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Robert P Jones, Founder and director of the Public Religion Research Institute
Deep Roots of White Christian Nationalism in America: Our Struggle for an Honest History: The Deep Roots of the White Christian Nationalism at the Heart of America’s Identity Crisis
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 25
5:00 – 6:30PM
Alice Campbell Alumni Center
Free and open to the public.
Is the U.S. a pluralistic democracy, or is it a divinely ordained promised land for European Christians? These competing visions of the nation have divided Americans throughout our history. To understand America’s current identity crisis, we must return to the fateful year of 1493, when the Christian Doctrine of Discovery coalesced into a powerful belief that God had designated all territory not inhabited or controlled by Christians as their new promised land. This reframing of American origins explains how the founders of the United States could build the philosophical framework for a democratic society on a foundation of mass racial violence—and why this paradox survives in the form of white Christian nationalism, which continues to undermine the promise of a pluralistic democracy.
Dr. Robert P. Jones is the founder and director of the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) and NYT best-selling author of White Too Long, The End of White Christian America, and The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy and the Path to a Shared American Future. For more information, contact Jon Ebel at jebel@illinois.edu.
