Texas pastor Joel Webbon is a radical Christian nationalist who advocates something called general equity theonomy, a far-right Christian theology that asserts that laws and rules set out in the Old Testament still apply today. While those laws and rules may have originally applied to conditions and circumstances specific to the ancient Israelites, general equity theonomists assert that the general principles behind those rules ought to still be in effect today.

This idea was the driving force behind legislation unabashed Christian nationalist pastor and Oklahoma state Sen. Dusty Deevers introduced earlier this year that would have amended the law for "willfully, knowingly and without probable cause (making) a false report" alleging that someone committed a crime by changing the penalty so that those found guilty would face the same punishment that the falsely reported crime carries.

Filing a false report was already illegal in Oklahoma, but Deevers' wanted the legislation changed simply so that the punishment will be in accordance with the Bible, repeatedly citing the Bible's various "eye for an eye" provisions found in the books of Genesis, Exodus, and Deuteronomy. (...)

For almost as long as Donald Trump has been in politics, he's cast himself as a target of different forces - the deep state, the Democrats - and he talks about being persecuted. That rhetoric resonates deeply with members of his white evangelical Christian base. Candida Moss is a professor of theology at the University of Birmingham and is the author of "The Myth Of Persecution." It traces the theological history of persecution in Christianity. We talked about that history and how it plays out in Donald Trump's politics. Moss says she's not suggesting that religious persecution isn't real or even widespread, but she argues it's perceived in a particular way in America.

Donald Trump, a 77-year-old Bible salesman from Palm Beach, Florida, has emerged as the nation’s most prominent Christian leader. Trump is running for president as a divinely chosen champion of White Christians, promising to sanctify their grievances, destroy their perceived enemies, bolster their social status, and grant them the power to impose an anti-feminist, anti-LGBTQ, White-centric Christian nationalism from coast to coast. That Trump doesn’t attend church and has obviously never read the book that he hawks for $59.99, seems of interest exclusively to his political opponents.

What might catch the attention of some evangelical conservatives, however, is that Trump’s ostentatious embrace of White Christian militantism coincides with a precipitous decline in religious affiliation in the US. According to the Public Religion Research Institute, one-quarter of Americans in 2023 said they were religiously unaffiliated. “Unaffiliated” is the only religious category experiencing growth. In a single decade, from 2013 to 2023, the percentage of Americans saying that religion is the most important thing, or among the most important things, in their life plummeted to 53% from 72%. (...)