Is Christian nationalism possible?
In the hands of far right politics, ‘Christian nationalism’ is becoming popular. But does it make sense to be both a Christian and a nationalist?
This post describes the tension between them. There is more information in my new book How Jesus Liberated the Oppressed, published last month.
Kent County Council, now run by the Reform UK Party, introduced the recitation of the Lord’s Prayer and the National Anthem in Council meetings. On 29th May, according to Kent Online News,
Kent County Council’s Reform UK leader Linden Kemkaran says bringing the Lord’s Prayer and national anthem into full council meetings is about pride, heritage and shared values.
It seems that the Lord’s Prayer and the National Anthem are being treated as though they were the same kind of thing.
To me this brings back memories. In the boarding school I attended in the 1960s the Lord’s Prayer and the National Anthem kept being repeated. The message was that we were to obey our elders and betters, and if necessary to sacrifice our lives for our country. This is apparently being revived, not only among people who attended boarding schools in the 1960s.
National anthems
It isn’t new. It goes back to the fourth century, when the Roman emperor Constantine decided to adopt Christianity as his imperial cult. Ever since then governments of traditionally Christian countries have found it convenient to treat support for their policies as a Christian virtue. They have often been able to appoint church leaders willing to agree.
Constantine could not have foreseen the long-term results. After the collapse of the Western Roman empire European rulers fought wars against each other. By the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries (I have described this earlier ) monarchs were demanding for themselves the allegiance that had previously been due to the Pope. They encouraged their subjects to identify with their nation – instead of identifying with Christianity, which had been more common before.
To make their demands seem morally justifiable they often surrounded themselves with a quasi-divine mystique, as though they had taken over from the Pope the role of God’s representative. National anthems were designed to justify a sense of superiority that turned other nations into enemies and demonised them.
This was done, for many centuries, in the name of Christianity. Here lies a contradiction. Last Friday the Church of England’s Diocese of Southwark issued a troubling statement:
We are aware that some members of the ‘Patriot Platform’ movement have been attending worship at one of the churches in our diocese. Concerns have been raised with us about the language and actions of this group and how they are proclaiming the Christian faith in association with anti-migrant rhetoric.
Patriot Platform is best known for its anti-immigrant protests at Dover and Portsmouth. Like Reform UK, it claims to be Christian while opposing immigration.
Kent County Council’s ‘Pride, heritage and shared values’ sums up my school days pretty well. But which shared values? When churches find new attenders claiming to be Christians while promoting an anti-immigrant message, who decides what counts as Christian?
The Lord’s Prayer
The word ‘Christianity’, for all its misuse, still has that ‘Christ’ in it. It is fundamentally about Jesus of Nazareth. The national anthem doesn’t come from Jesus. The Lord’s Prayer does, and it’s different.
The prayer fits within a traditional Jewish frame. It affirms the one supreme creator god and longs for the peace and harmony for which God has designed us, when we don’t demonise and fight each other.
In Jesus’s day many people believed different nations had been created by different gods. Jesus, as a Jew, believed the whole world had been made by a single god. The underlying message of that Jewish tradition was universal: we might speak different languages, look different and eat different food, but everybody in the world was one of God’s children, loved and valued equally.
Admittedly Jews had a tradition of being a ‘chosen race’ and this has led to antisemitism; but I have argued elsewhere that this arose for specific practical reasons. The Jewish tradition Jesus represented was universalist.
Jesus believed that because everybody in the world was one of God’s children, equally loved and valued by God, people living in a godly way will have compassion on those in need regardless of nationality. Refugees crossing the English Channel in dangerously small boats are risking their lives. Only the truly desperate do this. When they are that desperate they need help. A follower of the way of Jesus will want to help them. The Southwark Diocese statement continues:
Each week churches across our diocese welcome through their doors people of all ethnicities, backgrounds, political and ideological perspectives. We believe that the gospel is for everyone… Southwark Diocese has a long-held commitment to the tough work of anti-racism, to interfaith cooperation and to advocacy for the marginalised and oppressed. We remain committed to the inclusion and flourishing of all people.
