Illiberal Democracy meets Corrupted Christianity: Not a match made in Heaven

“These six things the LORD hates, Yes, seven are an abomination to Him: A proud look, A lying tongue, Hands that shed innocent blood, A heart that devises wicked plans, Feet that are swift in running to evil, A false witness who speaks lies, And one who sows discord among brethren.”
~ Proverbs 6:16-19

Out of the chaos and confusion of sinister social media fed culture wars, out of the rubble that is contemporary American politics, out of the shambles of what once passed for a ‘liberal democracy,’ we must now confess the critical role religion has played in getting us to this perilous place we now occupy, a democracy in decline. Perhaps more than at any other time in our history, now is the time for clear-eyed analysis of how the nefarious intersection of religion and politics is eroding the foundations of both institutions.

The reality, unsavory as it is for some who identify as ‘Christian’, is that without the votes of the many who also see themselves as faithful Christians and proud Patriots, D.J. Trump would never have set up shop in the White House in the first place, much less once again.

But before elaborating on the role of religion in this political moment, we should pause to define terms. In the first paragraph of this post I used the term ‘liberal democracy’ to describe the current model of government that is now in peril with the next Trump-on-steroids administration in D.C. According to Wikipedia, “Liberal democracy emphasizes the separation of powers, an independent judiciary, and a system of checks and balances between branches of government. Multi-party systems with at least two persistent, viable political parties are characteristic of liberal democracies. While liberal democracies protect individual rights and freedoms, illiberal democracies do not. Elections in an illiberal democracy are often manipulated or rigged, being used to legitimize and consolidate the incumbent rather than to choose the country’s leaders and policies.”

A prime example of illiberal democracy is Hungary under the authoritarian rule of Viktor Orban, who prides himself on coining the term, and who serves as Donald Trump’s role model. From the University of Virginia’s Democracy Initiative – Religion, Race & Democracy Lab, read the following and apply it to the direction that democracy in America may be headed if the system has just reached “the wrong conclusion.”

“The purpose of democracy is to confer political legitimacy. Political leaders are legitimate when democratically elected. Laws are legitimate when passed by valid democratic procedure.

But what happens when a democratic system reaches, so to speak, the wrong conclusion? How should we think of democratically elected leaders who are unfair or unjust? What if they pursue policies that undermine democracy itself?

Many nations are confronting these questions, but they are felt with special force in Hungary, whose relationship with democracy has never been more fraught. From the perspective of western liberals, the problems in Hungary begin and end with Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and his Fidesz Party, who have effectively turned the country into a one-party state.

But this was not the result of an authoritarian coup d’état. In fact, when Orbán returned to power in 2010 (he was Prime Minister once before, from 1998 to 2002), he had the overwhelming support of the electorate. He won in a landslide. This is precisely what allowed him to make fundamental changes to Hungary’s system of government, leading to the consolidation of his power. Ten years later, Orbán enjoys broad control over the press, election procedures, and the judiciary in Hungary. Given the direction of the country, did democracy in Hungary arrive at the wrong conclusion in 2010?

Many people do not think so. For one, Orbán is still popular in Hungary. He enjoys relatively high approval ratings, and the public supported his heavy-handed response to the coronavirus pandemic by wide margins. His precise degree of support is open to dispute, given that polling is often conducted by pro-government agencies like the Nézőpont Institute, but they are not inventing numbers out of thin air. He also won reelection in 2014 and 2018, with his Fidesz Party retaining a supermajority in Parliament after both elections. These results are also misleading to an extent, thanks to redistricting efforts in recent years that favor Orbán’s party. But he still legitimately won his bids for reelection; they were not sham victories in any literal sense. Orbán is not a universally reviled autocrat—far from it. Many Hungarians love him.

Orbán also has admirers abroad, including in the United States. He is especially popular among religious conservatives, who admire his explicit and enthusiastic insistence that Hungary is a Christian nation. Hungary’s purported Christian identity is even written into the country’s Constitution, another change that followed Orbán’s election in 2010.

So now Hungary is an “illiberal democracy.” This is Orbán’s description, not a critical epithet leveled by his detractors. It is illiberal because the government openly favors, in both its rhetoric and policies, one set of beliefs at the expense of others. Christianity, or rather a specific strand of conservative Christianity, enjoys a privileged status; it is first among unequals. And this arraignment is arguably just a reflection of the will of the Hungarian people. An illiberal democracy is still a democracy, after all.

Or is it? That is the question this piece explores.”

With Trump as an Orban wannabe on day one of his inauguration, this is the direction his administration will be heading, and Christian Nationalist zealots will be the wind in the sails of this ship of state with an autocratic rudder directed by Project 2025.

To see the interplay of Christian Nationalism with American politics, look at the results of a Pew Research Center survey conducted just before the election, and comprehend the tale they tell.
+ For Trump: 82% of White evangelical Protestants, 61% of White Catholics and 58% of White nonevangelical Protestants.
– For Harris: 86% of Black Protestants, 85% of atheists, 78% of agnostics, 65% of Hispanic Catholics and 65% of Jewish voters.

Compounding these statistics is the astounding reality that many of the MAGA faithful who who are staunch adherents of Christian Nationalism are convinced that God has favored them with God’s very own anointed ‘Messiah.’ Through a kind of reverse psychology/divine wisdom that only God can comprehend, God sent unto them a modern day ‘Cyrus,’ a pagan leader to restore the perceived greatness that once was America before ‘wokeness’ turned the nation into a ‘garbage can’ polluted by indecent, unAmerican immigrants, queers and other ‘low life’s’ tainting the purity of red-blooded Americans. As Christian Nationalist Stephen Miller, MAGA’s ‘High Priest’ of immigration and newly appointed deputy chief of policy proclaimed at the Trump MSG Rally, “America is for Americans and Americans only,.”

The intersection of pernicious politics and perverted religion is a deadly duo that seeks to divide and conquer in a no holds barred, ends justifies the means battle for absolute power. The ancient text from Proverbs that began this post provides us with a short list of those things that were then and still are today an abomination (vile, hateful, wicked) to God:
“A proud look, A lying tongue, Hands that shed innocent blood, A heart that devises wicked plans, Feet that are swift in running to evil, A false witness who speaks lies, And one who sows discord among brethren.”

That’s a nasty list that unfortunately checks off the negative qualities that history has recorded belonging to the man and his minions to whom America has handed over the reigns of democracy, the very qualities the book of Proverbs says God despises. Proverbs is an example of biblical wisdom literature that raises questions about values, moral behavior, the meaning of human life, and right conduct. Its theological foundation is that “the fear (reverence, respect) of God is the beginning of wisdom.”

The wisdom of Proverbs, the ministry of Jesus and now the sense of foreboding that accompanies the daily appointments by the incoming President of inept cronies to critical governmental positions calls to question the wisdom of the majority of American vote-casters. As we face a future fraught with the consequences of this decision, may we recall this bit of true wisdom from Booker T. Washington.

“A lie doesn’t become truth, wrong doesn’t become right, and evil doesn’t become good, just because it’s accepted by a majority.”