The Cultural Consequences of Very, Very Republican Christianity

They’re not always what you think.

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In the aftermath of the presidential election, one thing is unclear about the Evangelical vote, and two things are quite clear. Here’s what’s hazy: Did Joe Biden win the presidency in part because there was just barely enough slippage in the white Evangelical vote to make a difference in key counties in key states?

My friend Michael Wear makes that case in the New York Times, relying in large part on exit polls. He may well be right, but there is some conflict in the available polling. So I’m going to take the advice of my podcast co-host Sarah Isgur (who hates exit polls) and wait until 1) the exit polls have been re-weighted; and 2) I can dive fully into actual, county-level voting data before I test the vote-slip hypothesis.

But while the precise level of white Evangelical support may be unclear, their overwhelming electoral preference is not. White Evangelicals once again supported Donald Trump as least as much as they supported Mitt Romney, John McCain, and George W. Bush. Moreover, their support isn’t simply about religious liberty and abortion. As a group, they’re not holding their noses and casting their votes based on those two issues alone. No, they’re Republicans down the line.

In fact, as Eastern Illinois University’s Ryan Burge notes, if you really drill down into white Evangelical political preferences, immigration explains their support for Trump more than abortion. Here’s how Burge outlines white Evangelical politics:

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  1. CatoTheElder

    Today’s online NYT has an opinion piece by Katherine Stewart, described as author of “The Power Worshippers: Inside the Dangerous Rise of Religious Nationalism,” [link here: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/16/opinion/trump-religion-authoritarianism.html ]

    The article, entitled “Trump or No Trump, Religious Authoritarianism Is Here to Stay”, both speaks loudly and carries a sizable cudgel.

    Some selected quotes:

    —“The 2020 election is proof that religious authoritarianism is here to stay, and the early signs now indicate that the movement seems determined to reinterpret defeat at the top of the ticket as evidence of persecution and of its own righteousness.”

    —“...Christian nationalism: the idea that the United States is and ought to be a Christian nation governed under a reactionary understanding of Christian values.”

    —“In their responses to the election outcome, some prominent religious right leaders have enabled or remained true to the false Trumpian line of election fraud.” [She then gives three examples: Michele Bachmann, former MN Congresswoman and one-time GOP presidential candidate; Richard C. Antall, writing in the Catholic journal Crisis Magazine; and Mat Staver, whom she describes as “chairman and founder of Liberty Counsel”. Rev. Msgr. Antall is pastor of a church in the Cleveland Diocese. Liberty Counsel is a religious non-profit “litigation, education, and policy organization”, according to its website, working for various religiously-centered right-wing causes.]

    And there’s more, of course.

    Reading just a bit of the most recent piece Msgr. Antall wrote for Crisis Magazine, I can see why Stewart would want to highlight him. I’ll not comment on his abilities or suitability as priest, but I will say that my impression of him, based on a few paragraphs of his writing about how “A New Resistance Is Rising”, is that he’s Trumpian to the core. Take, for instance, his comparison of our most recent election with a corrupt election in Latin America: “As in some parts of the United States these days, no one compared the number of votes with the number of registered voters for the district.” Or this: “The media is trying to present the election results reported by the Associated Press as a fait accompli. This is the same media source that tried to trash the Catholic Church about the Payroll Protection Plan. They’re responsible for a vicious attack on Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s person, faith, and family. Whatever the AP is selling, I’m not buying it. The French phrase that might be appropriate is coup d’état.”

    We find him going from an unsubstantiated claim that there are significant voting irregularities not being investigated to likening the current state of affairs to a coup d’état. Really. [I know, I know, this sort of thing is becoming old hat, really. But...really? From a priest? ]

    A short distance down the page, Stewart gives us this quote, from one David Harris Jr of the Falkirk Center:

    “If you’re a believer, and you believe God appointed Donald J. Trump to run this country, to lead this country, and you believe as I do that he will be re-elected the President of the United States, then friends, you’ve got to guard your heart, you’ve got to guard your peace. Right now we are at war.”

    Stewart goes on to say that Christian nationalists (a phrase I don’t recall running into before today) “may come around to the reality of Joe Biden’s victory. There is no indication, however, that this will temper their apocalyptic vision, according to which one side of the American political divide represents unmitigated evil.“ She describes Christian nationalists as a top-down driven political movement in which the leaders are highly unified, not by structure, but by “a radical political ideology that is profoundly hostile to democracy and pluralism, and a certain political style that seeks to provoke moral panic, rewards the paranoid and views every partisan conflict as a conflagration, the end of the world. Partisan politics is the lifeblood of their movement.”

