A Brief History of Christian Nationalism in the USA
There’s been a visible rift in the last few weeks nationally that goes like this: “Trump and his team are going against the Constitution (and have been) and that’s damaging the country!” And then we also hear “Promises made! Promises kept! Trump is doing what we voted for! Keep going Elon!”
Half the nation sees Trump and his supporters’ actions as un-Constitutional. But to the Christian Nationalist and the rest of his Base, they are cheering, because this is exactly what they voted for. How can Americans see this so differently? I wondered the same thing. It all makes perfect sense when you look at the history of Christian Nationalism. We can do that here pretty quickly.
It all started with those wacky Puritans. Back in 1600s and 1700s, the Puritans and other settlers came over into a ‘New World’ full of people and what they saw as a “Christian nation” with a divine mission to create a "city upon a hill," a godly community that would serve as a model of Christian virtue and righteousness. The sermon “A Model of Christian Charity” creates the notion of American Exceptionalism (The New World/USA is better than everyone else and chosen by God).
Why did that guy pass out and what’s the lightning? ‘Witch No. 1’ Joseph E., ca. 1837-1914, artist, Wikimedia Commons
The Puritans would go on to gift us with one of the largest examples of religious paranoia, the Salem Witch Trials. The driver of those trials stemmed from Puritan beliefs in Satan’s influence, strict religious doctrines, and fears of societal disorder - pretty much the same fears we see today in the Christian Nationalist movement.
The Second Great Awaking came along in the 1790s-1830s. This was a major religious revival that brought more evangelical preaching, new denominations, and more individual involvement in religion and the country. Positive highlights included early work to help end slavery, aiding participation in women’s rights, and encouraging ordinary people take charge of their lives. On the flipside, they promoted Bible-based “moral” behavior, opened more Christian schools (including the notorious schools for Native Americans), and started the temperance movement which led to prohibition. Key drivers were resistance to the rise of modern science, decline in church membership, and political and social upheaval following the Revolutionary War - again, similar drivers to today.
Then we can see the movement branch off, entrench, and start to grow:
1860s-1870s: Christianity was used to justify both slavery in Southern churches and abolition in Northern churches. This begins a key long-term ideological split in the nation around race, science, and government. The idea of America as a Christian nation intensifies during Reconstruction, with some groups resisting racial equality using religious arguments, a trend that would continue up into modern times.
Early 1900s: Evolution became a cultural battle with The Scopes Trial (1925), between the realities of modern science and biblical literalism. Christian conservatives increasingly viewed secularism as a national threat.
Now we can see the divide speed up:
Fun looking crowd, eh? The Ku Klux Klan in Muncie, Indiana, in 1922, William Arthur Swift, Wikimedia Commons
1920s and beyond: The KKK, at its peak of about 5% of U.S. population, promoted an explicitly religious, white nationalist vision of America. They opposed immigration and violently fought against racial integration on religious grounds, with murders, bombings, and lynching continuing up into the 1950s and 60s.
1930s-1940s: Christian conservatives resist government expansion, seeing it as infringing on religious and local authority. Fear of communism, often associated with atheism, grows after WWII, reinforcing Christian nationalist sentiments.
And then here’s the series of events that has led us to where we are today:
1954, Brown vs Board of Education: Many white Christian conservatives declared segregation in public schools unconstitutional, siting "God-ordained" racial separation. This led to the rise of "segregation academies"—private Christian schools formed specifically to avoid integration. This is when the concept of “school vouchers” began, where today it is a major political issue costing some states billions in taxes.
1960s-1970s: The religious right grows after Brown, further unified in the late 1970s around abortion after Jerry Falwell and the “moral majority” pick it up. Abortion was a way better topic to rally around than open racism. Good thinking!
1983, Bob Jones University vs United States: The Christian school lost its tax-exempt status because it banned interracial dating. The conservative anger around this case was key to eventually gaining control of the Supreme Court in 2022. Angered Christian Nationalists shifted their focus from segregation to broader political activism on abortion, religious freedom, and conservative social issues. This is when key people like Paul Weyrich begin to work for religious control of all branches of government. His long vision and the tactics he proposed and documented proved effective by 2024.
The movement grows through the Regan and Clinton years, until the Republican party is seen as betraying Christian Nationalists by focusing on the secular government of the USA, as defined by the Founders, instead of the Christians themselves. So the Tea Party essentially takes over the GOP. The election of a black man, Barak Obama, adds fuel to the fire. The movement gets even more extreme with QAnon and conspiracy-based media. Over the next few years, Trump is seen as a tool by which Christian Nationalists can achieve control of U.S. government. Christian Nationalists rally behind Trump and are key to getting him elected twice. They are pivotal on Jan 6, trying to overturn a legal U.S. election, and are key participants throughout the “Stop the Steal” hysterics over the next four years.
This is because it’s not just control they want. Per their own words on Jan 6 and in common rhetoric, Christian Nationalists see secular government as an “Evil,” that they - the “Kingdom of Light” (of course) - must vanquish in their “holy war” of “Good vs Evil.” Cooperation is not the end game, like it is for those looking for common ground in the USA or globally. Full control is their end game, per their own words, along with the vanquishing of whatever they deem “Evil,” which is a lot. And its not just government. The Seven Mountain Mandate calls on Christians to “invade Babylon” and literally seize control of these seven “mountains”:
Business
Education
the Church
Family
Arts and Entertainment
Science and Medicine
Government
To the modern Christian Nationalist, “any authority outside of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ is an illegal authority.” And today, they control all branches of government.
These are the things they’ve done to date, with a centuries-old history deeply rooted in racial segregation, opposition to civil rights, and resistance to secular policies, science, and reality. Their objectives today are nothing short of full control of every aspect of life in the United States. And, apparently, also places like Canada, Panama, the Middle East, and Greenland (or ‘Red, White, and Blue Land’ as some GOP members refer to it).
And so here we all are - smack in the middle of this part of OUR history. Which way will it go?
