It’s Not Enough to be Against Christian Nationalism
by Jacob Bennett
My childhood faith made me fear my own country - and my family.
Christian nationalism has understandably dominated analysis of religion in the United States for several years now. But even in traditions that have historically resisted Christian nationalism, trauma surrounding faith and national identity can still take root.
That was my experience growing up as a Seventh-day Adventist, anyway. As a kid, I lived primarily with my mom while visiting my dad and my half-brothers every other weekend. (My parents were never married.) At six years old, I was baptized into the Seventh-day Adventist Church when my mom’s side of the family joined. My dad was more of a mainstream Protestant Christian, and although he thought it was odd that we stopped eating pork and started attending church on Saturdays all of a sudden, he was largely respectful of this change.
Adventism is known for its preoccupation with the End Times, frequently hosting “prophecy seminars” surrounding the biblical books of Daniel and Revelation. That’s how my family found the church. Despite some common roots, Adventist eschatology has taken a largely independent trajectory from the End-Times Narratives you’ll hear in mainstream Protestantism and evangelicalism. For Adventists, the End Times aren’t about returning the United States of America to an earlier, holier time, as it is for Christian nationalists. Indeed, that rhetoric of a national returning to God is understood within Adventism to be the very vehicle by which the “Mark of the Beast” will arrive.
In her magnum opus, The Great Controversy, founding prophet Ellen G. White wrote that the U.S. government would soon fall under Protestant and Catholic influence and mandate that all American citizens must attend church on Sunday. Any Adventist or ex-Adventist will instantly recognize this as the “Sunday Law,” obedience to which will constitute the Mark of the Beast in the End Times. Those who resist the Mark of the Beast — Seventh-day Adventists, in particular — will be violently persecuted.
Adventists consider Sunday the false sabbath, with Saturday being the true sabbath, sacralized and commanded to be observed every week by God. While Adventists often share with other Christians a sadness for an increasingly secular culture, they rarely join calls to enforce Christian values by law and have a longtime dedication to the separation of church and state (with some culture-war exceptions, like abortion or LGBTQ+ issues). This expectation of eschatological religious persecution has motivated many U.S. Adventists to stick up for the rights of other minority faiths and resist joining Christian nationalist demands and visions of the country.
Yet it also instilled within Adventism a persecution complex, an expectation of eschatological government persecution that has consistently failed to materialize. That’s not to say Adventists haven’t faced persecution; they have, especially abroad. But they have experienced less persecution than other sectarian movements like Jehovah’s Witnesses and Latter-day Saints and have grown increasingly comfortable cooperating with governments over the last century.
Adventism’s dedication to this End-Times Narrative brought an enormous amount of fear and confusion to my childhood. Unlike Jehovah’s Witnesses, who reject identification with the nation-state, it is not uncommon for Seventh-day Adventists to serve in the military or espouse patriotic views, which led me to question why we would be institutionally okay with serving the very government that may be hunting us down tomorrow.
Verses like Matthew 24:18 were interpreted as an instruction for what to do when compulsory Sunday church attendance becomes law: “Let no one in the field go back to get their cloak” (NIV). If we’re supposed to turn and run and leave everything behind, I wondered, what if this law was passed while I was at school? Would my parents come and get me first, or would I have to fend for myself?
The threat of having my whole way of life upended felt viscerally real to my young mind. Mental images of myself or my family being chased and tortured by the bad guys were frequent. Most damaging of all was the teaching that not only the government but also our fellow citizens, Christians, and family members would eventually hunt us down — to kill us.
Adventism teaches that once the Latter Rain of the Holy Spirit has been poured out upon the whole planet, God will then reign plague upon those who still insist on adherence to the false Sunday sabbath. Those “Sunday-keepers” in turn will blame the “Saturday-keepers” for the plagues, arguing that by observing Saturday instead of Sunday like everyone else that they are the ones provoking God’s wrath. Ending these plagues will thus require outright extermination of Seventh-day Adventists, turning friends and family against each other along religious dividing lines. This is thought to be a fulfillment of Matthew 10:21: “Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child; children will rebel against their parents and have them put to death” (NIV).
