The second-highest-ranking official in Indiana, Lt. Gov. Micah Beckwith, openly identifies as a Christian nationalist. This self-description has ignited debate across the state, from the pews to the Statehouse, forcing residents to confront a fundamental question: What is the proper role of faith in public life, and what does it mean for the future of a pluralistic state? This is not an abstract debate; it has manifested in legislative action, crystallized by a controversial resolution that put competing visions on a collision course.
Our first story in this series explains what was in the resolution and how it fared with legislators; defines Christian Nationalism; offers Beckwith’s view on its place in government; and lines that up against the view of a constitutional law scholar.
The Watermarks
On April 15, Indiana State Rep. Joanna King (R) authored House Resolution 53.
The resolution, cosigned by 22 other members of the House, was called “recognizing the importance of repentance.” It asked that the Indiana House of Representatives “acknowledges the need for divine providence, choosing to humbly submit its ways to the Lord, Jesus Christ.”
Further, it asked lawmakers to “uphold the biblical principles set forth in the word of God.”
The resolution died in committee, but the fact that more than 20 percent of Indiana’s House of Representatives co-signed a resolution asking lawmakers to spiritually give themselves to the Christian God was cause for concern to many.
“I saw it and I had some discussions with people involved in this decision about ‘is this controversial?’” said Rep. Matt Pierce (D). “And I said, well, this seems to be running straight into the idea of a separation between church and state.”
Neither King nor any of the other 22 co-signers responded to multiple requests for comment from WFIU News on House Resolution 53.
Pierce said he was surprised at the lack of ambiguity in the resolution, and that it appears to be a product of more radical Republicans entering the government.
“It seems that as each election cycle goes by more and more Republican primaries are producing legislators who feel that the idea of separation of church and state is exaggerated and that, in fact, legislators have a responsibility to use the power of government to reinforce biblical principles,” he said.
“I think we have a kind of a group of people (who) feel that their particular brand of religion, their religious principles need to be reinforced in society.”
The group Pierce is talking about has large overlaps with the Christian nationalist movement. This ideology says that the United States, having been founded on Christian ideals, should have more laws, policies, and the moral undertones of a Christian nation.
This idea includes the whole nation. On Sept. 8, President Donald Trump told attendees of the Religious Liberty Commission that new guidance regarding prayer in public schools is on its way.
In Texas, Senate Bill 10 took effect in early September requiring public schools to display the Ten Commandments in classrooms.
Pierce said he’s reminded of when Indiana’s near total abortion ban was being debated in the House chambers in 2022.
“I was kind of surprised at how open people were basically saying that they felt abortion was prohibited by the Bible,” he said. “It was God's law and that they had an obligation as Christians to apply God's law.”
As a lawmaker, being able to debate and converse about issues is one of the most important parts of the job. But Pierce said when it comes to arguing laws that have a religious slant to them, invoking God pushes the limits of the democratic process.
“In a way, it cuts off debate, right? Because I've always said I cannot win a policy debate with God,” he said. “So if someone tells me that God says this is what the policy must be, there's nothing I'm going to be able to say in a policy arena that's going to change that person's mind. It's just not possible.”
What is Christian nationalism?
Christian nationalism is not a new idea. Books, documentaries, academic papers and news stories have been written on the topic. But the term itself, “Christian nationalism,” can be hard to pin down depending on what lens it is being viewed from.
Andrew Whitehead is a professor of sociology, the executive director of the Association of Religion Data Archives, and a research fellow for the Charles F. Kettering Foundation. He is one of the foremost scholars on Christian nationalism, whose work has been cited by Time Magazine, The New York Times, and NPR among other media organizations.
His definition of Christian nationalism is based on over a decade of research.
“It is the desire to see a very particular expression of Christianity privileged in the public sphere and fused with American civic life,” he said. “And it wants to see the government at all levels vigorously defend this particular expression of Christianity as central to national identity and social belonging.”
This particular expression also brings additional “cultural baggage,” as he puts it, that act as markers to identifying Christian nationalist rhetoric.
One of the key markers he looks for is a desire for a traditional social hierarchy in the United States with certain people at the top, others in the middle, and some at the bottom, generally based on gender and sexual orientation.
"We must recognize that at its root, the battle is spiritual."Intercessors for America, Christian Nationalism: A Prayer Guide
“It also refers to a desire for strong ethno-racial boundaries around American identity, and the fact that in this historical narrative of Christian nationalism, the idea that white, protestant, capitalist men form this country, and they're the ones that should have the easiest access to civil rights and power,” he said. “And that other folks can live here. But this country wasn't necessarily created for them.”
