Religions tend to share certain features: a set of beliefs, rituals, texts, holy days, rites, etc. We usually think of religion as having to do with spirituality and belief in the divine. This is true, but many aspects of religion do not require either of these. Some people hold their religious beliefs and practices casually. Many other hold these quite fervently. People can demonstrate religious like devotion to entities we have not traditionally thought of as religions.
American nationalism is one such entity. We have our holy days, the highest of which is the Forth of July. Our rituals include the Pledge of Allegiance and National Anthem. Our most sacred symbol is the U.S. flag. I think also about how much the U.S. flag or variations thereof are used by a certain side of the political spectrum. We also have the story of our founding, the values which the country was based on (according to the story) as well as the heroes: our founding fathers.
I was once in the gift shop at a baseball game before the game started. Even in here, when the national anthem begun out on the field, everyone became silent and removed their hats in honor. This certainly struck me as a religious act. Consider the great taboo which burning the flag is considered. Or think of the enormous controversy resulting from some people taking a knee during the national anthem. Consider also who we consider heroes and how we venerate them. The U.S. military is clearly the savior for many people. This is evident by how enraged people become if they sense even the slightest possible disrespect of this institution. This could only come as a result of people feeling an existential threat. In other words, some believe their existence is so closely tied to the military that they perceive any possible disrespect as a threat to their own life.
Evangelicals have been blamed/credited for Trump. They certainly helped him win the presidential election in 2016. Some did so quite enthusiastically, however many did so with significant reservation. As close as U.S. presidential elections tend to be, I wonder if Trump will lose evangelical support now that their half-century long dream of the overturn of Roe vs. Wade has come to pass. (I had long believed that Republicans would continue to talk but not actually do anything substantial in regards to abortion in order to continue to use it to motivate their political base. I don’t know if I was wrong in this belief or if Trump were just careless.) All this to say, while white evangelicals largely supported Trump, they are not his true base.
Trump’s core support base are white, small town blue-collar workers. Most of this group will claim Christianity. Yet I argue that in reality, the faith of many of these evangelicals actually lies with the United States as they imagine it. In other words, I think as significant set of evangelicals in the U.S. actually hold to a religion of American nationalism with a Christian veneer. This is the religion of Christian nationalism.
There are numerous variations of a meme which have circulated online. They say, “Only two defining forces have ever offered to die for you: Jesus Christ and the American soldier. One died for your soul, the other died for your freedom.” I think this perfectly captures the sentiment. (Never mind that Jesus stated, “No one can serve two masters.” (Matthew 6:24)) Many have falsely understood Jesus as only being related to an abstract afterlife. Faith in Jesus is merely “fire insurance” and a get out of hell free card which has nothing to do with our present life and world. Or the degree to which God does relate to our world is merely that he wants everyone to follow the rules.
I have also witnessed how much many churches venerate the U.S. flag and the U.S. as a whole around the Forth of July. I’ve seen sidewalks lined with flags and the sanctuary similarly decorated. Along with this, many evangelicals believe that the U.S. was established to be a Christian nation and that mission of the U.S. and the church is or at least should be one and the same. Quite simply, many Christians believe that if Christianity guides them to do something, then this is the U.S. government’s job to do, and conversely, the when the U.S. takes action, they are more or less doing the will of God.
Trump’s well known campaign slogan is “Make America Great Again”. For a long time this didn’t make sense to me because I am not a part of Trump’s target audience. (See Donald Trump: Make America Great Again.) I’ve always lived either directly in a city or in the surrounding suburbs. Though my father did blue-collar work, he was well educated and did not work in a factory but was instead a self-employed contractor.
The past several decades have not been kind to small town communities. When we think of the industrial revolution and the early twentieth century, we think of cities being filled with factories. However since the latter part of the twentieth century, factories are most often located near smaller towns and away from larger cities. This makes sense; factories take a lot of land, and land in cities is costly.
During the post World War II manufacturing boom, rural communities developed a symbiotic relationship with industry. Since industry was booming, these companies were able to offer their workers a modest middle-class income as well as generous benefits. Many people (by personality) not only expect their lives to remain fairly similar to their parents’, but they desire this consistency as well.
