By Ron Lora

We hear so much about Christian Nationalism that it bears further examination. At its heart is the belief that America was founded as a Christian nation. And more: our laws and policies should reflect that. However, there are two terms in the phrase.

The Christian part refers to the faith that a nation’s laws and culture should reflect Christian doctrines; government is an institution to implement those doctrines. Nationalism, on the other hand, refers to the primacy of the state that runs on power. The fusion of the two can confuse the public, and sometimes supporters, as to which dominates.

If Christian is the stronger partner, its symbols like the cross, the Bible and its Old Testament and New Testament language, become weapons to validate a particular political agenda, whether about immigration, education, gender relations, evolution, or abortion–all interwoven with white racial identity. When God takes sides in politics, Christian becomes less about conversion to the gospel than about enforcing compliance with religious convictions. When Nationalism is the stronger partner, Christianity becomes the ornamental cover for a political and cultural ideology that places the interests and loyalty to the nation above other interests, including Christian. 

Individual Christian Nationalists may differ on just which part of the movement is dominant, but overall it seems clear that for several decades the Nationalist part of Christian Nationalism has dominated the Christian half of the term. 

Who holds these views? Surveys reveal that roughly 32 percent of Americans are adherents or sympathizers of Christian nationalist ideas, which means that roughly two-thirds of the U.S. population falls into the Skeptic or Rejecter categories. Frequent religious service attendees and older age persons exceed that percentage, as do states with larger white working-class populations. 

There is a strong connection to MAGA politics. The Public Religion Research Institute released a survey showing that 56 percent of Republicans qualify as either adherents or sympathizers of Christian Nationalism.  

The most recent book studying this phenomenon is “No Prophets: The Fight to Save Democracy from Christian Nationalism,” published this summer. In it Rep. Jared Huffman (D-CA) contends that extreme Christian Nationalism is the country’s “most dangerous political movement.”  Its targets are democracy, pluralism and church-state separation. It permeates the Trump administration, but at times can operate separately from President Donald Trump.

A self-proclaimed humanist, Huffman is alert to the many occasions when Christians appear at their weakest.  He is rightly alarmed when the Bible is interpreted in ways that undermine climate science, as U.S. Rep. Mary Miller did when telling a Christian media host that ”The whole climate change is a sham….God controls the climate, because he controls the sun, and the sun controls the weather.” 

Biblical prophecy may also warp foreign policy, one example being the creation of modern Israel in 1948 and justification of its military and administrative control over Palestinian land. For example, U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, during a 2025 visit to a West Bank settlement, said (using Biblical names Judea and Samaria) that Scripture promised their land “to the Jewish people.”

Many are too busy with their lives – careers, family, perhaps addicted to social media – to reflect on dangers posed by Christian Nationalism. One danger, certainly, is the slow erosion of the constitutional separation of church and state by advocating government-sponsored prayer and government funding for religious institutions, thus violating the Establishment Clause in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof..." And it risks marginalizing religious minorities, Muslims, Hindus and others, relegating them to second-class citizenship as less than true Americans.  Racial, cultural and religious pluralism is believed to threaten national security when, in fact, history proves it to enhance the strength of American democracy.

In addition, Christian Nationalists roll back equality when they pursue policies that limit religious and civil rights for all people. More visible to the broader citizenry is their support for attempts to undermine elections, even to the authoritarian extreme of violence seen in the January 6 Capitol attack. 

One way to respond to the anti-democratic challenges is to study and understand the threat Christian Nationalism poses. Talk with others on a personal level –on both sides of our political divide – seek opportunities to affirm civic and religious freedom, and then work with different politico-faith perspectives to pursue pro-democracy policies. Last,  participate in our political processes, which often run slow, but do eventually respond to deeply felt needs.