Christian Nationalism and American Exceptionalism

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Christian Nationalism and American Exceptionalism

Christian nationalism and American exceptionalism are related but distinct ideas that have shaped debates about religion, national identity, history, and political authority in the United States. American exceptionalism generally refers to the belief that the United States occupies a distinctive place in history or possesses political, cultural, religious, or moral characteristics that set it apart from other nations. Christian nationalism more specifically connects the identity and political order of the United States with Christianity, although scholars, religious leaders, political activists, and the public disagree considerably about exactly what the term means.

The relationship between the two ideas is historically complex. Religious language about providence, covenant, national mission, and chosenness appeared long before the emergence of the modern term "Christian nationalism." Puritan settlements, revolutionary rhetoric, Manifest Destiny, American civil religion, missionary movements, patriotic ceremonies, and political speeches all contributed in different ways to traditions that presented the nation as having a special purpose.

Modern Christian nationalism draws upon some of these traditions, but it should not automatically be equated with ordinary Christian religious belief, patriotism, religious political participation, or American exceptionalism. Researchers frequently distinguish between personal religious commitment and the belief that Christianity should occupy a privileged place in national institutions, culture, law, or definitions of American identity.

American Exceptionalism, Providence, and National Mission

Ideas of American exceptionalism have taken many forms. Some versions emphasize republican government, constitutional liberty, economic opportunity, immigration, religious freedom, or democratic institutions. Other versions have emphasized providence, national chosenness, or the belief that the United States has been assigned a distinctive historical mission.

Religious interpretations of national purpose have deep roots in American history. John Winthrop's seventeenth-century description of a Puritan community as a "city upon a hill" was later transformed into a much broader national metaphor. Although Winthrop was addressing a particular colonial religious community rather than describing the future United States, later generations repeatedly invoked the phrase to describe America as an exemplary nation.

Covenant theology also contributed to this tradition. Some colonists understood their communities through biblical concepts of covenant, collective obligation, divine judgment, and moral responsibility. Later Americans adapted such language to national circumstances, helping produce narratives in which political events were interpreted as evidence of divine favor or punishment.

During the nineteenth century, ideas of providential mission became closely associated with territorial expansion and Manifest Destiny. Religious and political arguments sometimes portrayed American expansion as part of a divinely sanctioned historical process. These claims also interacted with racial, Anglo-Saxon, and imperial ideologies, demonstrating that religious exceptionalism could coexist with systems of exclusion and hierarchy.

American exceptionalism therefore has never represented a single doctrine. It has included universalistic claims about liberty and democracy as well as more exclusive claims involving religion, race, ethnicity, territory, or national destiny.

Civil Religion and Sacred National Identity

The concept of American civil religion provides another way of understanding the relationship between religion and national identity. Sociologist Robert Bellah famously used the term to describe a collection of national beliefs, rituals, symbols, commemorations, historical narratives, and references to God that function in a religious-like manner without necessarily belonging to a particular denomination.

Presidential inaugurations, national holidays, memorial ceremonies, references to divine providence, the language of sacrifice, and expressions such as "one nation under God" can operate within this civic tradition. Civil religion may provide a shared symbolic language through which citizens interpret the nation's history and political ideals.

Scholars disagree about its political consequences. One interpretation views civil religion as capable of encouraging national unity while placing moral limits on political power. Another emphasizes its potential to sacralize the nation, portray national policies as divinely authorized, or marginalize citizens who do not share the dominant religious tradition.

Christian nationalism and civil religion can therefore overlap without being identical. Civil religion often uses broadly theistic language intended to encompass multiple traditions, whereas Christian nationalism generally makes Christianity itself more central to national identity.

Was the United States Founded as a Christian Nation?

The relationship between Christianity and the American founding is one of the most contested historical questions in contemporary discussions of Christian nationalism.

Christianity strongly influenced colonial society and the intellectual environment in which the United States developed. Churches were major social institutions, ministers participated in political debates, biblical language appeared frequently in public discourse, and religious ideas contributed to arguments surrounding morality, liberty, revolution, and government.

At the same time, the founding generation did not speak with one voice about religion. Religious beliefs varied substantially among leading political figures. States followed different policies regarding religious establishment, religious tests, public funding, toleration, and disestablishment.

The federal Constitution did not establish Christianity as an official national religion. Article VI prohibited religious tests for federal office, while the First Amendment prohibited Congress from establishing religion and protected the free exercise of religion. Debates surrounding these provisions demonstrate that religion was important to the founding generation while also revealing significant concern about government control of religion and national religious establishment.

Consequently, historians often distinguish between the observation that Christianity profoundly influenced American society and the stronger claim that the constitutional United States was formally established as a Christian state.

Contemporary disputes over a "Christian founding" frequently concern not only historical interpretation but also modern questions about national identity, education, law, and political authority.

Christian Nationalism and American Identity

Contemporary scholarship commonly examines Christian nationalism as a set of beliefs linking Christianity with ideas about what America is, who fully belongs within the nation, and what role government should play in preserving a particular religious or cultural order.

Survey researchers have developed measures asking respondents about such questions as whether the federal government should declare the United States a Christian nation, whether American success is part of God's plan, whether government should advocate Christian values, and whether being Christian is important to being truly American.

Research indicates considerable variation rather than a simple division between Christian nationalists and everyone else. People may strongly endorse some statements while rejecting others. Support also varies according to religious tradition, political identification, geography, race, age, education, and other characteristics.

Some scholars distinguish between religious traditionalism and Christian statism. A person may believe that Christianity has strongly shaped American culture without believing that the government should enforce Christianity. Conversely, political appeals to Christian identity may sometimes be driven as much by cultural or national identity as by conventional measures of religious participation.

These distinctions have led researchers to caution against using the label "Christian nationalism" so broadly that it becomes synonymous with conservative Christianity, patriotism, or Christian political participation.

Race, Immigration, and National Belonging

A significant part of the scholarship examines relationships among Christian nationalism, race, immigration, and ideas of national belonging.

Historically, religious nationalism sometimes developed alongside racial and ethnic definitions of American identity. Nineteenth-century Anglo-Saxonism, Manifest Destiny, segregation, and some twentieth-century nationalist movements combined religious narratives with racial hierarchy.

Contemporary research similarly investigates whether Christian-nationalist attitudes are associated with views about immigration, racial inequality, interracial relationships, demographic change, and who is considered culturally American.

These relationships are not identical across every racial or religious group. Research on Black, Hispanic, white, Catholic, Protestant, evangelical, mainline, and unaffiliated populations demonstrates that religious nationalism can take different forms in different communities.

This variation has contributed to debate over whether Christian nationalism should primarily be understood as a religious ideology, racialized national identity, political identity, cultural orientation, or some combination of these.

Democracy, Political Authority, and Political Violence

Another body of research explores relationships between Christian nationalism and attitudes toward political institutions.

Researchers have investigated associations involving voting access, civil liberties, authoritarian leadership, emergency powers, political violence, conspiracy beliefs, gun ownership, and perceptions that Christianity or the nation faces an existential threat.

Some studies report correlations between stronger Christian-nationalist beliefs and greater acceptance of particular restrictions on democratic norms or political violence under certain circumstances. Such research generally examines statistical associations and does not establish that all people holding Christian-nationalist beliefs support authoritarianism or violence.

The January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol intensified research and public debate because Christian symbols, prayers, flags, and nationalist imagery appeared among portions of the crowd. Scholars and journalists have subsequently debated how representative those displays were of broader American Christianity and how the event affected public perceptions of religion and politics.

