A Conservative Christian Weighs In on Growing Conservative Christian Cruelty

By guest contributor Brian F. Marks

I’m a theologically orthodox, politically conservative-leaning evangelical Christian and deeply patriotic American. Never once have I voted for a Democrat and I don’t plan on doing so anytime soon.

But for a few honorable socially conservative Dems in pockets of the country (usually the southern or midwestern states) I think the party, as a whole, is bat-guano crazy and responsible for tremendous evil, especially the national party leadership. The Republicans have plenty of problems, but in my mind, nothing compares to seeing the van that was set up outside the DNC in Chicago performing abortions last summer. That appallingly brazen display of that kind of evil more than solidified my opinion, as has their furious commitment to sterilizing and surgically mutilating children who identify as transgender. They have tethered themselves to Moloch-style child sacrifice, an unmistakably demonic wickedness. As a political organ, the party is fueling a horrendous, antichrist repaganization of the country, and I have no qualms whatsoever voting against them at the ballot box.

And as I’ve written previously, I also have no patience for “progressive” Christianity. I unequivocally believe it is another gospel. It’s false. It’s a distortion. It does not present Jesus as Lord. Their ministers are wolves. The mainline churches in America are all awash in this type of apostasy. It’s truly awful, and I want nothing to do with those so-called churches. In some ways, I think they are even worse than secular Democrats because of the way they blaspheme God’s name.

Yet this essay isn’t about secular leftist debauchery or the false gospel of the apostate churches. And why not? Because while they must be resisted, I expect them to be predictably terrible.

The worst kind of evil, in my opinion, is when it possesses the veneer of truth and righteousness and is often subtle and harder to detect. And within conservative Christian circles, this is a most unfortunate thing. This has always been around to some degree, but lately, the wickedness that is manifesting is not subtle or covert. It’s overt and monstrously cruel while dressed up as regard for God’s righteousness.

While I’ve seen this kind of ugliness in a variety of denominations, nowhere is this dynamic more clearly seen than among the Reformed tribes. The meanness and nastiness among that group are ungodly, to say the least. And the question is, why are they exhibiting such? I have my theories. More on that in a minute.

Nowhere is this unChristlike viciousness more clearly seen than in the emerging debate over abortion abolitionism vs mainline pro-life activism. For those who don’t know, abortion abolitionists differ from pro-lifers in their approach to the shared goal of ending abortion. Pro-lifers work to bring comprehensive change through education and resources for vulnerable women and legislative efforts that incrementally eliminate abortion throughout the country. They embrace legislative efforts that would penalize abortionists for performing the procedures rather than penalizing women who’ve been largely duped or coerced into abortions over decades. Many women still believe their unborn children are just clumps of cells. Abolitionists have no patience for this approach. They want a federal ban, and they want it today. And they really, really want to make women pay. Their proposed legislation abolishes abortion completely, and the means of doing this is penalizing the women who procure abortions. Since abortion is murder, they say, she should be fined or jailed. Even as they place nearly all the blame on the women, they continue to insist their approach is oh so simple, one of “equal weights and measures.”

Women are on the receiving end of the harshest brunt of this particular brand of cruelty, though it affects men as well. It is uncanny that the people pushing this cruelty are usually white, bearded Reformed theobros and their theological pick-me girls.

Take, for example, Reformed commentator and athlete Jon Root and other Calvinistic bullies like Ben Zeisloft who, in typical accusatory fashion, recently lashed out at pro-life leader Kristan Hawkins. Hawkins has spent decades of her life fighting for the unborn at great personal cost. Root even had the gall to say Hawkins had “blood on her hands” because she opposed state-level abortion abolition measures, and he invited an internet mob pile-on to demonize Hawkins and view her as a feminist enemy for her failure to agree with his strategy.

While a few abolitionists will be consistent enough to say that men who coerce women into abortion should be punished too, 90% of their rhetoric is directed at women, and there’s a palpable contempt in their tone. That’s a feature, not a bug, of their approach. They have it in for the #shoutyourabortion women, and they want revenge. They present their solution as God’s righteous, “biblical” prescription. Christians who oppose this policy must “repent” of their unbiblical position, they say. Some of the Reformed handmaiden nasty women who argue for this approach even try to make quasi-feminist arguments, arguing that it's an insult to tell women that they don’t know what they are doing when they choose abortion.

