The Trumpian new right: from traditionalism to Jesus slop
Reject tradition, embrace postmodernity
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That includes this one, which is a longish essay about Donald Trump, JD Vance, the so-called trad Cath movement, and the new right’s bizarre relationship to “tradition.” Enjoy.
There’s a viral clip of Russell Brand that’s recently been making the rounds on social media. If you haven’t seen it, Brand — who is facing multiple charges of sexual assault — was asked by Piers Morgan about a Bible he seems to have brought with him to the set. Suggesting it’s a Bible he’s also been bringing with him as a talisman to court, Brand then spends a full 90 seconds trying and failing to locate the “relevant passages” he’s been consulting amidst his legal troubles. It’s pretty hilarious, and I think most people who saw the clip will have drawn the obvious conclusion that the reason Brand couldn’t find the passage was because his newfound Christian identity (he converted and was “reborn” about two years ago) is totally fake. So fake, it seems, that he hasn’t even bothered to do the reading.
We’ve seen versions of this all over the place, and they’re not always conservatively-coded (remember Kevin Spacey coming out as gay the moment he was accused of sexual misconduct?). But religious conversions have occupied a particularly special place on the right during the Trump era, and conversions to Catholicism especially. Why Catholicism specifically? There’s probably no single answer here, but it’s likely some combination of the following.
First, Protestants are more numerous in America than Catholics, and among right wing Christians the proportion is probably even more lopsided. So there’s a whiff of hipsterism about people who suddenly come out as trad Catholics in that they get to feel like they’re part of a special niche that is smaller and has consequently greater cultural cache. Catholicism also lends itself to the kinds of intricate theological and doctrinal debates that allow recent converts to become nerds about it if they want to.
