Spiritual Quote of the Day (David French, on ‘Christianity Properly Lived’)

“In the upside-down kingdom of God, religion is still dangerous, but the danger has flipped. Fundamentalist faiths make religion dangerous to others, the nonbelievers and heretics who must be made to yield. But Christianity properly lived is dangerous to Christians. It’s dangerous to people who refuse to hate those they are told to hate, to people who refuse to oppress, to conquer, to exploit — even when they’re told to conquer in the name of God.”—Opinion columnist David French, “Christianity Is a Dangerous Faith,” The New York Times, Dec. 23, 2025

The image accompanying this post, from the 1959 Best Picture Oscar-winner, Ben Hur, shows Jesus awaiting Pilate as the Roman procurator washes his hands. It illustrates why Jesus, in saying "My kingdom is not of this world," disappointed those who expected, in French's words, “a true Messiah [who] was supposed to lead the people to political triumph.” 

Today, their counterparts are often labeled Christian nationalists. I wish there was an alternative name that didn’t spark a negative reaction, but “Dominionism,” “Christian Supremacy,” and “The Seven Mountain Mandate” are not immediately understood. 

But Patrick Shreiner’s 2023 post “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly of Christian Nationalism” on the Website of the Gospel Coalition identifies two elements that make this ideology problematic: it desires either a fusion of Christianity with civil life, or even a supremacy over it, often with a resort to power to force belief in tenets that violate notions of freedom of conscience and separation of church and state.