Training materials produced by the Florida Department of Education direct middle and high school teachers to indoctrinate students in the tenets of Christian nationalism, a right-wing effort to merge Christian and American identities.
As a Christian, I have come to abandon the "church" because of this kind of maneuvering to inject the bible into government. I believe with every fiber of my being that these people have a corrupted belief system that is 100% political with no real connection to the message of Jesus. The real goal here is power, and as any student of history knows - power is the most corrupting influence of all.
Seems to me the framers of the constitution knew this when they took care to separate church and state, using language to imply "to each his own" when it came to matters of faith.
As Alice noted, Jesus would never have defined a Christian, but his overriding message seemed to be love for/service to others (especially children and strangers), and forgiveness because all are imperfect but worthy of forgiveness. I also think it's interesting that acquisition of wealth and judging others were both viewed negatively.
One detail that gets overlooked is that “Christian” is not really a religion. Religions are usually characterized as SYSTEMS of practice and belief. They’re based around some consistent interpretation of their foundational scripture and tradition. It means something to be a Lutheran vs Catholic vs Quaker. Modern Christianity has become more of a “choose your own adventure”. It’s loosely based upon the Bible (setting aside the questions of which version and which translation) and cherry picking verses that suit your mood. The deeper analysis of its totality, which recognized denominations have been doing for centuries, is largely missing.
Right now I am reading a book on Strongmen leaders, and before that was reviewing hundreds of years of German and European history with my daughter, and it strikes me that the amount of wars and cruelty fought over various Christianities alone, and about other religions was the very opposite of the intention of the teachings of Jesus. This struggle between the Catholics and Protestants is well illustrated by author Ken Follett in his Kingsbridge trilogy. I just reread The Column of Fire, the last of the Trilogy. People were dying for their beliefs because of their differing vision of what their God wanted of them.
Excellent point! This is exactly why, despite an abiding belief in and gratitude for the recorded teachings of Jesus, I no longer affiliate with any church or religious denomination, which seem to be modified by the preferences or whims of men. For me, the beauty of America's constitution is the freedom for each of us to individually embrace the principles of our faith and beliefs.
Jesus was Jewish, as you know. He never even thought of a "Christian" terminology. He preached the teachings of the Torah. Everything he said was a quote or story from the Torah...
These people worship a very WEAK God. So weak in fact, that they think God has to have them do the dirty work, so weak that Jesus' teachings are weak. So weak that they know more of what God wants and requires than God does.
The similarity is the result of their common origin with Abraham and the Old Testament. At their progressive edges, forces for good; at their centers, rife with dogma and superstition, and right of center, simply evil.
Christian nationalism is like a leaky basement. Nothing to worry about at first, just some water running across the floor. Then, after some time, a few cracks appear in the walls. Then, the house falls and you wonder why you didn’t pay more attention. These folks will stop at nothing, including supporting Trump, to have their beliefs written into law and taught in every school in the nation. They ultimately seek a theocracy. Thirty states have passed aa juiced up version of the 1993 Federal “Religious Liberty Restoration Act.” A Georgia bill that laid dormant for 8 years was revived in February 2024 and is working its way through the statehouse. Opponents fear it would enable private employers to deny benefits (or otherwise interfere in personal healthcare decisions) based on their religious beliefs. Conservatives control 27 state governments, plus they own the US Supreme Court. They’re empowered and will stop at nothing!
Please, remember that the bottom line of the Christian Nationalism rests on racism and some form of orthodox dogma. The believers and promoters find their self worth in being Caucasian and in having the rights to dictate what others can and cannot do. Their movement to influence education (and all other areas of life) is obviously dangerous to the well-being of our "free" society, the place that all nations want to send their children to for their higher education. If you haven't noticed, our universities are filled with Chinese and Indian and Middle Eastern nations (Saudi Arabia, Morocco et al). [The Chinese usually stick to themselves and study the STEM courses, not the arts or history.]
Of course they cherry pick their facts--the mark of the poorly educated. You found wonderful sources in Amanda Taylor, Robert P. Jones, Mindee Washington, Andrew Whitehead, and others. Thank you so much for your presentation and intensive research.
Oh my. If there is such a thing as God, may he/she help us. Separation of church and state means EXACTLY THAT. No God in government, couldn’t have been stated plainer. I would venture that I lead a moral life (more so than these proselytizing folks) and I don’t believe in the concept of God for myself. I am fine with others believing for themselves. Leave me and government alone.
