Putting the label before the argument concerning Christianity
OPINION — Attacking Christianity directly is still a little awkward in America. So secular progressives have found a workaround: give traditional Christianity a sinister new name.
“Christian Nationalism” began as an academic construct and developed into a political weapon. Give ordinary Christian political participation a menacing title, attach racism and authoritarianism to it, and the accusation does the arguing for you.
Add “White,” and rhetorical alchemy supplies the guilty verdict. Christian heritage, public faith and actual theocracy are collapsed into the same rhetorical bucket, then painted with white supremacy, oppression, violence and religious domination.
Academia supplied the jargon. Activists supplied the outrage. Politics supplied the smear.
The practical message is equally clear. Christianity is tolerated in the public square only if it leaves Christianity at home. Christians may speak, vote and participate, but when faith informs positions on abortion, marriage, sexuality, education or public morality, their convictions are readily recast as evidence of “White Christian Nationalism.”
That is not tolerance. It is permission conditioned on surrender.
The permission comes with an ideological veto: Christians may participate, but not meaningfully as Christians. Once faith actually influences public judgment, the demonization appears. The issue is not theocracy. It is who gets to bring moral convictions into the public square without first receiving secular approval.
Religious morality is condemned as “sectarian” while secular progressive ideology advances under the camouflage of “neutrality.” But that is not neutrality. It is secular privilege.
There are genuine extremists in every political and religious tradition. Judge them by what they actually advocate, not by sinister implications attached to a label.
“White Christian Nationalism” does more than label an idea. It discredits the Christian before his argument is heard. That is not an accidental consequence. It is a strategy of poisoning the well.
When argument falters, reach for the smear.
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