’s nothing wrong with being a patriot. But what is really happening with Christian nationalism is that they are pushing a very specific type of Christianity at the expense of other people’s freedoms.

 

[Hazelelponi]

Understanding key differences: Christian conservatism vs. Christian nationalism

Nearly all self-identified Christian Nationalists are Calvinists, typically Presbyterian like Wolfe, but often theologically Reformed Baptists like the subjects of the Politico article

www.christianpost.com

Most of what is written about Christian Nationalism is silly. Critics and analysts sweepingly deride conventional Christian conservatives as Christian Nationalists. By some counts, there are, by this definition, tens of millions of Christian Nationalists. Sometimes even civil religion, with its homage to a vague deity, is labeled Christian Nationalism. If so, all presidents from George Washington to Joe Biden are Christian nationalists. Sometimes the target is folk religionists who conflate God and country.

They sometimes sport paraphernalia with American flags draped around the cross. These folk religionists typically aren’t aware they are Christian nationalists. They don’t publish articles, much less books. And they typically don’t have policy agendas, just an attitude that God and country should be interchangeably honored.

But some more intellectual Americans do consciously self-identify as Christian Nationalists. Politico has published an article about two of them. But unhelpfully the article does not explain distinctions and, like a hundred other articles, focuses on a combination of Christian conservative and New Right views held by their subjects without defining why they call themselves Christian Nationalists.

Christian Nationalism is distinct from conventional Christian conservatism. The former are typically post-liberals who want some level of explicit state-established Christianity. The latter have been and largely still are classical liberals who affirm traditional American concepts of full religious liberty for all. Both groups want a “Christian America.” But the former want it by statute. The latter see it as mainly a demographic, historical, and cultural reality.

I didn't know you made this thread... Completely missed it.

Good thread, posting to mark and read later... and perhaps resurrect...

 

[essentialsaltes]

Lead us forward to dispel the darkness
and bring light throughout the Church, Family,
Education, Business, Military, Government, and
Arts, Entertainment, and Media.

Seven Mountain Mandate​

The Seven Mountain Mandate is part of dominionism.[5]
The seven areas that the movement believe influence society and that they seek to influence are family, religion, education, media, entertainment, business, and government.

PS That's not a word being lifted up. Close, though.

 

[RoBo1988]

View attachment 349708

Lead us forward to dispel the darkness
and bring light throughout the Church, Family,
Education, Business, Military, Government, and
Arts, Entertainment, and Media.

Seven Mountain Mandate​

The Seven Mountain Mandate is part of dominionism.[5]
The seven areas that the movement believe influence society and that they seek to influence are family, religion, education, media, entertainment, business, and government.

PS That's not a word being lifted up. Close, though.

Ephesians 6:17

 

[RoBo1988]

The seven areas that the movement believe influence society and that they seek to influence are family, religion, education, media, entertainment, business, and government.

As an individual, I seek to do the same.

I view the happenings of this world in the lens of The Word, and seek direction from it, and the Holy Spirit, instead of humanistic resources like television, the NYT, etc. And view those that do take their leadings from worldly culture as " sheep without a shepherd" Mark 6:34

I have no inclination to force this worldview upon anyone else, because unless The Lord draws, they will not come, anyway. Psalm 73:28

 

[essentialsaltes]

Christian Nationalist Pastor Joel Webbon Apparently Traumatized By Non-Christians In His Neighborhood​

“I walk around my neighborhood and it’s not that there are [just] different shades of white and brown,” he added. “No, it’s like full, straight-up Hindu garb at our neighborhood swimming pool that my daughter is asking [about and] I’m trying to explain.”

“I don’t even know what country I’m in, in my own neighborhood,” Webbon declared. “I don’t know where I am.”

“When we go on a family walk, the number of Pakistanis, Hindus, [there are] all these different not just ethnicities but religions with visible religious outfits on,” Webbon griped. “And the same thing when we go to Costco. I’m like, ‘Where am I?'”

