"'Yes, a holy war for the righteous cause of human freedom,' he writes in the book’s introduction. 'One thousand years ago, after years of ceding land to conquering Muslim hordes, the pope ordered military action to save Europe. "Deus vult" ("God wills it") was the rallying cry of Christian knights as they marched to Jerusalem.'”

#Hegseth #WhiteChristianNationalism #tattoos #Crusades #HolyWar #Trump #MAGA
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"'We the people,' which are the opening words of the US Constitution; 'MDCCLXXV,' which is the year of the US army’s founding in Roman numerals (1775), and an image of an assault rifle embedded into the stripes of the American flag.

'This time in our history calls for an AMERICAN CRUSADE.'"

#Hegseth #WhiteChristianNationalism #tattoos #Crusades #HolyWar #Trump #MAGA
/5

Some of the best evidence that Hegseth’s tattoos reflect a belief that Christian Americans should exert violent dominance over Muslim people is found in the first few pages of his 2020 book American Crusade. The cover pictures him holding an American flag and shows off three more of his tattoos:"

#Hegseth #WhiteChristianNationalism #tattoos #Crusades #HolyWar #Trump #MAGA
/4

“'We’re at now perhaps the apotheosis of 50 years of them building power

You look at Hegseth’s embrace of Crusader imagery, and then you look at his actions, which are embracing and leading a war against Iran. We are seeing a Crusader mentality play out at the absolute highest levels of government.'”

#Hegseth #WhiteChristianNationalism #tattoos #Crusades #HolyWar #Trump #MAGA
/3

"That’s another way of describing Christian nationalism, a far-right ideology that has accumulated frightening power during Trump’s second term. ...

'His ideas are – you know, I’d like to say cuckoo bananas, but it’s more like they’re extremely close to the centre of power,' says Tal Lavin, a journalist whose book Wild Faith explores the Christian right’s American takeover."

#Hegseth #WhiteChristianNationalism #tattoos #Crusades #HolyWar #Trump #MAGA
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"You can't understand the MAGA movement, the thing that is like ripping the world apart, without understanding Christian nationalism, right? And the hold that it has on the deep followers, particularly white evangelicals in this country."

#Trump #Republicans #MAGA #WhiteChristianNationalism #WhiteEvangelicals #media #NewYorkTimes
/9

"And I was like... Well, how are you going to understand the kind of biggest force shaping the MAGA world if you're going to ignore the best social scientific research in the country? …

You cannot understand the Latino vote without understanding religion, right? You can't understand this entanglement with the Pope over war without understanding religion."

#Trump #Republicans #MAGA #WhiteChristianNationalism #WhiteEvangelicals #media #NewYorkTimes
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5. How the Roberts Court has weaponized (individual) religious liberty to curtail other freedoms.

Jones:

"We've actually had two top level religion reporters at The New York Times essentially saying we're not going to use the term Christian nationalism because they think it's a made up term by academics."

#Trump #Republicans #MAGA #WhiteChristianNationalism #WhiteEvangelicals #media #NewYorkTimes
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2. How Hegseth’s anti-DEI crusade is really about mainstreaming white Christian nationalism in the military.

3. Why reporters who refuse to use the term “Christian nationalism” are out of step with well-grounded social science research.

4. The enormous influence of Christian media on those within its bubble (which doesn’t include most political reporters).

#Trump #Republicans #MAGA #WhiteChristianNationalism #WhiteEvangelicals #media
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