(RNS) — Last month, onetime Fox News host Tucker Carlson sat in his cabin-like studio and introduced a bearded, 70-year-old Idaho pastor named Doug Wilson as the person “most closely identified” with Christian nationalism, calling him one of the “rare” clergy “willing to engage on questions of culture and politics.” The vibe was similarly effusive weeks later, when Charlie Kirk, founder of the youth-focused conservative group Turning Point USA, had Wilson on his podcast to define Christian nationalism for listeners, calling the Reformed pastor a “thoughtful, brilliant thinker.”
Kirk was so excited by the interview that he encouraged listeners to “send it to your pastors.”
From talk shows to the conference circuit, Wilson, the influential head of Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho, for decades, has become a regular voice in conservative political circles, emerging as a figurehead for what is framed as a comparatively moderate version of Christian nationalism.
As far as Wilson is concerned, the media blitz is simply the political world paying attention to ideas he has preached for some time.
“The reason I think it happened,” Wilson told Religion News Service in an interview last week, is because “we’ve been pounding away at these issues for a number of decades.”
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But scholars and critics of Wilson argue his version of Christian nationalism remains radical, and as Wilson associates himself with a widening web of right-wing influencers and personalities — including some who argue the U.S. Constitution is “dead” — analysts say they are worried about precisely what kind of ideas the small-town pastor will promote on the national stage.
Wilson’s recent elevation has centered less on his past statements and controversies — of which there are many, from anti-LGBTQ+ slurs to comments decried by critics as pro-slavery to contentious stances on gender roles — and more on his vision for a Christian nation. For example, he has floated incorporating the Apostles Creed into the Constitution; believes building a Christian nation in the U.S. should be a “pan-Protestant project”; and has said that while he does not personally endorse the idea of establishing a religion at the state level, he believes it to be legal.
“As a Christian, I would like that national structure to conform to the thing that God wants, and not the thing that man wants,” Wilson told Carlson. “That’s Christian nationalism.”
Kristin Kobes du Mez, a Calvin University professor whose best-selling book “Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation” includes a section on Wilson, said the pastor is “well-positioned for this moment.” Among other reasons, she said, he is part of a “right-wing critique of moderate evangelicals — or essentially of any evangelicals, as some are quite conservative — who are pushing back against extremism, or who are not supporting Trump, or who are not all-in on the Christian nationalist project.”
In an interview with RNS last February, Wilson imagined a global order of Christian nations that would exclude any self-described Christian nation that allowed for same-sex marriage or abortion access, saying a “liberal Methodist” nation would be “out” and people who embraced “some total loopy-heresy” would be barred from holding public office.
“This is a Christian republic, and … you’re not singing off the same sheet of music that we are,” he told RNS at the time. “So, no, you can’t be the mayor.”
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Wilson, who engages with Christian nationalism in his new book “Mere Christendom,” has framed himself as a more moderate alternative to other self-described Christian nationalists such as Nick Fuentes, who is known for spouting extremist rhetoric, including antisemitism.