Christian Responses to Christian Nationalism

Christian communities themselves are deeply divided over Christian nationalism.

Critics within evangelical, mainline Protestant, Catholic, Baptist, and other Christian traditions argue that Christianity should not be subordinated to national identity or political power. Some contend that granting government authority to define or privilege Christianity can threaten both religious liberty and the independence of churches.

Organizations led by Christians have consequently organized campaigns opposing Christian nationalism while emphasizing that Christians may participate fully in democratic politics without seeking governmental preference for Christianity.

Other Christian writers defend stronger connections among Christianity, public morality, national solidarity, and political institutions. Some argue that critics use the term "Christian nationalism" too broadly or apply it to political positions that would be better understood as ordinary Christian conservatism or religious participation.

Still others advocate versions of Christian nationalism explicitly, arguing that Christianity historically shaped American institutions and should retain a privileged role in the country's public life.

The resulting debate is therefore not simply a conflict between religious and secular Americans. It also represents an internal dispute among Christians over theology, patriotism, political authority, religious freedom, and the proper relationship between church and nation.

Contemporary American Exceptionalism

Debates about Christian nationalism have renewed broader questions about American exceptionalism.

Some contemporary interpretations continue to portray the United States as possessing a distinctive political tradition based on constitutional government, individual liberty, religious freedom, democratic institutions, and civic ideals. Religious advocates may interpret these achievements partly through providential history.

Critics distinguish this civic understanding from claims that the United States possesses divine approval or a unique right to exercise power. They point to slavery, Indigenous displacement, racial segregation, imperial expansion, and other parts of American history that complicate narratives of unbroken national virtue.

A third approach treats exceptionalism primarily as a historical question rather than a statement of national superiority. From this perspective, certain characteristics of American political and religious development may genuinely be unusual without demonstrating that the nation is morally superior or divinely chosen.

The continuing power of exceptionalist language demonstrates how religious narratives, historical memory, and national identity remain intertwined in American public life.

Conclusion

Christian nationalism and American exceptionalism share a long historical background involving religion, national identity, providence, civil religion, and narratives of American purpose, but the concepts are not interchangeable.

American exceptionalism encompasses a wide range of claims about America's distinctive history, political institutions, culture, and role in the world. Christian nationalism more specifically concerns the relationship between Christianity and national identity and, in stronger forms, the extent to which government or public institutions should privilege Christianity.

The history behind these debates includes Puritan covenant theology, the "city upon a hill" metaphor, revolutionary religion, Manifest Destiny, civil religion, religious liberty, racial and ethnic nationalism, and competing interpretations of the American founding.

Modern scholarship shows that Christian nationalism is internally diverse and that its relationship to ordinary Christianity, patriotism, conservatism, racial identity, and political behavior remains debated. Supporters, critics, historians, theologians, political scientists, sociologists, journalists, and religious leaders frequently disagree about both the meaning of the term and its implications.

Understanding Christian nationalism therefore requires separating several questions that are often combined: the historical influence of Christianity in America; the constitutional relationship between religion and government; beliefs about American exceptionalism and divine mission; the cultural definition of American identity; and contemporary arguments about whether Christianity should possess a privileged place in public institutions.

These distinctions make it possible to examine the subject historically and analytically without treating Christianity, patriotism, American exceptionalism, civil religion, and Christian nationalism as though they were the same phenomenon.

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Definitions, Surveys, Measurement, and Conceptual Debate

  • [The Summer of Taking Christian Nationalism Seriously | Megan Fowler | Christianity Today | July 30, 2026]
Reports how several Protestant denominations are studying, debating, defining, or formally responding to Christian nationalism.
  • [The Weakness of Anti-Christian Nationalism: When Religiously Inclusive Orientations Can’t Increase Tolerance | Paul A. Djupe and Brooklyn Walker | Politics and Religion | March 26, 2026]
Examines whether inclusive religious and political orientations consistently counter the social and political attitudes associated with Christian nationalism.
  • [Fact Sheet: A Closer Look at Christian Nationalism in Nine States | PRRI Staff | Public Religion Research Institute | February 17, 2026]
Provides detailed state-level comparisons showing how Christian-nationalist beliefs vary geographically and among religious and demographic groups.
  • [Religion Is Sometimes Raced: Christian Nationalism as In-Group Protection | Brooklyn Walker et al. | Perspectives on Politics | October 14, 2025]
Examines Christian nationalism as a form of religious group identity whose political effects can vary according to perceived threats to one's in-group.
  • [Experts Discuss Christian Nationalism and Patriotism: A Post-Fourth of July Conversation | PRRI Staff | Public Religion Research Institute | July 8, 2025]
Explores distinctions and overlaps among patriotism, nationalism, Christian nationalism, American identity, and religious understandings of citizenship.
  • [The Varieties of American Christian Nationalism | Nilay Saiya | Politics and Religion | May 13, 2025]
Argues that Christian nationalism contains multiple strands and examines differences in their understandings of Christianity, nationhood, political authority, and American identity.
  • [Comparing Levels of Religious Nationalism Around the World | Laura Silver, Jonathan Evans, Maria Smerkovich, Sneha Gubbala, Manolo Corichi and William Miner | Pew Research Center | January 28, 2025]
Places American religious nationalism in international perspective by comparing beliefs about religion and national identity across numerous countries.
  • [The Internal Conflicts and Contemporary Dilemmas of America’s National Characteristics | Shaoqing Zhou | International Journal of Anthropology and Ethnology | January 13, 2025]
Places contemporary evangelical nationalism within longer conflicts among civic nationalism, religion, national identity, and American nation-building.
  • [What We Are Getting Wrong About Christian Nationalism | Josiah R. Daniels and Eric L. McDaniel | Sojourners | 2025]
Discusses scholarly debates over definitions of Christian nationalism and cautions against treating its adherents or manifestations as completely uniform.
  • [Catholic Christian Nationalism Is Having a Moment | Ruth Braunstein | Religion News Service | July 23, 2024]
Examines the growing visibility of Catholic forms of religious nationalism and their similarities and differences with evangelical Christian nationalism.
  • [On the “Nation” of Christian Nationalism | Peter J. Leithart | First Things | April 12, 2024]
Offers a Christian conservative analysis of nationhood and questions how the term “nation” should function in debates over Christian nationalism.
  • [Support for Christian Nationalism in All 50 States: Findings from PRRI’s 2023 American Values Atlas | PRRI Staff | Public Religion Research Institute | February 28, 2024]
Examines geographic and demographic differences in support for Christian nationalism and attitudes about whether American institutions should reflect Christian values.
  • [Poll: Most Americans Cool to Christian Nationalism as Its Influence Grows | Axios | Axios | February 28, 2024]
Reports survey findings about public attitudes toward Christian nationalism and differences among religious, partisan, and demographic groups.
  • [New Survey Finds Pockets of Support for Christian Nationalism Across the Country | Jack Jenkins | Religion News Service | February 28, 2024]
Reports state and demographic patterns from national survey research measuring agreement with Christian-nationalist statements.
  • [The Duality of American Christian Nationalism: Religious Traditionalism versus Christian Statism | Ruiqian Li and Paul Froese | Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion | August 2, 2023]
Distinguishes religious traditionalism from support for state enforcement of Christianity and argues that these represent different dimensions of Christian nationalism.
  • [Christian Nationalism and Millennialism in the USA | Angela M. Lahr | The Cambridge Companion to Religion and War | May 2023]
Explores historical connections among American nationalism, Protestant millennial expectations, war, providential mission, and ideas about the nation's special destiny.
  • [Views of U.S. as a Christian Nation, Christian Nationalism and Its Meaning | Pew Research Center | Pew Research Center | October 27, 2022]
Measures Americans' views of whether the United States is, was, or should be a Christian nation and what respondents understand that phrase to mean.
  • [In Their Own Words: How Americans Describe “Christian Nationalism” | Pew Research Center | Pew Research Center | October 27, 2022]
Analyzes open-ended survey responses showing that Americans attach widely differing meanings to the term, from Christian moral influence to institutional religious dominance.
  • [What Is Christian Nationalism? | Paul D. Miller | Christianity Today | February 3, 2021]
Defines Christian nationalism from a Christian theological perspective and distinguishes nationalism from patriotism and ordinary Christian participation in politics.
  • [Christian Nationalism Is Alive and Well in America | Stephen Mattson | Sojourners | October 22, 2020]
Critiques the fusion of Christian identity with American nationalism and discusses its presence in contemporary religious and political rhetoric.
  • [America as a “Christian Nation”? Understanding Religious Boundaries of National Identity in the United States | Jeremy Brooke Straughn and Scott L. Feld | Sociology of Religion | June 4, 2010]
Studies how Americans use religious boundaries when deciding who belongs within the symbolic definition of the American nation.


