Tag Archives: Civic nationalism

There are people who want us to believe there is nothing wrong with Christian Nationalism. Particularly in the U.S.A. and in East Europe (Poland and Hungary) there are many who call themselves Christian, though they do not really follow the teachings of Christ and even have another god than Christ (because they do take Jesus to be God himself and worship him even before pictures and statues, which is an abomination in God’s eyes).

Those very conservative Christians often also believe Jesus Christ was a white person, though as a Palestinian he had a light brown skin. For them, Jesus had to belong to the White Race, because only the Caucasian or Europoid, as descendants of Adam, are the ones directly created and foreseen by God. The Mongoloid, and Negroid where considered the lower sort of human beings because they arrived from the sinners and as such had to bear the consequences of their sin and thus had to come to terms with the fact that, as people of colour, they were inferior human beings.

For many Americans God has given them America. According to them, it belongs to them. They forget that the Red Indians were and still are the original and rightful residents of what is now called North America or the United States of America and Canada. They also seem to forget that God has put all things under Christ’s feet and has made him the head over all things for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all (Ephesians 1:15-23) and that all people should become united in Christ. Those who call themselves Christian should as members of that body (Christ = the Church) should be as brothers and sisters, as siblings forming one body and one spirit, just as they were called to the one hope of their calling, not telling lies but speaking the truth in love, being prepared to let everybody grow and themselves also growing up in every way into Jesus Christ, him who is the head, from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by every ligament with which it is equipped, as each part is working properly, promoting the body’s growth in building itself up in love. (Ephesians 4:4, 15-16)

That community sphere and love of Christ is far to look for in many of those American churches, and certainly in those nationalist churches. Strangely enough, several Americans in such nationalist churches or conservative evangelical churches have forgotten their own family background, or simply do not want to acknowledge it, but others want to convince others that the land they live in, has always belonged to them and is a gift from God that they should protect against all strangers trying to come to nest in ‘their nation’.

Those nationalist Christians believe they have a heavenly calling to become immortal, coming to live in heaven. This heavenly goal is for them something which is received by grace and can only be received by the chosen people (they – and strangely not the Biblical Chosen People of Israel). According to them, the white man was created by God (they seem to forget that Adam means the ‘red man’ or ‘man from the red earth‘) to form families, clans, tribes and nations under different earthly governments. Nations and governments are, therefore, according to them, an absolute good and not merely a post-fall necessity of political systems. And that can only be accomplished by their society of white evangelicals making sure that their race and community shall not be polluted by mixing varieties, or coloured people and people thinking differently.

Stephen Wolfe defines Christian Nationalism as follows:

“Christian nationalism is nationalism modified by Christianity.

My definition of Christian nationalism is a Christianized form of nationalism or, put differently, a species of nationalism. Thus, I treat nationalism as a genus, meaning that all that is essential to generic nationalism is true of Christian nationalism.” {The Case for Christian Nationalism (p. 10). Canon Press. Kindle Edition by Stephen Wolfe}

One can wonder what he means by nationalism that would be Christianised. He explains:

My definition of nationalism is similar to that of Christian nationalism, though with less content: Nationalism refers to a totality of national action, consisting of civil laws and social customs, conducted by a nation as a nation, in order to procure for itself both earthly and heavenly good.” {The Case for Christian Nationalism (p. 10-11). Canon Press. Kindle Edition by Stephen Wolfe}

This for me gives the impression that man would be capable to produce heavenly good. Clearly he, like more Christian Americans does not know the Bible enough to work from those Scriptures. But that does not seem to him to be a shortcoming or problem at all, as he assumes that we may think further from the human mind and put everything in the light of the human relationship to the ecclesiastical relationship in order to be able to come to our place in the entirety of God’s work.

About his methodology Wolfe explains:

I assume the Reformed theological tradition ^{might he mean Calvinism}, and so I make little effort to exegete biblical text. Some readers will complain that I rarely appeal to Scripture to argue for my positions. I understand the frustration, but allow me to explain: I am neither a theologian nor a biblical scholar. I have no training in moving from scriptural interpretation to theological articulation.” {The Case for Christian Nationalism (p. 16). Canon Press. Kindle Edition by Stephen Wolfe}

He has a very strange idea about the unity of the church, but that is a general misconception of most American conservative evangelists. He writes:

Spiritual unity is inadequate for formal ecclesial unity. {The Case for Christian Nationalism (p. 200). Canon Press. Kindle Edition, by Stephen Wolfe.}

Though, ecclesial unity can only be formed by all those in the ecclesia willing to go for the same values and same beliefs. Without spiritual unity, based on Biblical Truth, no real good spiritual raster or framework can be built, nor shall the congregation be able to form one strong unity in Christ.

Not to fall far the trap of Christian Nationalism he is right to say

People do not suddenly speak some Gospel language and then assume a Gospel culture. The people’s way of life permeates the visible church, and it serves as an ancillary feature that makes possible the administration of sacred things (e.g., preaching in the vernacular). The administration of the Word and Sacraments require, at a bare minimum, a common language; and church fellowship requires at least a core culture serving as the cultural norm for social relations. Culturally distinct groups of Christians could, of course, start their own churches, and this would solve one problem. {The Case for Christian Nationalism (p. 200). Canon Press. Kindle Edition, by Stephen Wolfe.}

It is important to get a “Way of life” in line with the “Way of life of Christ”. And that is the main point where those Christian Nationalists go wrong. In Eastern Europe as well as in North America, those Nationalist Christians do not follow the teaching of Christ at all, which speaks of tolerance and unselfish love for all people, which is very wrong with those nationalists who exclude others, especially if they have a different colour or race, and do not think they belong to ‘their’ nation.

