Human beings search for meaning and fulfillment in life. That’s how we’re made. And every so often, we are uplifted in a moment of beauty or love or mystery or excitement, but then the moment is over and the search returns. It’s a simple process, really. We enter this world, and as we try to organize the sensations that come our way, we create an interpretive network of assumptions based on the past, and expectations as we face the future. Inevitably and universally, we transition from seeing the world as it is into what we think it is, thereby losing touch with reality. Encased in our private perceptions, our relationships with nature and with other persons can easily become less than fulfilling, and we begin to feel that something is missing in our life, as indeed it is. How could it be any other way? We have broken the bond of oneness that ties us all together and entered our own little world.

This existential feeling that something is missing in our life is expressed neurologically in decreased dopamine, one of the magical “feel good” chemicals that so changes our mood. Produced by our brain in greater quantity when we engage in pleasant behavior, we feel the lack of it when things are not going so well, such as when the search for meaning is coming up empty, a situation we do not enjoy. The void is not a happy place to be. And so we work to fill the hole and escape the emptiness. The fillers, or escapes, if you will, are manifold. TV. cell phones. Food. Extreme sports. Violence. Money. Sex. All of these and more will increase the dopamine for a time, but only a time.

White Christian Nationalism [wcn] falls into this same category of dopamine creation. WCN is a great escape that offers to fill the void with a variety of promises and stimuli, including: a sense of power and self righteousness, the belief that god is on your side and that you have joined forces with divine power, a sense that a cosmic battle is raging which will inevitably include violence and victory, the belief that a messiah has been sent to lead the charge, and a promise of fulfillment has been given.  Furthermore, you are not alone. A community of true believers stands by your side. The dopamine rages, and you refuse to give it up. Your color and your nation feed the incessant hunger for meaning, albeit with delusion and self-destruction.

The combination of race, god and country is nothing new, but that does not make it any less terrifying. Throughout history, civil religion has emboldened the madmen of major nations, and it should come as no surprise that it is awakening here in the US. The evidence is abundant, and is documented in a recent study [Salon, Feb 11, 2022]. We must not underestimate the power of a committed few to disrupt if not destroy life for the many. Four hundred truckers tied up the Canadian capital city of Ottawa.

Inasmuch as the movement has hijacked the name “christian”, the task of the Christian [capital C] church is clear. For too long the focus of church attention has been on the attrition in membership and what to do about it. It is time to fully recognize that it makes no difference whether one is secular or religious, and also time to proclaim that what matters is not what one believes, but whether one does good or not. The task of the church is to join hands with everyone who seeks to enhance the oneness of all that is, and to disassociate from all those who do not. WCN is not only a total perversion of everything Jesus, it is also a present danger to everyone that must be fought.

The fight can take place in the apparatus of public behavior. No more stars and stripes in the front of the sanctuary. No more worship services in the park on Independence day. No more hymns of nationalism. It can also take place psychologically and theologically. If people can be helped to understand how they are egocentric and how they search for meaning in the wrong places, then perhaps a new path is possible. If people can be helped to understand that the god they profess is not the God of Jesus, that no man is the messiah, and that God blesses all people, not just America, then perhaps WCN can be overcome. The church has a job to do, and that quite simply is to speak truth to perversion.