The Nazi Experiment Vol. 12: Positive Christianity as the "Christian Nationalism" of the Third Reich

The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Ep. 196 Today in America, we face a confusing "Christian Nationalist" (https://newdiscourses.com/2023/04/two-wolves-of-christian-nationalism/) movement that is reaching into many legitimate complaints and anxieties of American Christians and turning them to its project. While the term can mean many things, at least some of the meanings of "Christian Nationalism" are undeniably a kind of political movement (https://newdiscourses.com/2024/12/the-hoax-that-broke-the-conservative-internet/) posing as a theological movement. In fact, the most movement-ish strains (https://newdiscourses.com/2023/08/wtf-is-christian-nationalism/) of that line of thinking are precisely that. Something like this has happened before. When Hitler and his National Socialists were establishing the Third Reich, they had a huge cultural problem to overcome: nearly all Germans were Christians, not National Socialists. Their solution was an ambiguous term called "Positive Christianity" that increasingly got used as a bridge faith to turn believing German Christians into Nazis. In this episode of the New Discourses Podcast, host James Lindsay continues his Nazi Experiment series (https://newdiscourses.com/?s=nazi+experimentto) explore the justifications for Nazi "Positive Christianity," revealing concerning echoes from the past. Join him to hear about the Third Reich's unique "Christian Nationalism" movement in their own words. Latest from New Discourses Press! The Queering of the American Child: https://queeringbook.com/ Support New Discourses: https://newdiscourses.com/support Follow New Discourses on other platforms: https://newdiscourses.com/subscribe Follow James Lindsay: https://linktr.ee/conceptualjames © 2026 New Discourses. All rights reserved. #NewDiscourses #JamesLindsay #Christian