Is conservative Christianity really that united?

[Khendra]

(Note: I hope that this is the right forum.  This post covers both political and theological conservatism.)

Hi all.  I'm almost 38 now, and I have so many thoughts to gather these days now that I have a seven month old whom I want to raise with some semblance of sanity in this society.  It's got me to pondering matters like, is conservative Christianity really that united?

Other than broad agreement on matters like abortion, homosexuality, and trans issues, I've learned over the last few years (much to my surprise) that conservative Christianity is all over the place.  Members of different upbringings or denominations can think the other is outright Satanic.

On a sub-forum for Christian mothers at the What To Expect forums, for example, there are some members there who think Catholics -- no matter how conservative (Matt Walsh, Clarence Thomas, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett, to name a few) -- just aren't Christian, period.  That goes further than even what my fellow WELS Lutherans believe -- we have this controversial doctrine where the office of the pope is viewed as antichrist, but we still think there are genuine believers within Catholicism, even though we think they're in great doctrinal error in other matters (Mary veneration, etc.).  They're still trinitarian and mostly orthodox in other important doctrinal matters, so we always hesitate to "condemn" them.  Many Baptists, on the other hand, are VERY quick to condemn Catholics as unbelievers, even if they agree on the typical conservative Christian topics like abortion, homosexuality, and trans issues.

Mormons are another group usually condemned.  In WELS, we think Mormons and JW are too outside doctrinal correctness to usually be considered Christians; we're much more skeptical of their believer status than Catholics.  However, Mormons are -- percentage-wise -- the MOST LIKELY to identify as, and vote, Republican of ANY "Christian" denomination in the United States.  I remember Jordan Niednagel, theologically conservative Calvinist, once chiding some fellow Calvinist friends of his for not being as outwardly moral as the Mormons are.

Speaking of morality, there's division as to what constitutes works-based righteousness in American Protestantism as well.  I've explained here before how I was raised in a fairly live-and-let-live environment, despite my parents identifying as conservative, and me being homeschooled.  We didn't really identify with any group -- my parents left WELS when I was a little girl, and we never attended church consistently after that -- my parents just studied the Bible and came to their own conclusions (which included some false predictions about the End Times, and some beliefs in miracles that never took place, such as raising the dead and being healed from diseases).  But morality wasn't something they focused much upon.  In my teenage years, I ran around in short hair, suits and ties, and weird makeup, and I looked at pics of naked guys for hours, but they didn't think that was a big deal.  My dad has also always liked women who were bold, opinionated, great at business, loved sports, and were talented in the arts.  My mom passed away a few years ago, but his girlfriend of the last few years is very much like my mom.  My dad doesn't like women who are passive, sentimental, and fastidious.  He thinks they're boring.  Even though he's a Trump guy, he's NEVER been the authoritarian, moralistic type.  So I've always found it hard to relate to families where the conservative men are taught to be super authoritarian and moralistic, like in Vision Forum.  The Niednagels weirded me out with that stuff for years; it was very foreign to how I was raised.

Also, getting back to the End Times stuff a bit -- there's obviously a HUGE gulf between the pre-millennial sorts who usually think "the Rapture" is just around the corner, and the CREC post-millennial sorts who want to institute theocracy upon the lands.  Both of those groups can have authoritarians, moralists, and ultra-conservative types, but their eschatology does NOT mix.

Finally -- though there are many other issues I've not touched upon -- one last thing I want to mention is the response to COVID-19.  Trump REALLY shocked a lot of the conservatives when he supported the vaccines toward the end of his presidency.  Ben Carson did as well.  Even though vaccines are NEVER mentioned in the Bible, many of the "Biblicist" types used peer pressure to make antivaxx something of necessary requirement/"doctrine" to be a "real" Christian.  In many cases, it was elevated beyond traditional doctrines, such as the trinity!  I'm old enough to remember when antivaxx was a fringe thing, and never heard about it in Christian circles.  But now it's another issue dividing members, especially older ones who remember when polio was horrible.  In WELS, we're one of the few conservative denominations that didn't give into the antivaxx pressure.  We have a small number of those, but the official position -- and the one held by most members -- is that the vaxx isn't a big deal.

