Christian nationalism

Brazil In Brazil, Christian nationalism, a result of a Catholic-Evangelical coalition, has a goal of curbing the influence of "moral relativism, social liberalism, alleged neo-Marxism in its various forms, and LBGTQ rights". A 2024 Pew Research Center survey found that 13% of Brazilians self-identified as "religious nationalists". Canada The COVID-19 pandemic saw a rise in Christian nationalist activity with many groups using anti-lockdown sentiments to expand their reach to more people. The group Liberty Coalition Canada has garnered support from many elected politicians across Canada. In their founding documents, they argue that "it is only in Christianized nations that religious freedom has ever flourished". Their rallies have attracted the support of Alex Jones and Canada First, a spin-off of Nick Fuentes' group America First. Many of Liberty Coalition Canada's leaders are pastors who have racked up millions in potential fines for violating COVID protocols and in many cases express ultra-conservative views. A 2024 Pew Research Center survey found that 3% of Canadians self-identified as "religious nationalists". A Dominican friar, Filip Antonín Maria Stajner, publicly recommended that Christians vote for the neo-fascist Freedom and Direct Democracy (SPD). In a separate instance around the 2021 parliamentary elections, Josef Nerušil, who worked for the Archbishop of Prague and was the social media representative of Cardinal Dominik Duka, announced his candidacy as the SPD's lead candidate in a Prague district. He argued that the party aligned more closely with Christian values than the overly centrist Christian Democrats (KDU-ČSL). Neither Cardinal Duka nor the Prague Archbishopric issued any public disavowal or distancing from Nerušil's decision to join and run with the SPD. (Freedom of Speech and Religion Association), associated with MP and former chair of the Christian Democrats Päivi Räsänen, has also supported openly fascist candidates of Blue-and-Black Movement that seek to ban the LGBT movement and "non-native religions". The association also supports VKK and Freedom Alliance. The Blue-and-Black Movement itself is also inspired by the Christian fascist Patriotic People's Movement and its leader Tuukka Kuru is a member of the traditionalist Lutheran Mission Diocese. Aforementioned local far-right pro-Russian parties have recruited combatants for the Russian side in Ukraine, who have then after gone to the Russian Imperial Movement's training camps in St. Petersburg and become fighters in the Russo-Ukrainian War. The Finnish Bible Belt of Ostrobothnia has been significantly shaped by the conservative Finnish Lutheran revival and Awakenism. The area was also the place of origin of the Finnish fascist movements Lapua Movement and Patriotic People's Movement, and revivalism was a dominant force among Finnish fascists and Nazis. Even in the modern day, the Revivalist chooses to ordain their priests in Russian Evangelical Lutheran Church of Ingria because of its strong opposition to the LGBT movement and women in ministry. There has emerged a Finnish Christian nationalist media ecosystem. Neo-Nazi Nordic Resistance Movement has published Magneettimedia newspaper that Suomen Kuvalehti characterized as Christian nationalist. The newspaper and its distribution were funded by department store tycoon and holocaust denier Juha Kärkkäinen. In 2013 the newspaper was circulated to some 660,000 households. Theological magazine Vartija also defined as Christian nationalist the alt-tech website '''', and the television channels and . It further observes that "It has been noticeable that those on the extreme right, both religiously and politically, have found each other": there is an informal group of over 500 religious members of the far-right Finns Party. Ghana In Ghana, Christian nationalists seek to uphold what they see as "traditional markers of Ghanaian identity including, Christianity, social conservatism, and antagonism to 'progressive' 'Western' ideas, such as LGBTQ+ equality". A 2024 Pew Research Center survey found that 17% of Ghanaians self-identified as "religious nationalists". Arrow Cross' antisemitism was much more extreme, and the Government of National Unity unleashed the Holocaust in Hungary. According to researcher and Holocaust survivor Moshe Y. Herczl: Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has often advocated for Christian nationalism, both within Hungary and as a type of international movement including other European and American Christian nationalists. A 2024 Pew Research Center survey found that 1% of Hungarians self-identified as "religious nationalists". In 2017, Bakiewicz held a speech during the Independence March, kissing a crucifix and calling for a crusade against "cultural marxists" and for a Catholic theocracy. The attendees of the Independence March used slogans such as "We want God" and "White Poland". The Christian nationalist All-Polish Youth has also been linked to neo-Nazis and caused controversy when its members were