Muslim Sharia Law Isn’t the Religious Extremism Threatening America; White Christian Nationalism Is.

The Christian Right has been right.For decades they tried to tell us that the sky was falling, that devils and demons were walking among us, that the end of all we love was so very nigh. For decades they lamented our imminent moral devastation, trying to prepare us (as good prophets do) for the quickly encroaching enemy coming to enslave decent people to their sadistic religious perversions.They pounded their pulpits with ferocity and thumped their Bibles with abandon, forecasting this country’s certain doom at the hands of violent, self-righteous extremists, and we refused to listen. We rolled our eyes and dismissed them as conspiratorial cultists whose hold on reality was tenuous, at best. And yet, they had it right all along.It turns out that every single one of their raw-throated, brimstone-breathing prophecies was true:The wolves would come to devour the innocent in the name of their God.There would be a twisting of religious texts to justify vile evil of every kind.Women, LGBTQ people, and immigrants would be terrorized by a radical minority claiming divine authority.Marginalized, oppressed, and vulnerable human beings would be discarded, hounded, and brutalized.Good people in America would be preyed upon by opportunistic monsters wielding scripture like a hammer.These sage Evangelical prognosticators had everything about the approaching disaster correct—except its source. Conservative Christians neglected to predict the actual genesis of this great decimation, and all they had to do was look in the mirror. You see, it isn’t and will not be some supposed Islamic horde running amok through our nation with a violent, theocratic religion of coercion meant to enslave people to their draconian moral code. Radical Muslims are not an existential threat to our nation, bringing some punitive pestilence upon this nation. They are not here waging an unrelenting holy war on those in America who do not share their beliefs.The real religious extremists have already breached the border.The thick, black shadow of theocracy is already upon us.White Christian Nationalists are here right now.Evangelicals are the greatest existential threat to this diverse nation, and it isn’t even close.For years the Christian Right has been warning us about Godless hordes coming to destroy America, and it turns out this was true; it’s just that the words were autobiographical.As a longtime pastor and lifelong Christian, I’ve had a sick sense of déjà vu watching politicians professing to be followers of Jesus dismantling every program designed to care for the vulnerable and the hurting, seeing the way the corrupt are being awarded greater power, watching empathy vanishing and hatred skyrocketing, witnessing people legislating their antiquated theology upon everyone else.I’ve heard this story a million times before; proclaimed from pulpits on Sunday mornings, unleashed in religious social media rants, and shouted through bullhorns on street corners—with one notable twist. I knew this was coming, or at least I should have. We all should have. These harbingers of doom were absolutely right to warn us, and ironically they were the approaching pestilence. In the sickest kind of self-fulfilling prophecy, they were the plague of these days that they have long said would come.It would be the Christian preachers and the evangelists abandoning the compassionate heart of their faith tradition, perverting the words of their scriptures for their agenda, and selling their souls for a high place overlooking the world. They would be the very false prophets they told us that we should like hell run from. These supposed disciples of Jesus would be the ones to betray him with a kiss and send him to a bloody, undignified end.We are approaching an election, and the monsters need a distraction. They need to press into the irrational fear of those who are not awake and alert enough to see clearly, and Islamophobia is on the menu.Don’t be fooled by White Evangelicals who are spending every waking moment dehumanizing and demonizing our Muslim brothers and sisters. Pay attention to where America is right now, to what is happening here in this moment in the name of God, to the oppressive marriage of Church and State currently being consummated, to the unthinkable harm being done this very day by professed righteous soldiers in the army of the Lord.Yes, the Christian Right was right; evil was going to viciously assail America, terrorize the lives of good people, and make a mockery of God. It was just going to be an inside job.The Beautiful Mess by John Pavlovitz is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit johnpavlovitz.substack.com/subscribe