This classic episode of the Good Faith podcast jumps straight into the relationship between faith and politics. David French and Curtis Chang explore how the concept of a “Christian nationalist” blurs the line between a healthy sense of patriotism and potentially dangerous nationalism.

When the American church and politics collide, it can feel impossible to separate the two – but now more than ever, followers of Jesus must draw a line between their Christian and American identities. True patriotism does not mean to overlook the faults of your country: rather, it is to care deeply enough about your country and neighbors to want to better it. Moments in recent history – particularly illustrated in the events of January 6 – must be a call for Christians to reexamine and reclaim a healthy sense of what it means to love their country.

Listen in to this timely conversation with Curtis and David, drawing from theology, history, and of course, C.S. Lewis.

This excerpt has been edited for length and clarity.

David French: To use the family analogy, we know our spouse, we know our kids. We want them to make good choices, to live virtuous lives, but we know they’re not going to be perfect and we know their flaws better than anybody. But does it diminish your love for your family? I think that that’s one of the real challenges when we talk about this larger national community. We have to have enough security in our affection for our fellow citizens and the home that we are growing up in together, that we are not insecure about the truth. And we can also celebrate what’s good.

A lot of the right is turning away from legal immigration. That’s not the spirit of the liberal conservative world I grew up with. In that world I grew up with, we were proud that people wanted to come here. And then the other thing is the fact that we have extended with this power an umbrella of protection around a host of nations that contain hundreds of millions of souls – that’s not imperialism. That network is not American imperialism. It is in our national interest, but it is also an element of national sacrifice.

Curtis Chang: Well David, that’s why you went to Iraq, right? To protect and extend the strength of America to protect the vulnerable. That is America at its greatest. That’s not the whole story, but it is part of the story, and it’s a part we want to nurture into further fruit.

It does seem to me that ultimately when we come back down to it, that is the core of the threat of Christian nationalism. It all flows from that construction of identity. The construction of identity is an “us versus them” construct that ultimately forces us to draw ever-more narrow definitions of “us,” and exclude the others because they’re part of the “them.” And that happens whether in immigration or in terms of foreign policy.

Ultimately, in the Christian vision of humanity, there is no “us versus them.” In Jesus all of the dividing walls that we normally erect to define us versus them have been broken down. In Christ there’s only an “us.”