Eternal Hostility: The Struggle Between Theocracy and Democracy.

by Frederick Clarkson (Monroe, ME: Common Courage Press 1997): 288 pp.; $15.95 paper.

Of all the books which have been written on the religious right, Frederick Clarkson has authored the best. Eternal Hostility is authoritative yet readable and covers the variety of farright groups as no work has ever done.

A veteran researcher and analyst, Clarkson goes toe to toe with right-wing propagandists. For example, in the opening chapter, "The Born-Again Struggle," he exposes charges of "Christian bashing" by the far right as simply a clever effort by its leaders to "define the terms of the debate" so as to avoid criticism of their extremism. Bigotry, he asserts, is not criticism of an opponent but the refusal to uphold the "values of democracy which respect and define the right of difference."

One of the main virtues of this book is that it neither overestimates nor underestimates the threat of the far right. Clarkson writes, "The Christian Right does not have the numbers to carry elections without the help of moderate Republicans," which is why it has infiltrated the Republican Party during caucuses at the precinct and other levels. He reminds readers that Democrats and Independents in many states "have the legal opportunity to vote in GOP primaries and could help to defeat the Christian Right candidates before they reach the general elections."

Clarkson also notes there is division within the ranks of the far right among those who find it difficult to understand why "unbelievers, Jews, Mormons, and Muslims" are included in the Christian Coalition. Hence, they do not believe that the coalition is Christian. In actuality, the group admits anyone who will accept leader Pat Robertson's control, because the goal is power rather than purity.

Clarkson also discusses briefly other major political players, such as James Dobson, who has tax-exempt status for his organization, Focus on the Family, despite its "35 state level think tanks and lobbying units located in or near state capitals." He adds that "Dobson has been quietly building a political empire for a decade."

Clarkson deals in depth with the hardcore Christian Reconstructionists and their influence on Robertson and the Pentecostal and Charismatic churches. Reconstructionists, who seek to infuse the strict features of Mosaic law into U.S. law, are a major influence in the armed militia movement and in the effort to abolish public schools. They are also influential in the Christian home school movement, one of whose major curricula is produced by a Reconstructionist.

A significant chapter on the Reverend Sun Myong Moon ties his religious sect to various Christian right leaders and labels it "mainstream fascism." Moon's Washington Times newspaper influences politics despite the fact that it is a Korean entity and is not registered, as it should be, under the Foreign Agents Registration Act, which was passed in the 1930s.

Clarkson warns that there is an emphasis by the Christian right not only on religious and cultural war but on preparation for violence, noting:

The whipping up of fear and

hatred of people because of their

religious, sexual, or political orientation 

remains the stock-in-trade

of many elements of the Christian

Right. This powerful mix of belief

in supernatural evil, and ascribing

such evil in the form of demons 

to those with whom they disagree,

almost inevitably leads to

the kind of violence predicted by

Robertson.

(Robertson wrote in 1992 that "he expected `physically bloody' confrontations in the efforts of `Christians' to win political power." Clarkson cites the Army of God manual, "the underground handbook of anti-abortion violence," as a good example.

In his chapter, "Bombings, Assassinations, and Theocratic Revolution," Clarkson links anti-abortion vigilantes to Reconstructionism and the militia movement. He cites numerous violent actions against clinics and medical personnel, as well as the murders of gays. In 1990, he says, the Christian right opposed the Hate Crimes Statistics Act, which requires the federal government to collect statistics on crimes motivated by prejudice based upon race, ethnicity, religion, or sexual orientation. Right-wing Christians objected to the "inclusion of sexual orientation as a category."

Clarkson is also one of the few writers who discusses the superficiality and misleading rhetoric of Stephen Carter's book, The Culture of Disbelief. Under the subhead, "Stop Religious Warfare Before It Starts," Clarkson says:

The religious bigotry and overt

Christian Nationalism that is integral

to the cultural and political

agenda of Promise Keepers and

the wider Christian Right is one

of its least noticed features. However,

it is the crucial seed of the

growing theocratic political movement

in the U.S. and the tap root

of the religious warfare spreading

from this movement, which is still

in its early stages.

Eternal Hostility should be in every public library and read by all who are concerned with preserving church state separation and a government of law rather than violence.

John M. Swomley is a regular contributor to The Humanist.