When the Cancer of Fundamentalism Migrates to Politics
Evangelical Christianity, Trumpism, and the authoritarian mindset
In an interview, David French, the conservative political commentator at The New York Times, tells how he was ostracized from his Evangelical Christian church and from the broader conservative Christian community because he dared to criticize the white nationalist themes of Trumpism.
Just for criticizing this aspect of Donald Trump’s politics, White Evangelicals harassed him and his family online.
French says that he underestimated “the antipathy that existed towards Democrats,” that is, “this raw hatred and/or fear of Democrats on the part of so many Christian Republicans.” And he says he underestimated also how “fundamentalist” these Christians had become, “where there’s this zone of absolute religious certainty that they’ve extended into politics so that if you were not going to support the Republican standard-bearer,” this wasn’t just a political mistake but “a sign of apostasy, of departing from the Christian faith itself.” This “blindsided” him, French says.
French goes on to detail how conservative Christians harassed him at his church and disinvited him from speaking at a panel.
