Evangelicals

Abby Olcese 2-15-2024

A scene from 'God & Country,' Oscilloscope Laboratories

The new documentary God & Country, inspired by Katherine Stewart’s book The Power Worshippers, fortunately escapes most of the major pitfalls of political documentaries as it addresses the rise of Christian nationalism.

Florida Governor and Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis arrives to address the Concerned Women for America Legislative Action Committee’s 2023 Leadership Summit in Washington, D.C., Sept. 15, 2023. REUTERS/Leah Millis

Former President Donald Trump and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis made their cases to evangelical voters who gathered in Washington, D.C., for a pair of events on Friday, seeking an edge with a voting bloc likely to play a pivotal role in selecting a 2024 presidential nominee.

Rebecca Randall 2-27-2023

George Washington Carver. Via Alamy. 

Over his career, Luther Williams has seen the impact of racist education standards and a lack of Black representation in science.

Sarah Einselen 3-04-2022

Photo Courtesy FRACEEV.

One measure, an executive order from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, jeopardizes foster care licenses for anyone who takes in unaccompanied immigrant children who arrive in the country without authorization. The other, a bill being fast-tracked through the state legislature, would bar state and local governments from contracting with businesses that knowingly transport undocumented immigrants, including bus companies or airlines.

Robert P. Jones 12-13-2021

A protester in London on Dec. 5, 2020. Photo: Joshua Windsor / Alamy.

This new survey found a remarkable number of Americans reporting serious family conflict over COVID-19 vaccinations. Fully one in five Americans (19 percent) say that disagreements over COVID-19 vaccinations have caused “major conflict” in their families. Similarly, earlier this fall, PRRI found that 22 percent of Americans reported that their extended family relationships have been “strained to the breaking point” over the issue of getting a COVID-19 vaccination.

Betsy Shirley 11-18-2021

Julius Jones supporters and their signs on the second floor rotunda at the Oklahoma Capitol Wednesday, November 17, 2021. Doug Hoke/The Oklahoman via Reuters.

Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt accepted a recommendation from the state’s parole board on Thursday to grant Julius Jones clemency, sparing the life of the man who was set to be executed later that day. Jones was convicted of killing Paul Howell during a 1999 carjacking, but Jones maintained his innocence during the nearly two decades he spent on death row.

“After prayerful consideration and reviewing materials presented by all sides of this case, I have determined to commute Julius Jones’ sentence to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole,” said Stitt in a statement issued on Thursday around noon in Oklahoma.

A polling booth at the Complexo do Alemao  in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Nov. 15, 2020. REUTERS/Ricardo Moraes 

Nearly 13,000 candidates with religious titles ran for office in Brazil's Nov. 15 local elections – an increase of 24 percent compared to previous municipal elections.

Miguel Petrosky 10-28-2020

A supporter of President Donald Trump wears a QAnon shirt after participating in a caravan convoy circuit in Adairsville, Ga., Sept. 5, 2020. REUTERS/Elijah Nouvelage

Why does QAnon resonate with these evangelicals? Part of the answer is their strong political alignment with the president, but it’s also true that evangelicals have long organized around the issue of human trafficking. And according to the major anti-human trafficking organizations in the U.S., that axis of devotion and suceptibility due to political alignment is creating a nightmare for their work.

Sabina Wong 10-19-2020

The author's grandparents, mother, and uncle in August 1959. Photo courtesy of the author.

My kids are the great-granddaughters of Chinese immigrants, but until recently, I hadn’t shared much about our immigration story or been a vocal advocate for immigrant rights. Instead, like many evangelicals, I had absorbed hardline views on the subject.

Randall Balmer 5-20-2020

Anti-Evolution League at the Scopes Trial. Dayton, Tenn. From Literary Digest, July 25, 1925

Symbolically, the Scopes Trial on teaching evolution was a turning point.

Randall Balmer 4-17-2020

Pastor Tony Spell talks with journalists before attending Sunday service at the Life Tabernacle megachurch challenging state orders against assembling in large groups to prevent the spread of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Baton Rouge, La., April 5, 2020. REUTERS/Carlos Barria

Times of crisis tend to engender apocalyptic thinking. We’re seeing that today during the coronavirus pandemic. Conspiracy theories abound, and some people are talking about the end of the world. Could the current crisis be God’s judgment for sinfulness or our persistent abuse of the environment? Is an apocalyptic reckoning at hand?

John Fea 3-10-2020

Donald Trump delivers remarks at the Liberty University commencement ceremony. May 13, 2017. Via Wikimedia Commons. 

We have failed to be good citizens. We have become complicit in the president’s nativism, racism, xenophobia, narcissism, and fearmongering.

Randall Balmer 3-09-2020

People arrive at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) annual meeting at National Harbor in Oxon Hill, Md., Feb. 27, 2020. REUTERS/Joshua Roberts/File Photo

The emergence of Bernie Sanders as one of two finalists for the Democratic presidential nomination has renewed focus on his self-identification as a “democratic socialist.” Although several pundits, including Paul Krugman of the New York Times, have argued that Sanders’s “socialism” is really a pale version of what most Europeans regard as socialism, many Americans — including those who identify as evangelical Christians — remain suspicious of Sanders’s ideology. 

A couple receives a blessing during a secret service at the home of an underground priest, date unknown. Image via Institute of Church History at the Ukrainian Catholic University. 

Orthodox in doctrine and Catholic as a matter of universality, the Church has outlived a half dozen empires and several continental wars in little over a millennium. From 1946 to 1989, the church was outlawed in the Soviet Union, which had annexed Lviv and the surrounding area after winning WWII. The Soviets brought with them state atheism, driving most Christians (though not all) underground.

Randall Balmer 1-24-2020

President Donald Trump participates in a prayer before speaking at an Evangelicals for Trump coalition launch at the King Jesus International Ministry in Miami, Fla. Jan. 3, 2020. REUTERS/Tom Brenner

I don’t give up on evangelicalism lightly or willingly. Evangelicalism is in my DNA, and I’ll put my credentials as an evangelical up against anyone: evangelical parents, a preacher’s kid, gave my heart to Jesus at age three (and many times thereafter), youth group, Bible camp, graduated from Trinity College and Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. My father was a distinguished pastor in the Evangelical Free Church for 40 years; I honor his ministry and his memory.

M.C. de Boer 1-22-2020

Supporters raise their hands during President Donald Trump's speeches to evangelical supporters in Miami, Jan. 3, 2020. REUTERS/Eva Marie Uzcategui

Trump does not repent of his actions but persists in them and excuses them, mocking not only God but also his evangelical supporters.

Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro and U.S. President Donald Trump shake hands during a bilateral meeting at the G20 leaders summit in Osaka, Japan, June 28, 2019. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

Bolsonaro is forming alliances and shaping policies according to conservative evangelical religion. 

Nancy Hightower 12-19-2019

Poster on King David Street near the King David Hotel, sponsored by an evangelical Christian group. Jerusalem, Israel, 22 May 2017. 

Trump’s latest executive order is yet another chapter in the spiritual story created by evangelicals. 

Robert Muggah 12-16-2019

Image via Shutterstock/Joa Souza 

Persecution of these Afro-Brazilian religions, whose adherents are largely poor black Brazilians, has been around since at least the 19th century.

Aaron E. Sanchez 11-26-2019

Ramiro Peña. Credit: YouTube 

The 2020 Latinos for Trump organization prominently features three Latino evangelical pastors with long ties to Trump.