Other key markers include viewing the world as chaotic and in need of a strong ruler or rules to enforce order, and that the country is being taken away from the common person by the media, academia, and other politicians.
Joseph Wiinikka-Lydon, senior research analyst with the Intelligence Project of The Southern Poverty Law Center, offered a similar, though more pointed, definition in a 2023 interview with Church & Society, a United Methodist advocacy group. He said:
“White Christian nationalism, as an identity and a vision of the United States, is informed both by white supremacy and Christian supremacy over culture and politics. It subscribes to American Exceptionalism, where the United States is understood to have a special, God-given mission to save the world. The resulting vision of the country is one that is exclusive, less caring, and even cruel, and which has the backing of the divine, at least for its adherents.”
André Gagné, a professor and chair of the Department of Theological Studies at Concordia University in Montreal, said he prefers not to use the term when discussing the movement.
“It's much more complicated than just declaring people as Christian nationalists,” he said. “Now it's become pejorative, so people don't want to be associated with that… This is why it's always better in my sense to look at it from the theology perspective.”
Gagné prefers to see if someone adheres to dominionism, a belief system that mandates Christians to control various realms of society.
And if you ask Intercessors for America, a right-wing national prayer ministry, they say the term Christian nationalism is a progressive left smear campaign and a false label.
Whitehead doesn’t view the term as a label to be placed on people. Instead, he sees it as a spectrum with certain cultural markers that believers adhere themselves to.
What he has found is that when the term is used as a label, it is often rejected or redefined by those who could be labeled as such. He cites Sen. Josh Hawley from Missouri and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green from Georgia.
“[T]hey would say, ‘yeah, I'm a Christian nationalist,’” he said, “but what they do is redefine it and say, ‘well, it means I love Jesus and I love this country, and if that's a Christian nationalist, then what are we afraid of?’”
So while someone might claim themselves as a Christian nationalist, Whitehead said they are typically trying to distance themselves from the academic definition of the term.
And placing that distance is important, because the rise of Christian nationalism is worrying many people. Whitehead calls it “a threat to a pluralistic, democratic society.”
“What we find with Christian nationalism is it's a self-interested power. It's … wanting to instill again these cultural beliefs and values at the expense of other groups and only to benefit the ingroup, the us, the we, the true Americans.”Andrew Whitehead
“In its vision, there's only certain people that would have the easiest access to the democratic process, and they would have to align with those cultural values of Christian nationalism, politically and religiously,” he said. “That really cuts out a lot of Hoosiers who maybe are a minority but are still a part of this state.”
Whitehead echoes Indiana legislator Pierce and calls being a political opponent to this belief system a “zero-sum game” because you are seen as arguing against God.
“It raises the stakes to a level that we actually can't have any sort of interaction because folks that embrace it strongly will see anybody that opposes them as opposing God,” he said. “And that kind of flies in the face of equal participation.”
Whitehead said Christianity and any religion can have a space in the public square.
During the civil rights movement, religious belief played a huge role in spurring leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. to action. It has been said that Jimmy Carter’s war on poverty and John F. Kennedy’s international aid distribution and founding of the Peace Corps. were shaped by moral vision of their respective faiths.
“What they were doing was expanding access to the beauty of democracy in the United States, it wasn't limiting,” Whitehead said. “What we find with Christian nationalism is it's a self-interested power. It's … wanting to instill again these cultural beliefs and values at the expense of other groups and only to benefit the ingroup, the us, the we, the true Americans.”
Beckwith in the spotlight
Another major watermark illustrating the presence of Christian nationalism in Indiana is the election of Lt. Gov. Micah Beckwith, who has a track record for his opinions on the intersection of faith and law.
In October of 2022, he posted a video titled “Do you think ‘Christian Nationalism’ is a bad thing? The Bible says otherwise. Here are 3 reasons why every follower of Jesus should be a #ChristianNationalist, no matter what nation you live in.”
He also posted the day after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol that God had told him “I sent those riots to Washington.” He later deleted that video but clips can still be found online.
Beckwith sat down with WFIU News in August to discuss his beliefs.
“I chuckle because you can ask 10 people what Christian nationalism is to them and they're going to give you 10 different answers,” Beckwith said. “I think when people are throwing it at me from more of a derogatory term, they're trying to make the statement that somehow I want like America to be a theocracy, which I've never said nor do I want. I want us to be a constitutional republic rooted in principles that are true and good.”
