Process Theology's Counterpoint to Evangelical Christian Militancy, Part 2

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Process Theology's Counterpoint

to Evangelical Christian Militancy

Part 2

by R.E. Slater & ChatGPT

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Related References
Constitutional Democratic Governance - Whitehead's Processual Approach, Part 5
Constitutional Democratic Governance - Connolly and Process, Part 4
Constitutional Democratic Governance - 5 Dissenting Political Voices, Part 3
Constitutional Democratic Governance vs Maga-Trumpism's NeoLiberal Rule, Part 2
Constitutional Democratic Governance vs Maga-Trumpism's NeoLiberal Rule, Part 1

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Renewal: From Holy War to Holy Relationship

Process Theology begins with a fundamentally different picture of God: not the supreme commander wielding coercive power, but the relational presence who works persuasively within all creation toward beauty, justice, and love. 

From this starting point, the church’s mission, worship, and ethics are reimagined. Militaristic metaphors are not “erased” but reframed so they cannot be weaponized against others. The “battle” becomes the struggle against alienation, injustice, and despair - not against human beings or cultures.

What follows is an era-by-era counter-history showing how Process Theology diverges from militarized evangelicalism, why it diverges, and why it offers a healthier Christian foundation.

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1. The Biblical and Theological Roots of Process Theology

• Process Reading: A Process Christianity sees warrior passages as narratival histories of their time, not templates for divine action. Whereas the ancient's imagined God’s power as weaponized, process does not. Today's Christian imagination sees God's power as persuasive, never coercive; as loving, never wrathful.

• The Enemy is Redefined: The Process Christian enemy is always the alienation and injustice of people of difference. It can never be justified, sanctified, blessed, nor condoned.

• Why the Process Perspective is Preferred: Process Christianity teaches against divine violence which historically has legitimized human violence. Rather, it centers Jesus' Mission in the Sermon on the Mount.

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2. 19th Century: Process's Mission is Ministry, not Conquest

• Process Alternative: Mission as co-creating mutual transformation; the gospel of Jesus is the conversation of love, healing, and reconciliation; it teaches that God has always been lovingly active in all cultures through all times.

• Why Process is Preferred: It resists all forms of cultural imperialism while continually focusing on relational expansions of love.

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3. Early 20th Century: War is seen as Tragedy, not Sacrament

• Process Alternative: A Process Christianity or process-based Gospel honors sacrifice when it protects life and dignity, but never sacralizes killing.

• Why Preferred: A Process Gospel maintains theological integrity by refusing to equate nationalism and empire wars as God’s work.

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4. WWII and the Cold War: Process Rejects Demonization

• Process Alternative: Process Christianity sees evil as systemic - not embodied in nations but embodied in those who speak evil and lead by demonizing others.

• The Christian apocalypse: Envisions the hope of Revelation as a processual unveiling of renewal to love and redeem all nations. But it does not endorse and any time any form of annihilation or hope of divine terror, judgment or wrath.

• Why Preferred: Process always seeks reconciliation within political conflict that loving, respectful, kind, and helping ethics are experienced on all sides without judgment or harm.

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5. Civil Rights and Vietnam: Processual Justice is Peacemaking

• Process Alternative: Process Life seeks full solidarity with liberation movements, whether feminist, LGBTQ+, racial, religious, etc; Processual Christian victory is defined as the dismantling of oppression, injustice, and inequality, and not in defeating people.

• Why Preferred: Processual Ethical Action holds peace and justice equally together, thus avoiding the evangelical split between “order” and “prophecy.”

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6. Late 20th Century: Pluralistic & Intersectional Cultures without War

• Process Alternative: Process engages with moral issues through empathy and civic dialogue, not battle language and actions. It seeks to heal and help. To co-create solidarity, cooperation, communication, and community.

• Why Preferred: Process seeks to preserve the public square as a shared commons area rather than as a competing battlefield of Whites Only.

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7. 21st Century: Process Transcends Partisanship

• Process Alternative: God’s reign is never equated with any political or religious movement of injust or inequity. Process regards the "ins and outs" of a political system as one systemic society needing divine healing, repentance, reform, and redemption.

• Process does not condon the false evangelical rally (2015?) on the Washington D.C. Mall purporting to pray for America, rather than repenting of its nationalism, nor of the harm and discrimination borne in its heart. Actions which have birthed un-Constitutional and un-democratic Triumism supported by empire-driven Maga-ism.

• Why Preferred: True processual actions will sustain and deepen civic dialogue and shared civic life - even in the deepest of disagreements.

