Given the moral decay in our nation, it’s not hard to imagine the idea of an America clinging hard to the basic tenets of Christianity as a guideline for its laws and way of life as very attractive to all Christians and men of good will.
This is what is billed as Christian Nationalism, a movement within American conservative circles that has gained more prominent attention on social media and other outlets, especially since Donald Trump emerged victorious in the 2024 Presidential Election.
Like many Christians across America, I woke up the morning after election night filled with more of a sense of relief that Kamala Harris lost rather than an authentic joy that Trump won. It seemed that America would be spared the consequences of a continued downward moral trajectory with the allowance of so many depravities that may have been pushed by a potential Harris administration.
Now that we’ve had more than a year for the Trump administration to set in motion its numerous agenda items and appoint various advisors, many on social media platforms are screeching about a Christian Nationalist state rising up in America. Such fears I was initially compelled to dismiss as the pathetically irrational whining of liberals, who feared the ‘rights’ to various vices like abortion and gender ideology would be shuttered away.
However, for diametrically different reasons, Catholics should be concerned about the trajectory of their everyday life in America if these nationalist zealots have their way and make their Protestant American pipe dream a reality.
Recall that life in America has not been exactly kind to Catholic Christians. Persecutions were high at the establishment of the colonies, the Know-Nothing era was tough for the mass waves of Catholic immigrants, and the Ku Klux Klan took shots at the Church through various insidious propaganda pieces.
In recent memory, Catholics and other men of goodwill have had to endure the hardships of the previous presidential administration that essentially treated those who professed belief in the sanctity of life, as well as everyday Latin Mass Catholics, as domestic extremists who had terrorist potential.
This anti-Catholic movement, however, is more inconspicuously perfidious: much like walking along a pleasant meadow, only to be ensnared by a tar pit that hides hidden beneath piles of leaves with no chance of escape. The question must be asked then: What would life in such a nation look like for everyday Catholics in the pews, the clergy and the hundreds of religious brothers and sisters if the powers that be get a chance to make their desires for a truly Protestant America a reality?
In simple terms, it would be a hellish nightmare that no sincere Catholic could anticipate coming given the stakes of the last administration. One only has to look at the officials occupying influential positions of power within the current administration, and from whom they get spiritual formation, in order to see this renegade movement for the farce that it is.
Within this second Trump administration are spiritual advisors who equate the will of the president to the Holy Will of God, and have a blueprint for what an ideal Protestant America looks like — one that views Catholics as nothing more than those destined for eternal hellfire, owing to their supposed “pagan” worship of Mary, sacred statues, and the Eucharist, among many other falsehoods they level against the faith.
This burning hatred for the true Faith they so ignorantly mischaracterize fuels their ardent desire to see public Catholic life eviscerated from the nation and have individual Catholics sidelined from influencing public policy. If they manage to turn their pipedream into a reality, then all who have criticisms of this administration are suddenly at risk of losing a rather normal life, even if it won’t be on the level of Nazi Germany, where criticism was a literal death-sentence.
For Catholics and all men of good will, the most scorching criticisms of this administration seem to be its conduct in the ongoing conflict against Iran, with a very dangerous, almost blind loyalty to the even more bellicose State of Israel.
This alliance has been fueled for decades by the Zionist element of this Christian Nationalism, which has erroneously equated the State of Israel to the Israel of Sacred Scripture, and such a nearly blind loyalty to the Israeli government has been a disaster for the Christians, the true chosen people of God, living in the Holy Land and in the Middle East.
In the onset of the dreadful attack by Hamas on October 7, 2023, Jerusalem waged an unbridled, almost objective-muddled war against Hamas, at the cost of so many innocent Gazans, ensnaring Christians, Muslims, and innocent Jews in the fatal nets. While the previous administration tried a delicate balancing act of appearing to be concerned for the fate of Palestine’s natives, while feeding Israel with the weapons to bring about their doom, the current US administration, filled to the brim with bloodthirsty Zionist hawks, has taken the bootlicking to an extreme.