Beckwith supported House Resolution 53.
“Doesn't mean we have to worship Jesus,” he said. “Doesn't mean that we have to go to church on Sundays. It just means recognize his authority as being the ultimate authority, and let's make sure our laws are in line with the constitutional authority, which is then in line with God's authority.”
Beckwith views the role of Christianity in America as providing the ultimate moral law for its citizens. He said when the founders formed this country, they intended for an “objective moral truth.”
He said the phrase “separation of church and state” is not in the nation’s founding documents. In his opinion, the separation of church and state is a one-way street, and that it was meant to stop the government from telling people how to worship, not to keep the church out of the public square.
More importantly, he said that because the founding documents lay out the United States as being founded in Judeo-Christian ethic, separation of church and state does in fact apply both ways to other religions.
“It was saying, ‘hey, no, this is a Christian Judeo-Christian ethic founded nation, that now all faiths are welcome to worship here,’” he said. “If you're Hindu, great, worship all you want. If you're Muslim, great, worship all you want, but that doesn't mean you have a right to change the foundations.”
Beckwith maintains this point when presented with section three of the Indiana Constitution. It reads “That all men have a natural and indefeasible right to worship Almighty God, according to the dictates of their own consciences…And that no preference shall ever be given by law to any religious societies, or modes of worship.”
“It was all within the Judeo-Christian boundaries. It was the Judeo-Christian ethic,” Beckwith said. “The founders would've said this, ‘we're not talking about different religions as far as like Islam and Christianity or, you know, Hinduism, whatever religion.’ They would've said ‘no, what we’re talking about is the doctrines within the Christian orthodoxy.’”
Beckwith’s line in the sand appears when law begins to compel people to worship a certain way.
“We don't say, ‘hey, you are, you are being compelled to worship, this way or that way,’” he said. “You want freedom for people to be able to choose to worship. Again, I go back to say that doesn't mean that we don't take the principles of the moral truth of God's word and the Judeo-Christian ethic and apply them to our law."
Ultimately, Beckwith said, he calls for this religious moral center out of love for humanity and as an attempt to save people from themselves.
“It's not me saying, I hate you guys. It's me actually saying, I love you and I care about you, and I actually believe there's something better for you,” he said. “And that there is a God and a creator who loves you and has a purpose for you. And think that's where I’m probably the most misunderstood.”
Scholar: Beckwith wrong on separation argument
Scholars agree with parts of what Beckwith is asserting.
Daniel Conkle is a professor emeritus at the IU Maurer School of Law. Through his career, he’s engaged in scholarship related to constitutional law, religious freedom, and the separation of church and state.
He said it is fair to say that the U.S. was founded by Christians, as the founding fathers were made up of mainly Protestant Christians.
“That much I think would be largely beyond debate,” he said. “Founded by and for Christians, you know, the ‘for’ Christians part is contentious in terms of what the meaning of the original Constitution meant.”
But Conkle disagrees with the assertion that separation of church and state is not called for in the Constitution.
“One thing is quite clear, and that is the Constitution, through the First Amendment, demanded an institutional separation of church and state,” he said.
Conkle and Beckwith would agree that at the time of the nation’s founding, it’s muddy at best as to the intentions of the founding fathers when it came to the intersection of religion and politics.
“It's kind of a mixed picture in terms of the situation as it existed at the time of the founding,” Conkle said. “Clearly an institutional separation of church and state, but no prohibition on religious involvement in politics, much less to say that it would be improper or unlawful for citizens or leaders to rely upon their religious beliefs as they decided appropriate policies for society.”
Where their thoughts on the United States truly diverge regard the modern day. Conkle said in today’s era of religious and moral pluralism, what was once common in the colonial era must evolve for today’s times.
“You have, Catholics, Jews, Muslims, members of Eastern religions, you have a substantial number of non-believers,” he said. “And all of that I think does, or should, bear heavily on the extent to which a religion that had dominance to say the least at the time of the founding should be preferred in any official way.”
Conkle also emphasized the form of Christianity being highlighted by Christian nationalism is one distinct expression, and that Christianity itself should not be demonized.
“It’s a matter of not merely the source of the belief,” he said. “But what the person wants to advocate for whether it is poverty relief, food stamps, environmental protection on the one hand, or regulating abortion, going back to a prohibition on same-sex marriage on the other.
“Folks might want to be cognizant of the fact that Christian influence hasn't always been and need not necessarily be an entirely one-sided proposition.”