American Exceptionalism, Civil Religion, and Providential Nationalism

  • [On Christian Nationalism | Jesse Smith and Jonathan Tran | Religious Studies Review | September 5, 2026]
Reviews conceptual and empirical debates surrounding Christian nationalism and asks how effectively the term explains contemporary American religious politics.
  • [Competing Visions of America at 250: Politics, Religion, and American Identity | PRRI | Public Religion Research Institute | June 2026]
Examines conflicting contemporary visions of the United States as it approaches its 250th anniversary, including religion, pluralism, democracy, and national identity.
  • [Patriotic Christians: Nationalism, Imperialism, and the Origins of Theological Education in the United States | Andrew Gardner | Church History | April 20, 2026]
Investigates how nationalism and imperial expansion influenced American theological education and Christian institutional development.
  • [The Case for Christian Nationalism | R. R. Reno | First Things | March 5, 2026]
Presents an affirmative argument for a stronger relationship between Christianity, national solidarity, public morality, and American political life.
  • [For the Power or the Glory? The Religiosity of America’s Religious Nationalists | Ruiqian Li and Paul Froese | Socius | 2025]
Investigates the religious beliefs of Americans who combine Christianity and nationalism and considers how sacred narratives reinforce ideas of American power and exceptional status.
  • [An Ever-Changing Errand into the Wilderness: The Relationship Between American Civil Religion and Exceptionalism | Blake S. Hart | Bound Away: The Liberty Journal of History | 2024]
Examines how religious concepts of mission, eschatology, Manifest Destiny, and the “errand into the wilderness” contributed to American civil religion.
  • [Cities on a Hill: American Religious Exceptionalism and White Christian Nationalism | Clyde Wilcox | Political Science Quarterly | June 12, 2024]
Directly examines the relationship between longstanding ideas of American religious exceptionalism and the contemporary phenomenon of white Christian nationalism.
  • [America’s Proclivity for Extremism Has Religious Roots | John Fanestil | TIME | October 4, 2023]
Traces strands of American religious history that the author connects to later movements combining religious certainty with nationalist politics.
  • [Which Civil Religion? Partisanship, Christian Nationalism, and the Dimensions of Civil Religion in the United States | Abigail Vegter, Andrew R. Lewis and Cammie Jo Bolin | Politics and Religion | January 26, 2023]
Distinguishes forms of American civil religion and investigates how partisanship and Christian nationalism shape competing interpretations of sacred nationhood.
  • [American Exceptionalism | Stephen McDowell | Providence Foundation | October 14, 2022]
Presents a supportive Christian interpretation of American exceptionalism that attributes the country's distinctiveness to biblical ideas, religious liberty, republicanism, and providence.
  • [The Puritans and American Chosenness | Ian Tyrrell | American Exceptionalism: A New History of an Old Idea | December 10, 2021]
Traces how later Americans transformed Puritan religious ideas into broader narratives about national chosenness and exceptional historical purpose.
  • [The Newly Chosen Nation: Exceptionalism from Reagan to Trump | Ian Tyrrell | American Exceptionalism: A New History of an Old Idea | December 10, 2021]
Traces the revival and transformation of exceptionalist language in recent American politics and its connections to nationalism and religious identity.
  • [The Peculiar Tale of American Exceptionalism | Ian Tyrrell | American Exceptionalism: A New History of an Old Idea | December 10, 2021]
Surveys competing definitions of American exceptionalism and identifies religious chosenness, political ideology, material abundance, and Manifest Destiny as recurring themes.
  • [Looking Back, Looking Forward: Remembering the Revolution | Ian Tyrrell | American Exceptionalism: A New History of an Old Idea | December 10, 2021]
Examines how memory of the American Revolution became a foundation for narratives portraying the United States as historically distinctive and exemplary.
  • [Cultural Nationalism and the Origins of American Exceptionalism | Ian Tyrrell | American Exceptionalism: A New History of an Old Idea | December 10, 2021]
Explores nineteenth-century cultural nationalism and the combination of providential history, religious liberty, democracy, and national destiny.
  • [Race, Anglo-Saxonism, and Manifest Destiny | Ian Tyrrell | American Exceptionalism: A New History of an Old Idea | December 10, 2021]
Examines how racial Anglo-Saxonism and religious ideas of providential expansion became incorporated into nineteenth-century exceptionalist ideology.
  • [Two Isms: Americanism and Socialism | Ian Tyrrell | American Exceptionalism: A New History of an Old Idea | December 10, 2021]
Traces changing definitions of “Americanism” and the ways religion, ethnicity, immigration, patriotism, capitalism, and national identity interacted.
  • [Afterword: American Exceptionalism | Ian Tyrrell | American Exceptionalism: A New History of an Old Idea | December 10, 2021]
Evaluates exceptionalism comparatively and distinguishes demonstrable historical differences from ideological claims that the United States possesses a unique national destiny.
  • [Manifest Destiny, American Exceptionalism, and the City on a Hill Seen Through Winthrop, O'Sullivan, and Bush: Opportunities for Religious Peacebuilding | Steven Clark Cunningham | Sociology Compass | November 8, 2021]
Examines the religious and political evolution connecting Winthrop's “city upon a hill,” Manifest Destiny, American exceptionalism, and later claims about America's divinely favored global mission.
  • [Making America Exceptional Again: Donald Trump's Traditionalist Jeremiad, Civil Religion, and the Politics of Resentment | Flavio R. Hickel Jr. and Andrew R. Murphy | Politics and Religion | October 15, 2021]
Analyzes political rhetoric invoking national decline and restoration through the traditions of American exceptionalism, civil religion, and the jeremiad.
  • [The New Frontier: Religion in America’s National Space Rhetoric of the Cold War Era | Deana L. Weibel | Religions | November 2020]
Shows how Cold War space rhetoric revived themes of frontier settlement, divine calling, Manifest Destiny, national mission, and American exceptionalism.