These people consider The Handmaid's Tale an instructional manual for their ideal society. Of course each imaginer sees themselves as one of the future select few, a righteous leader, who gets all the perks. They are willfully blind to the fact that they would all be just another peon in any such society.
How the odious uber wealthy DeVos' and Carlson's and Musk's of the world have managed to convince the MAGA hoi polloi to carry their water is a social psychology study for the ages.
"Florida Department of Education" is the taxpayer funded state board, correct? It's not some right-wing independently funded group with a deceptive name, correct? If so, taxpayers are funding bribes to groom fascism.
To your point, at a Homeschool Convention in Orlando, Ron showed up (never thought he'd step foot in Orlando) and offered some wisdom. He gloats about the voucher program and said " we don't want kids in schools (public) for 8 hrs a day so they can be indoctrinated". I kid you not. Biggest douche in Florida and will single handedly set these kids back 20 years. This other nonsense of Civics Education and offering them $3K to attend is a gross misuse of public funds. It is professional indoctrination, nothing more.
It's is definitely "some right-wing PUBLICLY funded group with a deceptive name," and taxpayers are absolutely funding bribes to groom fascism, because that's what happens in GQP controlled states now. We are entirely subject to minority rule, unless we can turn things around in the November elections.
How can these deranged zealots be prevented from turning the USA into a theocracy? Most Americans probably do not see anything wrong with this. If most Americans want this, it can happen (see Florida), Constitution be damned.
Folks with different values have to vote in overwhelming numbers to be sure these zealots are not in positions to indoctrinate both teachers and students.
The accountability lies with the voters, not with a political party. Too many voters have simply tuned out of politics (for a variety of reasons) and failed to support candidates opposing the GOP. Democrats have had to choose (not always wisely) where to invest their resources. However, they are certainly responsible for poor messaging and inferior candidates like Charlie Crist.
It's not most Americans, but it IS currently a series of carefully engineered minority control of critical offices, from School Boards, to Elections Commissioners, to State and US Congress, and the SCOTUS, plus the gradual bamboozling of Republican voters into buying into concepts that are antithetical to actual conservative values and voting against their own best interests. This is a conglomeration of projects of disparate right-wing extremist individuals and organizations, that took arguably 50 to 60 years to push the US consistently right-ward, until it reached a critical mass to produce the current disasterous-to-Democracy results.
They have very nearly locked the majority of voters out of the Democratic process. We have a very limited window to turn this around before their near complete institutional control moots the will of the individual voters. Vote in November, and vote for Democratic candidates from Dog Catcher to President.
Thank you for your fearless expert reporting. This is shocking and, really, unAmerican. I have long mourned the diminishment of real Civics classes in middle and high schools. Understanding what government is and does is crucial to our responsibility as citizens of a democrscy. Theocratic regimes are all mercilessly repressive.
Religion ruins the world. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. You don't need the threat of eternal damnation to be a good person while we're here. The truth is that nobody knows what comes before or after death, if anything, and we never will. The only logical view to have is: treat others the way you want to be treated and be the best person you can be while we're here in this life.
Thank you for covering this so thoroughly, Judd. It's vitally important that there be pushback against Christian Nationalism. One of my favorite organizations, Freedom From Religion: https://ffrf.org/ fights the notion that our country's founding was intertwined with Christianity.
Was hoping to see this comment, and I hope more people read it. There is no cultural competency around Judaism as it is, and the notion that “Judeo-Christian” has EVER been a real thing makes it that much worse. It’s truly just a cruel use of the Jews to lend credence to a set of beliefs, claiming legitimacy while discarding actual Jewish people and practices. The phrase makes my blood boil.
In 2006 or so, when Michelle Goldberg, now of The New York Times, published her book "Kingdom Coming," about the rise of the Christian Right in the U.S., I wrote a book review of it in which I warned that Christian Nationalism was going to get worse before it got better. Readers of my paper roundly ridiculed me for saying so. But to paraphrase Judith Miller, I have been proved effing right.
Christian Nationalism, right-wing propaganda notwithstanding, is the very antithesis of what the Framers envisioned for their new country, and the proponents of this curriculum must engage in all manner of mental gymnastics to propound their views. Those gymnastics range from the tendentious, as in their readingi of the George Washington quote, to outright lies. These people must be savagely defeated at the ballot box for us to keep and expand our freedoms.
