Abstract:
Modern formulations of nationality and nationalism are inextricable from religious identity, because it was formed out of Christian cultural structures. However, nationalism as it is
experienced in 2017 is surely not the same as the proto-nationalism of pre-modernity, and neither is the Church’s formation. Both require temporal and positional location, which is provided through the theoretical lens of institutions and systems. Using this framework, built chiefly through the work of Benedict Anderson, Mary Douglas, and Benjamin Moffit, I will explain the rise of nationalism, its maturation, and locate populism as the dominant form that it takes in our present era. From this place, I will identify a structural malformation that has occurred in the Church as a result of increasing, global populism and its endless crises, which is the first step in taking a corrective course of action. This comprehensive argument requires something of a 30,000-foot perspective over the subjects at hand. However, this overview is necessary to expose the systems and categories of thought that are improperly bridging nationalism and Christian institutions and through which the Church’s witness to the Kingdom of God is being damned.
The full paper is attached to this post.
