evangelicals

Pat Robertson Helped Make Intolerance a Permanent Plank in the Republican Platform

by Anthea Butler

Pat Robertson lived at the intersection of public piety, apocalyptic rhetoric, and the pursuit of profit, and did as much as anyone to make the vilifiation of opponents as threats to the moral fiber of the nation a part of conservative politics. 

Leadership Battle at Bob Jones U Shows National Crisis for Christian Colleges

President Steve Pettit, a relative liberalizer of the South Carolina school's strict codes of conduct and conservative sense of mission, is clashing with the chair of the Board of Trustees in a fight that symbolizes the choice between reform and retrenchment that faces many evangelical colleges. 

The Role of US Evangelicals in Radicalizing Ugandans Against LGBTQ Rights

While the accusation that LGBTQ adults are a risk to the safety of children has recently reemerged in American politics, US evangelical groups have been encouraging it in Africa for years. 

Leaked Emails Show Christian Nationalist Anti-Trans "Holy War"

“Stopping the existence of transgender people and the acceptance of trans people in the public sphere is to them some sort of religious imperative,” according to historian Thomas Lecaque. 

WDJD (What Did Jesus Do)?: Do Evangelicals Care?

by Adam Jortner

While American leftists could find much to embrace in the Gospels, the political actions of many white Evangelicals is likely to push them away. Is it too late to reverse the merger of evangelicalism with conservative movement politics? 

Trump's Apocalyptic CPAC Speech Aimed Squarely at Southern Evangelicals

by Thomas Lecaque

In the past, Evangelicals and other apocalypse-minded constituencies have projected their views onto Donald Trump. Now, Trump seems to be fully embracing the bit, suggesting that violence above and beyond politics will usher in the Kingdom. 

Will MAGA Be the Last Straw for Conservative Jews' Partnership with the Christian Right?

by Eric Alterman

Since the 1970s, an alliance between Christian and Jewish conservatives has been brokered over mutual support for Israel's occupation and settlement of the West Bank. Are changing attitudes toward the occupation among American Jews and the naked antisemitism of the MAGA right breaking the alliance? 

In "God Forbid" the Falwells Epitomize Christian Hypocrisy

by Anthea Butler

The story of the Falwells and the scandal that undid their empire isn't about sexuality, but about the Evangelical compulsion to push back social change and the elevation of power over morality. 

Christian Nationalism Debates Show Multiple Views of Society – and History – Among US Christians

Historian John Fea and other scholars discuss how the idea of Christian nationalism evokes different understandings of religion in history and how that history should guide the future. 

Has the IRS Abandoned Enforcing Ban on Church Political Activity?

Evangelical megachurches are increasingly confident that they can directly intervene in political races, declaring one candidate "ordained" and another "demonic," without anyone doing anything about it. 

Texas GOP Candidate for Congress Wrote Anne Frank Sequel Wherein Jewish Teen Finds Jesus in Auschwitz

In Johnny Teague's narrative, Anne Frank asks whether Jews have failed to recognize the Messiah. He insists that his story does not claim Frank ever converted to Christianity. 

Pro-Life and Pro-Gun?

by Daniel K. Williams

Gun rights aren't intrinsic to evangelical Christian theology. But they are intrinsic to the individualism through which most white Evangelicals see the world and frame their political identity.

How the Southern Baptist Sex Abuse Revelations are Rooted in the Denomination's Racism

by Audrey Clare Farley

White evangelicals need to come to grips with the way that institutional racism gives rise to sexual abuse. 

The Imminent Demise of Roe Signals More Christian Nationalist Attacks on Secular America

by David Sehat

Christian conservatives are targeting not just abortion or contraception, but the broader idea of a secular American republic. 

What Everyone Gets Wrong about the Evangelical-Abortion Connection

by Gillian Frank and Neil J. Young

A widely-accepted narrative holds that conservative Christian leaders pushed their followers to oppose abortion as a galvanizing issue when their first concern, resisting school desegregation, became politically unpopular. This obscures the movement building at the grass roots as Christians considered and debated the issue.

Why American Christians "Back the Blue" so Fervently

by Aaron Griffith

Evangelicals within police forces and in the public at large have been encouraged to understand a scriptural mandate for police authority that often short-circuits consideration of other Christian obligations for justice, argues a historian of evangelical attitudes to law and order. 

The Lesson from Republicans' Embrace of "Classical Education"

Calls for "transparency" in curriculum are working hand in hand with an agenda to divert public school funding to charter schools using a curriculum steeped in Christian nationalism. But liberals would do well to heed the connection these plans draw between education and citizenship, and parents' desire to connect them more firmly.

Why Have No Evangelical Christians Served on Supreme Court?

Evangelicals are arguably the most politically engaged religious group in America, with strong views on issues before the court. Yet Ketanji Brown Jackson could become the first nondenominational Protestant to sit on the highest court. 

Trump's "Sh*thole Countries" Remark is Nothing American Churches Haven't Said for Generations

by Kathryn Gin Lum

American missionaries in the nineteenth century prefigured the former president's comments by forming a worldview of a "blessed us" and a "backward them." 

White American Evangelicals have been among Putin's Biggest Fans – Will Invasion Change Things?

by Anthea Butler

The invasion of Ukraine will test whether American evangelicals' enthusiasm for Putin's brand of Christian nationalism outweighs their faith's calls for peace and mercy.