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Why Process Theology Is the Healthier Foundation

1. Resists Co-optation: Refuses the coercive power model that invites political hijacking.

2. Centers Relational Ethics: Frames morality as transforming relationships, not defeating opponents.

3. Holds Justice and Peace Together: Keeps both as inseparable dimensions of love.

4. Global Compatibility: Works across cultures without assuming superiority.

5. Future-Oriented: Focused on co-creative participation in God’s unfolding work, not defending an imagined past.

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Conclusion: From Marching Armies to Healing Communities

From the imperial hymnody of the 19th century to the holy war politics of MAGA Christianity, militarized evangelicalism has repeatedly fused the gospel with conquest - first externally, then internally.

Process Theology offers a fundamentally different vision:

• The Christian God as the redeeming lure toward life - not the warrior god of armies;
• The Christian mission as a mission of healing relationship - not of conquest; and,
• Christian victory as measured in healthy reconciliation - not domination and dominionism.

In an age where the church’s moral witness has often been compromised by political captivity, this alternative is not a luxury - it is survival.

To embody the gospel in the 21st century, Christians must exchange the drumbeat of war for the patient work of repair, trading battle cries for invitations, and replacing the banner of conquest with the table of fellowship.

This is the doctrine and ministry, hope and activity, resolve and commitment found in a Process-based Christianity. A Christianity that guides the Christian faith towards healthy, redemptive faith and keeps it from it's imperialistic and dragonian calls to hate and divide, kill and oppress.

R.E. Slater & ChatGPT
August 12, 2025

Christian Militaristic Imagery & it's Influence on the Christian Faith, Part 1

Christian Militaristic Imagery

& it's Influence on the Christian Faith

Part 1

by R.E. Slater & ChatGPT 5

"Onward, Christian Soldiers" is a 19th-century English hymn. The words were written by Sabine Baring-Gould in 1865, and the music was composed by Arthur Sullivan in 1871. Sullivan named the tune "St Gertrude," after the wife of his friend Ernest Clay Ker Seymer, at whose country home he composed the tune. The Salvation Army adopted the hymn as its favoured processional. The piece became Sullivan's most popular hymn. The hymn's theme is taken from references in the New Testament to the Christian being a soldier for Christ, for example II Timothy 2:3 (KJV): "Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ."

Introduction

Christianity is often imagined as a faith of peace and reconciliation, but much of its musical and textual tradition in the 19th and 20th centuries contains strong militaristic imagery - "armor," "soldier," "battle," "victory," "armies," "conquest." While this language can be traced to biblical metaphors (e.g., Paul’s “armor of God” in Ephesians 6), its prominence in modern hymnody and church life was deeply influenced by nationalism, imperial expansion, and the wars of the modern era.

From the 1800s through the late 1900s, Christian worship in the English-speaking world leaned hard on military metaphors. Yet, these terms were not invented in modernity - they echo biblical imagery such as Yahweh as warrior in Exodus 15 - the "armor of God" in Ephesians 6 - and Revelation’s apocalypticism. In the church these images became supercharged with empire imagery - nationalism, mass war, and by extension, missionary expansion.

Biblical hymns and favorite verses became carriers of civic religion - where the nation’s cause and God’s cause blurred. Some communities heard "spiritual struggle" while others heard "a green light for earthly violence".

By the century’s end, pacifist traditions, liberation voices, and process-oriented theologians began to push the usage of military language from the Christian lexicon and to re-center the Sermon on the Mount in it's place.

This project traces how, and why, worship language prefers marching to strong militaristic metaphors in its cultural struggles and "warfare" upon the societies it finds itself within.

1. Biblical and Theological Roots -->

                                    Militaristic Metaphor -->

                                                    Re-literalization of the Christian Faith

• Hebrew Bible - Yahweh as "Warrior" (Exodus 15); Conquest narratives in Joshua; the Royal Warrior psalms resonating in King David (Psalm 144). These bible texts formed Israel’s memory of deliverance under threat. Not a standing license for conquest but they seeded their faith vocabulary with divine power.

• New Testament - Further elucidated the biblical text's shift towards metaphorical combat: Ephesians 6 frames armor of God (Eph 6.10-17) as truth, righteousness, gospel, faith, salvation. In Tim 2.3-4, the faithful remnant of Christ is a good soldier.

• In later centuries the church re-literalized its bible to fit nationalistic or imperial goals. From once stressing the church's spiritual struggle against flesh and blood and other-worldly principalities, to now actively committing warfare upon society itself in authoritarian struggles against national constitutions constructed for pluralistic societies.