  • [The Biblical Theme of Covenant and American Popular Culture: From the Puritans to the Postmodern Age | Terry R. Clark | Religions | 2020]
Traces covenant imagery through American history and culture, illuminating religious ideas of collective mission, destiny, obligation, and national identity.
  • [American Civil Religion in the Era of Trump | Various Scholars | Religion and American Culture | 2010s–2020s]
Examines continuing scholarly debates over whether American civil religion acts as a unifying democratic tradition or a vehicle for exclusionary national identity.
  • [Contesting Civil Religion: Religious Responses to American Patriotic Nationalism, 1919–1929 | Michael Lienesch | Religion and American Culture | June 18, 2018]
Studies efforts after World War I to sacralize American patriotism and the religious groups that resisted or offered alternatives to patriotic nationalism.
  • [American Exceptionalism and Civil Religion: Reassessing the History of an Idea—Review | Tim Roberts | Church History | October 30, 2017]
Reviews Wilsey's study of civil religion, providential nationalism, exceptionalism, and Christian interpretations of America's historical mission.
  • [Our Country Is Destined to Be the Great Nation of Futurity: John L. O’Sullivan’s Manifest Destiny and Christian Nationalism, 1837–1846 | John D. Wilsey | Religions | April 17, 2017]
Examines religious themes in John L. O'Sullivan's nationalism and connects Manifest Destiny with ideas of providence, chosenness, and national mission.
  • [Religion as Nationalism: The Religious Nationalism of American Christian Zionists | Tristan Sturm | National Identities | January 17, 2017]
Examines how religious commitments can function as forms of nationalism, focusing on American Christian Zionism and its connections to national identity and geopolitical narratives.
  • [American Exceptionalism and Civil Religion | John D. Wilsey | IVP Academic | November 22, 2015]
Traces theological interpretations of American exceptionalism and distinguishes versions emphasizing humility and responsibility from versions associated with national superiority.
  • [The Remnants of Theocracy: The Puritans, the Jeremiad and the Contemporary Culture Wars | M. Cathleen Kaveny | Journal of Law and Religion | January 24, 2013]
Traces contemporary culture-war rhetoric to Puritan covenant theology and the jeremiad tradition while examining how older ideas of national moral obligation have changed.
  • [Civil Religion and the Cultural Politics of National Identity in Obama’s America | Rhys H. Williams | Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion | 2013]
Examines how competing versions of American civil religion shape political arguments about citizenship, national identity, inclusion, and belonging.
  • [“Wee Shall Be as a Citty Upon a Hill”: John Winthrop's Non-American Exceptionalism | Mark A. Noll | The Review of Faith & International Affairs | May 24, 2012]
Reexamines John Winthrop's famous phrase and challenges later interpretations that treat it as an uncomplicated declaration of American exceptionalism.
  • [Chosen Land, Chosen People: Religious and American Exceptionalism Among the Mormons | Spencer W. McBride | The Review of Faith & International Affairs | 2012]
Examines how Mormon ideas about sacred geography, chosenness, divine destiny, and the United States interacted with broader traditions of American exceptionalism.
  • [The Culture Wars, American Exceptionalism, and a Comparative Analysis of Religion-State Relations | Claudia E. Haupt | Comparative Constitutional Studies | 2012]
Places American church-state conflict and exceptionalism in comparative perspective, showing how national histories shape relationships between religion and government.
  • [Puritan Roots of American Exceptionalism | Ken Fuchsman | Clio's Psyche | June 2011]
Reconsiders John Winthrop, Puritan covenant theology, and the psychological and religious foundations often attributed to the American exceptionalist tradition.
  • [American Exceptionalism and the Naturalization of “America” | Maria Irene Ramalho de Sousa Santos | Prospects | July 30, 2009]
Critically examines how exceptionalist narratives can make particular cultural and historical assumptions about America appear natural, universal, or inevitable.
  • [With God on Our Side: Religion and American Exceptionalism | Carlos da Fonseca | Contexto Internacional | 2007]
Analyzes religious foundational myths, Puritanism, Manifest Destiny, exceptionalism, and their influence on American national identity and foreign-policy narratives.
  • [The Problem of American Exceptionalism | Andrew Kohut and Bruce Stokes | Pew Research Center | May 9, 2006]
Examines American nationalism and religiosity in comparative perspective and discusses how perceptions of American exceptionalism affect international attitudes.
  • [Civil-Religious Ideation and American Exceptionalism: Negotiating National Identity in a Contentious Time | Dan B. Thomas, Bruce McKeown and Larry R. Bass | Operant Subjectivity | July 1, 2004]
Investigates different combinations of American civil religion and exceptionalist thinking and how they influence understandings of national identity.
  • [City on a Hill: American Exceptionalism and the Elect Nation | J. R. Oldfield | Studies in Church History | 2000]
Explores the idea of America as an elect or chosen nation and places the country's exceptionalist tradition within a longer history of Christian ideas about sacred peoples and territories.
  • [American Exceptionalism Reconsidered: Anglo-Saxon Ethnogenesis in the “Universal” Nation, 1776–1850 | Eric Kaufmann | Journal of American Studies | December 1999]
Examines how Anglo-American ethnic identity developed alongside ostensibly universal ideas of American citizenship during the early national period.
  • [American Religious Exceptionalism: A Reconsideration | Edward A. Tiryakian | The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science | May 1993]
Reconsiders claims that American religious development is exceptional and assesses the historical foundations of religion's distinctive place in American society.
  • [Civil Religion in America | Robert N. Bellah | Daedalus | Winter 1967]
Introduces the influential concept of American civil religion, describing national rituals, symbols, leaders, and history through a quasi-religious framework.
  • [How America Became “A City Upon a Hill” | National Endowment for the Humanities | Humanities | n.d.]
Traces how John Winthrop's sermon was rediscovered and transformed into a prominent metaphor for American exceptionalism and national mission.