To those unfamiliar with Adventism, this particular vision of the End Times may sound convoluted or silly. But to a child, it can be overwhelming. When I would go to visit my dad for the weekend, I remember thinking: “What if the Sunday Law is passed this weekend? Will my dad and brothers try to kill me?”
My family’s eschatological fervor only grew over time. Every major world event, it seemed, was taken at one point or another as a step toward the Sunday Law. All the other Christian denominations were deceived, you see; we had the truth.
Leaving my childhood home in adulthood meant greater access to information about the world around me and less pressure to conform to this so-called “truth.” I had known that Blue Laws mandating rest or forbidding business on Sunday were around in Ellen G. White’s day. What I didn’t know is that laws compelling Sunday church attendance also had a long history in the United States — centuries before White wrote The Great Controversy.
Even more surprising: The initial 1858 publication of The Great Controversy made no mention of a Sunday Law. It was only in the 1880s — when compulsory Sunday church attendance was actually being debated in the U.S. Congress — that White revised her earlier work to include a “National Sunday Law” in her prophetic writings.
The evidence doesn’t suggest that we are all soon to face a Sunday Law, or that the End of the World™ revolves around a choice between Saturday and Sunday as a day of worship. It suggests that compulsory Sunday church attendance was part of the cultural milieu of White’s time, and her writings and apparent visions simply reflect this.
Nor do White’s interpretations of scripture fit with historians’ understanding of their original contexts. The book of Revelation is not about the United States of America; it’s about the Roman Empire, with the “Mark of the Beast” drawing a metaphorical boundary between the early Jesus movement and the rest of society. The historical Jesus likely thought the end of the world was coming within his own time, and the notion that quotes attributed to him in the gospels were actually spoken by him is questionable at best.
Being granted access to that information as a kid would have answered a lot of questions and eased my mind about my relationship to my dad’s side of the family, my relationship with God, and my relationship with my country.
I say none of this to demonize Adventism. Far from it. The Seventh-day Adventist Church has made genuine contributions to the United States and the world, particularly through its advocacy for religious liberty and its opposition to slavery — even if its own record in these areas hasn’t been flawless. Nor do I find “cult” to be a helpful term in discussions of a religious group’s beliefs and practices (although it is often a cathartic one).
Nevertheless, Adventist eschatology offers lessons in what not to do. Advocates for religious equality should recognize that it’s not enough to be against Christian nationalism; anti-Christian nationalist ideologies can still undermine mental health and community cohesion. In my case, such an ideology led me to look at every single human being outside my immediate Adventist bubble — even my own father and brothers — with severe distrust, an impact that took years to recognize, let alone unpack.
Perhaps the problem isn’t how such doctrines were taught; perhaps it isn’t about which eschatology is correct. The experiences of those raised in eschatological belief systems, combined with insights from historical scholarship, call into question the theological utility of End-Times Narratives. As expectations of the “last days” grow more and more unfounded even as they continue to cause harm, believers should strongly reconsider whether there is a right way to do apocalypticism at all.
About the Guest Author:
Jacob K. H. Bennett is a graduate student at the University of Texas at Austin and a research fellow with the Center for Mind and Culture’s Lawson Interviews of Seventh-day Adventists project. He was the academic chair for the inaugural Religious Trauma Symposium held at Harvard Divinity School in April of 2026.
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The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in guest blog posts are those of the individual authors and do not necessarily reflect the positions of the Religious Trauma Network. We recognize that each person’s healing journey is unique, personal, and courageous. The stories shared here belong solely to the contributors, and their experiences, perspectives, and advice may not apply to everyone. We encourage readers to honor their own paths and seek professional support as needed.