• Early Christian communities - often held pacifist stances. Martyrdom was understood as a Christian witness and testimony to Christ. But, in the church's more recent eras Christian witness is understood as supporting civil counter-violence.

• Across history - especially after Constantine, martial metaphors sometimes slid toward the literal sanction of church-state power. But in modernity, that cultural slide now re-appears as churches blending biblical "warfare" with national military goals.

• The idea of separating "church from state" is no longer in vogue. Rather, the church wishes to become the replacement for empire and imperial power. 

2. 19th Century: Empire, Mission & Evangelical Expansion

• Socio-historical backdrop: Victorian British imperial expansion. America's westward push against indigenous tribes and European colonial power. Reciprocating post-Napolenonic European colonial expansion across the New World.

• Socio-missionary movements: Westernized assimilation framed as the evangelization of pagans to "conquer the world for Christ." The accepted Christian language for faith-advance used terms like marching, banners, victory; useful, and quite natural, for promoting Christian imperial culture.

• Hymnbook headliners

  • Onward Christian Soldiers. Written by Sabine Baring-Gould (1865). Originally for a children’s Whitsuntide procession. Quickly became a global anthem of confident Christendom.

  • Stand Up, Stand Up for Jesus. By George Duffield Jr. (1858). Written after the death of revivalist preacher, Dudley Tyng. Recasts steadfast discipleship as soldierly courage.

  • The Son of God Goes Forth to War. By Reginald Heber (1812). Martyrs are represented as the church’s true soldiers . Bespeaks literal soldierly valor.

  • Occurring earlier, but influential in 19th c. circulation: Soldiers of Christ Arise. By Charles Wesley (1742). Recital of Ephesians 6 and widely reprinted globally.

• Favorite verses in pulpits and mission rallies

  • 2 Timothy 2.3-4. Endure hardship as a good soldier of Christ.

  • Psalm 144.1. Blessed be the Lord my strength who trains my hands for war. Often abstracted from its royal-psalm context.

  • Revelation 19.11-16. Apocalyptic imagery visualizing Jesus Christ on a white warhorse. The imagery gives to the church assurance of history’s final victory over evil when aligning with it's efforts to Christianized civilization. It sees itself as ushering in the Age of the Kingdom as opposed to Christ heavenly work of the same.

• Muscular Christianity - Set in bloody, cruel, and oppressive Victorian imagery , the church imagines itself in bodily vigor, manliness, and moral crusades, against society-at-large much like the Crusades of yesteryear. Adding to the illusion are Church parades, church uniforms and dress, and hymns normalized martial tone in consecrated religion.

3. Early 20th Century: Wars & Sacralized Sacrifice

World War I & II Influence:

Hymns and sermons became overtly patriotic, tying Christ’s cause to national war aims.

• World War I Influence: Churches framed the war as a moral trial; sacrifice on the battlefield was likened to Christ’s sacrifice.

• Hymns in Uniform: Onward, Christian Soldiers, Fight the Good Fight, Lead On, O King Eternal — sung at troop send-offs and memorials.

• Evangelical Role: Billy Sunday preached enlistment as Christian duty. Evangelical hymnals of the period leaned heavily on “battle” themes, reinforcing the war effort.

Cold War Militarism:

• Evangelicals in the U.S. adopted a "spiritual warfare" rhetoric against communism.

• Popular verses such as found in Ephesians 6:11–12 ("Put on the whole armor of God") were used to frame ideological struggle as holy war.

Civil Rights Era and Vietnam War:

• Hymns like "Battle Hymn of the Republic" - originally an abolitionist song, were repurposed for diverse political causes.

• "Victory in Jesus" (1939) became popular in revivalist circles, combining personal salvation with triumphant conquest language.

4. World War II & Cold War Civil Religion Matures as Vocabularies Harden

• Between wars - patriotic services became fixtures - with flags near pulpits - national hymns were sung alongside sacred ones.

• World War II intensified the identification of Axis powers with "evil" and Allied cause with "freedom." Preachers drew on apocalyptic texts to frame a cosmic struggle using patriotic services and flags in sanctuaries.

• Evangelical Role: Billy Graham’s "crusades" framed evangelism within Cold War opposition to "godless communism." Evangelical schools and camps reinforced “armor of God” training for children.

• Hymns and favorites

  • "Battle Hymn of the Republic" surged in public liturgies in a fusion of judgment & justice accompanied by a marching cadence fit for mass mobilization.

  • "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God" functioned as a language of resilience against imagined invasion by the world into church culture.

• Ambiguities

  • Some German churches colluded with nationalism - others resisted. The same repertoire could buttress state violence or shelter dissent - showing how context steers interpretation.