Christian Nation, Founding, and Historical Memory

  • [Reading the History of Religion in America: 250 Years of Influence | Vanderbilt Divinity School | Vanderbilt University | June 30, 2026]
Reviews religion's changing role across American history and considers how religious traditions have influenced national institutions, culture, and identity.
  • [Was America Founded as a Christian Nation? Historian Says the Answer Is Complicated | Michael Foust | Crosswalk | June 23, 2026]
Presents historian Thomas Kidd's view that Christianity strongly influenced American culture and political ideas while the Constitution deliberately avoided creating a national church.
  • [Did the Founders Create a Christian Nation? No, but Religion Did Shape Their Thinking | Peter Smith | Associated Press | May 3, 2026]
Reviews historians' interpretations of religion at the American founding and distinguishes religious influence from claims of an officially Christian constitutional order.
  • [Why Do People Believe America Was Founded as a Christian Nation? | John Fea | The Christian Past That Wasn't | 2026]
Examines the persistence of Christian-founding narratives and how contemporary political debates shape popular understandings of early American history.
  • [Hijacking History | John Fea | The Christian Past That Wasn't | 2026]
Analyzes the use of selected historical evidence to construct simplified narratives about Christianity, the founders, and America's national identity.
  • [The Christian Past That Wasn't: Debunking the Christian Nationalist Myths That Hijack History | John Fea | Eerdmans / JSTOR | 2026]
Examines modern Christian-nationalist historical narratives and compares them with documentary evidence from colonial, Revolutionary, and constitutional history.
  • [Christian America and the Kingdom of God | Richard T. Hughes and Christina Littlefield | University of Illinois Press | 2025]
Traces the Christian-America idea from Puritan settlement through contemporary Christian nationalism and examines its relationship to national chosenness and empire.
  • [Evaluating the Case for a Christian America | Richard T. Hughes and Christina Littlefield | Christian America and the Kingdom of God | 2025]
Reviews legal, demographic, cultural, and historical arguments used to characterize the United States as a Christian nation.
  • [Defining Christian Nationalism | Richard T. Hughes and Christina Littlefield | Christian America and the Kingdom of God | 2025]
Surveys competing definitions of Christian nationalism and distinguishes the concept from Christianity, patriotism, ordinary religiosity, and civil religion.
  • [Christian Nation Idea Fuels U.S. Conservative Causes, but Historians Say It Misreads Founders’ Intent | Peter Smith | Associated Press | February 2024]
Contrasts contemporary Christian-nation claims with historians' differing interpretations of the founders, religious establishments, constitutional government, and religious liberty.
  • [American Evangelical Nationalism: History, Status Quo, and Outlook | Shaoqing Zhou | International Journal of Anthropology and Ethnology | December 6, 2023]
Provides a historical and sociological examination of evangelical nationalism and its development within American religion and politics.
  • [Christian Nationalism Goes Back Further Than You Think | Robert P. Jones | TIME | August 31, 2023]
Argues that contemporary Christian nationalism should be interpreted in light of longer American histories of race, religion, power, and national identity.
  • [The Search for a Christian Nation: Christian Nationalism and the American Founding | Brad Littlejohn | Mere Orthodoxy / Ethics and Public Policy Center | October 4, 2022]
Examines competing interpretations of the American founding and argues for greater precision when describing America's historical relationship to Christianity.
  • [The Christian Nation | Kathleen Wellman | Hijacking History | November 18, 2021]
Examines historical narratives portraying the United States as founded explicitly as a Christian nation and evaluates their use in contemporary education and politics.
  • [A Founder of American Religious Nationalism | Paul A. Djupe / Historical Analysis | History News Network | 2020]
Examines R. J. Rushdoony and the development of modern arguments portraying the Constitution and American political order as fundamentally Christian.
  • [The U.S. a Christian Nation? Not According to the Founders! | Lawrence Wittner | History News Network | 2019]
Uses founding documents and early federal history to argue against interpretations of the United States as having an officially Christian constitutional foundation.
  • [What Politicians Mean When They Say the United States Was Founded as a Christian Nation | Sam Haselby | The Washington Post | July 4, 2017]
Examines colonial and Revolutionary Protestant nationalism and argues that contemporary “Christian nation” claims often use history to advance competing visions of present-day national identity.
  • [Is America a Christian Nation? | HNN Staff | History News Network | September 11, 2011]
Presents historians' arguments about the difference between America's historically Christian culture and the claim that the United States was constitutionally founded as a Christian nation.
  • [Was America Founded as a Christian Nation? A Historical Introduction | Henry G. Brinton | The Presbyterian Outlook | May 16, 2011]
Reviews John Fea's historical approach and emphasizes the complexity of defining “Christian,” “founding,” and “nation” when discussing early America.
  • [An Interview with Jon Butler: Was America Founded as a Christian Nation? | Rick Shenkman and Jon Butler | History News Network | January 1, 2004]
Discusses religion among the founders, deism, early American public religion, and the difference between a religious population and an officially Christian state.
  • [Religion and the Founding Fathers | John P. Kaminski | National Historical Publications and Records Commission | March 2002]
Reviews religious diversity among the founders and the significant but varied place Christianity occupied in Revolutionary-era American life.
  • [Religion and the Founding of the American Republic | James H. Hutson | Library of Congress | 1998]
Surveys religion in colonial America, the Revolution, state governments, the Constitution, the early federal government, and the development of religious liberty.
  • [America as a Religious Refuge: The Seventeenth Century | James H. Hutson | Library of Congress | 1998]
Examines colonies founded partly as religious communities and the competing traditions of religious liberty, establishment, persecution, and sacred social experiments.
  • [Religion in Eighteenth-Century America | James H. Hutson | Library of Congress | 1998]
Surveys the Great Awakening, denominational growth, evangelicalism, and religion's extensive role in eighteenth-century colonial society.
  • [Religion and the American Revolution | James H. Hutson | Library of Congress | 1998]
Examines how ministers and religious ideas provided moral and theological arguments both for resistance to Britain and for interpretations of revolutionary events.
  • [Religion and the New Republic | James H. Hutson | Library of Congress | 1998]
Explores evangelical expansion after independence and the complicated relationship among voluntary religion, republican citizenship, reform, and government.
  • [Religion and the Congress of the Confederation, 1774–1789 | James H. Hutson | Library of Congress | 1998]
Examines congressional proclamations, chaplaincies, religious language, and other practices that illuminate religion's place in America's first national government.
  • [Religion and the State Governments | James H. Hutson | Library of Congress | 1998]
Compares state establishments, religious tests, disestablishment, and religious-liberty policies after independence.
  • [Religion and the Federal Government | James H. Hutson | Library of Congress | 1998]
Explores the Constitution, First Amendment, early presidential practice, and debates over the proper relationship between federal power and religion.
  • [Religion and the Founding of the American Republic: Exhibition Overview | James H. Hutson | Library of Congress | 1998]
Provides documentary context for assessing claims about a Christian founding by examining religion across colonial settlement, Revolution, disestablishment, and the early republic.
  • [Manifest Destiny from a Religious Point of View | Luther Tracy Townsend | Boston Music Hall Patriotic Association / Library of Congress | November 6, 1898]
Provides a primary-source example of explicitly religious arguments used to interpret late-nineteenth-century American expansion and national destiny.
  • [Thomas Paine to Thomas Jefferson on Religion and Government | Thomas Paine | Founders Online | September 23, 1803]
Offers an early republican argument that government should protect equal civil rights of conscience without establishing a dominant religious creed.
  • [Amendments to the Constitution: Debate on Religious Establishment | James Madison and U.S. House of Representatives | Founders Online | August 15, 1789]
Records congressional discussion of preventing a national religious establishment and protecting equal rights of conscience during drafting of the Bill of Rights.


