If you'd like to support this work through a channel membership, here's the link! https://www.youtube.com/@culturefaithandpolitics/join Mark Ramm's Substack: https://theramm.substack.com/ Mark's article about Pete hegseth: https://theramm.substack.com/p/the-pentagon-confirmed-hegseth-admires My Substack page: https://culturefaithandpolitics.substack.com/ My books are available on Amazon: "A Christian Case Against Donald Trump" (2024): https://a.co/d/iVSTqny "MAGA Seduction: Resisting the Debasement of the Christian Conscience" (2020): https://a.co/d/1KNX3uQ What if Pete Hegseth’s rhetoric isn’t new at all? In this episode, I sit down with writer Mark Ramm of Transparency Cascade Press to trace the historic roots of Pete Hegseth’s theology of violence — and how it connects to Christian nationalism, hardline masculinity, and a centuries-old debate inside American Christianity. We follow the thread from Doug Wilson and the “Sin of Empathy” teaching… back through R.J. Rushdoony… and even further to Confederate theologian Robert Lewis Dabney. Is there a direct line from antebellum pro-slavery theology to modern Christian nationalist ideology? And how did those ideas make their way into today’s conversations about ICE, masculinity, authority, and the U.S. military? This is not a partisan conversation. It’s a theological one. We explore: • Pete Hegseth’s speech to military leaders • The doctrine of “inflicting pain” as moral authority • The debate over empathy in Christian teaching • Romans 13 and submission to authority • The long conflict between liberation theology and hierarchy theology • How churches have wrestled with power for over 200 years This discussion is for: – Christians wrestling with Christian nationalism – Evangelicals questioning authoritarian theology – Justice-minded believers and skeptics alike – Anyone concerned about the fusion of faith and political power American Christianity has faced this crossroads before — during slavery, Reconstruction, and the Civil Rights Movement. The question is not new. But the stakes are very real. Is this the way of Jesus? Or the defense of Christendom?