As a youth, I had 8 hands high pony who was my four-footed companion for cantering across grassy meadows and climbing hilly CC logging trails on those occasions when he wasn’t trying to rub me off under the nearest low hanging apple tree branch, using his “Shetland pony blitz.”
But, the WW2 blitzkrieg had introduced the world to the influence and dominance of a blitz. A blitz is effectively so fast that the targets don’t know what hit them.
Essential to the republic is a vision of our American nation in a socially sustainable form, i.e. avoiding civil war. Also essential is the need for Christianity to maintain its essence, to hold true to Jesus Christ’s basic message, and counteract the nihilistic goal of groups chasing after their idea of The Rapture.
We need to be aware of Project Blitz, as it is well funded by adversaries of America, well organized, and has forged a quasi Christian renegade identity to swing a wrecking ball against the pluralistic political landscape in 2022 and 2024, the power of its destruction already seen on January 6th.
One final note. In their podcast, they mention that American Muslims couldn’t even touch it as a topic, as they have been marginalized. This made me think of the citizens of Israel who reached out to the world a couple of years ago when they wrote that they would need outside help in confronting toxic political movements. However, the inverse is true here, in that only Christians can deal with and effectively confront the Christian Fundamentalists. And, why that is, is a whole different article. Erica P. Wissinger
BY TYLER HUCKABEE
First published 7 January 2021
In July of 2019, lawmakers in South Dakota passed a new law requiring all public schools to display the national motto, “In God We Trust”, in a “prominent location,” with a font no smaller than twelve by twelve inches.
Some students expressed discomfort with their new decoration. “We are a cultural melting pot, and it is really important that we make all people who come to America to feel welcome,” a student named Abigail Ryan told local news.
But in general, the mood around the bill was a celebratory one.
It’s part of a large coordinated effort. Six “In God We Trust Bills” (sometimes called the National Motto Display Act) have been passed in the last year, and ten more have been introduced.
They are, in most cases, the speartip of a broader effort from a coalition of Religious Right groups known as “Project Blitz.”
“Minimal pushback” to the white letters, In God We Trust
Project Blitz is an initiative that utilizes a mill of model bills promoting legislation favorable to the Christian Right. Organized by groups like the Congressional Prayer Caucus Foundation in partnership with an organization called Wallbuilders and the National Legal Foundation, these model bills are grouped in three different categories, ranked by the amount of expected opposition.
The general plan, according to a 148-page playbook published by Religion Dispatches, is to start with category one legislation like the “In God We Trust bills” that will meet with minimal pushback and slowly advance towards more controversial laws such as a “Resolution Establishing Public Policy Favoring Intimate Sexual Relations Only Between Married, Heterosexual Couples.”
Project Blitz was launched in 2015 as part of what’s known as the First Freedom Coalition and has since amassed 29 state legislative “Prayer Caucuses” to further its goals, but it’s part of a much older and larger movement in the United States that seeks to reframe the country as an inherently Christian nation.
This movement, known as Christian nationalism, is in the business of merging Christian and American identities, liberally mixing biblical teaching with the principles of constitutional democracy until the line between them is blurred or even erased altogether.
Some of this seems benign on the surface. An American flag in the church pulpit. “In God We Trust” on the dollar. Christian politicians refer to the Second Amendment as a “God-given right.” Christians, after all, have a right to advocate for favorable laws just like anyone else.
But real Christian nationalists aren’t out for anything so salubrious as equal treatment under the law, and their methods involve the marginalization of citizens who don’t see things according to a bracingly narrow definition of what it means to be both an American and a Christian — sometimes with deadly repercussions.
And Christian Nationalists are facing a growing and a vocal number of critics from the same demographic they claim to represent: American Christians.
Nearly a third of Americans say that being a Christian is a key part of being an American, according to a 2017 Pew Research survey. And it’s with that third in mind that Christian Nationalists are pushing their way into the public sphere.
At their most extreme, Christian Nationalists may describe themselves as “dominionists,” who believe Christians ought to have dominion over what they consider to be the seven forces — or, in their parlance, “mountains”— that shape culture: business, government, media, arts and entertainment, education, family and religion. As David Barton, a Christian Nationalist and one of the leaders of Project Blitz put it in a radio broadcast, “If you can have those seven areas, you can shape and control whatever takes place in nations, continents and even the world.”
Read More at Relevant Magazine
Excerpted from RINGING IN A CHRISTIAN NATIONALIST 2019 WITH AN EVEN LARGER LEGISLATIVE PLAYBOOK
BY FREDERICK CLARKSON
First published 18 DECEMBER 2018
When we speak of Christian nationalism, we’re talking about the idea that America was once, and must be again a Christian nation.
That this was the intention of both God and of the Founding Fathers, and that our culture and laws today should conform to this idea—from which we are said to have strayed.
For many, this is a vague and nostalgic view of a time and nation that never really was.
While there’s usually some room for religious tolerance on the part of Christian nationalists, there is no tolerance—at least not in the long run—from Dominionists who sustain a long-term vision of organizing all of society and government according to their understanding of the Bible.
Read More at Religious Dispatch
A counter-argument
Christian nationalism is a threat to American Democracy and a distortion of Jesus’ messages
SHANE CLAIBORNE, A FOUNDER OF THE RED LETTER CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT
In ages past, we have seen distortions of the Christian faith that warrant a response. Church leaders have held emergency councils in order to unilaterally denounce mutations of the orthodox faith and to affirm the core values at the heart of Christianity.
It is in that Spirit that we unite our diverse voices as Christian leaders to declare that “Christian” nationalism is a heresy.
What we saw manifest itself in the insurrection at the Capitol on Jan. 6 is the most recent deadly fruit of this heresy. It is a threat to democracy. And it is a threat to the orthodox Christian faith.
“White Christian Nationalism demands an enemy. There must always be a threat in order to close ranks and mobilize against an opponent.” – Jemar Tisby, PhD
Government should not prefer one religion over another or religion over nonreligion.
Christians against Christian Nationalism
Conflating religious authority with political authority is idolatrous and often leads to oppression of the minority and other marginalized groups as well as the spiritual impoverishment of religion.
We must stand up to and speak out against Christian nationalism, especially when it inspires acts of violence and intimidation—including vandalism, bomb threats, arson, hate crimes, and attacks on houses of worship—against religious communities at home and abroad.
Whether we worship at a church, mosque, synagogue, or temple, America has no second-class faiths. All are equal under the U.S. Constitution. As Christians, we must speak in one voice condemning Christian nationalism as a distortion of the gospel of Jesus and a threat to American democracy.
SOURCE: Christians against Christian Nationalism
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