Let’s get to the heart of the matter: a key aspect of Christian Nationalism is being able to exclude persons that those in power do not like from being given full rights and privileges as citizens. The whole point of fusing national identity with a given religion is to assert that only persons who adhere to the state’s preferred religious beliefs really belong. By definition, this means first dividing the world into “Christian” and “non-Christian,” then determining who and what “real” Christians are.
For those who are not particularly religious, or who have little direct experience with Christianity in the United States, that may sound odd. But just stop and think about the history of Protestants and Catholics in European history to remind oneself how these arguments can go. Or, if one needs a very contemporary example, look at how conservatives mock James Talarico’s faith as somehow not being real.
As I have noted before, I was raised Southern Baptist and spent a good deal of my life, well into adulthood, in either Baptist or non-denominational Evangelical churches. For much of my late teens, twenties, and into my thirties, I tried mightily to apply an intellectual understanding of the faith and the Bible, which included reading quite a lot about deviations from standing Christian orthodoxy as well as divisions within that orthodoxy. As such, I read quite a bit about things like Mormon theology v. basic protestant theology. There are some very important differences, for what it is worth. I say this as a matter of fact, not as anything else.
Beyond any of that, just sitting in various services over those decades, here are the kinds of things I was taught. In Baptist circles, Catholics were viewed on a scale from asserting”they were misguided in their theology” to people asking “are they really Christians?” to some who would say that they weren’t. I had a pastor at a Calvary Chapel in California repeatedly question the faith of mainline Protestants. And one thing was for sure: Mormons, Christian Scientists, and Jehovah’s Witnesses were members of cults. A prominent example of this can be found in the work of Walter Martin and his very influential (at the time) book, Kingdom of the Cults.
The point of bringing all of this up is that Christianity has a lot of internal division. And while, say, Evangelicals and others may be happy, in this moment, to see “Christian” as some big umbrella, once they get more power, don’t expect them to continue to operate that way.
Hegseth’s list that James Joyner noted a few days ago illustrates this principle. Eliminating 180 religions from the Defense Department’s list of recognized religions was a signal about what was “real” and what wasn’t. This was rather boldly reinforced by the fact that 21 of 31 religions listed (just over two-thirds of the list) are variations on “Christian.” As I stated in the comments of that post, I have no strong feeling about what the right number of religions should be, and can understand from a bureaucratic point of view that maybe 221 designations is unruly. But I will state, also, that I would prefer a system that errs more on the side of inclusion than exclusion.
At any rate, one of the designations still on the list, as James noted, was “Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (CJ)” but there is s a major difference between that listing and the 21 that precede it in the list. See if you can see it.
- Christian – Assemblies of God (AG)
- Christian – Baptist (BA)
- Christian – Brethren (BR)
- Christian – Catholic (CA)
- Christian – Church of Christ (CC)
- Christian – Church of God (CG)
- Christian – Church of the Nazarene (CN)
- Christian – Episcopal/Anglican (EA)
- Christian – Evangelical (EV)
- Christian – Jehovah’s Witnesses (JW)
- Christian – Lutheran (LU)
- Christian – Methodist (ME)
- Christian – Non Denominational (ND)
- Christian – Orthodox (OX)
- Christian – Other (CO)
- Christian – Pentecostal (PE)
- Christian – Presbyterian (PR)
- Christian – Quaker (QU)
- Christian – Reformed (RE)
- Christian – Scientist (SC)
- Christian – Seventh Day Adventist (SA)
- Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (CJ)
The Mormons are not classified as “Christian” but instead are classified on the list as being one of the other ten categories that aren’t “Christian” (e.g., Buddhists, Hindus, Sikhs).
This raised the ire of some of Utah’s members of Congress.
Here’s Representative Kennedy’s thoughts:
Senator Mike Lee is quite exercised, calling it “offensive” and “repugnant.”
He also seems to almost understand, at least when it is his ox being gored, why the US government shouldn’t be getting into making judgments about religion.
Once the government moves away from inclusivity and decides that, yes, being a Wiccan is just silly, or whatever, then you are not that far off from hardcore Evangelicals showing you that, in fact, they think Mormons are not a denomination but, in fact, a cult. Wait until the people who follow Doug Wilson tell you what they really think about Catholics.
Too bad no one studies history, or even contemporary world politics, as they might discover that many of the bloodiest fights are not between different religions, but instead within a religion over who belongs to the true faith.
Ultimately, there are only two ways to guarantee that your faith, whatever it may be, is protected. There is the illiberal pathway of religious nationalism wherein your faith is the official faith, and other faiths (or lack of faith entirely) are either tolerated as the pleasure of the ruling elites or persecuted and outlawed.
The other route is a liberal, pluralistic democracy wherein everyone’s faith is legally protected by a neutral, secular state.
Once you move away from neutrality, someone has to decide what is “proper” religion and what isn’t. And the more the state becomes infused with the notion that it is the state’s job to determine which faiths are proper, the more power will be wielded against the improper.
This whole issue of listing religious affiliation for the DoD is, on one level, small potatoes, but it is a small peeling away of the curtain to see how these people think.
But while it is true that Evangelicals have been more accepting of Mormons as belonging in their club since at least Romney’s run at the presidency, I don’t think that they really, truly accept that notion. Yes, they all believe in Christ, as Lee states, but their versions are rather different. And when you think you know the truth, you tend not to be in the mood to tolerate people whose version of the truth deviates from your own. Indeed, history shows that the greatest intolerance is often not Religion A versus Religion B, but it is the fight within Religion A over their view of God.
I will end with a family anecdote that illustrates the point. I learned as a small child that one of my aunts was estranged from the rest of my family because her denomination (I think it was the Church of Christ) thought that the rest of the family (mostly, if not all, Baptists) were going to Hell because the Church of Christ was the correct approach to Christian beliefs.
All of which is to say that we need to find our way back, as a country, to liberal pluralism before this gets ugly and we aren’t just fighting over bureaucratic lists.
UPDATE (James Joyner, 1544): It appears the Department got the message.