5. The Cold War: Anti-Communism & the Rise of Spiritual Warfare

• The 1940s and 50s United States and Allies used their conflict with communism to cast it as a moral and theological war. "Freedom under God" became a civil religious creed.

• Evangelical subculture popularized "spiritual warfare" language - drawing on Ephesians 6, Revelation, and it's language of cosmic dualism pitting God against the powers of evil. Para-church groups used military language of ranks, discipline, and warlike campaign metaphors.

• Favorite verses and songs

  • Ephesians 6 appeared on posters, tracts, and youth curricula.

  • Revivalist and gospel songs like "Victory in Jesus" (1939) fusing it with personal salvation for an overall triumphant-martial affect.

  • Patriotic hymns like "God of Our Fathers" and "My Country 'Tis of Thee" lived inside Sunday services on civic holidays - cementing church - nation linkage.

6. The Civil Rights Era: Vietnam & Counter-Liturgies of Love & Peace

• The 1960s cracked the consensus. Civil Rights leaders often sang "Battle Hymn of the Republic" as an abolitionist-justice anthem - re-directing "divine glory" towards Black civil liberation - and not at war.

• Tensions: Civil Rights leaders repurposed Battle Hymn of the Republic for justice; peace churches and mainline hymnals softened or removed battle imagery.

• Evangelical Role: White evangelicalism often avoided or opposed Civil Rights, prioritizing “order” over prophetic justice. Many evangelicals supported the Vietnam War, equating antiwar protest with unpatriotic rebellion.

• Vietnam provoked liturgical self-critique in mainline churches so that hymnals were reduced or rephrased in the use of martial language.

• Peace-forward songs entered congregational life

  • "Let There Be Peace on Earth" (1955). A simple, universalist statement orientated toward peace-loving communities.

  • "They’ll Know We Are Christians by Our Love" (1966) Grounded Christianity identity in love, not conquest.

  • "Make Me a Channel of Your Peace" (A Prayer of St. Francis) was reset in Catholic circles and widely sung across inter-denominations.

• Pacifist traditions such as found in the Mennonite, Quaker, and Brethren, churches offered robust counter-liturgies that emphasized The Beatitudes, loving one's enemy, and emphasizing ministries of reconciliation.

7. Late 20th Century: Moral Majority & Culture Wars

Contemporary praise music diversified the sound but kept some martial tropes - mighty warrior, the army of God, an enemy’s camp. Charismatic deliverance language sometimes mirrored warfare idioms.

Shift to Domestic Enemies: Evangelicals and the Religious Right declared a “war” on secularism, feminism, LGBTQ+ rights, and abortion.

Language and Music: “Army of God” motifs in youth rallies, Promise Keepers, Christian media; “enemy” increasingly identified as fellow citizens with differing values.

Editorial pushback grew:

• Several denominational hymnals either dropped "Onward - Christian Soldiers" or footnoted its metaphorical intent.
• 
  
• Text changes proliferated, swapping soldiers for people or pilgrims and replacing battle with journey or struggle.

National liturgies around Memorial Day, Independence Day, Remembrance Sunday, kept the civil-religious militaristic thread alive - even within otherwise peace-leaning congregations.

8. 21st Century: Enter MAGA Christianity

• Holy War Politics: MAGA rallies use "armor of God" branding, apocalyptic rhetoric, and worship-like atmospheres for partisan mobilization.

• Internal Enemies: Political opponents, immigrants, and dissenting Christians labeled as threats to the nation’s divine destiny.

• January 6 as Case Study: Shofars, "Jesus Saves" banners, and prayer on the Senate floor alongside violent insurrection.

• Evangelical Role: A large bloc of white evangelicalism now openly fuses faith with nationalist identity, sanctifying political conflict as God’s work.

9. Theological Appraisals: What Militarized Worship Does to People

• Potential goods - when handled as metaphor

  • Names real conflict with evil, injustice, addiction, even despair.

  • Encourages courage - perseverance - communal solidarity.

• Recurrent harms - when metaphor fuses with state or tribe

  • Confuses the church’s mission with national goals - baptizing violence as vocation.

  • Moves towards legitimizing domination, victory, and humiliation of enemies, rather than seek reconciliation, healing repair, or love of enemy.

  • Marginalizes the Sermon on the Mount re sentiment "the ends justify means."

• Constructive correctives

  • Girardian readings warn that sacred violence hides scapegoating.

  • Liberational, feminist, postcolonial, and process theologies insist that divine action is persuasive, relational, noncoercive, and that Christian formation should habituate peacemaking, truth telling, and repair.