“We’ll go on a family walk and every now and then we’ll pass by, you know, a white family that’s a man and a woman and has more than one kid,” he continued. “And every time I see it, I’m like, I don’t want to be this way but I feel this small sense of relief. Like, ‘I I see you. I’m glad you’re one of my neighbors.'”

 

[JustOneWay]

Christian Nationalist Pastor Joel Webbon Apparently Traumatized By Non-Christians In His Neighborhood​

“I walk around my neighborhood and it’s not that there are [just] different shades of white and brown,” he added. “No, it’s like full, straight-up Hindu garb at our neighborhood swimming pool that my daughter is asking [about and] I’m trying to explain.”

“I don’t even know what country I’m in, in my own neighborhood,” Webbon declared. “I don’t know where I am.”

“When we go on a family walk, the number of Pakistanis, Hindus, [there are] all these different not just ethnicities but religions with visible religious outfits on,” Webbon griped. “And the same thing when we go to Costco. I’m like, ‘Where am I?'”

“We’ll go on a family walk and every now and then we’ll pass by, you know, a white family that’s a man and a woman and has more than one kid,” he continued. “And every time I see it, I’m like, I don’t want to be this way but I feel this small sense of relief. Like, ‘I I see you. I’m glad you’re one of my neighbors.'”

This is happening in Texas? I wonder if he lives down around San Antone close to China Grove? Maybe he should move to Paris Texas?

I wonder what he thinks when he sees a Priest or Nun with their garb on? A Kippah perhaps?


"Among the participants was pastor Joel Webbon, an ardent Christian nationalist who believes that the American people are too degenerate, stupid, and cowardly to abide by the Constitution and therefore must be governed by a Christian dictator who “just rules with an iron fist” and forces everyone to, at the very least, “pretend to be Christian.”

 

[wing2000]

Christian Nationalist Pastor Joel Webbon Apparently Traumatized By Non-Christians In His Neighborhood​

“I walk around my neighborhood and it’s not that there are [just] different shades of white and brown,” he added. “No, it’s like full, straight-up Hindu garb at our neighborhood swimming pool that my daughter is asking [about and] I’m trying to explain.”

“I don’t even know what country I’m in, in my own neighborhood,” Webbon declared. “I don’t know where I am.”

“When we go on a family walk, the number of Pakistanis, Hindus, [there are] all these different not just ethnicities but religions with visible religious outfits on,” Webbon griped. “And the same thing when we go to Costco. I’m like, ‘Where am I?'”

“We’ll go on a family walk and every now and then we’ll pass by, you know, a white family that’s a man and a woman and has more than one kid,” he continued. “And every time I see it, I’m like, I don’t want to be this way but I feel this small sense of relief. Like, ‘I I see you. I’m glad you’re one of my neighbors.'”

Poor guy. He thinks the Kingdom of God is comprised of WASP.

 

[Vambram]

Christian Nationalist Pastor Joel Webbon Apparently Traumatized By Non-Christians In His Neighborhood​

“I walk around my neighborhood and it’s not that there are [just] different shades of white and brown,” he added. “No, it’s like full, straight-up Hindu garb at our neighborhood swimming pool that my daughter is asking [about and] I’m trying to explain.”

“I don’t even know what country I’m in, in my own neighborhood,” Webbon declared. “I don’t know where I am.”

“When we go on a family walk, the number of Pakistanis, Hindus, [there are] all these different not just ethnicities but religions with visible religious outfits on,” Webbon griped. “And the same thing when we go to Costco. I’m like, ‘Where am I?'”

“We’ll go on a family walk and every now and then we’ll pass by, you know, a white family that’s a man and a woman and has more than one kid,” he continued. “And every time I see it, I’m like, I don’t want to be this way but I feel this small sense of relief. Like, ‘I I see you. I’m glad you’re one of my neighbors.'”

I question the authenticity of the sources and website for this story.