Later in the interview, Wilson argued that Christians are morally obligated to engage in culture warring, something he believes was ordained in the curses God gave in Genesis 3, putting “antipathy” at the center of the relationship between Adam and Eve and the serpent. Because of this, Wilson contended, a person is either on the side of God or the side of the serpent with regard to their civic engagement.
“You could pretend to be neutral for a time, but it’s all gonna come crashing down,” Wilson said.
Addressing the criticism levied against him for his more nationalistic viewpoints and the possible threat they pose to Western democracy, Wilson said, “I trust our willingness to not cram our beliefs down their throat better than I trust their willingness to not cram theirs down our throat.”
“The thing that we have to understand is that the liberties we enjoy here in America—freedom of speech and those sorts of things—those freedoms were invented by Christians,” Wilson said. “So when America was closer to its founding and it was a Christian nation, a Christian culture—there was a Christian consensus close to our founding. When that happened, we were the ones who developed freedoms for nonbelievers.”
Noteworthy of Wilson’s recounting of history is the omission of widespread Anti-Catholic discrimination throughout America’s early history and similar treatment of the Muslim faith in more recent times.
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Further, Wilson’s claim that America was founded as a Christian nation has been the object of debate for some time. While many, though not all, of the founding fathers held Christian beliefs, and Christians have constituted the majority of the nation’s population since its founding, the Constitution expressly prohibits “an establishment of religion” by the government.
In other words, the veracity of Wilson’s claim is determined by how he defines “Christian nation.”
“I’m 69 years old; I was born in 1953. And I know that the America I’m living in right now is a lot more polarized and a lot less tolerant than it was when I was a young man,” Wilson, who was born roughly a decade prior to the end of legalized racial segregation in America, said. “It doesn’t even begin to compare. We have lost our ability to respectfully talk with one another.”
“And, I would say, back in the day, when we could respectfully talk with one another, that was closer to the day when we were closer to our Christian roots,” Wilson added. “The farther away we’ve gotten from our Christian roots, the less tolerance we have for one another.”
“Our second president, John Adams, once said, ‘Our Constitution presupposes a moral and a religious people…it is wholly unfit for any other,’” Wilson said. Notably, John Adams was a Unitarian and denied the divinity of Christ.
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Wrapping up his reflections on culture warring in America, Wilson said, “You can’t run away forever…We need to have certain key places where we take a stand.”