All to say, after those many examples (I could give more -- stuff about alcohol, dancing, rock music, and whatnot in the more moralistic denominations, stuff that LCMS or WELS Lutherans would never strongly object to, etc.), I just don't think conservative Christians are all that unified.  Yes, on some of the "big" issues they are, but I've now interacted with (and been a member of) enough groups to see that something like The Handmaid's Tale can't ever be instituted in the United States.  There are too many other divisions elsewhere among the various camps of conservative Christianity for us to come together.  I know I've been attacked/blocked by conservative Christians because I didn't think speaking in tongues was necessary (some Pentecostals think you HAVE to have this gift in order to be a "real" Christian), because I took the vaxx, because my dad let me marry an unbeliever, etc.  Heck, there are even some conservative Christians who are uncomfortable with Trump because of his lax morality (never mind his vaccine stance).

One thing I wish I'd learned earlier, and that I wish more Americans understood, is conservative Christianity isn't a monolith.  It took me a long time to find any kind of circle where I didn't get the message that my family and I were complete and weird outsiders.  I now consider myself only moderately conservative, and mostly theologically so.  I dumped the Republican party and moved onto the American Solidarity Party in 2020 because there's WAY too much fringe weirdness splintering the Republican party now, such as the conspiratorial madness that led to Jan. 6, and all that crazy white nationalism crap that's become all too mainstream in the last few years.

[47of74]

Sorry for the late response.  You’re right it’s not monolithic at all.  Pretty much the only thing keeping the Roman church allied with fundies is the desire to control women and their hatred of LGBTQ. Although the US branch is getting more fundie in recent years with some US bishops being climate deniers and being just shy of open defiance to the Pope.  Even within the US there are often regional differences. Sometimes even from parish to parish.  I’ve heard of more than one parish where the priest was pretty much yeah I gotta read this statement or publicaly support birth control but don’t care to know what the parishioners do in their bedrooms or what sort of medical procedures they all have while others want to know everything their parishioners do or say.

There’s also differences in educational requirements.  Some conservative churches want someone to go through years of formal education. Others the worship leader may just be a high school dropout who “found Jesus” and starts up a church but have no theological training at all and think the KJV is the original Bible. 

[47of74]

I meant publicly oppose birth control but turn a blind eye to parishioners using BC, getting snipped, etc. 

[Alisamer]

Honestly conservative christianity is fractured down to the family level in many ways. 

The thing is, conservatives (and republicans in general) will ally with literal nazis to get the big sweeping things done. While democrats and those on the left are debating over minutia and inclusive language trying to be the best and satisfy everyone, republicans and conservative christians will largely hold their noses and dive into the muck to go after the big goals. They don't care WHY someone is anti-abortion, or even if they are just saying they are for votes, they'll be like "yeah, come along!" Someone says they agree on a big issue (or hate the same group), and they'll be like "come vote with us" when you know full well they'd not speak to them in real life. That's a big part of why some of them supported Trump, at first. I think now there's some sort of mental derangement or something going around keeping them from breaking free of him, but originally it was "well, we know he wanted his mistress to have an abortion and paid off a porn star and is a genuine crook, but he'll vote against what we want him to vote against, so..."

They will join temporarily as a big monolith to get the big stuff on their wishlist done.

BUT. Once they succeed at those things, things will start to fracture again. Because conservative christians at the individual level will break off and form a new church for the smallest most inconsequential disagreements. They don't even have to be theological, it can literally be an argument about what color to paint the church sanctuary. Head deacon Bob is offended by the pastor's tie that has Easter eggs on it, and suddenly Bob is pastoring his own church and half the previous one left with him - after a couple months of heated gossip and tense church meetings. 