Politics, Elections, Democracy, and Government

  • [Meet the Lawmaker Who’s Worried About Christian Nationalism | Alec Dent and Dan Merica | The Washington Post | September 10, 2026]
Examines congressional debate about Christian nationalism, religious freedom, church-state relations, and competing interpretations of American national identity.
  • [A “Nonbeliever” in Congress Argues New View of Religion Is Gaining Ground on the Hill | Michelle Boorstein | The Washington Post | August 19, 2026]
Reports on debates between secular political organizing and Christian-nationalist conceptions of American government and identity.
  • [Backlash to Christian Nationalism: The Impact of the January 6th Insurrection on Americans’ Religiosity and Political Partisanship | David E. Campbell and Geoffrey C. Layman | Politics and Religion | July 13, 2026]
Examines whether January 6 and its association with Christian symbolism affected Americans' religious identities and political alignments.
  • [America Has a Religion. Revive It. | Samuel Goldman | The Washington Post | July 10, 2026]
Advocates American civil religion as an alternative to both explicitly Christian nationalism and a strictly secular conception of national identity.
  • [How Americans Feel About Religion’s Influence in Government and Public Life | Pew Research Center | Pew Research Center | May 14, 2026]
Surveys attitudes toward religion in American government and public life and provides context for contemporary debates over Christian national identity.
  • [“We Should All Be Christian Nationalists”: Elite Influence on Identification with Christian Nationalism | Political Behavior | Springer Nature | 2025]
Examines whether political elites' public use of the Christian-nationalist label influences Americans' willingness to adopt the identity themselves.
  • [Partisan and Racial Sorting of Christian Nationalism, 1996–2022: Backlash and Counter Backlash on the (White) Secular Left and Religious Right | Jesse Smith | Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion | December 26, 2025]
Traces changes over several decades in the racial, religious, and partisan composition of support for Christian-nationalist ideas.
  • [At NatCon, an Effort to Make Christian Nationalism a More Inclusive Movement | Jack Jenkins | Religion News Service | September 5, 2025]
Reports on attempts within the national-conservative movement to redefine Christian nationalism in ways advocates present as broader and more inclusive.
  • [Resistance to Christian Nationalism in All 50 States: A PRRI-Meanings of Democracy Lab Report | PRRI Staff | Public Religion Research Institute | October 30, 2024]
Studies Americans who reject Christian nationalism and compares their views of democracy, pluralism, religion, patriotism, and national belonging.
  • [In a Race They Cast as Good vs. Evil, Christian Hard-Liners Are Fired Up for Trump | Hannah Allam | The Washington Post | October 29, 2024]
Reports on religious activists whose political participation draws on spiritual-warfare themes and Christian-nationalist understandings of America's direction.
  • [How a Movement to Resist Christian Nationalism Took on Project 2025 | Ruth Braunstein | Religion News Service | August 16, 2024]
Reports on religious and civic organizations mobilizing against policies they interpret as expressions of Christian nationalism.
  • [Axios Explains: Christian Nationalism on the March | Axios | Axios | June 24, 2024]
Provides a concise overview of Christian nationalism's growing public visibility, organizations, terminology, and role in contemporary American politics.
  • [Christianity’s Place in Politics, and ‘Christian Nationalism’ | Chip Rotolo, Gregory A. Smith and Jonathan Evans | Pew Research Center | March 15, 2024]
Examines public attitudes toward Christianity in government and distinguishes support for Christian influence from stronger forms of religious nationalism.
  • [The Overlap of Trumpism and Christian Nationalism | Philip Bump | The Washington Post | February 29, 2024]
Examines survey data and demographic patterns concerning the overlap between Christian-nationalist beliefs and support for Donald Trump.
  • [Trump’s Christian Nationalist Vision for America | Robert P. Jones | TIME | 2024]
Analyzes contemporary political rhetoric through the author's framework of Christian nationalism, racial hierarchy, and competing visions of American identity.
  • [Liberty for Us, Limits for Them: Christian Nationalism and Americans’ Views on Citizens’ Rights | Samuel L. Perry et al. | Sociology of Religion | May 8, 2023]
Examines whether Christian-nationalist beliefs are associated with differing conceptions of civil liberties and rights for various groups.
  • [A Christian Nation? Understanding the Threat of Christian Nationalism to American Democracy and Culture | PRRI Staff | Public Religion Research Institute | February 8, 2023]
Surveys beliefs about Christianity's proper relationship to American government, culture, citizenship, leadership, and national identity.
  • [Understanding the Threat of White Christian Nationalism to American Democracy Today | Brookings Institution | Brookings Institution | February 8, 2023]
Presents a discussion among scholars and researchers about white Christian nationalism, American history, racial hierarchy, democracy, and contemporary politics.
  • [“I Don’t Want Everybody to Vote”: Christian Nationalism and Restricting Voter Access in the United States | Samuel L. Perry, Andrew L. Whitehead and Joshua B. Grubbs | Sociological Forum | January 3, 2022]
Investigates associations between Christian nationalism and support for policies or attitudes that restrict access to voting.
  • [The Devil That You Know: Christian Nationalism and Intent to Change One's Voting Behavior For or Against Trump in 2020 | Samuel L. Perry, Andrew L. Whitehead and Joshua B. Grubbs | Politics and Religion | April 21, 2021]
Studies how Christian-nationalist beliefs were associated with reported changes in presidential voting intentions during the 2020 election.
  • [Unchurched Christian Nationalism and the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election | Samuel Stroope | Sociological Forum | February 21, 2021]
Investigates Christian-nationalist attitudes among Americans outside regular church participation and their relationship to the 2016 election.
  • [Make America Christian Again: Christian Nationalism and Voting for Donald Trump in the 2016 Presidential Election | Andrew L. Whitehead, Samuel L. Perry and Joseph O. Baker | Sociology of Religion | 2018]
Examines whether Christian-nationalist beliefs independently predicted support for Donald Trump in 2016 after accounting for other religious and demographic factors.


Race, Immigration, Pluralism, and National Belonging

  • [Christian Nationalists’ Professed Support for Religious Pluralism Is Often Drowned Out by Perceptions That Christians Are Under Threat | Paul A. Djupe and Brooklyn Walker | Religion News Service | August 21, 2026]
Discusses research finding that perceived threats to Christians can reduce political tolerance even among respondents who otherwise express support for religious pluralism.
  • [What Is America? Immigration, National Identity, and Belonging | PRRI | Public Religion Research Institute | 2026]
Explores competing definitions of who belongs in America and how immigration, religion, race, culture, and national identity shape those definitions.
  • [In God We Trust: Christian Nationalism, Political and Ethno-Racial Identities, and Distrust of Immigrants | Christopher H. Seto | Sociology of Religion | May 24, 2026]
Examines how Christian nationalism combines with political and ethnoracial identities in shaping distrust of immigrants.
  • [Progressive Christian Mobilization and the Discourse of White Christian Nationalism | PRRI | Public Religion Research Institute | August 2026]
Examines how progressive Christian groups respond to Christian-nationalist narratives by advancing alternative understandings of Christianity, democracy, and American identity.
  • [Christian Nationalism and Hispanic Americans: Unpacking the Data | Anita Huízar-Hernández | Public Religion Research Institute | March 17, 2025]
Examines Christian nationalism among Hispanic Americans and highlights differences associated with religious affiliation, political identity, and demographic characteristics.
  • [Christian Nationalism and Organized White Supremacy: British-Israelism and Christian Identity in the Twentieth-Century United States | Politics, Religion & Ideology | February 2025]
Traces historical uses of Christian-nationalist narratives within British-Israelist and Christian Identity movements and organized white-supremacist politics.
  • [The Christian Nationalism at the Heart of Jim Crow America | William Horne | TIME | October 17, 2024]
Examines historical connections among white supremacy, Jim Crow governance, Christian rhetoric, and claims about America's religious and racial identity.
  • [Implications of White Christian Nationalism (and the Backlash Against It) for Religious Minorities | Sachi Edwards | Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies | April 5, 2024]
Examines Christian nationalism from the perspective of religious minorities and considers how both nationalist politics and responses to them affect minority communities.
  • [Race over Religion: Christian Nationalism and Perceived Threats to National Unity | Samuel L. Perry, Andrew L. Whitehead and Joshua B. Grubbs | Sociology of Race and Ethnicity | March 10, 2023]
Studies how Christian nationalism, race, and perceptions of group threat influence views about American national unity.
  • [Our Kind of American: Christian Nationalism, Race, and Contingent Views of Cultural Membership | Samuel L. Perry and Colleagues | The Sociological Quarterly | 2023]
Studies how Christian-nationalist beliefs interact with racial identity when Americans decide who belongs within the nation's cultural boundaries.
  • [White Nationalism Remains Major Concern for Voters of Color | Gabriel R. Sanchez, Keon L. Gilbert and Carly Bennett | Brookings Institution | March 30, 2023]
Examines survey evidence concerning perceptions of white nationalism among voters of color and its relationship to contemporary American political identity.
  • [Fill the Earth and Subdue It: Christian Nationalism, Ethno-Religious Threat, and Nationalist Pronatalism | Samuel L. Perry et al. | Sociological Forum | September 7, 2022]
Examines how Christian nationalism and perceptions of demographic threat relate to support for higher birth rates among favored national groups.
  • [Keep America Christian (and White): Christian Nationalism, Fear of Ethnoracial Outsiders, and Intention to Vote for Donald Trump in the 2020 Presidential Election | Joseph O. Baker, Samuel L. Perry and Andrew L. Whitehead | Sociology of Religion | May 14, 2020]
Examines associations among Christian nationalism, perceived ethnoracial threat, national identity, and presidential voting intentions.
  • [Christian America in Black and White: Racial Identity, Religious-National Group Boundaries, and Explanations for Racial Inequality | Samuel L. Perry and Andrew L. Whitehead | Sociology of Religion | December 8, 2018]
Investigates how racial identity shapes the relationship between Christian-nationalist beliefs and explanations for racial inequality in the United States.
  • [Christian Nationalism and White Racial Boundaries: Examining Whites' Opposition to Interracial Marriage | Samuel L. Perry and Andrew L. Whitehead | Ethnic and Racial Studies | March 6, 2015]
Examines connections between Christian nationalism, racial boundaries, and white Americans' attitudes toward interracial marriage.
  • [A More Perfect Union? Christian Nationalism and Support for Same-Sex Unions | Andrew L. Whitehead and Samuel L. Perry | Sociological Perspectives | April 6, 2015]
Studies how Christian-nationalist beliefs relate to attitudes toward same-sex relationships and ideas about American moral and social order.


