When the Cross is Wrapped in the Flag

Christian nationalism and the search for a better patriotism, by the County Ecumenical Officer for Norfolk and Waveney

12-Minute Read

The events in Thetford this summer brought some of the tensions surrounding immigration, identity and belonging uncomfortably close to home here in Norfolk and Waveney. They reminded us that behind arguments about immigration lie real people and real communities, sometimes struggling with rapid change, anxious about the future, and with very different understandings of what it means to be a member of the community.

It is important to say immediately that those who demonstrated in Thetford, or who have concerns about immigration there or elsewhere, should not simply be labelled Christian nationalists. Concern about immigration is not Christian nationalism, nor is opposition to particular government policies. People may hold such views for many different reasons, and it would be wrong to treat them as though they represented a single ideology, political or religious movement.

Nevertheless, these events form part of a wider context in which Christian nationalism has become increasingly visible. Its clearest contemporary expression has been in the United States, where Christian symbols and language have become closely associated with the American administration and parts of the MAGA movement. Crosses stand alongside campaign banners at political rallies, elections are presented as battles for the nation’s soul, and Christian faith is intertwined with claims about America’s identity and destiny. What was once largely the language of the political margins has moved much closer to the centre of American political life. 

We should not assume, of course, that what happens in America will simply be reproduced here. That said, echoes of the same language and imagery are becoming more visible in Britain. We have seen ‘Unite the Kingdom’ marches in London where crosses and images of Christ have appeared alongside appeals to recover a lost ‘Christian Britain’. Christian symbols and biblical language have also become more prominent within some strands of populist politics; especially where immigration, national identity and cultural change meet. 

It is this development, rather than concern about immigration itself, that particularly interests me. Something significant happens when Christianity becomes bound up with a particular account of national identity, where defending the faith and defending the nation begin to be presented as though they were the same cause.

For Christians, this development invites us to consider how we can respond faithfully. How can we take seriously questions of identity and belonging while remaining attentive to the dignity of our neighbour, the stranger, and our common life together?

This is one of the issues I explore in my new book, Loving What Is Ours: Patriotism and the Desire for Human Flourishing, to be published through Amazon at the end of September. Growing out of my doctoral research in moral philosophy, the book makes what may initially seem an unfashionable argument: that love of country can be a genuine moral good.

Its final chapters take that argument somewhere my original research did not, bringing it into conversation with Catholic Social Teaching and, in particular, the growing relationship between Christianity, national identity and political power. Although written from my Catholic perspective, the discussion is intended for Christians of other traditions, people of other faiths, and those of none.

So, what is Christian nationalism? Well, Christian nationalism is not simply patriotism practised by Christians. Nor, despite what some people may think, should the established Church of England be regarded as a form of Christian nationalism. Also, recognising and acknowledging the enormous influence Christianity has had upon British history, culture and institutions does not make someone a Christian nationalist.

I use the term to describe a family of beliefs holding that a nation is, or ought to be, defined by Christian identity; that it possesses a distinctive divine calling; and that Christianity should therefore be defended and advanced through political and cultural power. It is frequently accompanied by a nostalgic picture of the country itself: an imagined Christian nation, remembered selectively and idealised retrospectively, in which faith, culture and national identity once supposedly formed a more settled and harmonious country. 

Of course, such memories contain elements of truth. Christianity has profoundly shaped Western culture, including our own national life - something the historian Tom Holland has compellingly demonstrated in his book Dominion.

That said, I can’t help observing that the country being longed for often never existed in quite the form in which it is now remembered or presented, especially in the narrative that Christian nationalists tell. Some may wave this away as harmless nostalgia. Clearly, in some cases it may well be relatively harmless. But where it becomes a real danger is when this idealised past becomes the measure of the present, and those who do not fit its religious or cultural picture are seen as somehow less fully belonging.

That distinction matters because there is nothing inherently wrong with loving one’s country. During my life, I have worn my country’s uniform and served it in the military, before later working as a HR Director in the NHS and an Assistant Chief Officer in the police. I’ve spent much of my later life committed to study and constructing a philosophical defence of patriotism. And I am also a Catholic. It is precisely because I take both patriotism and my Christian faith seriously that I find Christian nationalism so troubling.

The moral form of patriotism I defend is conditional, self-critical and directed towards human flourishing. Christian nationalism does something different. It takes something - our country - that may properly be loved and gives it a significance it cannot bear. For me, patriotic partiality is morally justified only insofar as it remains subject to moral conditions. Christian nationalism, however, risks removing those conditions altogether, turning the nation from a proper object of love into a sacred cause.

We should, however, resist caricaturing those attracted to Christian nationalism. After all, Christianity really has retreated from much of Western public life. Cultural change is experienced by many as bewilderingly rapid and, as a result, some Christians genuinely feel marginalised. Immigration also raises legitimate questions about integration, social cohesion and the capacity of communities to absorb rapid change. More widely, many people today experience economic insecurity, alienation and a loss of belonging.

These are real experiences, and dismissing those who express such concerns does nothing to answer them. A movement can, nevertheless, arise from genuine grievances but still offer the wrong answer. 

The philosopher Hannah Arendt’s understanding of ideology can help us understand why. For Arendt, ideology is not simply a strongly held set of beliefs, but what she called ‘the logic of an idea’. What she means by this, is a single premise that gradually becomes more authoritative than the complexity of experience itself. Christian nationalism can take on precisely this character: the nation was once Christian and flourished because of it; that inheritance has been taken away by hostile forces; and political power must now be recovered if the nation is to be restored. 

