“The answer to hate,” said Charlie Kirk’s widow, Erika, at what appeared to be a Republican state funeral, “is not hate.” What a shame, then, then she wasn’t able to convince her late husband whose entire world revolved around fear and loathing before his shocking murder in Utah. Still, we have to start from somewhere and I suppose Mrs Kirk’s remarks came from a good place when other contributions certainly didn’t.
Some speakers at the event blamed the Democrats for Kirk’s killing including, inevitably, President Donald Trump who said: “That’s where I disagreed with Charlie, I hate my opponents, and I don’t want the best for them.” How the sell out crowd laughed and cheered – yes, they really did laugh and cheer – before Trump added: “I’m sorry. I’m sorry Erika,” adding that Kirk “is angry at me for saying that.” No, Donald. Charlie Kirk is not angry with you or anyone because – and I am surprised you aren’t aware of this – Kirk is dead. That’s why you are at his memorial service. More disturbingly, what this memorial service was really about was Christian Nationalism, far right conservative Christian ‘values’, strongly opposed to LGBT rights, including equal marriage, abortion rights, assisted dying and religious pluralism.
As I was growing up, I remember being told that the God I don’t believe in stood for love. These days, we are now told by the religious right, that actually God is the seriously unpleasant person he certainly was in the Old Testament, a vengeful and permanently angry God who is intolerant and violent. The conservative (and maybe Conservative) God is not someone I would want anything to do with thank you very much. But as well as being big in America, this version of God is gaining traction here in England.
At Stephen Yaxley-Lennon’s recent United the Kingdom rally, God was very much in evidence and indeed a flag promoting humanism was ripped to pieces by a bunch of people wearing New Zealand Māori outfits and face paint. To the conservative right, including the fascist right, God is very big. As a humanist who strongly believes that secularism is the only answer to extreme form of religion, it is odd that I find my lack of faith to be under threat. But if what has happened in America happens here, as it is beginning to happen with the likes of Yaxley-Lennon, who calls himself Tommy Robinson, Christian Nationalism is clearly a threat to our way of life and the stability of our country.
Ironically, the murder of Charlie Kirk may well build more support for Christian Nationalism than anything the man did himself, as he spread hatred and intolerance around America. Donald Trump said: “Charlie would have been so proud to hear people today giving glory to god. We need to bring back religion to America, we want to bring God back into our beautiful USA like never before.” Not, I would suggest, the ugly version of Christianity promoted by the far right, that’s for sure. But what we may be seeing is the Christian fundamentalist version of extreme Islam and all the hatred, intolerance that comes with it.
I still believe that people should have the right to worship the God of their choice within a secular country, as well as the right to not believe in any of the available Gods if they so choose. The Christian Nationalist God exists (except that he doesn’t exist) for the benefit of straight white men. Everyone is second class, especially women. That doesn’t sound much like Kirk’s widow’s assertion that “the answer to hate is not hate.” Hate is exactly what this extreme version of religion has in its heart.
God is not great and every day in every way, so many of his followers simply keep proving it.
