Three years have passed since the Jan. 6 riots at the Capitol, and much of the public’s initial horror at the violence has faded, at least on the right. Vote Republicans are less and less likely to view the January 6 rioters as “violent”; most now think it’s “time to move on.” Some insurgents even became martyrs Or folk heroes. And perhaps most tellingly, the new Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, was considered one of the primary architects behind the Stop the Steal movement.
Johnson’s more genteel political manner may not fit the image of an enraged mob storming the Capitol, but he has something in common with many January 6 supporters: a deep religious conviction in his own cause. In many ways, Johnson seems like a classic leader of the Christian right. His legal career has focused on elevating “religious freedom” protections above the rights of the LGBTQ community. On a more personal level, he clashes with traditional cultural benchmarks, for example by making his commitments at the wedding And avoid porn at the extremes. Scholars of the Christian right have called him a classic Christian nationalist.
But it is also something more recent. As reports from the fall showed, Johnson has deep connections to a movement called New Apostolic Reform – a network of politically ambitious church leaders, largely drawn from a kind of Christianity called neo-charismatic Pentecostalism. The leaders of the NAR (generally called “apostles”) were credited with stirring up the large and influential Christian nationalist contingent during the January 6 insurrection.
It can be difficult to keep up with all these movements and groups – Neo-Charismatic Pentecostalism, NAR, Christian Nationalism, etc. — and it can be tempting to dismiss this as a matter of right-wing Christians getting upset over Donald Trump. . But a new book, focusing on the political strategies of neo-charismatic Pentecostals, demonstrates that to truly understand the anti-democratic impulse of part of the Christian right, it is worth examining the segment that believes in a battle literal for the country between the supernatural forces of good and evil – the segment Johnson already has ties to.
The book is American evangelicals for Trump: domination, spiritual warfare and the end of times, written by André Gagné, professor and director of the department of theological studies at Concordia University in Montreal. It was first released for a French audience in 2020, and Gagné recently released an updated version for an English-speaking American audience.
To better understand how these neo-charismatic Pentecostals mobilized their religious influence to promote an anti-democratic agenda before January 6, and why it is important that the politically motivated leaders of this movement still have close ties to the Republican Party, Slate is interviewed with Gagné on Thursday. . This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.
Slate: Let’s start with Johnson and his connection to NAR. What is the New Apostolic Reformation?
Won : The New Apostolic Reformation is essentially a new mode of church government. It is a movement whose central idea is apostolic governance. (That is: churches led by “apostles”, people to whom God has granted leadership authority.) It is about dismantling the way churches operate democratically, with elders and congregation voting for their pastor. This undemocratic impulse at the Church level manifests itself as the idea of “dominionism” at the social level.
“Dominionism” is the idea that Christians should exercise authority, that the kingdom of God must be established here on earth now, and it is the responsibility of Christians to make this happen. This has its origins in a particular reading of chapter one of the book of Genesis, where God calls humanity to exercise dominion over the universe. And to do this, Christians must be able to climb the “mountains” of culture: religion, politics, education, family, media, etc.
You said that not all NAR members are neo-charismatic Pentecostals. But the overlap is strong. Who are the neo-charismatic Pentecostals?
Neo-charismatic Pentecostals, or neo-Pentecostals, place a lot of emphasis on the gifts of the Spirit: speaking in tongues, miracles, prophecy, things like that. It’s a third wave of charismatic and slash Pentecostals who buy into all these ideas of apostles, prophets and spiritual warfare. Spiritual warfare is very important (for them).
What we saw during the Trump years was that those who were very close to him were often people who embraced these neo-charismatic Pentecostal ideas.
What’s new about them, politically? How are they different from what we traditionally think of when we think of the Christian Right?
Neo-Charismatics are part of the Christian Right, but it is different from the old Christian Right. The Christian Right with the Moral Majority in the 1980s defended certain conservative social values. These people are not the same, because we are in the world of spiritual warfare, where your opponents are literally understood to be under the influence of demons.
Why would the concept of demonic influence make such a difference?
The idea that Christians are waging spiritual warfare against the demonic forces of the world that have sometimes gained the upper hand over their political enemies has been widely held. And the language of spiritual warfare ultimately leads to the possibility of violence. It’s not just spiritual; this carries over into the real world. On January 6, they sounded the shofar, a type of ancient Jewish trumpet that sometimes served as a rallying cry during battles.
Why engage in this rhetoric and performance if you aren’t excited enough to do everything you can to make sure Donald Trump stays in power? You have these people who stage all these symbolic things that recall the very violent actions described in the Bible. Actions of genocide, destruction and overthrow of power.
You argue that these people are not marginal. Are there any particularly notable neo-Pentecostal personalities?
Paula White-Cain was very close to Trump during his presidency; There was no gathering without Paula White-Cain, and she often opened the gatherings with prayer. Most of the time, she engaged in what we call spiritual warfare prayer – prayers directed against the enemies of President Trump, against the enemies of Christians. Which implies that these demonic forces have a hold on Trump’s political adversaries.
During Trump’s re-election campaign, there were 20,000 people at the Amway Center (at a rally in Orlando in June 2019). And the first person to stand on the podium is Paula White-Cain. And she prays against principalities and powers. With regard to these 20,000 people, she characterizes Trump’s opponents as influencers of evil supernatural forces. It is therefore a way of disqualifying Trump’s political adversaries.
What connection did this religious group have with the events of January 6?
Until January 6, they began to organize these rallies: the “Jericho marches”. This refers to a story in the Hebrew Bible in which God called Joshua to go around the city of Jericho and destroy and kill everyone in the city. Many of these leaders were present, preaching, crying out loud, “we are waging the spiritual battle against Jezebel,” and so on. Neo-charismatic Pentecostals closely linked to this idea of New Apostolic Reformation were present.
Many of these new charismatic Pentecostal leaders who had supported Trump bought into this big lie that the election was rigged. And they participated in instigating, through their spiritual warfare rhetoric, that they were fighting for the soul of America.
So you are saying that these neo-charismatic Pentecostal leaders promoted the concept of spiritual warfare in such a way that some religious conservatives did not care about democracy?
Yes. There are these people with their rhetoric of spiritual warfare, with their vision of domination, who constantly force this. this is the way to go. They quote Scripture: It is the violent who take the kingdom of God by force. But they completely decontextualize this: Jesus doesn’t mean that you have to be violent to take God’s kingdom. They use Scripture in a truncated manner and do not truly reflect careful biblical interpretation. This is why I think there is a danger for democracy.
You mentioned the Shofars and the steps of Jericho as symbols of spiritual warfare. What about Mike Johnson “Call to Heaven” Flagstolen in front of his office?
This flag was very popular in NAR circles. The flag was initially used during the Revolutionary War. The idea of an appeal to heaven comes from John Locke, who wrote about this idea of an appeal to heaven against the political idea of the divine right of kings. You can appeal to heaven: there is someone greater than the king. This concept was against tyranny. It’s interesting how this flag has completely flipped. The way they understand Trump is like a king. You are using this flag to support the idea that Trump should be president, that he is chosen by God. So I think all of this speaks very clearly to their deep fascination with power and ultimate power.
Are neo-charismatic Pentecostal leaders still worth our attention?
Now there are new actors left and right, and they are speaking in a very disturbing way. That’s why Americans need to pay attention to this, because they need to understand that a lot of these people have been trying to infiltrate politics and trying to influence politicians for quite some time. And their goal is to change society. Democracy and pluralism as Americans know them would certainly not be the same for these individuals in power.
