In McLintock, WayneвЂ™s character publicly spanks the leading lady, played by Maureen OвЂ™Hara, and he also encourages a man to spank his (WayneвЂ™s) adult daughter. But I distinctly remember the way John Wayne treated women in his films. My favorite was True Grit (because of the girl who could ride horses and shoot a gun-no surprise).

We watched quite a few John Wayne movies when I was a kid. Christian nationalism has reared its well-funded and long-established head in seemingly new (but really should have been expected) ways.Дu Mez lays out the historical cards of 20th-century American evangelicalism to show how no one should have been surprised by the white evangelical support of Trump, which she calls вЂњthe culmination of evangelicalsвЂ™ embrace of militant masculinity, an ideology that enshrines patriarchal authority and condones the callous display of power, at home and abroad.вЂќ From the вЂњculture wars,вЂќ to fear-mongering over communism, to systemic racism in evangelical colleges, Du Mez shines a light in all the dark corners.ДЄnd of course, John Wayne makes his appearances as the ideal man for patriarchy-leaning evangelicals, serving as a precursor icon of sorts for Trump: heвЂ™s masculine, gun-bearing, вЂњlaw-and-orderвЂќ establishing, and dominating. But more research is being done, and more people are gaining recognition of this shadow world, perhaps due to the 2016 election and the widespread evangelical support for Trump. IвЂ™ve been gone from the movement for almost eight years, and still most people I meet havenвЂ™t heard of this corner of American Christianity. No one outside of Vision Forum seemed to know anything about Vision Forum, and no one seemed to care. I tried to search the internet for resources on my questions but found little except for Homeschoolers Anonymous. When I was still in the Christian Patriarchy movement starting to deconstruct my beliefs, I felt like everything I was taught and the people I grew up with existed in a bubble, protected from the outside world. The book untangles the web of Christian nationalism, American evangelicalism, white supremacy, and patriarchy, and if you donвЂ™t think those things are connected, then you definitely need to read it.

With all that IвЂ™ve processed in the past decade, I am so thankful for this book and the work it is doing. Reading Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation by Kristin Kobes Du Mez is a little like reading a biography of my upbringing, just not the fun parts.

Jesus and john wayne book review