If you ask Christian nationalists to choose between Christianity and nationalism, guess what they’ll pick?
A final word on Trump vs. Pope Leo.
Programming note: I’m about to go live with Mark Hertling and Andrew Egger to talk about Donald Trump’s Lebanon–Israel announcement and Pete Hegseth’s press conference. Check it out on Substack or YouTube.
Fam: The conversation about accountability and reform in the comments yesterday was exceptional, even by the standards of this community. I cannot begin to describe how gratifying it is to labor over a piece of writing and then have readers add value to it the way you do.
Thank you.
1. Conservatism and Democracy
In 2018 David Frum saw the world more clearly than I did. He wrote, “If conservatives become convinced that they cannot win democratically, they will not abandon conservatism. They will reject democracy.”
That was on January 18, 2018, less than a year into Trump’s presidency. Frum’s prediction has become one of the key insights for understanding our moment.
It is also immediately what I thought of when Donald Trump attacked the pope this weekend.
American Catholics have increasingly thrown in with Christian nationalism over the last decade. If they are asked to choose between Trump and the Catholic Church, some significant percentage of them are going to choose Trump.
I’m doing Sarah’s Focus Group show and this week the groups we listened to were Catholic voters. I’m not supposed to give too much away, but I can’t stop myself.
You will not believe what these people had to say when asked to choose between Trump and their Holy Father.