C. S. Lewis has a great passage in The Four Loves, where he argues that love of country can become idolatrous and thus a vehicle for exploitation and evil. He was writing in the aftermath of World War II, when it was even clearer than today that patriotism can become demonic. Two signs indicate this might be happening in one’s life. One sign is when your race becomes more fundamental to our identity than our faith in God. Jonah knew that if Nineveh repented and received mercy, it might be bad for his nation. So he put his national interests ahead of the Ninevites’ need to hear God’s truth.
Lewis adds a second sign. When you start to whitewash our nation’s history, when we won’t admit the bad things our nation has done, then we are in danger of beginning to feel so superior to other peoples that we can justify cruelty.
Concerned about the rise of ‘Christian Nationalism’ in America, one group released the following statement. 1 I am sharing this here, not with my full endorsement (I am glad and grateful for the religious education element of my school experience - it changed my life!) but rather for our reflection and conversation.
‘As Christians, our faith teaches us everyone is created in God’s image and commands us to love one another. As Americans, we value our system of government and the good that can be accomplished in our constitutional democracy. Today, we are concerned about a persistent threat to both our religious communities and our democracy — Christian nationalism.
Christian nationalism seeks to merge Christian and American identities, distorting both the Christian faith and America’s constitutional democracy. Christian nationalism demands Christianity be privileged by the State and implies that to be a good American, one must be Christian. It often overlaps with and provides cover for white supremacy and racial subjugation. We reject this damaging political ideology and invite our Christian brothers and sisters to join us in opposing this threat to our faith and to our nation.
As Christians, we are bound to Christ, not by citizenship, but by faith. We believe that:
People of all faiths and none have the right and responsibility to engage constructively in the public square.
Patriotism does not require us to minimise our religious convictions.
One’s religious affiliation, or lack thereof, should be irrelevant to one’s standing in the civic community.
Government should not prefer one religion over another, or religion over non-religion.
Religious instruction is best left to our houses of worship, other religious institutions and families.
America’s historic commitment to religious pluralism enables faith communities to live in civic harmony with one another without sacrificing our theological convictions.
Conflating religious authority with political authority is idolatrous and often leads to oppression of minority and other marginalised groups as well as the spiritual impoverishment of religion.
We must stand up to and speak out against Christian nationalism, especially when it inspires acts of violence and intimidation—including vandalism, bomb threats, arson, hate crimes, and attacks on houses of worship—against religious communities at home and abroad.
Whether we worship at a church, mosque, synagogue, or temple, America has no second-class faiths. All are equal under the U.S. Constitution. As Christians, we must speak in one voice condemning Christian nationalism as a distortion of the gospel of Jesus and a threat to American democracy’.
The statement ends.
1 https://www.christiansagainstchristiannationalism.org/statement