You can be a nationalist. As a nationalist you can call yourself a Christian. But if you do, the Christianity you will be identifying with will be the opposite of what Jesus Christ stood for.
Reply by Tim Veater
One of my earliest memories, is seeing your father and mine discussing the finer points of theology, in the gateway outside my house, opposite Guy's Farm. They were both Christians - your father the local Vicar, mine the local Postman - but agreed to differ on doctrinal points. Your father leaned towards High Church, mine towards low Brethren, anti-conformism; yours towards ecumenism, mine against it. The rite of baptism, amongst other issues, was a subject of contention. I was merely an observer but also drawn into the debate, which was largely an internal, private one, shaping my own opinions and beliefs.
I liked and respected your father. I sought his help in my effort to save a very old bridge that the local authority ear-marked for demolition. He was very sceptical when I broached the idea but he gave it his valued support and we were eventually successful. The bridge still stands in the centre of the village. When he praised my efforts and articles to my father, he reportedly replied, "He could find something better to do with his time"! Perhaps privately he was pleased with my progress but it was not in his nature to show it.
Why do I refer to those things now, in response to your article? Because in a small way, that village upbringing in the 1950's and '60's was a microcosm of the issue you discuss. It might be called a traditional British conditioning suffused with Christian influence, both in school and village life. Beside the Public House, which was rather frowned upon, all social activity tended to focus around the four religious buildings and denominations, which despite their doctrinal and social divisions, were broadly 'singing from the same hymn sheet', with the same moral objectives. The term 'immigrant' had little meaning other than that applied to incomers from Bristol!
The village at that time was still a hive of commercial activity, consisting of many local shops and businesses but it was the end of an era, transformed by the appearance of the motor car and the supermarket, not to mention the later introduction of the Internet. It was just part of a national trend from local family business to large urban shopping centres and national conglomerates. It was a commercial and social revolution that some argue should be reversed and in small pockets, this is happening.
So the village was in a way, a microcosm of a wider picture of religion's place in society. Believers and non-believers living and working together within a generally agreed Christian context; the civil and ecclesiastical in parallel projected right to the top of the political order, with Bishops sitting in the House of Lords and the Monarch the Head of the Established Church. In matters of ceremony and festival, keeping to Christian tradition. This is now much diminished and many people are looking back with nostalgia, and linking it to political theories and objectives as discussed in your article. We have to come to an opinion as to whether this is a good or bad thing and whether if historical trends should or could be retraced.
What are those social and religious trends and what are their causes? The philosophical and scientific developments of the 18th and 19th Centuries in Northern Europe and America, undoubtedly weakened the Christian model of God and of society. The American Revolution (1765 - 1783) in making a break with the English Monarch, also constitutionally severed the link between Church and State. In many ironies, evangelical religious celebration thrives in America and was a significant factor in the election of a morally very questionable current President and of the policies he has pursued, aped in part by the new right-wing parties in Britain.
In the case of the French Revolution which followed (1789 - 1799), links with both King and Catholic Church were completely and literally severed. In the British case the link between the Crown and Church was retained in a most direct way, whilst religious belief generally weakened, challenged by the new scientific and philosophic explanations of life and the universe that dispensed with God. Of course a century earlier, Britain had also had its own turmoil from the Civil War in the 1640's, to the 'Glorious Revolution' of 1688/9, in which religion, specifically Puritanism v. Catholicism, had played a part. Tenuously my mind wanders back those conversations between your father and mine!