saluting swastika flags and chanting "sieg heil". All-Polish Youth is the unofficial youth group of the neo-fascist National Movement and one of the main participants of the Independence Day march. All-Polish Youth's self-declared aim is to "to raise Polish youth in a Catholic and patriotic spirit" and it operates under the slogan "Great Catholic Poland". National Movement, then led by Robert Winnicki, described as an "ideological soulmate" of Bakiewicz, sponsored the November 2017 anti-Israel demonstration that was attended by 60,000 people. Algemeiner characterized the demonstration as "Ultranationalist and neo-Nazi". Under PiS, there was a near total ban on abortion, and many areas in the country were declared "LGBT-free zones". PiS allegedly facilitated co-operation between conservative institutions and far-right extremists. In 2023, the PiS affiliated fundamentalist Catholic group Ordo Iuris started a campaign for the release of a neo-Nazi activist Marika Matuszak convicted of attacking an LGBT event, and she was released by PiS Justice Minister Zbigniew Ziobro. Sejm member and chair of the Together Party Adrian Zandberg criticized PiS Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki for "commemorat[ing] a unit that openly collaborated with the Gestapo" for paying tribute to the Holy Cross Mountains Brigade and said Hubert Jura may be a hero to Morawiecki, but not to him. Romania The leader of the National-Christian Defense League Nichifor Crainic was described as a "veteran Christian-nationalist and anti-Semitic combatant" by the International Commission on Holocaust in Romania. Ion Antonescu's order to confiscate Jewish property was justified as "a way to honor the old traditions of Romanian Christian nationalism and culturally unite the country with the new European celebration of national freedoms." Professor of theology and cleric Ioan Gheorghe Savin hailed the formation of Romania into an antisemitic fascist National Legionary State as a "full victory of Christian Nationalism". A. C. Cuza and Octavian Goga, the leaders of the National Christian Party that adhered to Nazism and fascism used the label to describe their movement. Cuza stated that Nazism "will restore Aryan and Christian culture against the international Jewish domination." Christian Nationalist and fascist Iron Guard (officially the "Legion of the Archangel Michael") was responsible for the Bucharest Pogrom and Iași pogrom in which over 13,000 Jews were killed. According to a police report from 1937, 1.2% of legionnaires were ordained priests, numbering several thousands. Legionary death-squads included a significant number of Orthodox seminary students. Russia President of Russia Vladimir Putin has been described as a global leader of the Christian nationalist and Christian right movements. As President, Putin has increased the power of the Russian Orthodox Church and proclaimed his staunch belief in Eastern Orthodoxy, as well as maintaining close contacts with Patriarchs of Moscow and all Rus' Alexy II and Kirill. In the 1990s, Ilya Lazarenko led the Front of National Revolutionary Action that according to their self-stated purpose supported "Orthodox national idea", primacy of Orthodoxy and "Great National-Socialist Russian Empire". According to the human rights activist Raphael Walden: The most radical Russian nationalists are members of the ROCOR or True Orthodox Church or Old Believers, due to Moscow Patriarchate's ecumenism, ties with the KGB and due to the church recently opening dialogue with Jewish communities. Alexander Barkashov was a parishioner of the Russian True Orthodox Church (RTOC), and the first cells of the neo-Nazi Russian National Unity (RNU) were formed as brotherhoods and communities of the RTOC. RNU is closely linked to the Russian Orthodox Army responsible for sectarian violence and antisemitic attacks in Donbass. The extreme nationalist Russian Catacomb Church of True Orthodox Christians has canonized Russian nationalists Konstantin Voskoboinik and Bronislav Kaminski as martyrs for their anti-communist stance which caused controversy due to their collaboration with the Nazis. In September 2025 in St. Petersburg, multiple international far-right groups founded the International Sovereigntist League (ISL) Paladins. The groups were described as "white" and "Christian nationalist". Its self-stated mission is to defend “white Christian values” and according to them “White Christians cannot coexist with non-whites.” The organization is named after the SS-Standartenführer Otto Skorzeny's group of the same name. The event was preceded and followed by a procession led by Patriarch Kirill. Serbia Serbian Action is a prominent neo-Nazi Christian nationalist group in Serbia. The group adheres to the ideology of the fascist ZBOR and the Serbian Nazi collaborators Milan Nedic and Dimitrije Ljotić and Bishop Nikolaj Velimirović, an early supporter of Adolf Hitler. They also organize annual memorial events and marches for them. Serbian Action is also proponent of the ideology of accelerationism