On Shaking Off the Christian Nationalism JimJams

Introduction

Let us review the options, shall we?

Christian nationalism is the current hot topic, and when confronted with the current hot topic, every sensible person always wants to dip their spoon in so that they might determine whether it needs any more salt.

As mentioned above, I thought it was therefore past time for us to review the basic options that lie before us. That way, we might have a reasonable debate and decide what constitutes the best course of action, doing so like actual grownups. This, to be distinguished from the tactic of shampooing our hair with lighter fluid, setting it off in order to run in tight, little circles, all while invoking the gods of anti-fascism. So to speak.

When I say basic options, I emphasize the word basic. There are many millions of us running around, and we have to organize ourselves in some fashion, and so we should limit ourselves to the basic logical options. We will therefore not spend any time refuting the Bonapartists, or the ultramontane Jesuits. What are the actual basic options?

Scope and Adjectives

I said there are millions of us, but I actually meant billions. There are billions of us, and at least one of the basic logical options includes all of us, as you shall soon see. The first three options are those options that cover the possible geographical range of government. The next set of variables would be two, and they will modify the first three options. That gives us six. Still with me?

The three options are tribalism, nationalism, and globalism. We can organize ourselves in little tiny pieces, medium size pieces, or one huge piece. These are the three basic options when it comes to social organization. So much seems obvious.

That tribalism is one of the logical options can be seen with tribes in the Amazon jungle, as well as the Crips and the Bloods in failed American cities. Tribes, in other words, can take various forms, but we can still recognize them as tribes.

Nations can also take various forms. They can be mono-ethnic, like the Japanese, or they can be sprawling huge affairs that encompass numerous regions, dialects, geographies, foods, ethnicities, histories, and so on. America would be a nation like this. There would also be the in between ones, like the old Czechoslovakia.

The globalists haven’t really had their day yet. They had one good run at it with the Tower of Babel, but some spoilsport came down from the sky and wrecked it all. And then Alexander the Great at least thought that big, but his troops didn’t, so they all headed home from India. So globalism has not ever really happened yet, and exists only as a fever dream for smart people.

The Two Adjectives

So what is the set of adjectives that gives us six basic options instead of three? Those two adjectives would be Christian and non-Christian. Now for purposes of our discussion here, because of the epistemological hegemony that secularism has in the West, I want to limit our discussion to that particular form of “non-Christian.” I do grant that there are plenty of other non-Christian options out there that are not secular, such as Melanisian frog worship, but I don’t think that kind of thing need detain us. This is because I am largely talking about North America, where the globalists are actually making their central power grab, and where the tribalists are contributing to the ongoing disintegration by clamoring for their little piece of whatever is left, and where the nationalists appear to be just now waking up.

The globalists are the Tisroc, the nationalists are fighting alongside King Tirian, and the tribalists are the dwarves, shooting the horses.

So here in North America, the basic non-Christian option is some form of secularism. So that gives us Christian and secular. Apply those two adjectives to our three sized options, and we have Christian tribalism and secular tribalism, Christian nationalism and secular nationalism, and Christian globalism and secular globalism.

Show Us Your Cards

Now one of the reasons this has become a hot topic is because Canon Press is about to release Stephen Wolfe’s very engaging book on this subject called The Case for Christian Nationalism, which I am enjoying very much indeed. If you buy the book on or before the day of its release, which is November 1, one of the great benefits will be that all of your male descendants will be brave and all of your female descendants will be beautiful. And that’s just one consideration. But at the same time, this glad publishing event has caused the furrowing of more that one brow, and thus it has become a hot topic.

And no, it doesn’t need any more salt. Just right.

So let us paraphrase the meaning of each of our six options.

If we were to find ourselves in some kind of Balkanized situation, or in a failed state, and the whole thing devolved into that kind of chaos, with competing warlords fighting for control of Chicago, should we seek to align ourselves with a tribe that wants to conduct its affairs in a way that honors the teaching of Christ, or a tribe that pays no regard to the words of Christ? Do we want a Christian tribe or a secular tribe?