Authoritarianism, Political Violence, and Extremism

  • [Christian Nationalism, Apocalypticism, Outgroup Hate, and Support for Violent Extremism | James A. Piazza | Defence and Peace Economics | January 10, 2026]
Examines relationships among Christian nationalism, apocalyptic beliefs, hostility toward outgroups, and reported support for political violence.
  • [An Army for God: Gun Ownership, Christian Nationalism, and Support for Political Violence | Donald Haider-Markel, Brooklyn Walker and Abigail Vegter | Social Science Quarterly | April 2, 2026]
Studies the interaction of Christian nationalism and gun ownership in shaping attitudes toward political violence.
  • [Old Wine in New Wineskins: Christian Nationalism, Authoritarianism, and the Problem of Essentialism in Explanations of Religiopolitical Conflict | Jesse Smith | Sociological Forum | August 11, 2024]
Critiques explanations that treat Christian nationalism as a single fixed phenomenon and examines its relationship with authoritarian political attitudes.
  • [One Leader Under God: The Connection Between Authoritarianism and Christian Nationalism in America | PRRI Staff | Public Religion Research Institute | September 10, 2024]
Examines statistical relationships among Christian nationalism, authoritarian attitudes, political leadership, democracy, and perceptions of America's national direction.
  • [Christian Nationalism and Violence Against Religious Minorities in the United States: A Quantitative Analysis | Nilay Saiya | Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion | September 2, 2024]
Uses quantitative evidence to investigate relationships between Christian nationalism and violence directed toward religious minorities.
  • [Christian Nationalism and Support for Leaders Violating Democratic Norms During National Emergencies | Samuel L. Perry and Joshua B. Grubbs | Politics and Religion | September 19, 2024]
Investigates whether Christian-nationalist beliefs correlate with willingness to permit political leaders greater latitude to violate democratic norms during crises.
  • [Christian Nationalism and Political Violence: Victimhood, Racial Identity, Conspiracy, and Support for the Capitol Attacks | Miles T. Armaly, David T. Buckley and Adam M. Enders | Political Behavior | January 4, 2022]
Examines how Christian nationalism interacts with perceived victimhood, racial identity, and conspiracy beliefs in attitudes toward January 6 violence.
  • [Christian Nationalism and the January 6 Insurrection | Amanda Tyler et al. | Baptist Joint Committee and Freedom From Religion Foundation | February 9, 2022]
Compiles research, reporting, imagery, and eyewitness evidence concerning Christian-nationalist symbols and rhetoric surrounding January 6.
  • [Enforcing Christian Nationalism: Examining the Link Between Group Identity and Punitive Attitudes in the United States | Joshua Davis | Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion | June 22, 2018]
Studies the relationship between Christian-nationalist group identity and support for punitive criminal-justice attitudes.


Christian Theology, Churches, and Internal Debate

  • [What Wendell Berry Can Teach Us About Christian Nationalism | Russell Moore | Christianity Today | September 9, 2026]
Uses themes of place, community, patriotism, and belonging to distinguish attachment to one's country from making national identity an object of religious devotion.
  • [Christian Nationalist Doublespeak | Russell Moore | Christianity Today | August 17, 2026]
Offers an evangelical critique of political efforts that authorize government to decide which forms of Christianity define authentic national belonging.
  • [How Christian Nationalists Took Control of the U.S. Military | Carmen Celestini | Sojourners | July 2026]
Examines the author's argument about Christian-nationalist networks, religious activism, and ideological conflict surrounding the United States military.
  • [What Do You Do When Christian Nationalism Comes to Church? | Russell Moore | Christianity Today | June 15, 2026]
Discusses how congregations can address disputes over Christian nationalism while maintaining theological commitments and church unity.
  • [Claiming What Is Theirs by Right: The Elective Affinity Between the Prosperity Gospel and Christian Nationalism | Naomi Haynes | Religion | June 11, 2026]
Examines theological similarities between prosperity teaching and Christian-nationalist claims concerning divine authority, territory, wealth, and political power.
  • [Is America a Christian Nation? A Conversation With Bishop Barron | Robert Barron and Adam O'Neal | The Washington Post | May 29, 2026]
Discusses Catholic perspectives on Christian nationalism, Christianity's historical influence in America, religious freedom, and national identity.
  • [America Needs a Better Gospel Than Christian Nationalism | Russell Moore | Christianity Today | May 20, 2026]
Presents an evangelical Christian critique arguing that Christianity should not be subordinated to national identity or political power.
  • [Not Everything Is Christian Nationalism | Chris Butler | Christianity Today | May 5, 2026]
Argues for a narrower use of the term and cautions against equating every conservative Christian political position with Christian nationalism.
  • [Christian Nationalism: Primer on an American Heresy | Craig L. Nessan | Currents in Theology and Mission | June 17, 2026]
Presents a theological critique of Christian nationalism and contrasts it with alternative Christian understandings of church, nation, and political authority.
  • [Christian Nationalism | BJC Staff | Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty | 2026]
Provides educational resources defining Christian nationalism and explaining the organization's distinction between Christian faith and government privilege for Christianity.
  • [It's Not “Christian Nationalism.” It's Conservative Identity Politics | Christianity Today | January 2026]
Presents a skeptical interpretation of Christian-nationalism scholarship and argues that conservative religious identity politics may explain some phenomena attributed to Christian nationalism.
  • [Patterns of Christian Nationalist Engagement and Connections to Spirituality | Seungju Kim et al. | Pastoral Psychology | July 28, 2025]
Studies how emerging religious leaders respond to Christian nationalism and whether different spiritual orientations correspond with acceptance or rejection of its ideas.
  • [Did the Mainline Church Pave the Way for Christian Nationalism? | Stephen Healey | The Christian Century | April 2025]
Examines arguments that American Protestant nationalism has historical roots extending beyond today's conservative evangelical movements.
  • [U.S. Christians Pushing Back on Christian Nationalism | Niala Boodhoo | Axios | October 7, 2024]
Reports on Christian individuals and organizations that oppose Christian nationalism while maintaining active religious engagement in American public life.
  • [The Strange World of Catholic “Integralism” — and Christian Nationalism | Jack Jenkins | Religion News Service | April 3, 2024]
Explains Catholic integralism and compares its ideas about church, state, political authority, and public religion with broader Christian-nationalist movements.
  • [Staying Awake to the Threat of Christian Nationalism | Nathan Empsall | Religion News Service | March 27, 2024]
Presents a Christian theological critique of efforts to fuse political power, national identity, and Christianity.
  • [But … Is It Christian Nationalism? | Amanda Tyler and Holly Hollman | Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty | 2024]
Examines practical examples to clarify which forms of religious political activity the organization considers Christian nationalism and which it does not.
  • [How Christian Is Christian Nationalism? | Kelefa Sanneh | The New Yorker | March 27, 2023]
Reviews competing intellectual and theological arguments surrounding Christian nationalism and asks how distinctively Christian its political program actually is.
  • [Understanding Christian Nationalism: New Polling and Media | Amanda Tyler and Holly Hollman | Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty | April 13, 2023]
Reviews scholarly definitions and survey measures while discussing differences between Christian nationalism and ordinary Christian participation in public life.
  • [The Next Phase of the Christians Against Christian Nationalism Campaign | Jaziah Masters | Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty | March 20, 2023]
Describes a Christian-led movement opposing governmental privilege for Christianity and advocating constitutional religious freedom.