The trend of religious scepticism increased progressively into the 21st Century, so that now it is estimated in a 2025 survey, only 37% of population identify as practicing Christian, down from 61% in 2017 and only 4% of under 35's say they attend a service at least once per week. (See: No revival in sight: Church attendance in Britain remains below pre-pandemic levels | National Centre for Social Research ) However some polls suggest a significant rise in this group over the last six years. (See: England and Wales: 56% more go to church than 7 years ago, Evangelical Focus ) This may show signs of revival. Whether or how this translates to any particular political position is undetermined, as is the effect of socio-economic or geographical factors.
Obviously another big issue is the effect of demographic changes, including immigration and emigration. Total UK population has risen. In 1950 it was just over 50 million; in 2026 it was almost 70 million. In the same period the proportion of the population non-white, rose from well under 1% to 16% . The Muslim population now accounts for about 6.5%. In London, although about 54% class themselves as 'white', only about 38% class themselves as 'white British'. (See: London Ethnicity Percentages 2026: Census Data | LocaleIQ ) So in the Capital City, and many other urban centres, we suddenly discover the indigenous population, with its generic Christian culture, is in the minority. This is bound to have cultural and political consequences.
Both a loss of Christian faith and an influx of foreign faith, play into the changed and changing religious profile, whilst fueling some of the resurgence of religious nationalism to which you refer. However changed protocols in Council Chambers for reasons of "pride, heritage and shared values" has little to do with genuine or profound religious belief or expression, and should not be regarded as such. The fundamentalist preaching of John Knox (1514 - 1572) or Richard Baxter (1615 - 1691) would not last a minute in today's liberal climate and probably just as well. Their place has been taken by vilified Muslim preachers perhaps? Christianity has become just a rather wishy-washy set of 'values' that are all things to all men, whilst the population is kept and amused by 'bread and circus', now conveyed by electronic means to every home.
So we return to the historical place of the relationship between the state and religion and specifically the Christian religion. Also amazingly, what Jesus Christ thought of it himself. In the scheme of things it is difficult to distinguish 'true' Christianity from the very many varieties on offer. I often wonder what the reaction would be if Jesus of Nazareth actually appeared to the various congregations? Would it be that of the disciples, mesmerised by his charisma and authority; the common people who followed him in droves looking to be enthralled and entertained; or the religious and political leaders for whom he was a challenge and irritant, who wished only to get rid of him - permanently?
The art and literature of the last few hundred years has turned Jesus Christ into a European. However if the Vatican's 'Shroud of Turin' is anything to go by - and I am aware of the controversy surrounding it's genuineness - he definitely looked Arabic not European. He was born in Palestine and spoke Arabic. Why should we be surprised? He was in a very true sense, a Palestinian!
The Bible account portrays him as a serious man with a mission. There is one account of him weeping - over the death of Lazarus - but never laughing or even smiling, even when surrounded by cheering adoring crowds. He appeared weighed down by the painful lot of mankind and of his own destiny. He was unlikely to be a jovial or entertaining dinner guest, although apparently had no problem associating with 'publicans and sinners', turning water into wine, or being pampered by women of dubious reputation. such as the woman who poured expensive ointment over his head and washed his fee with her tears.
For thirty years he lived in virtual anonymity as a carpenter. We read nothing more of his father after the dramatic birth story, but his many male and female siblings must mean he lived long enough to have them, although perhaps he had died by the time Jesus, the eldest, had reached maturity? Only Mary his mother and James his brother get significant mention in the unfolding story. Apparently James was also killed by the Jews sometime after 62 AD after playing a leading role in the evolving Christian church. He leaves one written very practical letter addressed to "the Twelve Tribes", so excluding non-Jewish Christians, on how to live morally good lives.
People perhaps forget, that initially Christians or the followers of Christ, were all Jews. It was an exclusive and divisive sub-set of that cultural and religious group, and carried with it many of the traits and prejudices of the former. Jesus himself, despite his scathing assessment of the political and religious leadership, that he knew was out to get him, directed his message specifically to Jews and appeared dismissive of foreigners. To the Canaanite Woman, he says, "It is not right to take the children's bread and toss it to the dogs." Harsh! Yet he acknowledges faith is not a Jewish preserve and accedes to her request because of it. It is not until Peter's vision and Paul's conversion, that the Christian faith is thrown open to the non-Jew, the non-circumcised.
