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No Kings Day – Convergence, Divergence

Religious awakenings or revivals often coincide with and sometimes bolster authoritarian political leadership and concentrated business power. The Founders of our early Republic, especially Jefferson and Madison, argued for a “wall of separation” between church and state. Years later President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned us: “In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex.” Early America saw religion as a private moral force, not a political one while protestant assumptions still undergird culture. Americans have always been wary of oligarchy (concentrated business power). In today’s America, religion and oligarchy have combined to undermine American democracy. 

Authoritarian or semi-authoritarian regimes often seek legitimacy by aligning with religious movements. President Trump cultivated a strong base among white evangelical Christians. According to one commentary: “About 80% of white evangelicals supported Trump in 2020 … making religiosity a linchpin of the base.” Authoritarian leaders are reinforced by religious rhetoric such as “I caught COVID and God saved me,” or “I survived two assassination attempts because I’ve been chosen by God.” An amalgam of moral-crusade language (against “woke”, trans, liberal elites) and denigration of the opposition (No Kings Day is Hate America Day or “the Democrat party’s main constituency are made up of Hamas terrorists, illegal aliens, and violent criminals” as the President’s Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt recently stated, reinforces that we are in a religious war of good against evil that only an all powerful leader such as our current President can win. This is not the America of our Founders.

The New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) is a movement within evangelical/charismatic Christianity that emphasizes dominionism. The core belief is that Christians should “take over” the seven mountains of society (government, business, media, arts, education, family, religion) and we are in a supernatural spiritual war. NAR is one of the most important shifts in Christianity in modern times and is inherently political and threatens to subvert democracy.

On the business/oligarchy side, scholars observe that the U.S. is increasingly functioning like an oligarchy (few wealthy actors dominating policy). For example: “Political outcomes overwhelmingly favored the very wealthy, corporations, and business groups.” [Harvard Business School]

Religious groups aligned with Trump endorse him publicly; business donors support him; policies respond to their interests; the religious-political narrative frames him as “God’s instrument” or “culture savior”. The NAR influence further blurs boundaries: church actors identifying political goals as spiritual warfare.

How do those who believe in democracy, separation of church and state, free enterprise, and personal freedom counter this convergence of forces that threaten to undermine the American experiment? David Brooks provides a convincing argument in his recent article in The Atlantic: American Needs A Mass Movement – Now. I’ll end with Brooks’s words. Happy No Kings Day

“The American spirit was given political expression 250 years ago by the signers of the Declaration. That spirit was perhaps best expressed by Walt Whitman, who wrote that American democracy is “life’s gymnasium,” one that produced “freedom’s athletes.” What Whitman feared was “inertness and fossilism”—the possibility that America would stagnate, or build walls around itself, or walls through the middle of itself that divided the people. He admired energy. “I hail with joy the oceanic, variegated, intense practical energy, the demand for facts, even the business materialism of the current age,” he wrote in Democratic Vistas.

We have traveled a long way from Whitman’s hymns of vigor and hope. But the spirit of the country, although perhaps dormant, still lives. Trumpism is ascendant now, but history shows that America cycles through a process of rupture and repair, suffering and reinvention. This process has a familiar sequence. Cultural and intellectual change comes first—a new vision. Social movements come second. Political change comes last.”