Pete Hegseth’s Minister Says That the Union War Effort Was a Campaign Against God Part 2

Earlier this week I posted an article on Rev. Doug Wilson. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is a member of Doug Wilson’s religious movement, the  Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches (CREC). Hegseth has given Wilson quite a bit of publicity over the last six months, turning this church leader from Moscow, Idaho into a spokesman for the emergent Christian Nationalism movement.

Douglas Wilson and his disciple Steve Wilkins authored a book on the Civil War and the Emancipation of African Americans called On Southern Slavery As It Was in 1995. Today I want to bring to you more excerpts from the book along with my commentary.

In Part 1, Wilson gave his explanation for why he was writing a defense of slavery and the Confederacy. Today, we will explore his analysis of why many people in the North adopted Abolition and tried to end slavery. The main cause, according to Wilson, was their turning away from Christianity. He calls this a “cultural apostacy,” the term he uses for the mass widespread turning against slavery by people in the North. Wilson writes:

“[W]e are backing into an informed discussion of the War Between the States. You have been told many times that the war was over slavery, but in reality it was over the biblical meaning of constitutional government. The inflammatory issue is slavery, however, and so the real issue is obscured in the minds of many. But is this not curious? The reason why many Christians will be tempted to dismiss the arguments presented in this booklet is that we will say (out loud) that a godly man could have been a slave owner.” [p. 11]

Wilson says:

“In the early nineteenth century, the intellectual leadership of the North apostatized from their previous cultural commitment to the Christian faith. The watershed event in this regard was the capture of Harvard by the Unitarians in 1805. This cultural apostasy was not nearly as advanced in the South, although there were some signs of it. By the time of the War, the intellectual leadership of the South was conservative, orthodox, and Christian. In contrast, the leadership of the North was radical and Unitarian. This is not to say there were no Christians in the North, or that no believers fought for the North. It is simply the recognition that the drums of war were being beaten by the abolitionists, who were in turn driven by a zealous hatred of the Word of God.” [p. 12-13]

When modern Southern Christians condemn their ancestors for holding slaves, they say that slavery is UnChristian.  This is unfair says Wilcox because slavery is part of the essence of Christianity, and, he says, that is explicitly said in the Bible. Wilson writes:

In other words, more people will struggle with what we are saying at the point where the Bible speaks most clearly. There is no exegetical vagueness here. Not only is the Bible not politically correct, it was not politically correct one hundred thirty years ago.

This points to the need for Christians to learn the biblical way of avoiding “problem texts.” This is the way of a priori submission. Christians must recognize that they are under the authority of God, and they may not develop their ideas of what is “right” and “fair” apart from the Word of God. And when the Bible is our only standard of right and wrong, problem texts disappear. This entire issue of slavery is a wonderful issue upon which to practice. Our humanistic and democratic culture regards slavery in itself as a monstrous evil, and it acts as though this were self-evidently true. The Bible permits Christians to own slaves, provided they are treated well. You are a Christian. Whom do you believe? [p. 13]

In other words, do you believe woke anti-slavery propagandists or do you believe the Bible?

Next, Wilson provides “a brief overview” of the moral and intellectual crisis that faced the nation in the 1850s and 1860s. According to the author, Northern society was captured by Unitarians. The Unitarians were against Christianity and were dedicated to anti-slavery. Now Unitarianism was not a majority denomination in the North. Roman Catholics, Presbyterians, Baptists, and Congregationalists all outnumbered the Unitarians and the only to Unitarian presidents were John Adams and John Quincy Adams.

Wilson compares the heightened Christianity of the Confederates to the Union forces arrayed against Christ:

“As an aside, it is interesting to note the revival that took place in the Confederate army during the War. It was so widespread that it has been estimated that (with the possible exception of Cromwell’s army) the Confederate Army was the largest body of evangelicals under arms in the history of the world.”[p. 13]

Wilson answers the obvious question. If slavery was Biblically authorized and the Confederacy was made up of righteous Christians, then how did the North win?

“This of course raises the obvious question—if the South was so “right” and “Christian” as all that, then why did she lose the War? Didn’t God know how right the South was?

We must reject the childish mentality which seeks to engage in mindless partisanship at the expense of truth. All attempts to say that the North represented nothing good, and that the South contained nothing sinful are examples of this kind of infantilism. R.L. Dabney, a godly man who fought for the South, made the point that the South lost the war because she was under the judgment of God. When northern Israel led the way in rebellion against God, the conservatism of southern Judah did not avoid final apostasy, but simply traveled that path more slowly than Israel to the north. Ina similar way, the South had not been entirely free from the various currents of unbelief. Although the South stood for much that was admirable, the biblical principle remains—to whom much is given, much is required. And although the South was correct about the central issues of that War, southern diehards must learn the hard lesson of Habbakuk, who had to accept that God can use an ungodly nation to judge another nation which is “not as bad” (Hab. 1:13).” [p. 13]

In the next installment, we will look at some of the evidence Wilson provides in support of his argument.

Note: My wife is on the board of the Brooklyn Universalist Unitarian Congregation.

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