John the Baptist and Jesus were cousins - the two Marys were sisters. Isn't it remarkable that these two families should have produced such dynamic and related characters, each having a dramatic effect on the other? Had they grown up together? We must presume they did, each observing and playing off each other to create two synchronous and powerful personalities. John introduces a revolutionary, previously unrecorded, ritual of 'baptism', in the River Jordan, to which Jesus subjects himself.
Note how after the miraculous 'resurrection', the rite of circumcision is progressively replaced by baptism, whereby the notion of the 'church' or 'Bride of Christ', is extended to include those with no Jewish heritage. Saint Paul deals with the topic extensively when writing to an early Christian church in Rome. Christians do not become Jews but many Jews become Christians and are persecuted for it. Rome saw Jews as a irritant and threat - hence the destruction of Jerusalem (again) in AD 70. It not clear how much it saw Christianity as a threat. More likely it saw them as a Jewish breakaway group, guilty by association.
Wherever Paul went on his missionary journeys, you could be sure sure of trouble, even riots, as his new religion with its roots in Judaism, threatened not only their established belief system, but also a thriving economy directly related to it. At the very heart of the Classical world, where rational thought had mixed with polytheism for several hundred years, Paul stood on Mars Hill - named after the God of War of course - and declared,
"Ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious. For as I passed by, and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, To The Unknown God. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you."
It is estimated that the Ancient Greeks recognised over 3000 gods, although twelve were the first tier 'Olympians'. Yet just in case they had forgotten or overlooked any, here was a statue to the 'unknown' one. Audaciously, but skillfully Paul uses it as his rhetorical introduction. His is the unknown God for which they are searching he claims. The circumcised, rabbinical Jew, fluent in Hebrew and Arabic, is speaking to them in Greek, about a Jewish man judicially murdered by the Roman Empire, as the initiator of a completely new faith that could and should encompass all nationalities equally! No wonder it was regarded with incredulity, suspicion and resistance. (See: List of Greek deities - Wikipedia )
Jesus speaks highly of John as a brave and unwavering person - not like a "reed shaken by the wind" - and John in return confesses he is "not worthy to untie Jesus' sandals", and this note, before Jesus had even started preaching. They were not only related, they were obviously close and held each other in high regard. Despite being convinced of his divine nature, Jesus allows John to carry out this radical and novel act of baptism, that later is adopted by Christians generally. In effect it replaces circumcision as a mark of membership and belief.
It is also emblematic of 'washing' and 'renewal'; of leaving an old nature with its sin and failures behind. It is a tenet of Christian theology that Jesus, though fully human, was sinless, so what was the purpose of him being baptised? It certainly marked a change in his life from carpenter and family man, to roving preacher and miracle worker, marked it is claimed by remarkable events - "He saw the spirit of God descending like a dove, and alighting on him, and a voice out of heaven saying this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased". Jesus was noted as the 'Miracle Man'.
Was the dove literal or metaphorical? Was the voice out of heaven real or imagined? Were these events witnessed by others, in the euphoric minds of the subjects or in the inspired mind of the writer? We shall never know but something remarkable happened on that day to be sure. It is up to us to interpret the historical event as best we can. Both John and Jesus would be regarded as subversive and sooner or later stopped in their tracks by the then political elite.
The news of the murder of John must have come as a painful shock to Jesus and confirmation of the dangerous path he was treading, although his tragic fate seems always to have been present in his mind, interpreted as God's necessary plan. We witness his tortured mind when in Matthew's account he says,
"He went a little farther, and fell on His face and prayed, saying, “O My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as Thou wilt.”
