I apologize in advance. This is even longer than usual.
The Stuff:
Author Blake Callens wrote this book in response to The Case for Christan Nationalism by Stephen Wolfe. It is information-dense and appears intended for a Christian audience—perhaps clergy?—who understands theology and American and European history.
All is not lost, however. Even an old heathen like me can read it and digest it. I detest anything that smells of fascism, especially when dressed in its Sunday best, and Christian nationalism is the latest flavor of fascism.
A few quick definitions: Christian nationalism views the United States as a Christian nation, usually because it was founded as a Christian nation. It isn’t, and it wasn’t.
Christian nationalists claim that it follows (it doesn’t) that Christians—the right kind of Christians (TRKoC), at any rate—should enjoy privileged places in American society and government.
No, they shouldn’t. Pretty damn cheeky to think professing a religion—even the right kind of the right religion—makes anyone special.
Author Callens answers Wolfe point by point, showing logical fallacies and revealing Wolfe’s misogyny, racism, and xenophobia. Wolfe argues that (in short) if (TRKoC) ran things, the world would shape up and fly the way God wants it to. TRKoC are justified in the violent overthrow of the present order and setting up their own Christian state with their own “Christian Prince” to manage things. Blasphemy should be a criminally chargeable offense, for instance.
Callens’s broad answer is that Wolfe’s utopia is fascism cloaked in Christian terminology. His assessment of the whole plan is summed up in the word at the end: “anathema, “that is, “cursed,” and worthy of excommunication.
I rather agree with Callens on these points.
Stephen Wolfe is not an idiot. He holds master’s degrees in philosophy and political science and a doctorate in political theory. And he wants Christian Prince…?
Thoughts:
Once upon a time, long ago, when I was young and innocent, I read Plato’s Republic out of curiosity. I really will read nearly anything out of curiosity.
“What is justice?” Socrates asks. His answer is, in part, that “justice” is a matter of staying in your place, minding your business, and not getting in the way of your betters.
Yeah, and the philosopher-king will arise, quizzed by learned men and women—at least Plato includes women. Wolfe has them at home baking cookies or something, you know, womanly—godly. According to Wolfe, once society is ordered the way he believes god wants it to be, an aristocracy will arise and, with it, a Christian Prince.
It set alarm bells off in my head. History has seen this before. Hitler—Il Duce—Dear Leader. It’s never turned out well but usually involved the miserable deaths of millions of innocents.
The parallel Callens draws is Franciso Franco of Spain, who called himself Caudillo (“chieftain”). Simply because the Christian Prince calls himself (it’s got to be a guy, according to Wolfe) TRKoC, will it be different this time? And you’re investing him with the power to punish thought crimes like “blasphemy”? And to execute those who refuse to stop proselytizing for “false religions”? I’m not taking that bet.
A lot of this book is two Christians arguing about Christian doctrine. What would human nature be like if Adam hadn’t fallen? I don’t have a dog in that race, so once I understood what Callens was saying, I more or less tuned it out. I care little about whether Wolfe’s stance is Christian. More important to me is whether it is humane, just (and not in Plato’s sense), and practical.
Callens describes his experiences of war in Afghanistan in often graphic terms. These are extremely difficult to read, but he recounts them for a purpose. He doesn’t want civil war in the United States. There is nothing grand or glorious about combat. It extracts a horrible toll, not only on the victims but also on the survivors.
Yet he states:
“There are very few things in the world that would cause me to advocate for, and personally return to, proactive violence. Stephen Wolfe and his compatriots attempting violent revolution to enact his vision would be one of them.” (p. 370)
There are several points on which I disagree with Callens. For example, “infanticide” is not legal in any state in the union. Infanticide is murder, which is illegal everywhere. Nor is it legal to abort a fully viable fetus. (p.83). Abortions taking place after viability (22 weeks or so) occur if an abnormality is discovered or if there is a danger to the mother’s life or well-being. These are often very much wanted babies, and their deaths are tragedies.
