White Evangelicals or Christian Nationalists?

The fact that white evangelicals have been strong supporters of the 45^th president of the United States has been widely publicized by the media because such support seems to be at odds with the basic tenets of their faith.  But it is also true that there is a significant number of white evangelicals who have been firmly denouncing the former president’s character flaws and policy priorities as antichristian.  In my previous writings about the matter, I have attempted to provide some degree of clarification regarding the particular white evangelicals I was denouncing (see for example White Evangelicals and their Agenda in their Own Words).  In their book Taking America Back for God, published in 2020, Andrew Whitehead and Samuel Perry explain that support of Trump can best be explained in terms of adherence to Christian nationalism rather than evangelicalism.  The events of January 6, during which Trump supporters attacked the Capitol in an attempt to overturn the will of the people and keep their candidate in power, seem to validate the perspective presented in the book.

In my previous post, Evangelical Leaders React to Christian Nationalism and the Attack on the Capitol, I pointed out that the statement issued by these leaders specifically denounced Christian nationalism.  In this post, I will discuss the distinctive aspects of Christian nationalism as identified by Whitehead and Perry, who conducted a rather comprehensive and convincing study with statistics to back their conclusions.

Defining Christian Nationalism

Whitehead and Perry define Christian nationalism as follows:

“Simply put, Christian nationalism is a cultural framework— a collection of myths, traditions, symbols, narratives, and value systems— that idealizes and advocates a fusion of Christianity with American civic life.”

Promoters of Christian nationalism believe that America was founded as a Christian nation called to live in covenant with God.  In other words, it is something like the concept of a chosen nation in the Old Testament, where the nation will thrive only if it obeys God’s commands.  It is therefore not surprising to hear preachers quoting 2 Chronicles 7:14, which says:

“… If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”

Christian nationalists will put much effort into finding ways of convincing their audiences that the founding fathers were Christians who incorporated their beliefs into the constitution.  From this perspective, one might expect their main focus to be on Christian piety and behavior.  However, it turns out that their primary objective is to make sure their brand of Christianity maintains influence on political and civic life.  Their understanding of the Christian faith is closely intermingled with ethnic considerations: they believe the nation was founded by white Protestants who, therefore, are entitled to a privileged status.  This, of course, gives them a skewed understanding of democracy: claims by non-whites, non-Christians are attempts to dilute the cultural heritage of true Americans.  Therefore, when they talk about religious freedom, they are usually referring to their rights at the expense of the rights of others.  Furthermore, they rely on religious symbols to provide justification for the political advantages they want to maintain.  In this manner, they believe their claims are right because they are divine, not because they are derived from a sense of fairness.  Consequently, in their struggle to prevail over their adversaries, the ends, including resorting to violence, justify the means.

The authors identify Christian nationalists by their responses to a set of questions that indicate how strongly they would like to see the government influenced by their “Christian” values.  The questions are listed below:

1. The federal government should declare the United States a Christian nation.
2. The federal government should advocate Christian values.
3. The federal government should enforce strict separation of church and state.
4. The federal government should allow the display of religious symbols in public spaces.
5. The success of the United States is part of God’s plan.
6. The federal government should allow prayer in public schools.

The authors group survey responders into four orientations toward Christian nationalism: ambassadors who strongly embrace all items in the above list (19.8%), rejecters who strongly reject them (21.5%), accommodators who lean toward embracing them (32.1%) and resisters who lean toward rejecting them (26.6%).  Roughly then, the nation is divided into ambassadors and accommodators who represent Christian nationalism and rejecters and resisters who are against it.

The Values of Christian nationalists

With the above classification in mind, it becomes apparent from a variety of data that there is a strong correlation between Christian nationalism and political conservatism.  However, they are not the same, and Christian nationalism correlates more strongly, for example, with attitudes seen in Trump supporters on race, gender, immigration, gun rights, Islam, and family/sexuality issues, than political ideology. In other words, some political conservatives may disagree with such attitudes. 

Christian nationalists tend to describe themselves as “Bible-believing” and view the Bible as the literal, perfectly true word of God.  They are particularly inclined to apply God’s commands to Israel in the Old Testament to their own situations.

Christian nationalists tend to be religiously affiliated and are found in many Christian denominations.  Evangelical Protestants (not including black Protestants), in greater proportion than other denominations, tend to display the characteristics of Christian nationalists.  Indeed, 33% of accommodators and 54.9% of ambassadors are evangelical Protestants. In comparison, 11.3% of ambassadors and 12.5% of accommodators are mainline Protestants, while 18.6% of ambassadors and 31.9% of accommodators are Catholics. However, when it comes to religious practice measured by attendance of religious services, prayer and reading of scriptures for example, differences between Christian nationalists and pious Christians become clear.  Also, unlike pious Christians, Christian nationalists tend to show little concern for matters of justice and care for the sick and the needy, and tend to embrace militarism.  For such reasons, it would be a mistake to assume that white evangelicals and Christian nationalists are the same group.

Christian nationalists are concerned about the moral decay of the nation and believe there is a current descent into depravity that will lead to the Rapture, the idea that Jesus will lift them into heaven during the Great Tribulation.  They also believe that God wants his faithful to be involved in wars between good and evil as defined by them.

Christian Nationalism and the Trump Presidency

According to Whitehead and Perry, even though it has been widely reported that white evangelicals tend to be strong supporters of Trump and his policies, it is more appropriate to associate such support to Christian Nationalism.  The events of January 6 certainly support this thesis.  To many observers, the use of Christian symbols by the insurrection was indeed a horrible misrepresentation of the Christian faith, and many Christian leaders, including evangelical leaders, felt compelled to strongly condemn these actions.