Jesus Christ was an historical figure in an historical and geographical context, far removed from our own, yet his life and message has had a remarkable longevity and influence. It must be continually examined and adapted to every age and circumstance. Historiography reveals how this has worked down through the ages. In this modernist, rational, post 'enlightenment' age everyone has to come to terms with the 'UNKNOWN GOD' of old; has to reconcile superstition with faith; of their religion with their politics and nationalism.
The 19th Century saw, perhaps the first time in human history, the emergence of a Marxian atheistic politics; of Sates covering huge land mass and populations, actively anti-religious belief of any kind. Physical, temporal, economic improvement were goals that subsumed all others, often at huge human cost. We are left wondering what part Christianity, whether real or just performative and symbolic, plays in the scheme of things now, making some feel the need to reintroduce Christian prayers to the school timetables and Council Meetings?
Perhaps to conclude, as followers of Christ, to greater or lesser extent, we should enquire as to how Jesus himself dealt with this question of the relationship between church and state, between faith and authority? He undoubtedly possessed charisma and celebrity and was followed by ecstatic and adoring crowds. Crowds can be fickle and easily turn nasty if suitably manipulated by their masters, as happened to Jesus when he stood before Pilate, concerned only with keeping the peace, not with morality or justice. How we have witnessed the same approach today.
There were two parties that had it in for him, the Herodian Sadducees and the religious Pharisees. They followed him around rather like the 'Stasi', always trying to get him to implicate himself in some way. On one occasion they thrust a Roman coin before him and asked maliciously, should they pay taxes to Caesar? They no doubt had put a lot of thought into it and believed it was a semantic trap from which he could not escape. If he replied 'yes' he would attract the animus of those who resented Roman occupation; if he said 'no', he could be charged with sedition.
Matthew reports Jesus knew their evil intent and he responded as follows:
“You hypocrites, why are you trying to trap me? Show me the coin used for paying the tax.” When they brought him a denarius he asked them, “Whose image is this? And whose inscription?” “Caesar’s,” they replied. Then he said to them, “So give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.”
The denarius, a standard long-lasting silver coin of the Roman Empire is not without its significance. It can still be viewed to this day (See above). The Tiberius denarius was issued between AD 14 - 37. Coinage, as it still does to this day, belongs to the State, in the personage of Sovereign or Emperor. In practice, we just 'borrow' it! In that sense who could deny that paying Rome with their own currency was actually returning what was theirs in the first place? But there is more to this than meets the eye.
As with all coins, the Denarius has two faces. On the upper or obverse there was an image of the Emperor Tiberius himself, son of the great Emperor Augustus and Livia his wife. It has the inscription in Latin, "TI CAESAR DIVI AVG F AVGVSTVS". This translates as, "Tiberius Caesar, son of the divine Augustus, emperor," On the reverse an image of a seated woman, thought to be his mother, with the inscription, "PONTIF MAXIM" or "Chief Priest".
It is impossible not to see the significance of these two aspects of the coin or its irony both then and now. Jesus claimed to be the 'Son of God' and Saint Paul claims he is our only High Priest Hebrews 4:14 -
"Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet sin apart. Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need."
From the Jewish tradition and perspective it was sacrilege for any mortal to claim to be Yahweh or God . This certainly applied to Augustus, as to 'Son of God' Tiberius. It also applied to Jesus, a claim made in interrogation that infuriated them and secured his fate. Christianity introduced the concept that there was only one intercessionary connection between God and man and that was through the eternal spirit of the Risen Christ. "For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;" (1 Tim 2: 5)
So in conclusion, we need to distinguish between the political and the spiritual: they are both separate realms. However they cannot but operate on one another. The temporal realm should facilitate and encourage the spiritual. The spiritual should encourage the honorable and ethical in the public realm. It has the effect of making statute law subservient to Natural Law, to Divine Law, by which all, now and for ever, will be judged. To be truly human, is also to be truly divine. (END TTV)
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