Schlepping my way across the campus of Colorado Christian University on Monday towards the lecture hall I had chosen as my destination, I thought I had a pretty good idea of what to expect. When the email landed in my inbox last week advertising the lecture “Christian Nationalism: Good or Bad?” hosted by the school’s think tank, the Centennial Institute, my interest was immediately piqued. I have taken a great interest in the conversations Christian communities are having amongst themselves in recent years about Christian nationalism, a force which threatens not just our shared democracy but also the particular faith which birthed it.
Christian nationalism
DAVIS: I Need Your Help
If you have read anything I have written over the last few years, you know that I believe that Christian nationalism is the most pressing threat to American democracy. I have been harping on this for years, since well before the Heritage Foundation crafted Project 2025, and well before Christian nationalism became the animating force behind Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign. Unfortunately, during the time I have been writing about the risks Christian nationalism poses to both democracy and Christianity, history has repeatedly proven my concerns to be justified. Now that Trump has returned to office and Project 2025 is well on its way to completion, there is not much utility in shouting from the rooftops that Christian nationalism is coming for us all. It has already arrived.
DAVIS: Xenophobia, Sexism, and QAnon Stand Out in New Study of Christian Nationalist Beliefs
Researchers released a new dataset measuring the size, demographics, and beliefs of the Christian nationalist movement in America earlier this month, and the findings are grim. The Public Religion Research Institute’s 2025 “Christian Nationalism Across All 50 States” data found that support for Christian nationalist beliefs is strongly correlated with increased hostility towards migrants, adherence to sexist and patriarchal views, and an increased likelihood of belief in conspiracy theories and support for political violence.
Colorado Democrats Should Not Grant Religious People Special Legal Privileges
I'm all for women being able to get abortion services, and I'm all for people being able to afford housing. But the law should say yes to an atheist's backyard, too.
DAVIS: A Conversation with Katherine Stewart about Her New Book, and the Movement to Destroy Democracy
Every now and then, I read a book which hits me with such a profound impact that, like Paul on the road to Damascus, I find my life divided into before and after, incapable of recovering from the revelation. More than a decade ago, legendary investigative journalist Katherine Stewart’s first book, The Good News Club: The Christian Right’s Stealth Assault on America’s Children, hit me with just such a haymaker. The Good News Club was not only revelatory, it was inspiring: ten years after I read it, the book was constantly on my mind as I investigated the happenings in the Woodland Park school district two years ago.
DAVIS: Project 2025 Is Here, and Not Wasting Any Time
Flooding the zone with shit.” That’s the phrase that Steve Bannon, the right-wing Rasputin and former Trump strategist, coined years ago for the technique we have seen the Trump administration deploy in the last week. The idea, as Bannon conceived it, was to unleash a firehose of disinformation, scandal, and intrigue at such an astonishing rate that neither the public nor the media would be able to remain focused on a single topic or transgression for long. Unfortunately, the first week of the second Trump administration was a masterclass in it: the Nazi salute, the talk of annexing Greenland, the “Gulf of America.”
DAVIS: Want to Understand Christian Nationalism Better? Read One of These Books.
I have never met a book I didn’t like. Although, I suppose that’s not quite true; I’ve thoroughly disliked most self-help books I have ever encountered, and I think the entire body of Victorian fiction is criminally overrated. Perhaps it is more accurate to say that I have never encountered a book which didn’t impress me, which didn’t force me to think about the efforts involved in translating all of those thoughts into words, and putting all of those words onto the page. Even the worst novels – and I have read a few – leave me with the impression that the author has accomplished a Herculean task: externalizing what was once only internal.
DAVIS: Mike Huckabee’s Ambassador Appointment is Worse Than You Think
Amid the unrelenting cavalcade of appalling Trump administration appointees announced in recent weeks, one pick slid past without nearly enough scrutiny: the selection of Mike Huckabee to serve as the United States’ ambassador to Israel. With no diplomatic experience whatsoever, Huckabee will take up the crucial posting in the middle of a war. But it’s not Huckabee’s lack of experience which makes the choice so eyebrow-raising, it’s his apocalyptic Christian Zionist notion of Israel.
DAVIS: Colorado-Based Christian Nationalists are Rewriting Recent History
The “least credible history book in print.” That’s the honor voters bestowed on David Barton’s 2012 book about Thomas Jefferson, which rewrote the third president as a modern God & Country evangelical and distanced him from that whole slavery mess. The book was ultimately withdrawn from publication by Christian publishing house Thomas Nelson, but neither the withdrawal nor the spate of scathing reviews slowed Barton down. If anything, his star has risen even further: today, Barton is constantly found onstage alongside the biggest names in the Christian nationalist movement.
DAVIS: Pete Hegseth & I Know the Same Christian Nationalists
When Donald Trump announced Pete Hegseth as his pick for secretary of defense, the initial public reaction was, understandably, something along the lines of, “A Fox News host is going to run the Pentagon?” It was only in the following days that the media fleshed out the public’s understanding of Hegseth and shone a light on one of his most prominent and controversial facets: his deep involvement with the Christian nationalist movement. As I dug into Hegseth, something deeper struck me.