Education, Culture, Science, and Public Life

  • [Americans' Views of Religion in Public Life: The Effect of Three Cultural Models on Attitudes Toward Religious and Nonreligious Groups | David Sikkink and Greg Wurm | Social Science Research | August 2026]
Examines competing American cultural models for religion's place in public life and their implications for religious and nonreligious groups.
  • [The “Manosphere” and a Church Against Extremes | America Magazine | June 25, 2026]
Examines Catholic involvement in contemporary nationalist politics, postliberal thought, masculinity, integralism, and Christian-nationalist movements.
  • [The Teen Believers in a Christian America | Eliza Griswold | The New Yorker | June 22, 2026]
Reports on young activists for whom Christian faith, patriotism, spiritual warfare, and efforts to restore a Christian understanding of America are closely connected.
  • [Thousands Flocked to the National Mall for an America-Themed Prayer Rally | Tiffany Stanley | Associated Press | May 17, 2026]
Reports on Rededicate 250, where speakers combined Christian worship, American patriotic symbolism, the nation's 250th anniversary, and claims about America's religious heritage.
  • [Trump Administration Will Join a Prayer Gathering Criticized for Promoting Christian Nationalism | Peter Smith | Associated Press | May 14, 2026]
Reports competing interpretations of the Rededicate 250 prayer gathering and its invocation of America as “One Nation Under God.”
  • [Share of Americans Who Say Religion Is Gaining Influence Reaches 24-Year High | Michelle Boorstein | The Washington Post | May 14, 2026]
Reports Pew survey findings concerning religion's perceived influence, public awareness of Christian nationalism, and attitudes toward religion in government.
  • [Pew: “Christian Nationalism” Is Becoming a Household Term | Jack Panyard | Christianity Today | May 14, 2026]
Reports increasing public familiarity with Christian nationalism and changing perceptions of religion's influence in American public life.
  • [A Neglected Crisis: Understanding Christian Nationalism’s Effects on American Education | Brock Lewis | Discover Education | May 7, 2025]
Reviews ways Christian-nationalist ideas may influence curriculum disputes, educational policy, history instruction, and church-state questions.
  • [Jesus and John Wayne Wannabes: How Christian Nationalism and Femininity Shape Extreme Politics Among Men in the US | Paul A. Djupe | Sociology of Religion | March 8, 2025]
Investigates how Christian nationalism and gender expectations interact with political attitudes among American men.
  • [Examining Religion’s Influence on American Politics and Democracy | Katherine Stewart and Elizabeth Bennion | PBS | December 6, 2024]
Discusses religion's influence on public policy and competing interpretations of Christian nationalism's role in contemporary American politics.
  • [How Project 2025 Impacts the Separation of Church and State | To The Contrary | PBS | September 6, 2024]
Examines concerns about church-state separation and policies associated by critics with Christian nationalism.
  • [Bad Faith Sounds the Alarm on the Past and Future of Christian Nationalism | Jim McDermott | Religion News Service | May 30, 2024]
Discusses a documentary that traces modern Christian nationalism through twentieth-century conservative religious organizing and contemporary politics.
  • [How a Beloved Worship Song Became the Theme Song of Christian Nationalism | Bob Smietana | Religion News Service | May 1, 2024]
Examines how Christian worship music has been incorporated into political demonstrations where religious and national symbols are deliberately blended.
  • [“God & Country”: Christian Nationalism in U.S. Politics | Laura Flanders | PBS | April 5, 2024]
Discusses the documentary God & Country and competing Christian assessments of nationalism, political power, democracy, and church-state separation.
  • [What Is Christian Nationalism and Why It Raises Concerns About Threats to Democracy | Laura Barrón-López and Sam Lane | PBS NewsHour | February 1, 2024]
Provides an explanatory overview of Christian nationalism, its historical background, current political role, and concerns raised by scholars and religious leaders.
  • [Controlling the Past to Control the Future: Christian Nationalism and Mandatory Patriotic Education in Public Schools | Samuel L. Perry et al. | Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion | May 22, 2023]
Examines Christian-nationalist support for patriotic schooling and disputes over how American history and national identity should be taught.
  • [Crusading for Moral Authority: Christian Nationalism and Opposition to Science | Joseph O. Baker, Samuel L. Perry and Andrew L. Whitehead | Sociological Forum | August 6, 2020]
Examines relationships among Christian nationalism, perceptions of moral authority, scientific expertise, and attitudes toward science.
  • [Culture Wars and COVID-19 Conduct: Christian Nationalism, Religiosity, and Americans’ Behavior During the Coronavirus Pandemic | Samuel L. Perry, Andrew L. Whitehead and Joshua B. Grubbs | Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion | July 26, 2020]
Studies associations between Christian nationalism and reported behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic while distinguishing it from conventional religiosity.
  • [Save the Economy, Liberty, and Yourself: Christian Nationalism and Americans’ Views on Government COVID-19 Restrictions | Samuel L. Perry et al. | Sociology of Religion | December 29, 2020]
Examines how Christian-nationalist understandings of individual liberty and government authority related to attitudes toward pandemic restrictions.
  • [Gun Control in the Crosshairs: Christian Nationalism and Opposition to Stricter Gun Laws | Andrew L. Whitehead, Landon Schnabel and Samuel L. Perry | Socius | July 23, 2018]
Examines how Christian-nationalist beliefs correlate with attitudes toward guns, gun ownership, national identity, and firearm regulation.
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