Every American believes his country should be Christian. For half of the population, this means the public display of Christian symbols, laws promoting those Christian teachings that don’t encumber the wealthy, and politicians who profess the Christian faith. These people understand Christianity as a set of definite beliefs tied to churches and opposed to secularism.
The other half of the population dismisses conventional expressions of Christianity but actually believes more fervently than any Falwell, albeit in attenuated form. They are Christian radicals that have taken the Christian idea of loving one’s neighbor, stripped it of every attendant belief, and elevated it to an absolute principle. Theirs is a faith of nonjudgmentalism, accepting every refugee, and always blaming oneself whenever one is attacked. Call this outlook “multiculturalism” if you like, but the only culture capable of producing it is a Christian one.
The leaders of both camps have rejected Donald Trump’s call to turn away all Muslim immigrants, but the second camp has done so with special hauteur. For them, Trump's proposal will become the gravamen of a thousand thinkpieces on the perils of Christian nationalism and virtues of strict secularity. Right as they are to criticize Trump's odious proposal, they are wrong to suppose they have any less religious or Christian a vision of what America should be. They too are Christian nationalists—ones who believe that Trump’s proposal is wrong because it is contrary to building a Christian nation, a civilization of love. As a typically theocratic American, I agree.
Matthew Schmitz is deputy editor of First Things.
