'Christ is King' under siege: Evangelicals warn phrase is being weaponized by hate groups
Leaders of a prominent research institute focused on identifying and predicting trends in misinformation said evangelical leaders are united in reclaiming the phrase "Christ is King" from far-right and far-left entities seeking to twist its meaning.
The Network Contagion Research Institute (NCRI) at Rutgers, which recently published studies showing how DEI training can fuel hostility and how political assassinations are gaining support online, was early in scientifically measuring the trend of online extremists hijacking the phrase, "Christ is King."
"We were looking at a lot of different kinds of heated languages and arguments and this sort of look online for threat-actors in general," the authors of a new March report told Fox News Digital.
"We noted that prevalence of the use of the term and a mismatch of the actors that were using it, that just didn't make any sense. And we want to understand, like, what is the origin of this? Where did it come from?"
Actors like Nick Fuentes, a far-right Holocaust denier and podcaster, were co-opting "Christ the King" to unify behind what they considered their righteous political mission, authors of the report said.
The institute said "Christ the King" resurged with Pope Pius XI's 1925 institution of The Feast of Christ the King in response to nationalist and Communist ideologies undermining Christianity's role in the West.
Instead of being the "spiritual guide," the phrase has been co-opted by both human and "bot" actors to rally behind ideals counter to Judeo-Christianity.
"What was really fascinating is that the NCRI folks were in real-time tracking the bot activity," said Rev. Johnnie Moore, a former commissioner for the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom.
"The question was how much of this vicious, virulent antisemitism that emerged when we published the report were these bot-nets – It was north of 30% of all the activity … were these antisemitic bot-networks latching onto [Christ is King.]"
Canadian psychologist-commentator Dr. Jordan Peterson, who co-authored the report, said after the study was released in March, "the narcissists, hedonists and psychopaths occupy the fringes wherever they obtain power."
"[A]nd using God's name, attempt to subvert the power of the divine to their own devices. A warning – not everyone who says "Lord, Lord," will enter the Kingdom of Heaven."
The report found evidence of mass "manipulation tactics" and, beginning in 2021, more than 50% of engagements were driven by "extremist influencers" like Fuentes and kickboxer-turned-commentator Andrew Tate.
Moore noted Thursday that in addition to NCRI's findings, evidence also surfaced after antisemitic protests exploded in New York and Los Angeles that there were reported social engagement connections to the Chinese Communist Party.
"It's quite clear that people are trying to steal this phrase from us, and we're saying no, it's a Christian phrase," Moore said. "You sure as anything can't use it to spread hate against Jews."
Moore, who had just left the White House's Easter Dinner, where he said the administration also welcomed religion back to the sociopolitical fore, added that no matter how hard fringe elements try to co-opt Judeo-Christian slogans, the bloc is a force to be reckoned with.
He added that those on the far-right who believe their antisemitic tenets with a Christian-like righteousness often forget "there's no Christianity without Judaism."
"They're losing their battle to Christianize antisemitism, because there's just a sheer amount of Evangelicals in every country… we're all pro-Israel.
Evangelical leader Robert Stearns said that Christians must not let "extremists hijack what belongs to God – 'Christ is King' is a cry of worship, not war."
Meanwhile, Princeton jurisprudence professor Robby George told Fox News Digital that when you hear the phrase as a Christian, the proper response is, "Amen."
"But if you hear someone say the same words as an antisemitic taunt, the correct reply is, 'I stand with our Jewish brothers and sisters.' Don't be played," the Catholic influencer said.
"What will happen at Easter is there will be countless millions of Christians all around the world that will be saying these words, and they only mean one thing, and it will drown out all of these people trying to steal our words to spread their hate," Moore added.
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