James Talarico

Yeah.

So I think there's lots of different ways you could describe it.

The way I define it is a little broader.

I say Christian nationalism is the worship of power, whether it's social power, economic power, political power, in the name of Christ.

And I think it's relevant to describe it this way because it's something we've struggled with within the Christian church from the very beginning.

So the first followers of Jesus didn't even call themselves Christians.

They called themselves the Way because their crucified teacher had taught them a different way of being human, a different way of relating to other people, of understanding your relationship to neighbor and to God.

And this transformed them.

They became these peculiar people, is how the Bible describes it, because they didn't participate in the economy, the military, the culture.

They were persecuted because they turned the world upside down.

Again, that's how it's described in Acts.

But 300 years after the Roman Empire crucified Jesus,

Emperor Constantine made Christianity the official religion of that very same empire, the same empire that crucified Jesus.

So this is 300 years later.

And now Christianity is the official sponsor of of the empire of Western civilization.

It's always hard to tell with politicians, and I say this as a politician myself.

Well, he was baptized, I don't know the year, but he was baptized after he had this vision before a decisive battle when he saw the cross and decided that his soldiers would put the cross as part of their emblem.

And then they won that battle, right?

Which, you know, who knows if it was because of his vision or not.

But it started a trend, which we've struggled with for literally, you know, more than 1500 years of powerful people, you know, emperors, billionaires, dictators, megachurch pastors, using religion to protect their own wealth and power.