"Savagely defeated at the ballot box..." is a fabulous phrase I will quote! It is absolutely descriptive of how I feel and hope this election proceeds!
I see the greatest irony in the ability of the "Christian" Right's leaders to grossly enrich themselves from their religiosity (with its undercurrent of racism and bigotry), building enormous, and enormously public, pseudo-religious business empires while living the most extravagant and un-Christian lifestyles. Yet their poorest constituents somehow see nothing wrong in this, and continue to pauper themselves donating to these conmen. The most egregious of them are the "Prosperity Gospel" sects, "God WANTS you to succeed!" They flaunt their lavish ill-gotten lifestyles as evidence of "God's love and approval," while convincing their parishioners that if they aren't rich it is because they themselves have failed God in some way, and if only they donate more and pray more they'll figure it out and turn their lives around!
Unless law enforcement catches their leaders out in overt criminality, we can't shut down these organizations, nor differentiate them from "real" churches, so we really need to tax all churches in such a way that really put the screws to these legalized criminal enterprises!
Religion is one thing. The second, I think, is aggressive proselytizing. Must the first inevitably lead to the second? I didn't used to think so, but come to think of it, missionaries have been a part of religion for centuries. This is the government being a missionary.
"...and all the founders were "steeped in the Judeo-Christian tradition." The abject stupidity of that quote is really all one needs to know about the author's knowledge of the primary writers of the constitution.
As a Christian, I have come to abandon the "church" because of this kind of maneuvering to inject the bible into government. I believe with every fiber of my being that these people have a corrupted belief system that is 100% political with no real connection to the message of Jesus. The real goal here is power, and as any student of history knows - power is the most corrupting influence of all.
Seems to me the framers of the constitution knew this when they took care to separate church and state, using language to imply "to each his own" when it came to matters of faith.
What would Jesus have said was the definition of Christian
As Alice noted, Jesus would never have defined a Christian, but his overriding message seemed to be love for/service to others (especially children and strangers), and forgiveness because all are imperfect but worthy of forgiveness. I also think it's interesting that acquisition of wealth and judging others were both viewed negatively.
One detail that gets overlooked is that “Christian” is not really a religion. Religions are usually characterized as SYSTEMS of practice and belief. They’re based around some consistent interpretation of their foundational scripture and tradition. It means something to be a Lutheran vs Catholic vs Quaker. Modern Christianity has become more of a “choose your own adventure”. It’s loosely based upon the Bible (setting aside the questions of which version and which translation) and cherry picking verses that suit your mood. The deeper analysis of its totality, which recognized denominations have been doing for centuries, is largely missing.
Right now I am reading a book on Strongmen leaders, and before that was reviewing hundreds of years of German and European history with my daughter, and it strikes me that the amount of wars and cruelty fought over various Christianities alone, and about other religions was the very opposite of the intention of the teachings of Jesus. This struggle between the Catholics and Protestants is well illustrated by author Ken Follett in his Kingsbridge trilogy. I just reread The Column of Fire, the last of the Trilogy. People were dying for their beliefs because of their differing vision of what their God wanted of them.
Excellent point! This is exactly why, despite an abiding belief in and gratitude for the recorded teachings of Jesus, I no longer affiliate with any church or religious denomination, which seem to be modified by the preferences or whims of men. For me, the beauty of America's constitution is the freedom for each of us to individually embrace the principles of our faith and beliefs.
Jesus was Jewish, as you know. He never even thought of a "Christian" terminology. He preached the teachings of the Torah. Everything he said was a quote or story from the Torah...
This cannot be said enough:
These people worship a very WEAK God. So weak in fact, that they think God has to have them do the dirty work, so weak that Jesus' teachings are weak. So weak that they know more of what God wants and requires than God does.
What do you expect. People create God in their own image.
Where's do they keep the golden calf?
At Mar-a-LARDO.
Yes, one of the many contradictions in common religious faith. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are similar in this respect.
https://michaelcornelison.substack.com/p/religion-is-evil
The similarity is the result of their common origin with Abraham and the Old Testament. At their progressive edges, forces for good; at their centers, rife with dogma and superstition, and right of center, simply evil.
