The real work before us is to rebuild a Christian culture in American hearts and communities. This will not be achieved, chiefly, by winning elections or imposing laws but by discipling families, evangelizing the lost, modeling holiness, strengthening churches, and reviving the nation’s moral imagination. A label like “Christian nationalism” does nothing to advance this mission and, in fact, serves as a distraction from it.

Three years ago, when “Christian nationalism” was still a fairly new idea on the scene, I wrote a column at WORLD titled, “What does ‘Christian nationalism’ even mean?” Almost three years later, we have the advantage of looking backward to see how the drama around “Christian nationalism” has unfolded. As I said in 2022, the term is essentially vacuous and endlessly malleable. Today, left and right alike still spar over the term. More than anything, though, the term has proven an unhelpful distraction.

For the left, “Christian nationalism” is an all-encompassing bogeyman. It is used to conflate everything from traditional pro-life advocacy to concerns about religious liberty under a single sinister label. When liberal pundits use the term, they are rarely making careful distinctions between different strains of Christian political thought. They are simply describing a general, amorphous enemy: conservative Christians who believe their faith should inform public policy.

It doesn’t matter if one’s political vision is deeply rooted in America’s constitutional regime. The moment Christians express the belief that biblical morality has something to say about law or culture, they risk being painted as theocrats. In this way, “Christian nationalism” functions as a convenient way to delegitimize any faith-based political argument without ever engaging with its merits.

Some on the right, sensing this overreach, have reacted by defiantly embracing the label. This is a mistake. Instead of reclaiming the term, they are merely cementing its status as a rallying cry for reactionary vanguards.

Even if the left exaggerates the dangers of Christian nationalism, the way the term is being adopted on parts of the right, especially as an online phenomenon, should be equally concerning to serious Christians.

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