“Unchristian Teachings”: The History of “Alt-Right” Beliefs In Lutheranism

I realize this is a pointless exercise.

Wokeism is a plague of our own times. It is a fad that is running its course.

This is a contemporary leftwing social movement that has infected nearly every institution in our society due to the tireless crusading of progressive activists. The rot can be found in all branches of Christianity. It has conquered American atheism. It can be found in every university in the country. It can be found in “journalism,” the military and HR departments. It can be found in NASA. It can even be found in unlikely places like your local gym or fire department. Joe Biden recently signed an executive order to impose this madness throughout the executive branch of the federal government.

The specific traditional doctrines of these institutions do not matter. The same doctrine that is bubbling up in the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod (LCMS) is far more widespread in the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA) which has “trans” bishops resigning over “racism.” Russell Moore and other woke elites in the Southern Baptist Convention tried to drive my friend James Edwards out of his church. Pope Francis is woke. Orthodoxy isn’t immune either. The most aggressive evangelists of Wokeism are atheists who completely reject belief in God. Woke activists are parasites who worm their way into all institutions and hijack those institutions which are used to reproduce their own doctrines.

Thus, it is pointless for me to point out that none of this has anything to do with Martin Luther or the founders of Lutheranism or the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod. It is pointless for me to point out that this alien doctrine did not exist within Lutheranism a century ago. It didn’t exist within Presbyterianism or Anglicanism or Catholicism a century ago either. This is all about progressive activists in our own times trying to hijack and reconstruct institutions in their own image. Every knee shall bend … not to the Lord, but to the latest fads and trends in circulation among educated elites in early 21st century America. Just like all other Christian churches, LCMS is updating its doctrines to conform itself to the world.

Here is the laundry list of the horrible teachings of the “alt-right”:

LCMS:

“Dear friends in Christ,

The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, its president, vice-presidents and all 35 district presidents, along with its ministerium and congregations, categorically reject the horrible and racist teachings of the so-called “alt-right” in toto (including white supremacy, Nazism, pro-slavery, anti-interracial marriage, women as property, fascism, death for homosexuals, even genocide). …”

Where to start?

Pro-slavery? In the 21st century, slavery is a moot issue and virtually no one including the alt-right is calling for the return of slavery, but C.F.W. Walther who was the founder of the LCMS lived through the War Between the States and addressed the issue when it was salient in his own times. Dr. Walther denied that slavery was a sin, blamed the “Abolitionist-Republican Party” for causing the Civil War, defended the secession of Missouri and attacked Black Republicanism which sought “a new age of freedom and equality” which he correctly associated with “ungodly, atheistic newspapers.” When Dr. Walther (a proud citizen of Missouri) was forced to swallow the dog and swear a loyalty oath to the triumphant Union, he felt compelled by his conscience to formally protest it.

Interracial marriage? Interracial marriage was banned in Missouri until the Supreme Court’s Loving v. Virginia decision in 1967. As far as I know, the LCMS never excommunicated any of its members of opposing interracial marriage when it was illegal in Missouri for most of its history.

White supremacy? Once again, Missouri was a slave state and a Jim Crow state and actual “white supremacy” was once the law of the land. C.F.W. Walther guided the LCMS through the Reconstruction era. Missouri banned interracial marriage and had segregated schools. Interracial adoptions were also illegal in Missouri. As far as I know, the LCMS never excommunicated anyone for “racism” or “white supremacy” during the Reconstruction era or throughout all of the Jim Crow era. Why didn’t the LCMS with its clear doctrine that something called “racism” is a sin even support abolitionism?

Nazism? Millions of German Lutherans fought the Third Reich in World War II. Most Lutherans throughout history have not lived under a liberal democracy. In Sweden, for example, Lutherans have lived under an absolutist monarch in a homogeneous Lutheran confessional state longer than under liberal democracy. The Church of Sweden, however, is now a “trans” church under liberal democracy and Sweden is one of the most irreligious countries in the world.

Fascism? Once again, it was Martin Luther’s successors who set up the traditional Lutheran model of the confessional state, which was created during the Reformation and owes nothing to the “alt-right.” This model of the Lutheran state was dominant into the 19th and early 20th century in some places.

Death for homosexuals? Sodomy was punished by the death penalty in Lutheran Europe like it was elsewhere in Europe into the 18th century. Homosexuals were being burned at the stake in England in the 18th century. The generations who were the closest to the Reformation had the least interest in liberal democracy and supported the harshest penalty for sodomy.

Women as property? I suppose Harrison is referring here to coverture, which is based on English common law, in which the legal identity of the wife was subsumed into her husband. Married women used to have no legal existence in the West. In Missouri, this wasn’t changed until the Married Women’s Property Act was passed in 1875. Has the LCMS ever excommunicated anyone before for opposing feminism and women’s suffrage? This seems like a startling new precedent.

Genocide? Woke activists commonly claim that Americans are living on “stolen land” and that American settlers committed genocide against Native Americans. Is Harrison endorsing this belief?