Christian nationalism is like a leaky basement. Nothing to worry about at first, just some water running across the floor. Then, after some time, a few cracks appear in the walls. Then, the house falls and you wonder why you didn’t pay more attention. These folks will stop at nothing, including supporting Trump, to have their beliefs written into law and taught in every school in the nation. They ultimately seek a theocracy. Thirty states have passed aa juiced up version of the 1993 Federal “Religious Liberty Restoration Act.” A Georgia bill that laid dormant for 8 years was revived in February 2024 and is working its way through the statehouse. Opponents fear it would enable private employers to deny benefits (or otherwise interfere in personal healthcare decisions) based on their religious beliefs. Conservatives control 27 state governments, plus they own the US Supreme Court. They’re empowered and will stop at nothing!
Please, remember that the bottom line of the Christian Nationalism rests on racism and some form of orthodox dogma. The believers and promoters find their self worth in being Caucasian and in having the rights to dictate what others can and cannot do. Their movement to influence education (and all other areas of life) is obviously dangerous to the well-being of our "free" society, the place that all nations want to send their children to for their higher education. If you haven't noticed, our universities are filled with Chinese and Indian and Middle Eastern nations (Saudi Arabia, Morocco et al). [The Chinese usually stick to themselves and study the STEM courses, not the arts or history.]
Of course they cherry pick their facts--the mark of the poorly educated. You found wonderful sources in Amanda Taylor, Robert P. Jones, Mindee Washington, Andrew Whitehead, and others. Thank you so much for your presentation and intensive research.
Oh my. If there is such a thing as God, may he/she help us. Separation of church and state means EXACTLY THAT. No God in government, couldn’t have been stated plainer. I would venture that I lead a moral life (more so than these proselytizing folks) and I don’t believe in the concept of God for myself. I am fine with others believing for themselves. Leave me and government alone.
OMG! you mean you can have morals and be virtuous WITHOUT religion?! Bless you!
/s/
But that’s not what I read above!! But I think I’m moral without religion. Maybe even more than they are.
Oh, Jan, come on, how bad could it get? Look how well theocracy works for Iran. 😇
These people consider The Handmaid's Tale an instructional manual for their ideal society. Of course each imaginer sees themselves as one of the future select few, a righteous leader, who gets all the perks. They are willfully blind to the fact that they would all be just another peon in any such society.
How the odious uber wealthy DeVos' and Carlson's and Musk's of the world have managed to convince the MAGA hoi polloi to carry their water is a social psychology study for the ages.
Who paid the teachers $3000 to attend online training? I’d be furious if I were a Florida taxpayer.
We the taxpayers funded this diversion, because the Republicans rule the check book in Florida.:(((((
Great point! Wonder if making this information more widely known would impact the election??
"Florida Department of Education" is the taxpayer funded state board, correct? It's not some right-wing independently funded group with a deceptive name, correct? If so, taxpayers are funding bribes to groom fascism.
Idiot Republican voters who down ballot vote every time because they lack the education to read and comprehend..
I’d love to know how many Floridians know their tax dollars are going to this.
Yes, the Florida Dept of Education oversees the public schools. DeSantis has filled it with his caliber of Republicans. They’ve brought in a bunch of external Religious education consultants who are pushing alternative facts and Bible-based curriculums. They’ve completely dismantled New College…see https://www.tampabay.com/news/education/2023/07/05/desantis-florida-higher-education-stop-woke-individual-freedom-tenure-new-college-diversity/
To your point, at a Homeschool Convention in Orlando, Ron showed up (never thought he'd step foot in Orlando) and offered some wisdom. He gloats about the voucher program and said " we don't want kids in schools (public) for 8 hrs a day so they can be indoctrinated". I kid you not. Biggest douche in Florida and will single handedly set these kids back 20 years. This other nonsense of Civics Education and offering them $3K to attend is a gross misuse of public funds. It is professional indoctrination, nothing more.
It's is definitely "some right-wing PUBLICLY funded group with a deceptive name," and taxpayers are absolutely funding bribes to groom fascism, because that's what happens in GQP controlled states now. We are entirely subject to minority rule, unless we can turn things around in the November elections.
How can these deranged zealots be prevented from turning the USA into a theocracy? Most Americans probably do not see anything wrong with this. If most Americans want this, it can happen (see Florida), Constitution be damned.
Folks with different values have to vote in overwhelming numbers to be sure these zealots are not in positions to indoctrinate both teachers and students.
A big challenge is having someone to vote for. Far too many positions are not being contested by Democrats or third parties.
And that is really a huge problem. How do we hold Democrats accountable for this?
