South Dakota Democratic Rep. Erin Healy made national headlines this week for attacking a Christian nonprofit organization's support for marriage.
“Extremist group Family Heritage Alliance said this morning that the safest place for kids are in families that have a married mom and dad,” Healy tweeted. “What a dangerous and un-American belief.”
It might be easy to dismiss Healy as just a single kooky state representative in an overwhelmingly red state, but Democrats and their media and think tank allies have been stepping up their attacks on conservative groups just like the Family Heritage Alliance. The Public Religion Research Institute and the Brookings Institution recently published a report on “the Threat of Christian Nationalism to American Democracy and Culture” that they have pushed out to CNN, NPR, and the Washington Post.
“More than half of Republicans support Christian nationalism,” the NPR headline reads, with the body of the story going on to quote Calvin University history professor Kristin Kobes Du Mez. “At its root, there are some deeply anti-democratic impulses here. So, to see that more than half of one political party is committed to Christian nationalism I think explains a lot in terms of our ability to achieve much bipartisan agreement.”
So what does it take to be labeled a “Christian nationalist” by the Brookings Institution? Well, PRRI asked respondents to agree or disagree with five statements to draw out this dangerous new movement:
- The U.S. government should declare America a Christian nation.
- U.S. laws should be based on Christian values.
- If the U.S. moves away from our Christian foundations, we will not be a country anymore.
- Being Christian is an important part of being American.
- God has called Christians to exercise dominion over all areas of American society.
Respondents who “completely agree” with a statement received a “1” for that statement, “mostly agree” received “.67," mostly disagree “.33,” and completely disagree “0.” Respondents' scores for each question are then averaged out over all questions.
Those whose total fell within the .75-1 range were labeled “adherents” to Christian nationalism, while those falling between .5 and .75 were labeled Christian nationalist “sympathizers.” Adding up the 21% of Republicans who qualified as “adherents” with the 33% who qualified as “sympathizers” gave NPR the 54% they needed to brand more than half of Republicans as supporting Christian nationalism.
Applying this test to myself, I’d answer “mostly disagree” on question one (America is a Christian nation but there is no need for the government to declare it); “completely agree” on question two ("Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"); “completely agree” on question three (if we abandon monogamous marriage this country will fall apart); “completely disagree” on question four (I’m not Christian); and “mostly disagree” on question five (everyone’s way of understanding the world affects what we think government should do, but the founders also wanted Americans to be able to worship the religion of their choice).
Averaging those out, I get .53, which makes me a Christian nationalist “sympathizer” despite my not being a Christian.
I am not going to speak for the Family Heritage Alliance, but their website says their mission is “To Champion the Judeo-Christian values of Faith, Family and Freedom,” so I am going to guess they would get a .5 or higher too, thus making them "antidemocratic" Christian nationalist "sympathizers" as well.
All for the crime of supporting the idea that children are best raised in married families.
Again, I am not a Christian, but it is undeniable that our nation was founded by people with deeply held Christian values. These values, including the equal dignity of all human life and the sanctity of the monogamous conjugal union, are essential to the survival of our democracy. If we move away from these values, our democracy will suffer.
Democrats like Erin Healy disagree. She and a growing number of Democrats (including some former conservatives) weirdly believe that married families are bad for the country.
That’s fine. We’ll settle this at the ballot box.