This is the fifth post in a series exploring how evangelical Christians in the U.S. have reached this point politically and culturally. See below for links to previous posts.
As we saw previously, by the early 1990s evangelical Christians—especially white evangelical Christians—were overwhelmingly conservative politically and loyal to the Republican Party. They drew most of their political and cultural views from right-wing radio shows, both Christian and secular, and their tone and demeanor were increasingly formed by these media as well.
The presidential candidacy of Bill Clinton revealed some exceptions to this seemingly impregnable bond between evangelicals and the GOP. Bill Clinton ran as a moderate Democrat, noticeably different in many ways from Democratic candidates of the recent past at that time. Many evangelical Christians—who assumed all Christians would support a conservative Republican candidate—were shocked to hear some of their friends from church expressing support for Clinton. Many wondered (and asked out loud): How can a faithful Christian support a Democrat? It also became evident, to those who took the time to notice, there were obvious differences between the political views and perceptions of most white evangelicals and most black evangelicals.
The views of Christians regarding Clinton came into much greater focus in 1998, when his presidency was rocked with scandal. Clinton eventually had to acknowledge an inappropriate sexual relationship with a young intern, Monica Lewinsky. There was immediate and virtually universal condemnation by evangelical leaders of this shocking behavior. (By this time, evangelicals could watch the news and political commentary from a pointedly conservative perspective on TV.)
The Southern Baptist Convention (Clinton’s own denomination) passed a strongly worded “Resolution on Moral Character of Public Officials.” In this statement, they noted “many Americans are willing to excuse or overlook immoral or illegal conduct by unrepentant public officials so long as economic prosperity prevails,” but continued “Tolerance of serious wrong by leaders sears the conscience of the culture, spawns unrestrained immorality and lawlessness in the society, and surely results in God’s judgment (1 Kings 16:30; Isaiah 5:18-25).” The statement concluded by saying:
[W]e urge all Americans to embrace and act on the conviction that character does count in public office, and to elect those officials and candidates who, although imperfect, demonstrate consistent honesty, moral purity and the highest character.
James Dobson released a public letter expressing many of the same convictions:
How foolish to believe that a person who lacks honesty and moral integrity is qualified to lead a nation and the world! Nevertheless, our people continue to say that the President is doing a good job even if they don’t respect him personally. Those two positions are fundamentally incompatible. . . . We are facing a profound moral crisis—not only because one man has disgraced us—but because our people no longer recognize the nature of evil.
The majority of white evangelical leaders called openly for the president to be impeached, and this was the view of most ordinary evangelical Christians at the time, as well. Many would still see this as an appropriate response to a president who had committed blatant evil, and who had attempted to obstruct justice to hide what he had done.
But a great many evangelical Christians had already been going far beyond this kind of (arguably) reasoned, balanced response. Long before this scandal, conspiracy theories about Bill Clinton had been spreading like wildfire among evangelicals, accusing him of everything from running a drug dealing enterprise when he was governor of Arkansas to murdering his deputy White House counsel. Books and videotapes were produced to spread the word about these heinous crimes allegedly perpetrated by the president of the United States.
To those who took the time to actually weigh the evidence cited, they found these accusations to be a house of cards, built on wild conjecture and innuendo. (None other than Ken Starr—the independent counsel who had exposed Clinton’s affair with Monica Lewinsky—debunked many of these conspiracy theories.) But too many Christians didn’t feel the need to fairly examine these accusations. The books and videotapes seemed powerfully convincing to them—and they confirmed what many suspected already about Clinton—so, many evangelicals believed these conspiracy theories and eagerly passed on the books, videotapes and accusations to others. This was, of course, blatant slander, something God condemns over and over again in Scripture in the strongest language. This was evil being perpetrated by those who claimed to be following Christ. But to many evangelicals, the greater urgency was to win against their enemy in this political and cultural war.
The 2000s brought the compassionate conservatism of George W. Bush’s presidency. Bush’s tone and the principles he articulated were similar in many ways to those of Ronald Reagan. Most evangelical Christians respected and supported Bush, but the ongoing war in Iraq and economic downturn in the U.S. caused many to be disillusioned with him to varying degrees by the end of his time in office. Not unlike the election of 1992, this resulted in some (although again a distinct minority of) white evangelical Christians voting for Barack Obama. This election also showed again real political dissonance between white and black evangelical Christians.
Whole books have been written about the Obama Administration, but there are two aspects I’d like us to especially note. It’s easy for those who tend to be politically progressive to not appreciate how radically the culture changed during the Obama years. We could discuss different examples of this change, but the most iconic—to those on the right and the left—would be the legalization of same-sex marriage in the Supreme Court case of Obergefell v. Hodges in 2015. In 2008, when Obama was first running for president, he opposed same-sex marriage. This was a common position among Democratic leaders at that time. By 2012, Obama had changed his view. Many of these changes in society happened incredibly fast from a historical perspective.
