A fringe evangelical movement calling itself the New Apostolic Reformation is slipping its octopus-like tentacles into the heart of the Republican Party. House speaker Mike Johnson is a fan.
The NAR looks like a Christian version of Iran. Its leaders are self-appointed and fancy themselves prophets of an almighty being. They wage spiritual warfare. They want to abolish separation of church and state. And they want to take over the core aspects of American society — religion, family, education, government, media, entertainment and commerce.
“Theology professor André Gagné, author of a 2024 book on the movement, has characterized it as inherently political and said it threatens to subvert democracy,” Wikipedia says (here), adding, “The NAR’s prominence and power have increased since the 2016 election of Donald Trump as US president.”
Raw Story minces fewer words; it says (here), “It is largely due to Trump that this movement has gone from a fringe ideology to something capable of shaping major political events in the United States.”
This goes beyond evangelicals supporting Trump, to something where Trump is empowering a group of ayatollahs plotting a religious dictatorship.
It’s not surprising that more Americans are losing faith in democracy and turning to strongman leadership for relief from social problems that seem out of control to them: Crime, drugs, homelessness, gun violence, illegal migrants, and transgender people. (I threw that last one in because it’s so intensely demagogued.)
Back in the 1930s, when capitalism seemed to be collapsing, some Americans turned to communism and fascism as replacement models for our democratic system of government. Fascism collapsed in World War 2, and the brief flirtation with communism ideology (which is touched upon in the movie Oppenheimer) led to the rightwing red hunts of the 1940s and 1950s.
I wonder if a similar fate awaits today’s evangelicals? Will today’s religious extremism lead to the sort of backlash we saw before against fringe groups and individuals associated with them (however tenuously)?
Mainstream evangelicals may want to think twice before joining or backing the NAR movement. And this is another reason for mainstream voters to vote for Trump’s opponent to keep him out of power. You may not like Biden, but would you rather be stuck with this?
Related story: For a glimpse of what life is like under Iran’s theocracy, click here. Do you want something like this in America?
Video below: Paula White, Trump’s presidential spiritual adviser, shown here praying for Trump to win the 2020 election, is closely tied to the theocratic New Apostolic Reformation movement.