    In continuing her analysis of the informal leadership of the informal but powerful Christian nationalist movement, Steward describes them as obtaining their power from “three underlying structural realities” persisting in American life: (1) increasing economic inequality—her argument for this is more just a description of how she sees “a cadre of super-wealthy donors” as key to the movement’s growth, strength, and persistence, apparently in a self-reinforcing feedback loop; (2) a “uniquely isolated messaging sphere” intrinsic to the movement; and (3) “a political system that gives disproportionate power to an immensely organized, engaged and loyal minority.” She doesn’t make clear what “disproportionate power” looks like, but it leaves this reader confident that she’s in favor of the abolition of the Electoral College, amongst other things.

    Is she right? Or is there a grain or two of truth which she exaggerates for desired effect? Is Ms. Stewart totally off-base? I’d dearly love to hear from Mr. French a response to Stewart’s diatribe (which word I use for accuracy, not as a pejorative), though that’s a big ask, I know. But I’d also like to hear from others here, in the context of French’s report on cultural consequences of “Very, Very Republican Christianity”. Is there overlap between what French sees and what seems to me a more apocalyptic vision (pardon the inescapable pun) of Stewart? If so, or if not, what does that mean? I think this topic might be much more important than many of us, myself included, have fully realized. I sit back now, and listen.

    Oh, but before I go, a reminder: the movie “Hillbilly Elegy”, from J. D. Vance’s book of the same title, is now out. I’ve heard very good things about it, but have not yet seen it. If you’re interested in this topic, I think you’ll be interested in the movie, even if you haven’t read the book. (Which, of course, I highly recommend.)

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    Pastorfbt

    Just had to nudge the comment counter past 666 😏

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  3. Eric

    I am neither conservative nor Christian, and I want to thank you for fine writing like this. I am bored in the company of those whose beliefs are similar to mine. I have been trying to understand views different than mine, and what motivates people to hold those views. Unfortunately, when I broach these topics with those whose views are very different than mine, I usually end up in the Culture War, because my questions are interpreted as provocative, instead of a real desire to learn something. Keep on writing, and keep on teaching. There are those of us out there who learn from you.

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  4. Jon

    Awesome discussion on the What’s Next event educating us about what an Evangelical Voter is. Many thanks!

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    Jason Gibson

    David you are truly on to something here. This was a great article. You and Ross douthat are truly leaders for the confused flock who (I believe) are wanting faith not politics and don’t understand why it’s so hard to find

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    Show Jay Janney the 🚪!

    "It's so hard to take right-wing masculinity Twitter seriously after it spent four continuous years hyping a incompetent, cruel boy-child president as a culture war avatar. He dodged the draft. He serially cheated on and preyed on women, but tell us more about "strong men."" (David French tweet)

    If this is how you talk/act in your community, that might explain why your community has backed away from you.

    Civility requires discipline...

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    Ed

    Two thoughts: First, I think maybe something very like this article could be written by a Progressive, worrying about how tying on with the Democrats has resulted in compromise in pursuit of victory: just substitute "Progressive" for "Evangelical" and "Democrat" for "Republican."
    That's coalitional politics. Secvond: White Evangelicals have been a critical part of the Republican for 40 years; so long that it is not surprising that we are a little confused about our primary identity. We'll wake up. I always look forward to these columns: even when I disagree- especially when I disagree- I end up thinking outside my usual intellectual ruts.

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  8. CliveStaples

    This is a near-perfect description of my experience in law school in Los Angeles:
    "The smaller numbers of Evangelicals who live in Blue America often have a different experience. With Christianity now so closely tied to virtually every issue in the GOP platform and to every GOP politician, they have to fight through a thicket of presuppositions that Christianity somehow means adopting specific (and despised) Republican stances on gun rights, immigration, taxation, health care, or climate change to even begin to get to true and real conversations about Jesus."
    Well said, David!

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    Nick H

    My experience is somewhat different, so maybe it depends as much on the community as whether or not it's an evangelical church. The church I attend is definitely evangelical. (It's right there in the name of the denomination - Evangelical Presbyterian Church.) But, much like the surrounding community, the political views of the congregation are not uniformly Republican. There are definitely people with conservative views (like myself), but there are also plenty of members who are more moderate. I know people who supported Trump, and I know people who didn't. I have friends at the church who are very into second amendment issues and have quite the collection of guns, and I have friends who don't understand why anyone would want or need to have guns at home. I don't know what the political views are of the pastors. I suspect that they, much like the congregation, do not all have the same opinions about politics, but when it comes to essential matters of faith I know they're all united. That is, I think, the way forward here. Build a strong community on the common ground and let faith bring us together. In a healthy church, politics is not stronger than faith.

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  10. Nathan

    I am Christian. A conservative. I am also disgusted with the conflation of the two. It's as though God is judging me on how i vote. Abortion they say - if we pass laws, we will be blessed. They also forgot the old testament.

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