The accountability lies with the voters, not with a political party. Too many voters have simply tuned out of politics (for a variety of reasons) and failed to support candidates opposing the GOP. Democrats have had to choose (not always wisely) where to invest their resources. However, they are certainly responsible for poor messaging and inferior candidates like Charlie Crist.
It's not most Americans, but it IS currently a series of carefully engineered minority control of critical offices, from School Boards, to Elections Commissioners, to State and US Congress, and the SCOTUS, plus the gradual bamboozling of Republican voters into buying into concepts that are antithetical to actual conservative values and voting against their own best interests. This is a conglomeration of projects of disparate right-wing extremist individuals and organizations, that took arguably 50 to 60 years to push the US consistently right-ward, until it reached a critical mass to produce the current disasterous-to-Democracy results.
They have very nearly locked the majority of voters out of the Democratic process. We have a very limited window to turn this around before their near complete institutional control moots the will of the individual voters. Vote in November, and vote for Democratic candidates from Dog Catcher to President.
Thank you for your fearless expert reporting. This is shocking and, really, unAmerican. I have long mourned the diminishment of real Civics classes in middle and high schools. Understanding what government is and does is crucial to our responsibility as citizens of a democrscy. Theocratic regimes are all mercilessly repressive.
Religion ruins the world. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. You don't need the threat of eternal damnation to be a good person while we're here. The truth is that nobody knows what comes before or after death, if anything, and we never will. The only logical view to have is: treat others the way you want to be treated and be the best person you can be while we're here in this life.
Thank you for covering this so thoroughly, Judd. It's vitally important that there be pushback against Christian Nationalism. One of my favorite organizations, Freedom From Religion: https://ffrf.org/ fights the notion that our country's founding was intertwined with Christianity.
I hate the couching of “Judeo-Christian” as though Jews and Christians have the same worldview. Nothing could be further from the truth!
Was hoping to see this comment, and I hope more people read it. There is no cultural competency around Judaism as it is, and the notion that “Judeo-Christian” has EVER been a real thing makes it that much worse. It’s truly just a cruel use of the Jews to lend credence to a set of beliefs, claiming legitimacy while discarding actual Jewish people and practices. The phrase makes my blood boil.
In 2006 or so, when Michelle Goldberg, now of The New York Times, published her book "Kingdom Coming," about the rise of the Christian Right in the U.S., I wrote a book review of it in which I warned that Christian Nationalism was going to get worse before it got better. Readers of my paper roundly ridiculed me for saying so. But to paraphrase Judith Miller, I have been proved effing right.
Christian Nationalism, right-wing propaganda notwithstanding, is the very antithesis of what the Framers envisioned for their new country, and the proponents of this curriculum must engage in all manner of mental gymnastics to propound their views. Those gymnastics range from the tendentious, as in their readingi of the George Washington quote, to outright lies. These people must be savagely defeated at the ballot box for us to keep and expand our freedoms.
"Savagely defeated at the ballot box..." is a fabulous phrase I will quote! It is absolutely descriptive of how I feel and hope this election proceeds!
I see the greatest irony in the ability of the "Christian" Right's leaders to grossly enrich themselves from their religiosity (with its undercurrent of racism and bigotry), building enormous, and enormously public, pseudo-religious business empires while living the most extravagant and un-Christian lifestyles. Yet their poorest constituents somehow see nothing wrong in this, and continue to pauper themselves donating to these conmen. The most egregious of them are the "Prosperity Gospel" sects, "God WANTS you to succeed!" They flaunt their lavish ill-gotten lifestyles as evidence of "God's love and approval," while convincing their parishioners that if they aren't rich it is because they themselves have failed God in some way, and if only they donate more and pray more they'll figure it out and turn their lives around!
Unless law enforcement catches their leaders out in overt criminality, we can't shut down these organizations, nor differentiate them from "real" churches, so we really need to tax all churches in such a way that really put the screws to these legalized criminal enterprises!
Religion is one thing. The second, I think, is aggressive proselytizing. Must the first inevitably lead to the second? I didn't used to think so, but come to think of it, missionaries have been a part of religion for centuries. This is the government being a missionary.
I didn't need another reminder that every election, at every level has consequences, but for those who might.
It's not hyperbole: this is dangerous and a threat to everything that really made America great.
"...and all the founders were "steeped in the Judeo-Christian tradition." The abject stupidity of that quote is really all one needs to know about the author's knowledge of the primary writers of the constitution.
Bruce, 🎯