By Harold W. Anderson, Ph.D., M.A., M.Div.
Since moving to this area, I have been singing Karaoke at both the local golf club and a local restaurant. I’m not great at it, but I have a lot of fun joining with friends to “howl at the moon,” so to speak. One night, though, a friend sang Lee Greenwood’s song “God Bless the USA.” I have a very difficult time with that song and when he sat back down at the table, I commented that while he had done a good job singing it, the song itself offends every theological, political, and philosophical bone in my body. He was quite taken back by that. He considers himself a progressive thinker and is as turned off by MAGA Republicans as I am. “I’m sorry” he said in a rather stunned way, and that was pretty much the end of our conversation. I didn’t have opportunity to say why it offended me except I muttered “it smacks of Dominionism.”
My friend has quite a wide-ranging vocabulary and encyclopedic knowledge. He is quite the trivia player and often carries our team on trivia night. But I don’t know for sure if even he knows what Dominionism is. A 2022 article in The Christian Century defines Dominionism as “the belief that Christians should take moral, spiritual, and ecclesiastical control over society” (Ladner, K., 2020. “The quiet rise of Christian Dominionism”). Dominionism has quietly made inroads into Evangelical and Fundamentalist Christian churches, and while individual believers may not claim to be Dominionist, their thinking has been powerfully influenced by it. It has influenced senators, congressional officials, judges and even presidents. Its influence, however, is not benign and could powerfully reconstruct democracy in the United States.
What do Dominionists believe? First, they embrace what is called “Manifest Destiny,” an idea made popular by John O’Sullivan (1813 – 1895), who supported the United States annexing most of the American West, which belonged to Mexico, and Oregon and Washington, which was under British control (for more on this, see my Blog, “Beware the Face of Fascism”). Building upon an idea rooted in the folklore of early settlers migrating to North America, manifest destiny held that America in general and the United States in particular, is God’s chosen land. It has been ordained by God to become God’s kingdom on earth and its “people,” God’s chosen people. “People” is put in scare quotes because it was only certain people, O’Sullivan held, who are truly citizens of this country. They are typically white and typically male.
Picking up on this idea, Rousas John Rushdoony (1916 – 2001)—a Presbyterian minister and immigrant whose family fled Armenian genocide—also held that the United States was God’s chosen land and its “people” (Rushdoony also stated that it was white males who would control and dominate this land) were God’s chosen people if they reconstructed the United States according to biblical law as he outlined in his book, The Institutes of Biblical Law. According to Rushdoony, God has given Christians the task of taking dominion over society and indeed the earth. World domination, then, is their goal, and when the dominion is complete, they believe, Christ will return in all his glory. From Rushdoony’s perspective, this meant dismantling the Constitution and gutting the Federal Government.
Modern Dominionists are more circumspect. Gary North, Rushdoony’s son-in-law, studied economics and has spent tremendous resources developing Rushdoony’s thought into a blueprint for Christian economics. This made an impact upon the Tea Party, which was not necessarily Dominionist, but nonetheless were heavily influenced by North as witnessed by their desire to gut government programs and taxes. Vice-presidential candidate, Sarah Palin, a Tea Party person herself, was heavily influenced by Dominionism in both her politics and her theology. Finally, the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) embraces Dominionist theology while rejecting Rushdoony’s goal of Mosaic law. However, they still believe that the laws of the United States must be based upon biblical law if it is to become God’s chosen land and its people God’s chosen people (see my “Beware the Mask of Fascism” for a more detailed account). The NAR also believes that apostles and prophets are the leaders of their church. These people “can receive new revelations and give that revelation to their followers” (“The quiet rise of Christian dominionism”). One of their prophets is Lance Wallnau who announced that God revealed to him that Trump was the new Cyrus based upon Isaiah 45, a foreign King who helped the Jews build the second temple and who they called a Messiah, translated “Christ” in Greek (God’s Chaos Candidate: Donald J. Trump and the American Unraveling). Wallnau was one of Trump’s advisors during his presidency and was one of the religious leaders that helped endear Trump to the fundamentalist and evangelical world. Trump, sounding very Dominionist with his disdain of the federal government and his racist discourse, embraces the idea that the United States is God’s chosen land because it puts him in good stead with fundamentalist and evangelical Christians. And his “Making America Great Again” logo feeds this belief.
