Yes, it is bonkers. All of it. But you would be wrong to make fun of it and blow it off. This phenomenon is going to matter. Divinizing MAGA and Stop The Steal is going to tear churches to bits, and drive people away from the Christian faith (or keep them from coming in the first place). Based on what I saw today, the Christians in this movement do not doubt that Trump is God’s chosen, that they, by following him, are walking in light, and whatever they do to serve Trump is also serving God. They have tightly wound apocalyptic religion to conservative politics and American nationalism…
America is in a very dangerous place. In this October TAC essay adapted from Live Not By Lies, I talk about Hannah Arendt’s criteria for discerning a pre-totalitarian society. In the essay, and in the book, I talk about how these criteria explain the woke Left, and why educated elites throughout politics, media, academia, and corporations, have absorbed their dogmas. But read the piece in light of what I’ve written above, especially about how alienated people are willing to believe ideology over truth, and how they are willing to smash any institutions for the sake of seeing their idea of justice triumph.
This is where the woke Left is. But this is also where a lot of the Trumpist Right — in particular, the Trumpist Christian Right — is. Remember, General Flynn, the central figure of today’s rally, recently endorsed a call for Donald Trump to declare martial law and arrest his political enemies. He was nevertheless at the center of today’s Christian event, along with the insanely malicious blowhard Alex Jones. What does this say about Christianity today? What does it say about what Christians like this think of truth? Of common decency?
Join the conversation as a VIP Member