So. If they succeeded in forming essentially a theocracy, the splits will very quickly start to show and widen. I think the outliers like Mormons and JWs will be the first to be split off as "not the right kind of Christian". But it'll fracture on down. Catholic Vs. Protestant. Contemporary services vs. traditional services. Denomination vs. denomination. Dunk vs. sprinkle. Women allowed to speak, women not allowed to speak. 

Take a look at many of the churches the Rodrigues family and Bro Gary go to visit. 5-10 people attending in some of those, and nearly all of them from the same family. I grew up Baptist and occasionally attend (a quite liberal, considering) Baptist church and the interim pastor always says if you ask 2 Baptists a theological question you'll get 3 opinions. 

Conservative Christians are only a monolith when they need to be to get their agenda items done. 

They all think all the others are going to hell in a hand basket, but they'll smile and line up with them to pack the Supreme Court or ban abortion or oppress immigrants. Then go home and gossip about how all those other varieties of Christian are hell-bound heathens. 

[47of74]

16 minutes ago, Alisamer said:

Honestly conservative christianity is fractured down to the family level in many ways. 

The thing is, conservatives (and republicans in general) will ally with literal nazis to get the big sweeping things done. While democrats and those on the left are debating over minutia and inclusive language trying to be the best and satisfy everyone, republicans and conservative christians will largely hold their noses and dive into the muck to go after the big goals. They don't care WHY someone is anti-abortion, or even if they are just saying they are for votes, they'll be like "yeah, come along!" Someone says they agree on a big issue (or hate the same group), and they'll be like "come vote with us" when you know full well they'd not speak to them in real life. That's a big part of why some of them supported Trump, at first. I think now there's some sort of mental derangement or something going around keeping them from breaking free of him, but originally it was "well, we know he wanted his mistress to have an abortion and paid off a porn star and is a genuine crook, but he'll vote against what we want him to vote against, so..."

They will join temporarily as a big monolith to get the big stuff on their wishlist done.

BUT. Once they succeed at those things, things will start to fracture again. Because conservative christians at the individual level will break off and form a new church for the smallest most inconsequential disagreements. They don't even have to be theological, it can literally be an argument about what color to paint the church sanctuary. Head deacon Bob is offended by the pastor's tie that has Easter eggs on it, and suddenly Bob is pastoring his own church and half the previous one left with him - after a couple months of heated gossip and tense church meetings. 

So. If they succeeded in forming essentially a theocracy, the splits will very quickly start to show and widen. I think the outliers like Mormons and JWs will be the first to be split off as "not the right kind of Christian". But it'll fracture on down. Catholic Vs. Protestant. Contemporary services vs. traditional services. Denomination vs. denomination. Dunk vs. sprinkle. Women allowed to speak, women not allowed to speak. 

Take a look at many of the churches the Rodrigues family and Bro Gary go to visit. 5-10 people attending in some of those, and nearly all of them from the same family. I grew up Baptist and occasionally attend (a quite liberal, considering) Baptist church and the interim pastor always says if you ask 2 Baptists a theological question you'll get 3 opinions. 

Conservative Christians are only a monolith when they need to be to get their agenda items done. 

They all think all the others are going to hell in a hand basket, but they'll smile and line up with them to pack the Supreme Court or ban abortion or oppress immigrants. Then go home and gossip about how all those other varieties of Christian are hell-bound heathens. 

Reminds me a bit of the Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX) in the Roman church.  That was started by the extremely conservative French Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre in 1970 because he disagreed with Vatican II and the new vernacular Mass.  He eventually got kicked out of the mainstream Roman church  when he decided to consecrate four new bishops without the Pope's permission even after the mainstream church tried a number of things to make him happy, none of which worked.  But it turned out he was too liberal for some of his priests.  They formed their own movement called the Society of Saint Pius V (SSPV).  Their main beef was having to use the 1962 Roman Missal which among other things removed the adjective perfidis in describing the Jewish people in the Good Friday prayers. 

 

[Pecansforeveryone]

Conservative Christianity has only ever been thinly united, and then only over people and ideas to hate, not a Jesus to love. It's part what will stop them from ever fully being able to have the conservative Christian utopia of their dreams.