However, the manufacturing party was not to last. Globalization really picked up in the 90s. The U.S. entered into several free-trade agreements, most notably NAFTA and the TPP. Many manufacturers opened factories in Mexico, China, along with other countries and closed factories in the U.S. Whether correct or not, these free trade agreements were seen as the cause for the decline in U.S. manufacturing. Each were signed during the terms of Democratic presidents. In the past, Democrats had been supported by labor. But workers now felt betrayed by these deals which they believed hurt them.
Job prospects are limited in small towns; when factories left, there were often few alternatives for their former employees. (Keep in mind, moving can be a significant expense which a laid off worker can struggle to afford, not to mention the many other reasons a person may not want to move.) The loss of factories resulted in unemployment for a significant portion of those living in these small communities.
Long term unemployment is a real weight on one’s sense of self-worth and well being. One could say the soul of rural America is hurting. This is a significant factor behind the opioid epidemic. (I can’t mention this without pointing out that since the 70s, “recreational” drug use has been demonized and frequently seen as a moral failing. Politicians used the notion of cracking down on “crime” (drugs) for their political gain. As a consequence along with privatization, U.S. prison populations have exploded with great numbers of especially non-white men being incarcerated long-term often for relatively minor drug offenses. It is great that the opioid epidemic is being viewed more as a health crisis. However it leaves one to wonder if this is more due to the fact that it’s affecting white communities more than others. Even now, Hispanic immigrants are being blamed for bringing in the opioids even though this is largely myth.)
Enter Trump. His promise to “make America great again” is directed to these primarily white, rural communities. He seems to suggest that he can run the U.S. like a business which he has had at least alleged success in. He seems to offer hope to a certain demographic of the country which has felt long neglected. His antics and irreverent behavior apparently appeals to these less educated communities. But more than this, his strong man persona resonates with more conservative groups which tend to hold traditional gender roles. Trump’s behavior is frequently at odds with Christian morality. However, since many evangelicals are Americans first and Christians second (a.k.a. Christian nationalists), they are general quite willing to ignore these transgressions in pursuit of their political goals. In any case, this is why Trump withdrew from the U.S.’s trade deals and instead imposed tariffs on imports.
Most people will only know the term messiah in relation to Jesus. However in Hebrew, messiah simply means an anointed person. So in one manner of speaking, any Israelite king or priest could be considered a messiah. That said, Jews had an expectation of a special messiah who would save them from foreign oppression and usher in heaven on earth.
I can imagine the argument being made that people pin their hopes on any politician, especially the president. How is Trump any different? It’s different in that it seems as though his primary base believes there is a real and imminent existential threat to the U.S. If Trump isn’t elected, the U.S. will continue to slide into a chaotic hell his supporters can’t understand nor tolerate, governed over by a devil.
It’s in this way that Trump is a messianic figure to his core supporters. The story they believe—the mythology if you will—is that America was great through the mid-twentieth century when order and traditional wholesome values were the norm, when men worked hard and were rewarded fairly. (Whether true or not, this is the belief. And never mind Jim Crow segregation since they weren’t affected by it but rather benefited if anything.)
It’s hard for me to understand the fervor of Trump’s support if he is not seen as a savior by his base. But if Trump is a messiah figure, it goes a long way toward explaining why a portion of his followers would believe it necessary to storm the U.S. capitol. (The irony is that in doing so, they attempted to undermine the very democracy they were trying to save.) Or more recently, this is demonstrated by people taping bandages to their ears (which reminds me of the shoes in Life of Brian).
I hope it is clear the danger of people seeing a politician as a messiah. Since people have become convinced that he is their savior, they seem to be willing to believe anything he says and to do anything he requests. Trump is now some people’s source of truth. And in this way, he functions as their god. In this way, “We are the church of Republicans, headed by Trump Christ, who is leading us into the heaven of a 1950s white America.” (I do want to point out that people can and many do support Trump without regarding him as a messianic figure.)