Get a grip, man.
I will warn the reader that this is not the most leisurely read. First, it is long, weighing in just short of 500 pages.
Second, it is dense. Callens writes in clear, understandable prose, but there is a lot of information to wade through. I have to hand it to him for making abstract topics comprehensible. He clarifies obscure subjects.
Third, he uses terms like “prelapsarian” (pertaining to the time before the fall in the Garden of Eden) and makes at least one passing reference to the Holodomor (the Ukrainian Famine of the 1930s, caused—perhaps deliberately—by the rapid industrialization and collectivization of the Soviet Union) without defining them.
Fourth, as mentioned above, the Gulf War scenes are graphic and extremely difficult to read. However, I did not find them exploitative or melodramatic. He wants to make the point that maybe war—and dying in one—is not so dulce et decorum.
Having said all that, I still think this is an important book. The extreme right-wing will always be there. These people think they’re doing god a favor. They’re not going to stop.
Police states exist. A certain confident naivete convinces us that it can’t happen here, even if the chances are low that it will happen next week.
Eternal vigilance.
As for recommending the book, I think the audience is small. It is not a casual read. But if the topic interests you, by all means, check it out.
Title: The Case Against Christian Nationalism: An Expository Commentary on Stephen Wolfe’s Book
Author: Blake Callens
First published: 2024
Reviews of Old and New Stories. Mostly Old 
…”The old lie: Dulce et decorum pro patria mori.” That’s one tragic poem by Wilfred Owen.
Nice review, Denise!
Thanks! The old lie,
I wished I had staid at home and gone to jail
For stealing the hogs of Curl Trenary,
Instead of running away and joining the army.
Rather a thousand times the county jail
Than to lie under this marble figure with wings,
And this granite pedestal Bearing the words, “Pro Patria.”
What do they mean, anyway?
Not that I think the guy who wrote this book stole anyone’s hogs. 🙂
Right? 🙂
I’m one of the “not that kind of Christians” and the thought of these people in power forcing their ideology on the masses is frightening. I just finished listening to the first volume of Dumas Malone’s six volume series on Thomas Jefferson. The Founding Fathers were most definitely against Christian Nationalism, which people would know if they truly studied this era in American History, rather than the fairy tale we’re usually taught in schools. Both Jefferson and John Adams proposed laws further defining freedom of religion to thwart cries of people who wanted to force people to declare a religious affiliation. And that’s the way it should be.
Agreed, Patti, And I know that you do not wish to force your faith on others. This is fascism calling itself Christianity.
I know you well enough to guess you’re not a fascist. Yes, it’s scary. How dangerous is it? I don’t know. But there’s no reason to let these “Right Kind of Christians” go unanswered.
They either don’t know or deliberately ignore history.
I had to do a little hunting but found Jefferson’s quote from the Notes on the States of Virginia:
“The rights of conscience we never submitted, we could not submit. We are answerable for them to our God. The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.”
That was one of the best quotes I read!
I read all six of Malone’s volumes on Thomas Jefferson, and it is very clear that Jefferson and other Founding Fathers were against a national religion. Reading the history of Europe and England and all of the deaths because religion makes one understand why people like Jefferson and John Adams wanted separation of state and church.
Yes! I just finished the first volume of Malone’s series on Jefferson. I wish more people would do just that, rather than relying on what we are spoon-fed in school and on the news.
That’s a hard pass…i think it would trigger me
Completely understand.
Thanks for the thoughtful review. We live in scary times. I can’t understand why some people want to bend others to their will. I listened to a program on NPR about evangelicals, and a former evangelical stated that many evangelicals want a state religion, and they don’t care what they do in order to achieve that goal.
Thanks for your kind words.
I agree. While I’m firmly in the none-of-the-above category, I’m not so enamored of viewpoint that I demand everyone else has to agree with me. I support everyone’s right to live by the dictates of their conscience.