One can understand how these rapid, significant, cultural changes caused real alarm among more traditional, conservative people, including evangelical Christians. A commonly heard sentiment during this period was: I don’t even recognize my country anymore. A lot of conservatives felt increasingly helpless in the face of great cultural change. Whether or not you agree with their views, you can understand how they might feel disorientated and even bitter. The speed and scope of these cultural changes made a conservative backlash more likely.
In the last decade we’ve been introduced to the phrase: Trump Derangement Syndrome. I assume I don’t need to define this expression, and I’m only observing it now as a frequently mentioned concept. We sometimes have short memories regarding syndromes of the past. Whatever our feelings now about “Trump Derangement Syndrome,” we tend to forget a fairly pervasive Obama Derangement Syndrome in right-wing culture and in many evangelical churches during the Obama Administration.
Now, I’m not talking about the usual discussion and debate of policies and significant decisions. Opposition to and criticism of a president is to be expected. I’m talking about the seemingly endless outrage over a president having the temerity to appear in public wearing a (gasp!) . . . tan suit. I’m talking about the wild conspiracy theories—which many evangelical Christians helped spread—claiming Obama was secretly controlling the weather; that he was building concentration camps under Walmarts; that he was going to declare martial law and use FEMA to round up and imprison Americans . . . possibly as a precursor to turning over control of the U.S. to the United Nations . . . who would be sending in black helicopters to subdue American communities.
None of this was remotely true, but it was commonly discussed as real threats by many evangelical Christians. They passed on these conspiracy theories interspersed with more casual criticism of Barack and Michelle Obama, sharing stories (often exaggerated or untrue) about something they had done or said. By the way, it shouldn’t make any difference, but I’m not writing this as a former supporter of Obama. I was politically opposed to Barack Obama during those years. But as a Christian and a pastor, I was horrified by the nature and tone of much of the opposition to Obama that I witnessed from my fellow evangelicals.
This irrational, trivial and/or baseless opposition began before Obama was elected. My family was politically conservative, and we enjoyed emailing each other about current events. One family member sent out an email pointedly referring to “Barack Hussein Obama,” claiming Obama wasn’t actually a U.S. citizen, and including other similar attacks. I noted in my response that Hussein is a common name in some cultural backgrounds. I don’t recall anyone making fun of King Hussein of Jordan’s name. This would be similar to ridiculing a German person in the 1940’s because their middle name happened to be the common German name Adolf. It’s silly and childish. The conspiracy theory regarding Obama’s birth certificate had already been thoroughly debunked even then. As I wrote to my family in response to this email: “We’re better than this! If we truly have the better principles and arguments, let’s use them. And if we win by lowering ourselves to these tactics, shame on us.”
A big part of the problem, though, is Christians were viewing this as war, and they just wanted to win! They weren’t concerned with being loving, gentle and respectful, or even being fair and truthful. They viewed Obama as the enemy, and they had to do whatever it took to defeat the enemy. The ends justified the means, so who cared whether or not something was actually true. And . . . you know, it’s . . . probably . . . true—so just go ahead and forward that email (or text or post or . . .), go ahead and repeat that—possibly slanderous—rumor. Because our enemies are the bad guys and they have to lose. And we can fail to see how we’re falling into blatant evil, completely contrary to the way of Christ, the way of truth.
A serious concern shared by many evangelical pastors and leaders is how much evangelical Christians have become susceptible to conspiracy theories. Maybe we always were. This is a problem we’ve seen involving both negative and positive claims. Over the years, I’ve heard many breathless reports telling about some guy in South America supposedly raising hundreds of people from the dead! I always ask the same question: Have you checked this out? I haven’t had one person say they had done the research to verify or falsify this claim. Many people just believe it because they want to believe it. It sounds to them like something that’s true, so they assume it is. And if they hear someone on a podcast or see someone on a YouTube video confidently asserting this happened, then, to them, it’s certain.
This tendency is even stronger when someone’s telling us something we want to believe about someone we don’t like or trust. When I’ve pushed back on this kind of conspiracy theory, asking for hard, verifiable evidence, the response is often: “Well, it sounds like something they’d do.” Maybe so, but suspicion isn’t evidence. We can also miss how mutually incompatible our conspiracy theories are, how they’re often in conflict with one another. A family member would faithfully forward to me articles revealing “the truth” about Obama (not realizing some of these articles were labeled “satire”). I finally had to gently point out that, if all these claims about Obama were true, it meant he was a gay, communist Muslim! As I explained, I don’t think that works! But we’re often so quick to believe the worst about our enemies, we don’t stop and really think through the conspiracy theories about them.
