On Sept. 1, 2017, religious leaders pray with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington after he signed a proclamation for a National Day of Prayer to occur on Sunday, Sept. 3, 2017. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

In the early stages of the coronavirus pandemic, Donald Trump, relying on the successful rhetoric of his 2016 campaign and his ensuing presidency, shifted attention away from any narrative that would portray him as not winning. As the spreading virus betrayed his lack of preparedness, he deflected blame onto non-Americans, be they the Chinese or the president from whom he tried to deprive citizenship, Barack Obama. He excepted the English-speaking countries Great Britain and Ireland from his initial travel ban because they have "great borders," until he had to face the fact that the virus doesn't share his respect for boundaries.

When called out by the media on his slow response to a pandemic that he at first minimized as if it were nothing more than a bad cold, Trump condemned reporters as "bad," and blessed reporters from conservative media who fed him opportunities to brag and gloat.

As many Americans unhealthily buried their heads in their hands in disgust and despair at Trump's misinformed, propagandistic press briefings, nearly half of all Americans still trusted in him, even as he spouted obvious misinformation. Not a few self-professed religionist Trump supporters stood firm in their belief that this louche, unreligious TV star descended on a golden escalator to return American to a utopia when everyone was white, women served their husbands, and the Bible dictated morality and political decisions.

For them, returning America to greatness meant asserting "Christianity" and "Christian values" as the guiding principles of American life, rescuing them from the continual assault of modernity. Because Trump had championed policies valued by those who clothed their preferences in religious piety, he earned undying support, regardless of his well-known adulteries and malfeasance.

One of the key points in Andrew L. Whitehead and Samuel L. Perry's Taking America Back for God: Christian Nationalism in the United States is that the ideological framework of Trump's base, Christian nationalism, bears little resemblance to Christianity. Christian nationalism, argue the authors, works in a decidedly un-Christ-like manner by supporting policies that marginalize those who, through their beliefs or identity, don't conform to a biblically ordained order that reverences the traditional family, militarism, closed borders, and white, Protestant supremacy.

For the Christian nationalists, keeping refugees on the other side of a wall takes precedence over caring, feeding and seeking social justice for migrants, acts of love that many would associate with Christianity. Indeed, argue the authors, Christian nationalism is a "hollow and deceptive philosophy that depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world, rather than on Christ."

The key deceit of Christian nationalism is that it is about religion. Though a seeming religious passion underlies its claims, Whitehead and Perry argue that Christian nationalism merely uses the Bible to impose its conservative political agenda. By asserting that they are true followers of Christ in a country that is founded on Christian principles, adherents of Christian nationalism can brand their political opponents as both ungodly and un-American.

By playing the role of an oppressed minority, Christian nationalism adds moral strength to its position while hiding the truth that its ideology is aging out and driving young people away through its intolerance.