Academics have warned that faith is being used to “legitimise political exclusion” and an “anti-immigration” worldview.
The group, including faith leaders, professors and political figures, met at the Bloomsbury Theatre as part of University College London’s Disagreeing Well Campaign.
Dr Katie Gaddini, Associate Professor in Sociology at UCL, said that Christian women in the US have become an increasingly crucial part of Trump’s MAGA movement.
“Being a Christian means being a Trump supporter,” she noted, adding that the lines between political and religious belief are blurred.
“‘That's how fused the categories were within the Christian communities that I grew up in… we're at the point, where departing from not only conservatism, but a MAGA-informed conservatism, automatically puts you on the outside within your Christian community.”
Gaddini warned of a “danger” in this fusion of ideas misconstruing what faith is about.
Rabbi Dr Jonathan Romain, who is part of a rabbinic panel overseeing conversions to Judaism in the UK, said that he has seen a rise in so-called Christian Nationalism across British politics in recent years. However, he urged the panel not to dismiss people who are drawn into the movement, but to engage with their interest in political issues.
“It might be the case that Christianity is being used to bless a form of politics that is xenophobic, anti-immigrants,” he said. “But, it's not good enough just to say, ‘No, don't dispute them stones’. Understand the grievance and redirect them.”
UCL President and Provost Dr Michael Spence closed the discussion by noting that both religious institutions and schools of thought, as well as politics, are guided by flawed people.
He emphasised that it’s important to “admit that we might be wrong.”
“We don't do that very well at universities," he admitted. "The deep importance of admitting that you don't have a monopoly on truth.”