These culture war conspiracy theories were prevalent among evangelicals in the 1990s under Bill Clinton, and they became an epidemic under Barack Obama. Yes, there were conspiracy theories on the left, too. But just because the other side does it doesn’t justify evangelical Christians (on the right or the left) believing and passing on baseless conspiracy theories. This is toxic for our nation, it creates greater animosity and division between people, and it destroys our witness as the church. Why should anyone believe us when we speak the truth of Christ after we’ve loudly spouted so much that is patently untrue?
We don’t realize how much this affects us. This us-versus-them, winner-take-all kind of combative spirit not only makes us accept really silly things as true, it also makes us less loving, less Christlike, and even cruel. During the Obama years, it was so disheartening to hear Christians laughing about the latest thing they had heard from Rush Limbaugh and others. Limbaugh aired a song mocking Obama titled Barack, the Magic Negro. He ridiculed Michelle Obama’s appearance and what she ate. Others on the right referred to Obama as “monkey man,” and to Michelle Obama as “gorilla face,” an “ape in heels,” etc. Alex Jones claimed she was actually a man. It doesn’t matter how opposed you are to someone politically, there’s nothing remotely appropriate or humorous about any of this. This is profoundly incompatible with spiritual maturity, the fruit of the Holy Spirit. Some evangelicals were embarrassed by this offensive, often racist mocking, but far too often it elicited snickers from evangelical Christians, and was spread to other evangelicals. It was seen as somehow acceptable because it was “owning the libs.” Tragically, even the children of some evangelicals I knew repeated some of these demeaning, racist comments.
Again, not all evangelicals fell into laughing at and repeating this moral garbage. And the left also has a long history of ridiculing and demeaning their political opponents. But no Christian should have any part of this repulsive, hateful rhetoric, no matter who it targets. And too much of what was spread by Christians wasn’t just insulting and offensive, it was blatant slander, passing on stories and accusations that were patently false.
There’s a story of a Jewish woman who had been spreading stories about the local Rabbi, not knowing whether these stories were true or not, but assuming they were. She discovered that what she had been saying about the Rabbi was not true. So she went to the Rabbi and confessed what she had done. The Rabbi instructed her to go home, take her feather pillow up to the roof, cut it open, and scatter the feathers in the wind. The woman did this, then reported back to the Rabbi, thinking her punishment was done. But the Rabbi told her, “Now, to show what it would take to undo the harm you’ve done, go and find every one of your feathers from your pillow and take them back.”
On December 14, 2012, a man shot and killed 20 small children and 6 faculty members of Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. Not long after this occurred, a conspiracy theory began to spread that this horrific event never actually took place. It was—people said—a hoax, a fake event, a false flag operation, staged for the benefit of gun control advocates and/or Obama. The children and staff were actors, and the “parents” were paid to lie to the public. There was never a shred of verifiable evidence of any of this, but a large number of people believed it, and spread these baseless accusations to others.
Now, put yourself in the place of one of the parents. You’ve experienced the unthinkable, the unimaginable. Your young, helpless child has been viciously killed where they should have felt completely safe, in their own elementary school. This precious life—your own little child—has been savagely ripped away from you. You now have to learn to somehow live with this loss, this tragic, aching, constant void in your life. Where once was laughter and love, is now only a haunting emptiness. But that’s not enough. No, you also have to deal with people seeking to profit from your loss by spouting ridiculous nonsense that this was all some kind of hoax, that you’re actually lying about your own dead child. Soon you have people accosting you in public, making your life even more of a living hell—because they believe some voice on the radio or some video they watched online. Wherever you are, you deal with people calling you, emailing you, commenting online, whispering as you pass, yelling outside your house, calling you a liar and worse. All while the child you love so much—the one who people maddeningly, ignorantly claim didn’t even exist—remains dead. And this doesn’t just last a few days or weeks, it goes on year after year after year after year. It never really stops. Now tell me . . . how can this harm be undone?
Who’s responsible for this? Who’s complicit in this added atrocity to what was already the unbearable loss of a child? Every single person who passed on this conspiracy theory to others. Everyone who told other people this was all a hoax, without bothering to check out the real, objective, easily verifiable evidence. Everyone who listened to people on the radio or online who told them lies that victimized people who were already tragic victims, and everyone who refused to listen to those who tried to tell them this was all lies. Everyone who still listens today to people who perpetrated this vicious outrage against those in horrible pain who had already suffered so terribly.
Many of those responsible for supporting these perpetrators and for spreading such vicious lies about these poor parents are evangelical Christians.
This is what culture war looks like; these are some of its victims.
This is not the way of Christ. It’s long past time for the church to repent, and repudiate any involvement with culture war and the spreading of conspiracy theories.
Evangelical Christians and Partisan Politics
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