Many Christian Nationalists believe that it is impossible for people from other backgrounds and cultures to achieve a spiritual presence, especially if they do not speak the same language and / or use the same Bible. They actually exclude the power of God’s Work, and apparently do not believe that God can protect his own Word if it were not printed in their language. All too often we find King James Bible only by such conservatives, but also groups that give preference to the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR)  Apostles Bible. That last movement allows Pentecostal denominations and Charismatic movements to be considered as one spiritual unit or church unity. For them is the world under Satan, and it is the white people who have become Christians who have the authority as well as the duty to reclaim the world for God.

In Great Britain the Christian Nationalists may think like their American believers, but on the continent, they mostly are convinced that only the Roman Catholic Faith is the right faith, and all protestants should come back to the Papal Church, whilst all the unitarian or non-trinitarian believers should be done away with because they would be the hand of Satan.

Europe and the U.S.A may try to be a gathering of bigger places or states, also known as nations, which try to have common bonds in their legal system, their general culture of freedom of speech, even their religious attitudes and holidays, their sports, their food, their music, their movies, simply said to have a common culture. The main aim is to have a general line of common things that should bring different people in that ‘unit’ together. There is an understanding that the common bonds though there is a diversity of these cultural experiences would tear the connection apart or subtract from the strength of the “commonness” or “unity”. Variety should not mean that it would not go together and would mean division. But the nationalist Christians do not want to find a variety of ideas in their ranks. For them, equality in thinking is one of the main things to belong to the covenant.

Religion may traditionally been something that binds a people or nation together, but no group of people can force others to have their religion, and that its in a way what those Christian Nationalists want. They want everybody to think like them and to believe like them.

At no time was it ever Jesus idea that White Americans or any other group of people would be of more importance than the real original People of God, the Bnei Yisroel (people of Israel). God made it clear that Israel was His Chosen People. And it is not up to man to decide who is to be God’s Chosen People. Those nationalists should better delve into the Scriptures to see what it teaches us about our place in the world and how we have to relate to other human beings.

It looks like a lot of Christian Nationalists are afraid of what is further from their bed, instead of opening their horizons, they want to close their world in a time of globalisation.

Those who think God’s Word is only for a few are wrong. The Word of God is revealed to all mankind and calls all people, be them white or bronw, to self-denial and transformation and to unite with eachother, coming closer to God in unity and full of love. From the gospels we learn that strangers were to be loved, the same as the followers of Christ would love themselves. The law effectively speaks against the actions of the nations in preferring their own.

We should know that any form of extreme behaviour or way of thinking is contrary to the open mind Jesus wanted his followers to have. From the previous centuries we also can see how such extremism derailed and gave birth to movements we as lovers of God should avoid, because they are totally against the rules of love for the other.

Giving exaggerated attention to the country or belonging to one country has created currents in the world that excluded others, such as what Nazism did to Jews, gipsies and true God-loving persons who did not wish to believe in the Trinity. Such a cursing attitude that goes against the commandments of God should be avoided by every Christian.

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Preceding

Evangelicals: For The Love Of Trump

Evangelicals & Seduction

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Additional reading

1. People of God
2. The Many Faces of Extremism
3. A diluted reformation point
4. Capitalism and economic policy and Christian survey
5. About Three-in-Ten U.S. Adults Are Now Religiously Unaffiliated
6. Living with some type of physical disability in the U.S.A.
7. Less Americans interested in praying
8. The American clouds of Anti-Semitism
9. Gradual decline by American Christians
10. The Media and Democracy
11. Right-wing fundamentalist Christians to dictate the U.S.A.
12. American churches closing their doors for good
13. American secularism is growing — and growing more complicated
14. American fundamentalists win
15. Our selection of The Week’s 2nd week of August 2022
16. Reasons why Christianity is declining rapidly in America
17. How willing are people to stand up for their values and beliefs
18. What Does it Really Mean to Be a Radical Follower of Jesus?
19. Gradual decline by American Christians
20. What is happening in America to religion and to the language of faith
21. How to Save the American Church
22. Have corrupt kleptocrats and international criminals to make America great
23. A president daring to use the Bible for underlining his hate speech
24. How the term Evangelical has grown to blur theology and ideology
25. Presbyterians and Reformed Christians, membership and active involvement is part of a congregation’s DNA
26. War against deconstruction Christian movement
27. Hope For, But Not In, Evangelicalism
28. Dan Foster on what he finds the Stupidest solution to school shootings presented by a Christian Pastor
29. Christian nationalism is shaping a Pennsylvania primary — and a GOP shift
30. Does one have to be afraid of Christian nationalism
31. Our stance against certain religions and immigrating people
32. Those willing to tarnish
33. Who are the anti-Jehovah people
34. Facing Extremism
35. The Moral Character of Public Officials: Remembering January 6
36. Martin Luther King’s Dream Today
37. Joshua, a Particular Baptist his view on Nationalism

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