If we were to find ourselves on the other side of a successful “great reset,” and the globalists have achieved their aspirational goal—you have no money, are eating bugs, and you love Big Brother more than Winston ever did—do you want that global order to continue on in its utter disregard for the authority of Scripture, or do you want them to submit to the authority of Scripture? Be sure to recall that disregarding Scripture means that they are disregarding all of it, and that you are granting global rule to sinful men who have no transcendent authority to restrain them.

Remember, we are not talking about how likely any of these scenarios might be. We are talking about which of them you would prefer.

Or we could continue on with our current system of nationalism. Do you want Christian nationalism or a secular nationalism? You have nationalism either way, but do you want a nationalism that doesn’t care what God thinks, or a nationalism that does? Which? Remember that a secular nationalism reserves the right to dismember babies in the womb by the million, sanctify sodomy as though it were holy matrimony, and bring their drag queens into schools to leer at your granddaughters. Not only so, but because there is no fear of God before their eyes, they can get a whole lot worse than that. Is that what you want?

Bring Out Your Idols

The response from professing Christians to Wolfe’s book, and to the whole debate, will likely come down one of two paths.

The first and obvious path will be to say that it is a racist dog whistle, and Christian nationalism is just our secret code for “white supremacy.” But look around, friend. Here in clown world absolutely everything is code for white supremacy. Straight black men are now the white people of black people. Muslims protesting the raunchy curriculum at a school board meeting found themselves described in the media as the new face of white supremacy. The expectation that people should show up on time is, according to Kyle Howard, one of the oppressive standards of this suffocating whiteness that surrounds us on every hand. So if white supremacy were a currency, I think we are well past the Weimar Republic inflation rate records. So just ignore that one. Those paper bills will buy you nothing.

The second and slightly more responsible path will be to worry that Christian nationalists are making an idol out of their nation. This is more responsible because this is a thing that actually can happen, and has happened. Take a gander at the picture I have helpfully posted here, just to the right. That is idolatry, and moreover, it is blasphemous idolatry to boot. Whoever was responsible for generating that image should be flogged in front of the synagogue, and with no objections from me.

But I still have some questions. John Calvin once pointed out that the human heart is an idol factory. We manufacture them like nobody’s business. We can make idols out of family, out of tradition, out of our bank account, out of our car, out of our career, out of our hobbies, and out of thin air. So what on earth makes us think that the tradition of secularism can’t be an idol? And not only so, but a deadly and pernicious one.

Go back to the options outlined above. What on earth could possibly make otherwise responsible Christians argue that our nation, as a nation, should not take the words of Christ into account? And feel virtuous while making such an outrageous claim? The thing that makes such a take even remotely plausible is the practice of assuming that human societies can function in a more or less decent manner without reference to God or His Christ. It is the serene assumption that the logical outworking of secularist premises will never actually work themselves out.

But if there is no God over the state, then the state becomes God. And the state which you have thus promoted to that position are sinful and unholy men, unstable as water. And it is not possible Christians who are anti-Christian-nationalists to have a high view of depravity and possible misdeeds when Christians are acting in the name of Christ and the Scriptures, but then to have that understanding of human nature evaporate when a national adopts functional atheism as its creed. Now the depravity of man gets swallowed up by secularist sunshine.

So I will conclude with this. Responsible Christian nationalists affirm the duties of natural affection, and the duties we have to honor our parents. But at the same time we also affirm that whoever loves his father or mother more than Christ is not worthy to be called His disciple (Luke 14:26). This means that anyone on the conservative right who loves America more than Christ cannot be a Christian nationalist—for the simple reason that he cannot be a Christian. He really is an idolator.

But I would call upon the Christian secularists, an oxymoron if ever there was one, to do the same thing. Please explain to us the ways in which you understand that your beloved secularism could become an idol. Tell us the steps you have taken to prevent this pernicious error from taking deep root within your ranks. I suggest, from the tenacity with which you cling to such an incoherent concept, that such idolatry has already taken deep root.