Quick Take
“God & Country,” a new movie from Santa Cruz filmmaker Dan Partland, is an examination of the rise of Christian nationalism, a poorly understood, largely American phenomenon that has threatened to consume evangelical Christianity, the Republican Party, and even democracy itself in the United States.
The new documentary from Santa Cruz-based filmmaker Dan Partland, “God & Country,” doesn’t really have an ending. That’s because it’s a drama still unfolding, and is expected to reach a climax in 2024.
“God & Country” is an examination of the rise of Christian nationalism, a poorly understood, largely American phenomenon that has threatened to consume evangelical Christianity, the Republican Party, and even democracy itself in the United States. As Partland defines it in the film, Christian nationalism is a purely political movement that distorts both Christianity and American exceptionalism for its own ends.
“Christian nationalism is a terrible term,” said Partland, who makes his home in the Soquel hills, “because it sounds totally benign. It’s not a faith, and in fact has nothing to do with faith. It’s a political identity masquerading as a faith. And that’s what makes it so powerful, because if you can convince large swaths of people that this list of political deliverables is essential to their Christian faith, you can convince those same people to go to the ends of the Earth to make sure that that happens.”
“God & Country” will be screened at a special one-night engagement at the Santa Cruz Cinema on Pacific Avenue on Thursday, the day before it is to open nationwide. Partland himself will be on hand for a post-screening Q&A.
The film, co-produced by director Rob Reiner, explains the rise of Donald Trump and the events of Jan. 6, 2021, through the lens of Christian nationalism, which has deep roots in American history but was particularly ignited by the anti-abortion politics of the Reagan era. Christian nationalism is a term to describe a political stance that embraces conservative positions with the trappings, rituals and symbols of traditional Christianity, often taking a strong anti-government stance and adopting the idea that America was founded as a Christian nation, an idea which many historians dispute.
Partland believes that much of the mainstream news media as well as many Americans on the left and center-left are unaware of the strength and scope of Christian nationalist sentiment, especially in the American heartland.
“The nature of our current media silos is that if you don’t make a real effort to get outside whatever silo you’re in,” he said, “you’re not fully aware of what’s really going on out there.”
To underscore his contention that Christian nationalist politics as embodied in the Donald Trump phenomenon is a clear distortion of traditional Christianity, Partland brings into his film a wide range of people with credibility in the church, such as Catholic Sister (and U.S. Presidential Medal of Honor winner) Simone Campbell, North Carolina Rev. William J. Barber, Christianity Today editor-in-chief Russell Moore and “Veggie Tales” author Phil Vischer, among many others.
Partland has been a director and producer in feature films and television for more than 20 years. His directing credits include “American Race,” a TV docuseries following former basketball star Charles Barkley on a tour to discover what race means to Americans, and “Unfit: The Psychology of Donald Trump.”
“Christianity is unmistakably one of the greatest and largest faith traditions in the world, that has done immeasurable good to societies, and by putting forth a lot of really important ideas about love, peace and justice,” he said. “What’s so tragic about Christian nationalism is the way it has trounced the image of what Christianity is all about, and replaced it with this perverse version of it.”
The film features footage of many pastors and religious leaders in the Christian nationalist movement on stage performing for rapt audiences. By insisting that Trump himself is a kind of televangelist, Partland’s film connects the rise of Trump with the television ministers of the 1980s. But the film’s unspoken conclusion is that the 2024 election season could be a point when the anti-democratic, anti-immigrant, pro-gun Christian nationalist movement will get the upper hand on the American political system. Fighting that rising wave will, said Partland, take political stamina, but also it will require a long-overdue reassessment of the unique nature of the American experiment.
“We’ve really lost our confidence in what we’re all about,” he said. “In another era, this kind of movement would have sprung out and we would have cried out, ‘That’s not what we’re about as Americans. That’s not who we are!’ But we’ve gotten to the point where too many people feel it’s hokey to say something like that. We need to find that place where we can be proud of our country again.”
“God & Country” will be screened Thursday, Feb. 15, at 7 p.m. at Santa Cruz Cinema, followed by a Q&A with filmmaker Dan Partland, moderated by Wallace Baine.
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