While Rushdoony’s thought was postmillennialist, meaning that Christians must first build God’s kingdom before Christ will return, most fundamentalist and evangelical Christians are premillennialist, meaning Christ will first return and then establish God’s reign on earth. Postmillennial scenarios, however, are not foreign to the civil religion of the United States. Ladner (2020) notes: “In the United States, Protestantism has historically been underpinned by such postmillennial beliefs. Christians, acting as God’s agents in history, are called to improve the state of society. Laws to protect workers’ rights and strict regulations on child labor, the push for the abolition of slavery, the civil rights movement—these are all fruits of postmillennial beliefs.”
This vision, however, is not shared by Dominionists, and this is the second point I’d like to make about their beliefs. The reconstructed society imagined by Dominionists is one where government is greatly limited because they think the government enslaves us and robs us of our freedom. If Dominionists have their way, government would no longer be responsible for “laws that govern public safety, social programs (including public schools and welfare), or just about anything else” (Ladner, 2020). The laws created by the government would be replaced with biblically based laws. Sounding hyper-libertarian, the only role for government would be to protect private property and mete out capital punishment, which is broadly applied to “17 different offenses ranging from blasphemy, witchcraft, worshipping false gods and propagating false doctrine to sodomy, juvenile delinquency and adultery” (Conn, J., 2011, Dominionism and democracy: religious right radicals’ growing role in the presidential election sparks a debate over what kind of America they want, Church & State, October, p.11a).
What Dominionists are imagining is the overturn of our democracy. The more extreme Dominionists advocate the complete overthrow of the U.S. government. According to them, “just” citizens are those who “comply with Biblically defined notions of citizenship (i.e., male head of household, essentially restricting the vote to Christian paterfamilias}” (Benedetti, “Dominionist Policy Goals,” 2023, pp. 9ff.). The more moderate Dominionists advocate radical modification of the government and supporting the “true” Constitution, which is one that establishes Christian Dominionism as the religion of the United States. The Constitution, then, will conform to and be interpreted by the laws of the Bible.
The consequences of this “reconstruction” are spelled out by Ladner (2020): [S]ociety would be reconstructed so that the male-headed family and local church fulfill the roles that currently belong to the government, which would have the authority only to protect private property and punish capital offenses. Families and churches, as the cornerstones of the reconstructed society, would implement Mosaic law, with Christ as king over what would have become a Christian nation. Without government welfare, churches would carry the responsibility of aid to the poor, and without public schools, families would be responsible for their own children’s education. The economy would operate without any government regulation, meaning present laws requiring the integrity of consumer goods, protecting workers’ rights, and disallowing exploitative financial practices would no longer be in effect. Because in a reconstructed America Christians would have brought God’s kingdom to earth through the implementation of Mosaic law, these protections would not be necessary.
Politically, she notes, the Religious Right under President Reagan were preparing for the end of the world; Dominionists are looking to take it over, and they are having greater success than one might think.
If you have spoken to someone who has been influenced by this mindset, you probably noticed several things about their discourse. First, they think that the United States is in a miserable state of decay even though statistics show that violent crime has decreased in most major cities, the stock market has reached unprecedented levels, inflation is low, and unemployment also is low. These factors would suggest that while the United States has many challenges that need to be overcome, things are pretty good for many. And if, as the Dominionists are wanting to do, we ask if things now are better than they were four years ago, I think we have to say “yes.” Four years ago, we were in the midst of a terrifying pandemic, which took the lives of millions of people, tanking the economy as it wreaked destruction. Yes, while the United States has some problems, it seems that we are certainly heading in the right direction. But Dominionists don’t think so. Why?
Even if we overcame all social ills and inequalities in the United States and everyone were free to realize their dreams, the Dominionists would still insist that we are on a path of decay and debauchery. They have to. It is part of their theology. The only way, they believe, things could be made right was if the United States were reconstructed and became a “Christian” nation as defined by Dominionism. If the laws of the United States were based on biblical law and the structure of government were completely gutted, if public education were shut down and home schooling and Christian schools prevailed, if white men were elevated to their God-given place of power and women “knew their place,” if persons of color were once again relegated to the margins of society by stripping them of their citizenship and taking away their right to vote, if abortion were completely banned and deemed a capital crime, if LGBQ+ folks are criminalized, and finally, if the Dominion-believing Churches took over all welfare responsibility for those they deem fit, then and only then—if all of these things were to become a reality—would the Dominionist think the United States was on the right track.