There has been a near silence on the razing of Gaza and the massacre of its citizens, all while floating grotesque ideas for so-called rebuilding projects in the aftermath of the destruction.
Despite the clear evidence of war crimes and genocide in Gaza, as well as attacks on Christian churches in the region, the blind loyalty from the Zionist wing has prompted silence on these matters, while punishing those who dare to speak out about the atrocities. Not even the Roman Pontiff has been spared vitriolic verbal abuse in this matter, particularly in his ongoing clamoring for peace in the region and rightful decrying of the threat of the death of an entire civilization.
Pope Leo XIV’s very poignant and correct critiques on the war against Iran have only been met with some verbal attacks from the president, who distorted the position of His Holiness about nuclear weapons and falsely categorized him with the radical left ideologues in many topics.
It will only be a matter of time before more ordinary Catholics are caught in the crossfires of this renegade Christianity, whose adherents are starting to see us as a bitter rival to their ideology, the consequence of more and more brave souls taking a Thomas More-esque stand against a political power. What will they do to us then?
In the midst of this chaos and the threats that could come, what are we to do?
Cowering is not the answer. We must continue to be bold, especially if one is in a position of public influence, to call the American government to account and pray without ceasing for the conversion of hearts, for a lasting and just peace, and the protection of innocent lives in all the parties involved.
Moreover, we need to rally behind all men of good will who do speak up against the continued violence and rhetoric. The Christian Patriarchs in the Holy Land, especially the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, have been constantly vocal about the savage crimes being committed by the IDF in their military adventures. Throw your support behind them and pray for them, for they are in the very heart of the battle and have stayed firmly united with their flocks even when they have had ample opportunity to flee.
Especially for Catholics, we also must do our duty to pray for the Roman Pontiff in this matter. For all the criticisms (legitimate and otherwise) one can levy against him, his perspective on what is going on in the Middle East is very important, and most essentially, correct.
Given his American background, he has shown more fortitude in one year standing up for the Gospel and the Church’s teaching on this matter than supposed devout Catholic politicians have in six decades. The Catholics in Trump’s cabinet have either gone AWOL or have perfidiously defended Trump’s stances and threats without the mention of dialing back the bloodthirsty rhetoric.
Many non-Catholics have come to Pope Leo’s defense. Shall we who especially submit to him as our spiritual father and universal pastor not do the same and at least consider what he has to say when such threats of mass genocide against Iranians are echoed from the Oval Office? Shall we not cheer on the Pope to keep pushing back against crimes against humanity when others shamefully tell him to stay in his lane, when in fact, this is precisely his lane?
We cannot let whatever criticisms we have of Pope Leo blind our hearts to the fact that he is one of the only ones speaking out boldly against this horrendous, unjust conflict inflicted not only on Iranians and Gazans, but also upon innocent Israelis and Americans. This applies for anyone else blowing the whistle on the atrocities, as well as those who share rightly ordered fears of what America could turn into if these fundamentalist zealots have their way – Catholic or non-Catholic.
Life on earth is messy and a constant warfare between the forces of good and evil. Satan has been tirelessly finding the smallest things as fuel to continually widen divides among the human race, and he is having a field day going about it. The many spirited discussions on various topics (the Latin Mass, abortion, synodality, immigration, capital punishment, ecclesiastical leadership, etc.) will continue until at last the trumpet sounds and the dreadful Judge shall descend from the clouds to exact proper justice.
Whilst we have the time, and even whilst these discussions are going on, it’s time, as Catholic Americans, to show a united front against the Devil and his minions. They are using a twisted form of Christianity to trap innocent Catholics and men of goodwill into a distorted worldview — one that will cause life in our country, as we know it, to disappear.
In all of this, may we go forward with no fear, entrusting ourselves and our nation to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Patroness of the United States, the holy, Ever-Virgin Mother of God, and clinging to the example of our forebearers in Faith that took the brave stand as the nation’s good subjects, but God’s first.
