Obviously, traditional Christians ought to limit that kind of nationalistic fervor. As “strangers and exiles on the earth,” our ultimate allegiance is to Christ’s kingdom. Our love for a non-American brother or sister in Christ should exceed our comradeship with unbelieving American patriots, whose numbers are legion. But measured patriotism still seems appropriate, and somewhat unavoidable for most Christians. Even Romans 13’s injunction to be “subject to the governing authorities” suggests a default support for your nation. If nothing else, we pray for our leaders and communities so that, as 1 Timothy 2 puts it, believers “may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way.” When believers can live that kind of life in a nation (as they often have in America), we should be grateful. (See Kevin DeYoung’s helpful reflections on our national history and identity.)
During Donald Trump’s presidency many critics have reviled his base as adherents of “Christian nationalism.” Christian nationalism, we are told, is the real religion of Trumpian “evangelicals.” But the definition of Christian nationalism is often unclear.
Why is Christian nationalism a slippery category? First, it is usually a term of insult. Yes, the term reflects those who would describe America as a “Christian nation.” But there are far more pundits who label people as “Christian nationalists” than there are people who embrace the term themselves.
Second, actual Christian nationalism is more a visceral reaction than a rationally chosen stance. I recently saw a yard sign that read “Make Faith Great Again: Trump 2020.” I wondered, How can re-electing Donald Trump make “faith” great again? What faith? When did it stop being great? No coherent answers would be forthcoming to such questions, but that’s the point. The sign speaks to a person’s ethnic, religious, and cultural identity in ways easier to notice than to explain.
Finally, it is often not clear whether “Christian nationalism” is referring mainly to devotion to the American nation, to the Republican Party, or to an individual politician. The Trump era has definitely produced exotic beliefs related to the president as an “anointed” ruler, as illustrated by the recent vision-induced “Jericho March.” But here I want to focus on the concept of Christian nationalism as nationalism per se.
Christian Nationalism vs. Christian Patriotism
What’s the difference between Christian nationalism (bad) and Christian patriotism (good in moderation)? Political theorist Benedict Anderson described nations as “imagined communities”: though nations may be vast in geography and population, many of us cherish such intense patriotic commitment that we would lay down our lives (or those of our children) to defend our country, and to promote its power around the globe.
Obviously, traditional Christians ought to limit that kind of nationalistic fervor. As “strangers and exiles on the earth,” our ultimate allegiance is to Christ’s kingdom. Our love for a non-American brother or sister in Christ should exceed our comradeship with unbelieving American patriots, whose numbers are legion.
But measured patriotism still seems appropriate, and somewhat unavoidable for most Christians. Even Romans 13’s injunction to be “subject to the governing authorities” suggests a default support for your nation. If nothing else, we pray for our leaders and communities so that, as 1 Timothy 2 puts it, believers “may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way.” When believers can live that kind of life in a nation (as they often have in America), we should be grateful. (See Kevin DeYoung’s helpful reflections on our national history and identity.)
America has long nurtured more problematic forms of Christian nationalism, though. In this, the United States is hardly alone. British nationalism was an enormously powerful commitment for white American colonists, one that most patriots only broke with great reluctance in 1776. Communist nations like North Korea also engender virulent forms of nationalism, since official atheism needs transcendent national commitments to fill the void usually occupied by theistic civil religion.
Still, since “evangelicals” (usually meaning white religious Republicans) are the Americans most often accused of Christian nationalism, it would behoove those of us who still accept the “evangelical” label to consider nationalism’s history.
History of Christian Nationalism
In The Cross of War: Christian Nationalism and U.S. Expansion in the Spanish-American War, Matthew McCullough defines American Christian nationalism as “an understanding of American identity and significance held by Christians wherein the nation is a central actor in the world-historical purposes of the Christian God.” War has generated the “strongest expressions of Christian nationalism,” he explains. As McCullough and others have shown, Christian nationalism can give an exaggerated transcendent meaning to American history, and undergird American militarism.
Christian nationalism has often changed over America’s history. It originally took the form of British Protestant nationalism aligned against Catholic national powers, especially France and Spain. Britain became America’s rival in the Revolution and the War of 1812. Other Americans became the great national enemy during the Civil War. But today’s Christian nationalism dates back to the Cold War.
In many ways, the fight against Soviet communism set the modern template for white evangelical engagement with politics. This helps explain why many of today’s most ardent adherents of Christian nationalism are also children of the Cold War. White evangelical leaders, especially Billy Graham, framed the Cold War as a conflict between the Christian values of America and the atheism of the Soviets. (White people have been the primary, though not exclusive, purveyors of Christian nationalism, partly because they have been great beneficiaries of American national power.) As Graham would later admit, this spiritual framing led him and other evangelicals to see almost everything about Cold War politics through spiritual lenses. Thus, whoever was toughest on communism (e.g., Dwight Eisenhower, Richard Nixon, or Ronald Reagan) got transformed into Christian warriors who had God on their side.
The details of a politician’s personal faith didn’t matter so much as their bona fides as a Cold War stalwart. This association of Republican politicians with the cause of Christian nationalism became more pronounced when the GOP, out of both opportunism and principle, identified itself as the pro-life party after Roe v. Wade (1973). The fact that most traditional Protestants in America correctly regarded abortion as gravely immoral made it even more difficult, ironically, to maintain clear boundaries between Christian identity, Republican politics, and the American nation. As the secular left in the post-Vietnam War era portrayed American history as morally mixed, if not relentlessly abominable, key white evangelicals responded with “God and country” celebrations, even at church services, and with the formation of the Moral Majority.