Does this narrative sound familiar to you? It should. It is basically the platform of the GOP and if Trump is reelected, the GOP hopes to put into place the reforms outlined in “Project 2025,” which according to a PBS article was created by the Heritage Foundation and fueled by former Trump administration officials. According to PBS, this nearly 1,000 page document “is essentially a government-in-waiting for the former president’s second term — or any candidate who aligns with their ideals and can defeat President Joe Biden in 2024” (“Conservatives aim to restructure U.S. government and replace it with Trump’s vision”).
Trump does not appear to be an evangelical Christian, and his lifestyle certainly is not in keeping with the values that most Christians advocate. However, he is the golden boy of the Religious Right, the group most influenced by Dominionist ideology. Trump, however, needs the vote of fundamentalists and evangelicals. It was their votes that propelled him to the presidency in 2016. With all of his court problems, one of which found him guilty for sexually assaulting and defaming a woman, some of these folks are beginning to have second thoughts. They may not vote for Trump, which might mean a second term for President Biden and the Project 2025 reconstruction of the United States would have to wait. To bring these folks back into the fold, Trump had an idea. He and longtime supporter Lee Greenwood would team up to support the “God Bless the USA Bible.” This is the horribly inaccurate translation of the Bible called the “King James Version,” sandwiched between documents of the “Founding Fathers” and a handwritten and signed copy of Lee Greenwood’s song “God Bless the USA,” which certainly seems in keeping with Dominionism, and is why so many are upset by it. In a 3-minute ad, Trump is shown holding the Bible claiming that he loves the Bible, and everyone needs to own and read it if America is to be great again. He also says he loves this book making one wonder if it has miraculously replaced his copy of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf, which his ex-wives say has a place of prominence on his nightstand (Trump’s New Line of Work: Bible Salesman). In this ad, he acts as if he were a committed Christian while he hawks his Bible for 60 bucks. Lee Greenwood, a longtime supporter of Trump and himself a conservative Christian who seems to support a Dominionist agenda, minimizes the controversy surrounding Trump’s endorsement by referring to detractors as “Trump haters,” and suggesting that anyone who complains about this Bible is a religion hater, which, he says, not even those on the left qualify as (Lee Greenwood hits back at critics of ‘God Bless the USA’ Bible sales: ‘Trump haters’).
While reception of this Bible has been one of irritation and anger by progressives even those on the right have reservations. On the one hand, Tony Perkins, the president of the Washington-based Christian conservative advocacy organization, Family Research Council, thinks its great if it brings more people to read the Bible. On the other hand, Andrew T. Walker, an ethics and public theology professor at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, holds “fusing America’s founding documents with the Word of God is a syncretistic expression of civil religion that goes farther than what those who love their country — and, more importantly, for those who love their Bibles — should ever allow.,” and he goes on to say, “To put matters bluntly, a Bible like this should never have been made,” Walker wrote. “That is not because I’m anti-Bible or anti-Constitution. Actually, I am very much in favor of both. They fuel both my heavenly citizenship and my earthly citizenship. But fusing the two in the name of religious-civic identity can quickly become a form of identity politics for the political right (“Trump’s Bible endorsement draws mixed reactions from Christians: ‘Syncretistic expression’”). While my theology, philosophy, and politics are probably miles away from that of Walker, I firmly agree that blurring the line between theology and politics risks creating a State where freedoms are denied including one’s right to worship as they see fit. Indeed, erasing the Constitutionally established line between Church and State is one of the first and most definitive moves to becoming a fascist state.
My friend thought singing Lee Greenwood’s song “God Bless the USA” was an act of patriotism. It wasn’t for me because the song stands squarely in the tradition of Dominionism, a theological ideology that looks towards Dominionist theologians taking dominion over the United States, and through the United States, the world. That is a frightening thought that promises to destroy many of our Constitutionally guaranteed rights and further marginalize those segments of society that have so gallantly fought to assure that our Constitution is also their founding document assuring that women have the right to decisions regarding their own bodies, persons of color have a right to achieve their dreams without prejudice, that people are not persecuted because of their sexuality, that all people living in the United States have the right to determine what God they wish to worship if any, and that no one can categorically tell us which religious text will make America great again. Yes, that song offends every philosophical, theological, and political bone in my body and with good reason, and if I would have had the opportunity, I would have explained to my friend why.