What’s at the root of this? What is driving these ice-cold, vengeful tactics? It’s only fair to ask: What is it about their religious worldview that gives rise to these appalling attitudes and forcefully punitive “solutions” on these touchy issues?

Though I’m sure there is more to it than what I have space for here, I think it’s two-fold – 1) a theological pride stemming from the belief that they interpret Scripture objectively and perfectly, and because of that, 2) they have the God-given duty to use whatever means possible to institute the implications of this “biblical” faith across society, including through the use of the law. This is especially the case given that they believe that the supernatural sign gifts are no longer in operation since the canon of Scripture is closed and all the original apostles are no longer on the earth (the doctrine of cessationism). Their approach is also informed by how they view the Bible primarily through a legal lens.

If you question them, you’re disagreeing with God, and who are you, oh mere man, to do that? They always seem to have some sniffy, accusatory talk-back rhetorical riposte to make you feel intimidated or theologically inept. Disagree with them and you’ll hear them huffily sneer that you have a “Pelagian” view of sin or “that’s denying God’s sovereignty” or something like that. On and on it goes.

And if you really think about it, if you believed what they believed, why wouldn’t you do what they do? If you’ve got life, including politics, all figured out because you think you interpret God’s Word exactly as it is, does it not behoove you to provide what you think is best? And with bold verve and God’s apparent blessing? For if you’ve got God’s truth on your side, shouldn’t you be put in charge and empowered?

But here’s the rub. Despite their fervent insistence that they are right (and they may understand some important matters right on the merits) they get some things dreadfully wrong. But their system inhibits them from seeing it. To admit they are wrong collapses their premises and they’ll have to face the painful fact of how many people they’ve wounded with their religious cruelty. Few are willing to do that.

But back to the meanness that characterizes their approach. The Reformed theobros are convinced beyond convinced that they have the Bible down pat; no one has a more intellectually robust and biblically faithful worldview than they do. In addition to being masterful proof-texters and loudmouths in the public square and on social media, they’ve studied theology books that are four inches thick. They do indeed have a cerebral form of Christianity packed in their heads. They know their stuff and will lecture you for hours if you poke them. Now-disgraced Reformed minister Steve Lawson (one of John Macarthur’s best buddy buddies) said that the reason most Christians continue to reject Calvinism is because they “just don’t know the Bible.” Um no, you pompous, arrogant jerk. You don’t own perfectly watertight theology like you think you do, and some of us are not impressed with your haughty demeanor. In fact, it’s a repulsive turn-off.

But given what they believe, they don’t have much of a choice NOT to be this way. Their system demands it of them.

I mentioned the cessationist element earlier. While there are degrees of this belief, at base, if you believe that God no longer moves through the sign gifts spelled out in 1 Corinthians 12 and 14, and if you believe that God no longer continues to speak to people outside of Scripture (and, of course, that still small voice of the Holy Spirit will NEVER contradict the written Word) all you’re left with is to pound and pack people’s head’s full of theology. And very narrow, Reformed theology at that. In those circles, there is an undeniably heavy emphasis on fine-tuning your doctrine to be nice and sound, right and tight. Then you can be a regenerated, righteous Christian, one of the esteemed elect whom God sovereignly chose before the foundation of the world.

But it’s a largely miserable existence. Testimonies are starting to emerge from YouTubers like Alana L (whom that bully John Macarthur told to “keep her thoughts to herself”), and “Idol Killer” Warren McGrew about how hard-edged Calvinistic doctrines choked the life out of their hearts. Having perfect doctrine all figured out? It’s never enough. There’s a real poverty of spirit, an orphan mentality, at work. And I don’t think it’s a coincidence that, out of that void, so many seek political and cultural power and influence, believing that if they could just manage to enforce God’s laws and righteous ways into culture we’d have this wonderfully just society. They are seeking external validation for an internal problem. Are they motivated by love for their fellow man? They might say so because they know that’s the right answer but their mean-spirited words and deeds indicate otherwise.

