2 minute read
When most people talk about the far-right of Christian conservatism the go-to taxological term is “fundamentalism.” This squares with neither my understanding nor personal experience of the world, though. I’ve known people who happily attended fundamentalist educational institutions like Bob Jones University and I’m telling you there are those who see that school as compromised. There are extremists who’ve split from even the Roman Catholic Church, Orthodox Presbyterian Church, Southern Baptist Convention, or Assemblies of God because they’re far too progressive.
Imagine someone’s grandpa who’s been slowly drifting to the Right. He initially rebelled against his Greek Orthodox family to become an atheistic communist in the 1960s. In 1974 he was a New Age liberal, then was left-of-center in the UCC by 1987. In the mid-’90s he was a moderate in the UMC before becoming a conservative evangelical in the C&MA in the 2000s. In 2016 he proudly self-identified as a fundamentalist and was a deacon at a KJV-only independent Baptist church. Last year he moved further to right and joined Westboro Baptist Church. So, what is he now?1
What’s to the right of Christian fundamentalism? This is almost embarrassing. It really should not have taken me 2+ years after January 6th to find the right category, but the obvious answer is Christian fascism.2 These troubling developments we’re all witnessing within the Christian culture of the U.S.? You’re not going crazy and imagining things. Many of your friends and family who were sane, Promise Keepers-type conservative evangelicals in the ’90s actually have drifted further than mere fundamentalism. Many are now embracing a militantly violent worldview.3
Sociologists Andrew Whitehead and Samuel Perry identified nine common features of fascism: 1) an ideology built on reference to a mythic past, 2) populist support for strongman demagogues, 3) a culture of anti-intellectualism, including anti-education and anti-science beliefs, 4) an ideology that views social hierarchies as normal and necessary, 5) idealization of patriarchal families, 6) peace maintained by authoritarian “law & order” tactics, 7) strongly pro-nativist/anti-pluralism, 8) foments cultural anxiety about sexual deviance, and 9) pervasive victim mentality.4 Checks out.
The original beatniks despised fascism and again align with the countercultural prophet from Nazareth. There’s an early scene in Star Wars: A New Hope where C-3PO comments he’s not even sure which planet he’s on. Luke replies, “Well, if there’s a bright center to the universe, you’re on the planet that it’s farthest from.” Well, if there’s an epicenter of Christian fascism, then beatnik Christianity is on the planet that’s furthest from. All nine of those aforementioned points are contemptibly anti-Christ, a complete adulteration of The Way of Jesus. It’s an abomination.5
You’re not gonna like the answer.↩
Since the 1970s it’s also been called “Christofascism.”↩
We’re getting into Crusades, Spanish Inquisition, and Salem witch trials kinds of shit.↩
Their 2020 book is Taking America Back for God: Christian Nationalism in the United States.↩
Some may read that and sarcastically think, ‘Why don’t you tell us what you really think?’ That is the gentle version.↩
