And it’s not even confined to American evangelics, either, making frequent appearances in Europe (we have to let those muslims drown, or they’ll destroy our values) and South America (Bolivia anyone?).
Matt_W
3449
I think sola scriptura is one of the pillars of Protestantism, but evangelicals–or at least every evangelical church I’ve encountered or been a part of–are fundamentalists; they read the bible as if it’s word-for-word true and scientifically and historically accurate. (I mean this is actually impossible because the bible is a collection of fractious and often contradictory texts composed from extant oral sources and redacted extensively over the course of a couple of thousand years.) The Fundamentals (which promulgated the doctrines of biblical inerrancy and literal interpretation of the text) were published in 1910, and I used to regularly see copies on pastors’ shelves growing up. There’s a reason why 40% of Americans say today, in 2019, that God created humans in their present form with no evolution.
That seems so strange to me. How are they persecuted? They worship as they want. Are they equating non-Evangelicals who are not open to their views as being persecutial?
My guess is that it stems from a combination of emphasis on the separation of church and state, plus any acknowledgement that other religions exist in our society and should be accepted into positions of power.
And “Happy Holidays!” Mostly that, probably.
“Given the polarizing nature of the President, I suspect some Republicans will refuse to turnout during the General Election because they don’t want to vote for him - though I don’t know that we will know what this universe would look like without us or a stakeholder creating a model,”
The plan also identifies the Republican-led elimination of straight ticket voting as “one of the biggest challenges ahead of the 2020 cycle.”
And, of course, they plan to buy up web domain names that include the names of democratic incumbents they are targeting.
KevinC
3453
Have you not heard about the War on Christmas?!?!? Starbucks cups have Happy Holidays on them. We’re an inch away from the martyrdom of millions of faithful Christians.
CraigM
3454
This is literally a part of it.
The decline of supremacy of their beliefs is equivalent to persecution.
It is all of this. They sincerely believe that a) non christians should not hold office and that the US was founded as an explicitly Christian nation b) that some non Christians hold office is evidence that their belief actually hurts their ability to hold office. I.e. true Christians are discriminated against in elections. And that is why Trump was so attacked by the left, because the left hates Christianity.
And though @tomchick may bristle at that, I can say with absolute certainty these things are true for a sizeable portion of the evangelical community. I see it in evidence in my family, I see it in evidence in their churches. If you were to poll their churches on their feelings vis a vis war on Christmas, religion and politics, persecution? You would get 80%+ in agreement with those things.
They literally believe, unironically, that Starbucks changing cups to Happy Hollidays instead of Merry Christmas is part of a ping running leftist plot to erase Christianity from our country because liberals hate god. No equivocation, no hesitation, that is the reason.
Matt_W
3455
Popular culture treats them with disdain. Their values–traditional marriage, patriarchy, opposition to abortion–are under siege politically and culturally. Lots of media is filled with content–sex, foul language, drug use–that they consider coarse and unwholesome and in opposition to their principles. Science belittles them for believing mythical nonsense about the origins of humanity. Liberals call them racist because of their association with the GOP. Everyone looks down on them. They’re constantly under pressure from all sides to subvert their values or faith in order to “fit in.” The world is trending toward increased secularism and they see that trend leading eventually to anti-Christian pogroms. They feel that the end-times are near or are happening now and believe prophecies that they interpret as predicting that Christians will be heavily persecuted during the seven year Tribulation preceding (following?) the glorious return of Jesus and the Rapture of believers into eternal heavenly bliss.
tl;dr It’s a cult. And cults thrive on perceived persecution.
CraigM
3456
Yeah, that’s good too. Very much accurate to what I’ve seen.
Enidigm
3457
I don’t think it’s quite fair to paint all evangelicals in the same box per se but I do think this points as to why they fear diversity without really understanding it. When cities become this seething mass of ethnic, religious, and cultural groups in many ways they find these areas “lost” to them. What they want is to convince the apostate culture to renounce their apostacy and come back into the fold (never mind that evangelical churches are themselves founded in a mass rejection of mainline Protestantism, for various reasons). But that’s not really possible with Hindu/Buddhist/Secular/Islamic peoples when the very basis of society is no longer shared. Even Catholics get a bit of a sideeye, although at least they feel like they can make inroads there.
A multiethnic multicultural multireligious society is one where Evangelical Christianity really is a fighting a rear guard action against a tide of diversity, especially when secularism is the professed value of government, and so cannot defend them through legal means against the tide of change that, effectively, what literalist Evangelicalism is founded to oppose.
There’s something to this tbh, but it’s a long and complicated argument. Effectively a society does need some kind of binding principle, and they’re grasping at straws intuitively. For them, otoh, things like Constitutional government seem increasingly less important than cultural uniformity. Which is an answer that will lead to division and conflict since the country cannot go backwards.
They’re forced to have nightmares about gay sex and abortions happening all around them, instead of pretending they don’t exist. The poor, poor things.
Matt_W
3459
Your whole post was very nicely put. Thanks!
Oghier
3461
This exactly, without sarcasm.
It’s the same as people who think white people are discriminated against by “press 1 for english” in voice-mail menus. I know people who believe this. I’m related to some.
It’s racism soup, heated by the outrage-industrial complex our media have become, spiced with the delicious feeling of being the victim (a spice that’s only tasty if you’ve not actually suffered any tangible harm) and greedily consumed with Hannity blaring in the background.
Strollen
3462
I really liked this column.
However, I think Republican is forever tainted, much like Communist.
So I’m going calling myself a Country-First conservative, perhaps in the future there will be a party that matches up with my beliefs.
It’s not so much about the 2,000 boxes of Jr’s book as the sign under which they reside…
Hey, he hasn’t gotten us into a war…yet.
He certainly hasn’t tried to free any slaves either!
ShivaX
3467
Given that a majority of the GOP is pro-traitors that Lincoln put down, it’s not surprising.
Yeah, that’s a good point. Why would a party of Confederate sympathizers admire Lincoln?
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