Their heavy emphasis on doctrine, doctrine, doctrine dovetails neatly with their view of the Bible as a legal document. Let’s not forget that John Calvin was a lawyer and when he wrote his 1000-page Institutes, though it’s chock-full of Scripture references, curiously missing is 1 John 4:8b: “God is love.” Of all the things to leave out of your treatise of the Christian faith! That’s called a glaring omission. To be sure, Scripture can be read through a legal lens and it’s useful to do so. It’s a vital dimension. But it’s woefully incomplete.

Wesleyan scholar and former president of Asbury Seminary Dennis Kinlaw observed in his remarkable book “Let’s Start With Jesus” that this legal metaphor “is only one metaphor Scripture gives us for understanding God’s work of redemption. If we view Christ’s saving work only in terms of a legal change of status for the sinner, this handles the problem of the sin’s penalty but gives no answer to the problem of human sin. Justification then means ‘to declare righteous’ not ‘to make righteous.’”

But for the Reformed theobros who are ready to send the women who procure abortions to the Big House? They take this legal lens to the utter extreme and wind up distorting the Gospel and grossly misrepresenting the character of God! They think their legal prescriptions will indeed MAKE a righteous society! Yes, just laws are necessary and they are pedagogical teachers of the good, of course, but legal statutes CANNOT transform hearts and infuse people with reverence for God’s righteous ways.

But the theobros feel like this neo-Reformed theological-political worldview on steroids gives them something to fight with and its seeming coherence clicks in their brains. Thus, they’re ready to tear apart the ‘feminized’ church with some vim and vigor. They are bone-tired (and rightly so, I might add) of the wishy-washy, mealy-mouthed moderates who kiss up to godless progressives and this theology supplies them with the gasoline with which to push back and push back hard. Meanwhile, it gives conservative non-Calvinist Christians like me a serious bout of indigestion watching them go after people who sometimes ARE promoting culturally popular sins and errors but knowing that the antidote they have in mind is their harsh, legalistic schlock they are persuaded to the core is “biblical”. I hate the cognitive dissonance I experience – that feeling of agreeing with them on some of the substance they espouse while being utterly repulsed at their application and vituperative means of engagement. As Kaeley often says, the progressive manipulative types (like the late Rachel Held Evans) and the archconservative abusive types (like Doug Wilson) are, in fact, two wings of a very broken and decrepit bird.

For years, so-called progressive Christians have pulled variations of the “you’re so mean” card against conservatives who are doing their level best to contend for God’s righteousness in their churches and the political realm. It’s emotional sabotage used to derail people and promote idolatry. But some of the conservative Calvinistic types who now warn of emotional sabotage are just as sinister. They use similarly manipulative tricks as the progressives to ensure that they always have the theological upper hand. If you cross them, you’ll be made to think you’re crossing God. And what sincere, biblically orthodox Christian wants to do that?

To reiterate, the worst kind of evil, in my view, is that which is dressed up as good and done in God’s name. I’m convinced that the only reason that the mean and nasty theobros have the following that they do is because they are partially right about some things. Some of what they are responding to has indeed been filling the vacuum left by a misplaced emphasis from some well-meaning Christians on being “winsome” and a refusal to believe in the kind of radical evil the reprobate progressives routinely display. The “winsome” crowd has been rather ineffective at addressing the crowd who are chemically castrating and surgically maiming kids, I must say.

But while overcorrection is always a concern, I’m disgusted to see how the frustration and horror many rightly have with ferocious, godless leftists swing the pendulum into religiously smarmy and abusive abrasiveness as seen most clearly in the abortion abolitionist movement. It makes me want to scream: “JUST NO! STOP!” It’s infinitely worse because, again, it’s done in God’s name with just enough biblically rooted truths mixed into it to seem right to many people who are hungry for justice and restoration to moral sanity.

I’m as conservative as they come in Christian circles. But if this overt, grotesque “conservative” cruelty gains even more of a foothold? Count me the heck out!