“If you don’t want Christian nationalism, what kind of nationalism do you want? And if it’s not the Christianity that’s the problem, is it the nationalism? … if we don’t want nationalism, do we want globalism?”
These questions from Voddie Baucham demand answers from all of us Christians, including those who have expressed serious concern about if not outright contempt for the idea of Christian Nationalism.
The political Anabaptists among us, including some neo-Anglicans who seem to be wallowing in their ahistorical and theologically lacking approach to the issue, have delivered a resounding "no" to the argument for Christian Nationalism. But what is their alternative? Again, Baucham forces them to speak plainly on the matter and answer the questions.
I am one among many who have hoped, clearly now in vain, for a libertarian solution. Everyone just leave everyone else alone and leave the State, if it is to exist at all, to provide minimal services while "every man does what is right in his own eyes." I am still sympathetic to certain libertarian principles, but I see now that libertarianism has failed abysmally to deal with the reality of the organic nature of human society and culture. What's more, it is abundantly clear that we can't "just all get along" in that framework. There is no libertarian utopia, real or imagined. It really is all about tribes; about communal organisms. Burke was right. And the non-Christian tribe here in these States, the LGBT movement seemingly leading the charge, is intent on forcing its will upon us.
So. . .
Since this is the case, Christians should start thinking seriously about abandoning Lockean individualism. Whatever Locke meant, I do not believe that he would put his stamp of approval on today's state of affairs in America. It's clear that secularist government has failed. It's not in any sense "neutral" at the end of the day, but godless and intensely anti-Christian.
We Christians in the West (it applies to Europe too) are sick of it. We're done. If we are true Christians, we should have long ago resolved that we will not be ruled by these people. I have so resolved. Have you? Assuming you're not a political Anabaptist?
Though nations and states are admittedly distinguishable conceptually, we often talk in terms of "nation-states." The Jews have an official nation-state. The Muslims have official nation-states. Western secularists have official nation-states. Why can't Christians have an official nation-state or states? Because the New Testament commits us to political Anabaptism? Rubbish, I say.
A certain brand of Protestantism argues that the Constantinian Settlement represented the Church going off the rails. But what if these Protestants are wrong? What if, instead, the Settlement was part of the Father's plan to advance his kingdom as referenced in the Lord's Prayer? Or the national conversions to Christianity such as that of Armenia, the first nation to convert in the early 4th century? What if "Christendom" was actually his will, and not, as these Protestants claim, a woeful, pagan aberration from the Faith?
“If you don’t want Christian nationalism, what kind of nationalism do you want? And if it’s not the Christianity that’s the problem, is it the nationalism? … if we don’t want nationalism, do we want globalism?”
Or Western secular government? Why would we want Western secular government when it's now clear that it planted the seeds of its own destruction?
You who denigrate the idea of Christian Nationalism, answer these questions. You Anglicans among them, answer them along with question of why it is you do so when Anglicanism, including the prayer book you use, was the product of English Christian Nationalism. And while you're at it, tell us why the famous Anglican literary figure and social critic T.S. Eliot was wrong when he penned these words:
“The World is trying the experiment of attempting to form a civilized but non-Christian mentality. The experiment will fail; but we must be very patient in awaiting its collapse; meanwhile redeeming the time: so that the Faith may be preserved alive through the dark ages before us; to renew and rebuild civilization, and save the World from suicide."
Tell us as well what we mean when we pray in the Prayers of the People at every Mass:
"We beseech thee also, so to direct and dispose the hearts of all Christian Rulers, that they may truly and impartially administer justice, to the punishment of wickedness and vice, and to the maintenance of thy true religion, and virtue."