Released five years ago, Kristin Kobes Du Mez’s Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation is no ordinary history book. Since it published, the treatise on militant Christian masculinity has shaped conversations about Trumpism in both Christian and secular spaces. A surprise New York Times bestseller, the book resonated with many readers who found that it clarified their own experiences of growing up in the American evangelical subculture — and it drew criticism from others who found it to be an unfair takedown of conservative Christianity.
Now, it has a theme song.
“Jesus and John Wayne” — the song — was released in June by indie artists Googly Eyes, Joy Oladokun, and Allison Ponthier. The first track from a charity album compiled by the All Things Go music festival, it opens with the lyrics: “I liked the teachings of Jesus so much that I followed him right out the door. / When steeples kept preaching with hate on their tongues and distaste for the meek, mild and poor.”
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The artists go on to sing about the grief that comes with leaving the church. Like Du Mez before them, they reference John Wayne, the rugged actor who starred in myriad Western films throughout the 20th century and came to symbolize white American masculinity:
What a devastation, a deep separation
A chasm of heart, head, and soul
And they'll cursе why I'm leaving
Blame my unbeliеving
But Lord knows I didn’t wanna goAnd God felt my heart splinter and break
You can have both of em, Jesus and John Wayne
In a Substack post, Googly Eyes shared that she wrote the song shortly after the November election, but hadn’t planned to release it. When her label reached out about making a song for the compilation album benefitting The Ally Coalition, an LGBTQ+ youth organization, she changed her mind.
“I’m nervous about this song,” she wrote in the post. “It covers something I never thought I’d speak on publicly.” Raised in a Christian home, the artist began to step away from her childhood faith after observing the complicity of Christians as President Donald Trump “separated families, attacked the free press, and dangerously encouraged hate groups like the Proud Boys.”
In a Substack post of her own, Ponthier described her involvement with the song as the “butterfly effect.” After reading Du Mez’s book, Ponthier thought it needed to be a song, but never got around to writing it.
“So months and months later, when Googly asked me to be on ‘Jesus and John Wayne,’ it was not only an honor, but kind of a cosmic thing for me,” she wrote. “The words were everything I wished I could say to the people who had made me feel unworthy, a response to all of the apocalyptic headlines that popped up on my screen, and a declaration that any God worth worshipping would love people like me.” Later, when Oladokun joined the project, it felt even more “powerful and right.”
“Honestly, it reminded me of singing in church,” Ponthier wrote.
'And for the life of me, I forget / All the times that Jesus said / Blessed are the war makers.'
On Instagram, Oladokun posted a video of herself singing part of the song with the caption: “send this to your old youth group buddy who is gay now.” Of the three artists involved, Oladokun’s music most directly references faith, especially the experience of navigating religious spaces as a queer person.
Du Mez told Sojourners that she’s a fan of the project. “I think the song is beautiful,” she said. “I absolutely love it when a history book, a work of scholarship, can also spark artistic responses.” Her favorite part is the bridge:
And for the life of me, I forget
All the times that Jesus said
Blessed are the war makers
Blessed are the black in heart
Blessed are the politicians
Blessed are the patriarchs
Blessed are the gold takers
Blessed skin like porcelain
Blessed is America, but only for Americans
“It’s so stark,” Du Mez said. The rhythm of that section is so familiar to those who know the Beatitudes, and then to swap out the subjects of each line with the polar opposite and realize how accurately that conveys a dominant strand of conservative Christianity today is really startling and clarifying.”
Du Mez said the song is especially powerful given the centrality of music in evangelicalism. “Evangelicals are very used to listening to music and listening to songs on repeat and having those songs shape their emotions, their values, their convictions,” she said, noting that a song can potentially reach people in a way that a 300-page book cannot.
“The arts are critical right now. I’m a historian, I write in prose, I’m all about facts and evidence, and that’s what I have to contribute to this moment. It’s important, but it’s not enough and it certainly shouldn’t stand alone,” she said. “Part of what it takes to respond to a moment like this is a renewed imagination, a deep, even visceral sense of what is good and true, which clarifies what is not.”
Googly Eyes’ track is not the first song to share a name with Du Mez’s book. Iconic Southern gospel group Gaither Vocal Band included a track called “Jesus and John Wayne” on their 2007 album “Lovin’ Life.” The performers sing of being caught “somewhere between Jesus and John Wayne / a cowboy and a saint, crossing the open range / I try to be more like you, Lord, but most days I know I ain’t.”
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After coming up with what would become the title of her book, Du Mez came across the Gaithers’ song and referenced it in the conclusion. “True to the Gaithers’ brand, it was a nostalgic ballad,” she wrote. “By that point in time, for many of their evangelical fans, little separated Jesus from John Wayne.”
From song to book to song again, those four words — Jesus and John Wayne — have come to capture different dimensions of the American evangelical experience.
“Five years out, it’s a good moment for me to reflect on the book and what it’s done and what it’s meant to me, to others,” she said. “There’s also an undertone of sadness because the reason the book has been so relevant and become even more relevant by the day is because the story I tell isn’t over. The trends that I describe are bearing fruit in the worst possible ways.”
Du Mez is currently working on a book called Live Laugh Love, a political and cultural history of white Christian women. She has described it as Jesus and John Wayne but “for the girls.”
On whether readers can expect a song inspired by Live Laugh Love, Du Mez laughed. “I will not close the door on that possibility, but I’m just thrilled to have this song inspired by this book.”
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