Letter: Rededicate 250 urges repentance, prayer

RE: Rededicate 250 urges repentance, prayer

I grew up in Southern Baptist and Texas Baptist churches listening to Jack Graham, Robert Jeffress, Jonathan Pokluda, and the like. I am now a Baptist pastor in Moscow, Idaho, which is home to one of the largest and loudest Christian nationalist churches in the country. Let me tell you what these Baptist pastors misunderstand about the real impact of Christian nationalism.

During the “Rededicate 250” event that occurred on May 17 in Washington, D.C., Graham, Jeffress, and Pokluda all spoke about America’s need for salvation and were comfortable identifying themselves with the Christian nationalist movement. Uniting God and country is apparently a means to bring about the salvation these pastors passionately espouse.

However, here in Moscow, Idaho, we know the real result of uniting God and country, and it isn’t salvation.

Every week, I encounter more people who have been physically, psychologically, and spiritually harmed by the entanglement of extreme fundamentalist theology and politics. I offer pastoral care to women and children who have silently endured spousal and parental abuse.

I listen to the stories of Black, Indigenous, and Hispanic community members who have endured extreme racial prejudice, slander, and abuse.

And I grieve with small business owners and struggling homeowners who have been pushed out of their properties due to landlords buying properties for their own purposes and raising rent prices.

Meanwhile, all of these abuses are done in the name of Christ, according to an incredibly narrow, fundamentalist version of Christianity.

The gospel of Christian nationalism isn’t salvation for women, children, the most vulnerable, and the marginalized, which means Christian nationalism isn’t salvation at all.

I invite my fellow Baptists to count the cost of Christian nationalist theology before singing its praises.

Hannah Brown, pastor
The United Church
Moscow, Idaho