and supports overthrowing the government in favor of Orthodox monarchy. Serbian Action is also affiliated with the neo-Nazi monarchist Russian Imperial Movement, Golden Dawn and the Iron March network that has been described as "terroristic". South Africa The future leader of the National Party and Apartheid Prime Minister of South Africa, B. J. Vorster in 1942 declared: "We stand for Christian Nationalism which is an ally of National Socialism. You can call this anti-democratic principle dictatorship if you wish. In Italy, it is called Fascism; in Germany, National Socialism and in South Africa, Christian Nationalism." While the National Party was primarily concerned about the nationalist interest of Afrikaners, there was a strong adherence to Calvinist interpretations of Christianity as the bedrock of the state. Moreover, by advancing ideas of Christian nationalism, the National Party could incorporate other "nations" in their programme of racial hierarchies and segregation. The Dutch Reformed Church in South Africa provided much of the theological and moral justification for Apartheid and the basis for racial hierarchy. A 2024 Pew Research Center survey found that 16% of South Africans self-identified as "religious nationalists". United Kingdom Former Naval officer Peter Huxley-Blythe was an influential figure on the British far-right: He mentored Colin Jordan and was the editor of the Natinform (Nationalist Information Bureau) and European Liberation Front's Frontfighter. He was also associated with the heads of the British-based House of Romanov and House of Tolstoy. Huxley-Blythe's writings promoted the supremacy of the Nordic race (ie. White, Christian and Northern European) and he equated the West with the white race and Christianity. He saw non-European immigration and the US Civil Rights movement as a plot to wipe out the white Christians by race-mixing. According to BBC News, in 2006 the fascist British National Party (BNP) had "recently stepped up its efforts to present itself as a staunch defender of Christianity", using Jesus and Bible quotes in its European Union election campaign. The same year, the BNP founded the Christian Council of Britain, led by the Reverend Robert West. The founder of the BNP, John Tyndall's "linkage of Christian ideas to notions of race remained present throughout his BNP leadership years" and Tyndall's Spearhead magazine stated that "the white race thought of itself as Christendom", and "many of us still think that today". Tyndall's successor Nick Griffin also started streaming a "Christmas message" from Iona, chosen for its importance in Celtic Christianity, in which he railed against erosion of the Christian tradition. When a list of some BNP members was leaked in November 2008, it included multiple vicars. In BNP's Identity magazine, John Maddox wrote that atheism and Islam will end the Christian civilization of Britain. He added that "the struggle is political and social as well as spiritual and theological" and that Christians should resist by voting for BNP. United States Christian nationalism asserts that the United States is a country founded by and for Christians. Christian nationalists in the United States advocate "a fusion of identitarian Christian identity and cultural conservatism with American civic belonging". the Seven Mountain Mandate movement, and dominionism. Christian nationalism supports the presence of Christian symbols in the public square, and state patronage for the practice and display of religion, such as Christmas as a national holiday, school prayer, singing "God Bless America", the exhibition of nativity scenes during Christmastide, and the Christian cross on Good Friday. Christian nationalism also influenced the constitution of the Confederacy, which mentioned God overtly in contrast with the US Constitution. Christian nationalism has been linked to prejudice towards minority groups. Christian nationalism prioritizes an ethno-cultural, ethno-religious, and ethno-nationalist framing around fear of "the other", those being immigrants, racial, and sexual minorities. Studies have associated Christian nationalism with xenophobia, homophobia, misogyny, political tolerance of racists, opposition to interracial unions, support for gun rights, pronatalism, and restricting the civil rights of those who fail to conform to traditional ideals of whiteness, citizenship, and Protestantism. The Christian nationalist belief system includes elements of patriarchy, white supremacy, nativism, and heteronormativity. Christian nationalists feel that their values and religion are threatened and marginalized, and fear their freedom to preach their moral values will be no longer dominant at best or outlawed at worst. Studies have shown Christian nationalists to exhibit higher levels of anger, depression, anxiety, and emotional distress. It has been theorized that Christian nationalists fear that they are "not living up to" God's expectations, and "fear the wrath and punishment" of not creating the country desired by God. == See also ==