10. Text, Tune & Translation: How Editors Re-Arm the Bible

• Common edits in late 20th century hymnals

  • “Lead On - O King Eternal” - lines about “holy warfare” retuned to “holy calling” or “holy mission.”

  • “Onward - Christian Soldiers” - omitted in some books - or reframed with notes about spiritual - not physical - conflict.

  • “Stand Up - Stand Up for Jesus” - softened terms like “ye soldiers of the cross” in some editions to broader discipleship language.

• New classics are reoriented towards peace, justice, and community repair

  • “For Everyone Born - a Place at the Table” - inclusive ethics over conquest.

  • Global song - Taizé chants - Iona Community hymns - that center lament - healing - and pilgrimage more than battle.

• A Scriptural reframing in lectionaries and preaching

  • Emphasis on Isaiah 2 - Micah 4 - Matthew 5 - Romans 12 - 2 Corinthians 5 (ministry of reconciliation) - to pull the center of gravity from conquest to communion.

11. Cultural Mechanics: Why Martial Metaphors Remain

• March music captivates people. The meters and cadences of martial songs produce mass solidarity and resolve.

• The visual spectacle of flags, uniforms, and processions create a sense of emotional identity and belonging.

• The simplicity of binary framing, of "us versus them," is cognitively regenerative... that is, it is easily mapped onto the human psyche and easily relevant to spiritual growth if communities are not vigilant.

• Print capitalism and mass media including cheap hymnals, motivating radio crusades, even emotionally moving television services, can easily spread a shared militarized repertoire at scale across the gospel of Christ affecting church beliefs and doctrines.

12. Research Project: Review, Code & Compare

• Corpus - assemble hymnals from 1800s to 2000s across denominations - plus major revival songbooks - praise compilations - and liturgical books.

• Tagging - annotate lyrics for military lexemes (battle - soldier - victory - conquer - armor - enemy - sword - banner) versus peace lexemes (peace - shalom - reconcile - heal - mercy - justice - repair).

• Timeline - map frequency trends against historical events - wars - imperial milestones - civil rights - and denominational statements.

• Scripture usage - compile sermon collections - tract literature - evangelistic manuals - and curricula - then count verse usage - especially Ephesians 6 - 2 Timothy 2 - Psalm 144 - Revelation 19 - Isaiah 2 - Matthew 5.

• Case studies - a British parish - an American mainline church - an American evangelical megachurch - a Mennonite congregation - to show how context redirects the same texts.

• Outcome - a comparative matrix that reveals not only shifts in words - but shifts in affections - practices - and communal ethics.

13. Constructive Proposals: De-militarizing Church Language

Without Flattening Zeal and Courage

• Keep moral seriousness - swap weapons for virtues - courage - fidelity - patience - truthfulness - solidarity.

• Retrain the “enemy” concept - target systems of harm - not persons - and always hold open the door for enemy conversion.

• Rebalance the canon - pair every Ephesians 6 reading with Matthew 5 - every Revelation vision with the Lamb’s nonviolent witness.

• Lament and healing - normalize songs of grief - confession - and communal repair so worship is not only triumphal.

• Embodied practices - peacemaking liturgies - foot washing - reconciliation testimonies - community organizing blessings - to give courage a non-military shape.

Conclusion: What We Have Learned & Where to Take It

Across two centuries, militarized language in Christian worship rose with the idea of Western empire. It then hardened in both civic and spiritual warfare, maturing under the combined auspices of civil+religion.

From this grew a chorus of alternative Christian denouncement and critique urging peacemaking traditions and theologies centered on relational, persuasive, divine action of God. The biblical mustard seed of re-statement likewise used metaphorical language to inspire its Christian ideals: using metaphors of armor as virtues, victory as love’s perseverance, the conquering Lamb as the One who suffers love.

And yet, modernity repeatedly re-literalized the metaphors to infect and bind church affections to national power.

Presently, the remaining remnant of the church's task is not to purge courage - but to redirect it towards proper targets. A de-militarized worship still names evil, still calls for resolve, still charges people to risk comfort, status, and even safety for the good of neighbor and enemy alike.

However, the non-martial church simply just stops all references and training of Christians from warlike endeavor to calls to action to love, to healing, to reconciliation. These are the real Christian victories and not nationalized power, cruelty, nor oppression of one's fellow man.

Gospel Love and Reconciliation re-centers the strange and difficult, violent grammar of the bible, and of the Cross, where power becomes service, where enemies become neighbors, and where the church’s march is a pilgrimage of healing, redeeming, repair.