There may be fragments of truth within that story, which is partly why it can be persuasive. The danger comes when everything is made to fit the narrative, and whatever challenges it is then dismissed or explained away.

This is where Christian nationalism becomes particularly potent. Populism feeds on telling people that they have been ignored or betrayed. Christian nationalism adds the claim that God has been betrayed. Political disagreement can then become a contest over sacred truth. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that some populist movements are increasingly drawn to Christian nationalism: it gives political grievance a transcendent authority.

A good example is Restore Britain, which explicitly presents itself as a political home for British Christians, declaring that Britain is "an historically Christian country, guided by Christian morality" and promising that a Restore Britain government would "honour those moral traditions".

The worry with this presentation is that those with whom such movements disagree can cease to be simply seen as fellow citizens, and instead become opponents of the nation’s supposedly Christian purpose. Faith itself then risks becoming a marker of cultural identity rather than a summons to discipleship. The more demanding claims of the Gospel - love of enemies, welcome of the stranger, concern for the poor and self-giving service - then become secondary to defending nation, culture or political power. As I put it in my book, "Christianity is then wanted for its banner, but not for its cross." For me, this is where the issue actually becomes ecumenically important.

I see two contrasting ways in which Christianity can present itself in public life. One is a Christianity that unites, rooted in Jesus who healed the sick, comforted outcasts and broke bread with sinners. It feeds the hungry, welcomes the stranger and builds bridges. It does not pretend that difficult questions about immigration, social change or national identity do not exist, but it refuses to make fear of the other its organising principle.

The other way increasingly defines itself through opposition - to immigrants, secular society, the establishment, cultural change or those who believe differently. Christianity, in this sense, becomes another boundary separating 'us' from 'them'. Once Christian identity becomes a test of authentic national belonging, citizens of other faiths, or none, inevitably occupy a different position. They may be welcomed or tolerated, often they are not, but even if they are they risk being regarded as not quite fully 'one of us.'

That should trouble all Christians. Christian teaching begins from the conviction that human dignity is inherent and God-given: it belongs to the person before nationality, religious affiliation or political identity enters the picture. No nation or political movement therefore determines the fundamental worth of a human being. A Christianity that forgets we are all made in the image of God begins, in my view, to contradict the faith it seeks to defend.

My answer is not that Christians should stop loving their country. Instead, what we need is a better patriotism. The patriotism I defend begins with the country that actually exists: its landscape and institutions, its complex history and, crucially, the people who live here now. Loving what is ours means loving the neighbours who are actually our neighbours, whatever they believe and wherever they come from. 

Some Christian nationalists may reject this account of patriotism precisely because they believe loyalty to the country and its 'true' Christian values should be fierce and unwavering. But that mistakes criticism for disloyalty. The patriotism I advocate is perfectly capable of fierce loyalty; what it rejects is blind loyalty in favour of critical loyalty.

When my country is wrong, I do not abandon it, but neither do I excuse it. I seek to set it right. The biblical prophets loved Israel deeply, but that love did not prevent them from telling Israel when it had gone wrong. Indeed, their criticism arose from their fidelity to it and to the standards by which it was called to live. Genuine patriotism similarly leaves room for dissent, repentance and change. The question is not whether patriots should criticise their country, but how such criticism is exercised and voiced: whether it seeks the country’s good or merely expresses contempt for it.

Above all, patriotic love must know its place. For Christians, the country can be a genuine good without being the highest good. Christ’s declaration that his kingdom is not of this world and Paul’s reminder that our citizenship is in heaven do not abolish earthly responsibilities. They prevent those responsibilities from becoming ultimate. Put simply: God is God and the state is not. This allows us to love our country deeply while recognising that the stranger possesses the same human dignity as ourselves. Particular love need not be the enemy of universal concern. Properly formed, it can become one of the ways through which we learn responsibility for others.

This is also where I believe ecumenism has something important to contribute. Christian nationalism cannot be answered simply by dismissing or ignoring it. Many of those attracted to it are sincere people responding to experiences of cultural loss, social dislocation and neglect. Their concerns should be heard even where their conclusions must be challenged. If we fail to listen to the concerns from which Christian nationalism draws its appeal, we are unlikely to persuade those attracted to it that there is a better Christian response.

Christians from different traditions have spent decades learning, sometimes painfully, how to remain in relationship across profound disagreement. They have learnt to speak truth without making an enemy of the person with whom they disagree and, in the process, they have discovered that difference need not destroy communion.

It is in this sense that ecumenism can also be a school of civic charity - a view I shall explore further at the annual NWCT Talk in January. It is also something covered in Churches Together in England’s excellent Kingdom over Nation resource, which provides churches with an ecumenical framework for reflecting upon ideology, nationhood and Christian witness.

In the end, when it comes to Christian nationalism - or nationalism in any form - the struggle is not between those who love their country and those who do not. The real task is learning to love our country well: gratefully but critically, confidently but humbly, and always in a way that enlarges rather than diminishes our concern for others.

Explore CTE’s Kingdom over Nation

This article is by Dr Ian Watson and is adapted from Chapter Nine, ‘When the Cross Is Wrapped in the Flag’, from his book Loving What Is Ours: Patriotism and the Desire for Human Flourishing to be published in September 2026.

Image: Cover of Loving What Is Ours: Patriotism and the Desire for Human Flourishing © Ian Watson 2026.

The quotes from Restore Britain can be found on their website