The former president went on to describe religious fundamentalists based on his personal observations and experiences. (Carter appeared to use the term “fundamentalists” as including highly conservative evangelicals.) He said that, invariably, “fundamentalist movements are led by authoritarian males who consider themselves to be superior to others and, within religious groups, have an overwhelming commitment to subjugate women and to dominate their fellow believers.” He found that these people believe the past is better than the present; they draw clear distinctions between themselves, as true believers, and others; they are “militant in fighting against any challenges to their beliefs”; and they are “often angry” and sometimes resort “to verbal or even physical abuse against those who interfere with the implementation of their agenda.” Carter summarized the characteristics of fundamentalism as “rigidity, domination, and exclusion,”[63] a description that would apply equally to the authoritarian personalities introduced in the last chapter.
While neoconservatives are not religious fundamentalists, Carter said he believes that they hold related views. He had observed firsthand how neoconservatives evolved from criticizing his foreign policy—when he attempted to “impose liberalization and democratization” on other countries—to embracing his goals but to achieving them by employing very different means. Carter sought to spread democracy through diplomacy, while the neoconservatives “now seem to embrace aggressive and unilateral intervention in foreign affairs, especially to advance U.S. military and political influence in the Middle East.”[64]
A long-tenured Sunday school teacher, Carter also adroitly uses his King James Bible to show how conservative Christians quote selectively from scripture to attack homosexuals and women, to oppose the separation of church and state, and to support other issues on their political agenda. Carter demonstrated that the Bible actually supports a much kinder, more loving, and more progressive ethos, but in the end, he said, he believes Bible quoting in politics is fruitless. “There is no need to argue about such matters, because it is human nature to be both selective and subjective in deriving the most convenient meaning by careful choices from the 30,400 or so biblical verses.”[65]
Former senator John Danforth of Missouri (who served from 1976 until 1995) is an ordained Episcopal minister and a partisan Republican, and has made points similar to those of Jimmy Carter. Danforth has been called a “right-wing zealot in moderate’s clothing.”[66] Certainly he was to the right of Goldwater on the issue of abortion when they were colleagues in the Senate. Danforth cosponsored a proposed amendment to the Constitution that would guarantee legal protection to unborn children and overturn Roe v. Wade. Even he believes that conservative Christians have crossed the line.
Danforth wrote an op-ed for the New York Times in response to the insistence of Christian conservatives that the federal government intervene to save the life of Terri Schiavo. Speaking on behalf of mainstream Christians, Danforth observed, “When, on television, we see a person in a persistent vegetative state, one who will never recover, we believe that allowing the natural and merciful end to her ordeal is more loving than imposing government power to keep her hooked up to a feeding tube.” He went on to describe in some detail (a selection of his statements are quoted and bulleted below) how conservative Christians operate and the impact they are having at the national leveclass="underline"
[C]onservative Christians have presented themselves as representing the one authentic Christian perspective on politics…[when] equally devout [mainstream] Christians come to very different conclusions.
Many conservative Christians approach politics with a certainty that they know God’s truth, and that they can advance the kingdom of God through governmental action. So they have developed a political agenda that they believe advances God’s kingdom.
In the [past] decade…American politics has been characterized by two phenomena: the increased activism of the Christian right, especially in the Republican Party, and the collapse of bipartisan collegiality. [It is not] a stretch to suggest a relationship between the two.
[Mainstream Christians] reject the notion that religion should present a series of wedge issues useful at election time for energizing a political base. [Rather they] believe it is God’s work to practice humility, to wear tolerance on our sleeves, to reach out to those with whom we disagree, and to overcome the meanness we see in today’s politics.[67]
When Christian conservatives take their religious beliefs into the political arena, they also carry their authoritarianism with them. Studies (cited earlier in a footnote) show that the “acceptance of traditional religious beliefs appear to have more to do with having a personality rich in authoritarian submission, authoritarian aggression, and conventionalism, than with the beliefs per se.”[68] Bob Altemeyer offers a convincing explanation for why right-wing authoritarians are characteristically religious. Authoritarian parents transfer their beliefs to children through religious instruction. Christian conservatives tend to emanate from strict religious backgrounds, and often prevent their children from being exposed to broader and different views by sending them to schools with like-thinking children, or by home schooling them. This, in turn, results in an authoritarian outlook that remains strong during adolescence—the period when authoritarian personalities are formed and then taken into adult life.
Christian conservatives’ primary tool in reinforcing authoritarianism is preaching fear, and no one does so more consistently than the head of the Christian Coalition, Pat Robertson. I met Robertson in 1982, when he invited me to appear on his television program, The 700 Club, the ostensible reason being to promote my recently published book, Lost Honor. I was told that his Christian Broadcasting Network reached over one hundred million homes, and that The 700 Club had a large following. While authors do not pass up such opportunities, I knew the book was not exactly normal fare for his audience, and I had little doubt that I was being checked out, for it was subtly suggested there was a place for me in this politically active Christian world. For my part, I certainly gave no sign that I was interested in the politics of Christian conservatism, for I had long believed that both religion and politics suffer when they are mixed. Robertson was a congenial and engaging host who wears his Cheshire cat grin both on and off camera. Even back in 1982 it was apparent that CBN was a substantial operation that was likely to grow, for viewers kept sending Robertson money. I was given a tour and saw a small army opening mail to retrieve five dollars here and five hundred dollars there, which arrived daily by the truckload. In the end, all that came of my appearance on The 700 Club was that Pat Robertson, of whom I had been only vaguely aware, was now on my radar. I have now been observing him for over two decades.
66.
Paul Jalsevac, “Bush Appoints a Pro-Lifer to the UN,”
67.
John C. Danforth, “Onward, Moderate Christian Soldiers,”
68.
Bob Altemeyer,